SoTier

One of the stupider posts I've seen on TBD in a while.

Certainly better than Losman. If you're going to end up with a modestly successful QB (Matt Schaub or Tyrod Taylor), better to take him in the third or sixth round than in the first round, especially if you trade up to get him.

You are totally missing my point. I'm not talking about whether schools produce QBs frequently or not, but how much hype -- publicity intended to boost a QB's draft stock -- the QBs from some schools get compared to other schools. Would Darnold be as highly regarded if he played for Miami of Ohio or Wisconsin or Boston College? IMO, I don't think he would be, but as I noted, he was being mentioned as a likely #1 pick as early as 2016.

Some fans understand that it's hard to have success consistently when you have a QB who gives the ball away too often.

Aikman attended UCLA not USC, which was the team I referenced, and USC gets much more hype than UCLA. More to the point, I specifically referenced the hype that's been a hallmark of USC QBs in "recent years, which 1989 certainly is not, and how USC QBs have not lived up to their hype when they got to the NFL. Palmer, Leinart, and Sanchez were all supposed to be "can't miss" prospects, at least according to their fans, but only Palmer had a decent NFL career. The hype surrounding Darnold has been even worse than the hype spewed out for Leinart and Sanchez ... and his flaws -- too many INTs and fumbles and poor mechanics -- are among the most frequent problems of QBs who fail to transition from college to the NFL.

I imagine that Hue Jackson had his fill watching DeShone Kizer regularly throw completions to the other team last season. Since I like the Brownies, I hope they leave Darnold and Allen to the Jests and take Rosen (and his concussions) while leaving Mayfield to the Bills.

I put Darnold just above Allen. If he's there at 12, maybe the Bills take him, but if Roquan Smith was still there, I'd take Smith over him, and maybe use #22 on Jackson. If Jackson's gone, I'd consider Rudolph in the 2nd. These are all red flags for me. I'd only trade up to take Mayfield or maybe Rosen (primarily because of his concussion history). Some of the most notable QB busts in recent years had no problem "being able to suit up on Sundays", but they sure had problems producing completions and TDs for their teams (not always so much for their opponents). I'm thinking of guys like Mark Sanchez, Christian Ponder, Blaine Gabbert, and even EJ Manuel. The link among the recent USC QB's is the USC hype machine. Darnold has been hyped since 2016 when his fans tried to paint him as the next Andrew Luck despite his shortcomings which include being turn over prone and having poor mechanics, which might be tolerable faults in a kid taken after the first round but not in a supposed "blue chip" first rounder. Darnold hasn't been able to fix either of those faults since, so why would he be able to fix them in the pros? FTR, since 2003, USC has produced 3 QBs who have been drafted in the first round: Carson Palmer #1 in 2003, Matt Leinart at #10 in 2006, and Mark Sanchez at #5 in 2009. Prior to 2003, USC last produced a first round QB in 1991 when Todd Marinovich went #24th. While Palmer has been successful, he probably hasn't had quite the kind of career that he was expected to have as the #1 pick. Leinart and Sanchez were definitely overhyped busts.

Somebody posted a whiney post about how horrible things were in Buffalo, and I responded by listing some of the reasons that I thought it was likely that poster made the claims that he/she/it did. Those claims had nothing to do with whether an individual worked blue collar, pink collar or white collar, and everything to do with attitude because I have several well educated friends/acquaintances who whine exactly the same way. You can believe the politicians claiming that you don't post-secondary education/training for success if you want, but remember that 99% of those spewing that BS have college degrees or more themselves, and you can bet that they aren't counseling THEIR kids that they don't need to get at least a two year degree. The future belongs to the educated and the skilled whether you like it or not -- and that's been true since the mid-19th century and the rise of the Industrial Revolution, and there's no turning the clock back. It's no longer enough to learn to do a job a certain way because the new technologies and methodologies are changing constantly. The days of working in the same place doing the same thing for the 30 or 40 years of your working life are long gone. The pace of technological innovation is now growing by geometrical proportions, and that pace is only going to increase. It's estimated that in twenty years, most jobs will be in fields/industries that don't even exist today. Feel free to dig in your heels and choose to "go your own way", just don't come around me whining about how bad things are when you get left behind.

Dude, I wrote my research in American history so long ago that you were probably weren't even a sparkle in your parents' eyes at the time but that's neither here nor there. There is nothing particularly "elitist" about getting off your ass and getting a welding certificate or nursing degree rather than perpetually whining about how "there are no jobs in Buffalo" or "there are no jobs in WNY". There are plenty of jobs in and around the city and around WNY, although not so many for the unskilled and poorly educated because a lot of those jobs have been replaced by computer-controlled/assisted technology. That's a fact of modern economic life throughout the country, not just in NYS.

It seems to me that your bitter little rant encompasses the typical blue collar lament wailed by individuals who ... haven't lived in Buffalo for a while or live in one of the backward neighborhoods still stuck in a time-warp because the residents refuse to accept change have never lived in Buffalo and get all their info about what's going on here from their grandfathers and their retired cronies who all live in Florida are under-educated individuals with limited academic credentials and/or no or outdated job skills refuse to help themselves by going back to school to make up for their deficient educations or job skills want to be able to do mindless assembly line jobs that pay well and then retire with comfy pensions like their fathers and grandfathers did are embittered because they think people in administrative, educational, medical, managerial jobs are overpaid and consider only blue collar work to be "real work" are embittered because they don't like technological and social change are embittered old fogeys who think the "good old days" were so much better because white American males didn't have to compete with or "kowtow" to women, gays, Blacks, Jews, Asians, Hispanics, and numerous other "foreigners" like they do today. Buffalo has changed tremendously in the last decade. It's not the same city that it was even in 2005 or 2006. A lot of new people have moved in who aren't weighed down with the baggage of the past, and they're turning the city around ... and a lot of locals who aren't prepared to board the new fast moving train don't like it much. I suspect you and yours are among them.

That they didn't trade up says, again, that the fault was in not picking the right QB; they failed to recognize the qualities that would make him a significantly better pick than Losman. Furthermore, If they had stayed put in 2004, they would have been in a position to take Rodgers the next year (Bledsoe was still their starter so they could have waited). They could have also taken Cutler in 2006 who while not all that great a QB was certainly better than Losman, Edwards, Fitzpatrick, Manuel, and Orton. You ignored my statements that they chose to pass on both Flacco and Wilson when they drafted in those rounds with both QBs still on the board. Trading back for Manuel only mitigates the stupidity of picking a QB in the first round just to placate fans and put butts in the seats, but it doesn't change the fact that the Bills should have passed on a QB in the first round completely in 2013. They could have taken Bridgewater or Carr in 2014 and been much better off. Once again, the Bills picked the wrong guy, and whether they stayed where they were or traded back, it would have made no difference. They lost out on useful QBs in order to grab a bust. That's the real story of the Bills' QB woes.

Well, if your aim is to take a first round qb to placate fans and sell tix, then there's nothing wrong with it. You can't miss. If your aim is to build a winning team, however, it could be a costly mistake. What if neither Cleveland nor the Giants take QBs? Wow, great the Jests get first crack at the QBs, but since they had the sixth pick anyways, how are they all that much better off picking at 3 rather than 6. Indy wasn't taking a QB. The Browns aren't taking two. So, that leaves Denver, which doesn't seem likely to draft a QB with both Keenum and Lynch on the roster. So, the Jest gave up a lot to get the same or slightly better choice than they would have had if they stayed put ... and they don't control their destiny any more at #3 than they would have at #4. They bought into the "4 QBs are going to go in the top 5" hype being spewed by the media mavens and got played by the Colts. That's not even dealing with the bigger issue of picking the right QB in a draft class that simply has a lot of flawed prospects rather than only 1 or 2 outstanding ones.

I thought it looked odd, but drafthistory.com has him as "Leotis" so I thought I had it wrong!

The test gives an indication of whether or not the player can learn an NFL playbook. It's not much of an indicator of whether a particular player can read a defense or recognize a blitz. In case you don't realize or forgot, Fitzpatrick graduated from Harvard (not attended, graduated) which might be rightly called "an anti-football factory". Harvard and the other Ivy League schools don't give athletic scholarships but scholarships for financial need and for merit. I believe that Harvard's endowment is so large that most of its students get free tuition, except, perhaps, for students who parents are multimillionaires, so competition to get in is fierce. This probably wasn't quite the case when Fitzpatrick was admitted, but it has never been easy for non-legacy students to be admitted there. (Non-legacy = students who don't have a sibling, parent, grandparent who is an alumnus.)

Well, actually it did. LOL. In 1983, the Bills had 2 first rounders. They stayed where they were and took Kelly with the second of those picks at #14. The one time they traded up (from the 2nd round back into the first) in 2004, they got the booby prize of JP Losman at #22. In 2013, determined to take a first round QB but not loving EJ Manuel or any of the other duds from that class, they traded back to 16, and Manuel was still there. BTW, the Bills missed out on Aaron Rodgers because they took Losman the year before and didn't have a first rounder in 2005. They also had to take Leotus McKelvin at #11 in 2008 instead of grabbing Joe Flacco, and in 2012, they had to grab TJ Graham while Russell Wilson was still available. The Bills problems at QB over the years hasn't been that they didn't have opportunities to draft franchise QBs because they didn't trade up to get them, but that they repeatedly failed to pick the right player, except once, when they had future franchise QBs available. Hopefully, the Beane/McDemott regime picks the right player, whether they trade up or stay at #12. Getting the right player seems to be a much more effective strategy than simply obtaining any player who plays a specific position of need, no matter how desperate that need.

Including the Bills. That's what you want, though, and that's how smart GMs operate. That's why these kind of trades happen on draft day when the team with the higher pick is on the clock. A team doesn't trade up just to get "a player" (well, maybe if they're the Jests they do), but "the player they want". What's the point of trading up if the guy you want is already gone? Obviously, the Giants want a player that they think Cleveland might want, too. If Cleveland doesn't take him, then they aren't trading. If Cleveland doesn't, they open to a trade -- provided that Cleveland didn't take the player the Bills wanted.

If the Bills draft Josh Allen, I will remain skeptical that he can become a good NFL QB, even as a Bill, until he proves he is one. Sorry, IMO, NFL GMs and scouts put way too much emphasis on size, arm strength, and athleticism when they should be trying to figure out what's between QBs' ears. I'm more impressed by a QB who demonstrates leadership, a will to win (see Brady, Thomas), good decision making, the ability to process what he sees quickly and accurately, and learns from his mistakes than a guy who can throw the ball 70 yards in the air. For physical traits, I want to see a QB who can put the ball where he wants it to go, who has "touch" on the ball so that so that the receiver can catch it, and who has decent mechanics. I'm not sold on Allen because I don't think that he possesses the traits I think are most important.

I think those are good definitions, although, like in almost everything, there are exceptions. I can think of two recent QBs who are exceptions: Andy Dalton in 2011 and Russell Wilson in 2012. Both were good enough to start from the get-go so they definitely weren't "projects" although their draft positions put them there. For Dalton, you really have to wonder how the geniuses that are supposed to be NFL scouts and GMs could have picked Jake Locker, Blaine Gabbert, and Christian Ponder ahead of him. Of course, Wilson's problem was that he's short, less than 6' and maybe not even 5'11", and NFL GMs are notoriously prejudiced against height-impaired QBs. Aside from Brett Favre, Drew Brees, Dalton, Wilson, and Derek Carr (whom I forgot originally) there haven't been too many Day 2 "projects" who've made the grade, although they've been more successful, as a group, than the first round "projects". Garoppolo might be one, but fewer than 10 starts is simply not enough games to judge him. I can't think of any others from rounds 2 or 3 who proved themselves decent starting QBs for multiple seasons. All the other non-first round QBs to succeed in the NFL in the last 20 years were "winning lottery tickets" -- from Brady and Romo to Cousins and Keenum.

How do you know that drafting a first round QB was the Bills' "plan" since last year? Acquiring draft capital is NEVER a bad idea, especially with a new regime that has clear ideas about how to build a winning roster, and many players who didn't fit their requirements. Your claim is nothing but fantasy in your first-round QB obsessed brain. FTR, It couldn't have been a "plan" because Beane wasn't even hired then, and McDermott was too busy with his new responsibilities as HC and the 2017 draft to worry about the 2018 draft. Only QB obsessed fans would believe that teams determine that they're going to draft a first QB in a draft more than a year away when they don't even know who will be available. The Bills traded back because they didn't like any of the players left on the board at #10 in 2017 enough to take them there, including Mahomes and Watson. The Bills traded Watkins because they didn't think they could sign him and wanted to get something for him, and they traded Dareus because he and McDermott didn't seem to work well together as well as the fact that Dareus hadn't been playing well. Furthermore, any draft is unpredictable, and drafts never go the way all these supposed "draft experts" in the media claim it will unless there's an Andrew Luck available. Drafts don't always even go the way teams expect them to, either. Teams trade up and/or reach in every draft. Every competent FO needs to have a contingency plan that includes "what if A is gone?" and "what if B (who was expected to be gone in the top 5) is available at 12?" Should the Bills pass on Barkley if he fell to #12 for Mason Rudolph just because they need a QB? That, sir, is a Tom Donahoe or Marv Levy/Dick Jauron type move.

I totally agree although I don't like to question the FO's moves short term. I love Barkley and think he is a better RB prospect than any of the QBs are QB prospects, but I sure don't want the Bills trading up to get him. I would only want the Bills to trade up for a QB, only into the 5-10 range, and that QB better be named Mayfield or Rosen and not Allen or Darnold.

I think that this question determines the results of the general question about "project QBs who DID reach potential". If you define a "developmental QB" as a QB who was an UDFA or QBs drafted after the first round, then you'll get a lot of examples compared to limiting your definition to "first round QBs who were projects". I think you would have to go back thirty or forty years to find any examples of first round "projects" who were actually successful because there simply aren't any in the last twenty. Pretty much, first round "projects" in the last 20 years have all failed. I also don't think that going to a "small school" = "project". Ben Roethlisberger was not a "project" despite going to Miami of Ohio (not the U!). Neither was Matt Ryan, Joe Flacco or Carson Wentz. All of these QBs were impressive QBs even if they played in lower regarded Div 1 (or even Div II schools in Flacco's case) programs. JP Losman wasn't nearly as impressive at Tulane as Roethlisberger, Ryan, Flacco or Wentz, and Josh Allen wasn't at Wyoming, either.

Six in the top 30? Six in the top 8? Four in the top 5. Somebody thinks 8 in the first round. Really? ROTFLMAO. Only in the hype machines of the Jason LaCanforas and other media mavens and in the wet dreams of Bills fans. IMO, only 4 go in the entire first round (that's 32 picks), probably only 2 or 3 in the top twelve because I don't think the pros really think as highly of these QBs as the media claims they do. I really don't think that even teams desperate for a QB will use a first round pick on Mason Rudolph, although sometimes teams do stupid **** in the draft on owners' orders or to put butts in the seats as witness Tim Tebow, EJ Manuel, and Johnny Manziel all going in the first round. Hopefully, the Bills learned their lesson the last two times out.

IMO, there will be 1 or 2 of the top four QBs available at #12, but whether the Bills like their choice(s) at that point is the big question. If they don't, then I would like them to go BPA. Keep in mind that if 4 QBs go in the top 11, then there will be some blue chippers available at #12, so the Bills can get one of those. In 2011, with 3 QBs gone in the top 10, the Texans scooped up JJ Watt at #11 while the Jags wasted #10 on Blaine Gabbert and the Vikes spent #12 on Christian Ponder. RIP. Where do I send the flowers?

Or maybe some people just aren't as enamored of a turn over prone QB from USC as are the media mavens who keep hyping him as their "hands down #1 pick". That includes me. I don't see what's so special about Darnold. I don't want a QB who "just wins" but one who leads his team to wins. Every time I've watched Mayfield, I'm reminded of watching Russell Wilson at Wisconsin, so he's my pick.

Another day, another too-stupid-to-be-true-but-unfortunately-isn't thread.