James Hardy - Take a look at this

[Thurman#1]

Exactly. He isn't the type of receiver that had to run perfect routes, and learn the intricacies of route-running in college. Other recievers, like Desean Jackson and Eddie Royal, relied on speed and quickness, and hence, the ability to run great routes, which allowed them to contribute immediately at the pro level. Hardy was able to rely on his size and physical assets instead. In the pros, receivers like Hardy typically take 2-3 years to develop. Didn't Eric Moulds suck until his 3rd season?

 

 

People would like to believe that speed / quick guys have to learn to run great routes and big guys don't. It's not true. Pretty much everyone is coached on route-running, starting right from high school. If they aren't doing it already, it's because either their coaches sucked, or they don't have the ability to do it for whatever reason or they weren't willing to change what they were doing, perhaps because they were already having success.

 

Larry Fitzgerald, for instance, is not a quickness guy, he's more like Hardy, but he came out as a superb route-runner.

 

Tall guys, short guys, quick guys, slow guys ... all of them do better when they start to learn route-running, which is basically just being extremely precise with your steps and disguising which way you're cutting by not altering stride in a predictable way before you cut, and also running the route in the same way each time, so the QB can throw before you cut and know you'll be there exactly. This isn't rocket science, and doesn't depend on height, quickness, etc.

 

The tougher part for recievers to master as they go to the pros is going through route trees, reading defenses, knowing how to adjust the route depending on what the defense is doing and what the QB is thinking. That's what generally takes three years to master.

[Thurman#1]

Wrong.

 

This year alone:

 

Collie, Harvin, Maclin, Nicks, Knox, even Crabtree all had more catches than Evans.

 

 

 

No, its exactly right. He said "Rookie WR tend to suck their first year." "Tend," get it?

 

They do. There are a few exceptions every year. Very few.

 

It also helps a lot when you're on a team with an actual offensive line and QB, unlike the Bills last year, who had clever facsimiles. How many of those guys had 82 catches for 1292 yards, which is what Lee Evans did in his third year, back when he had a guy who would actually throw him the ball occasionally. Or even 48 catches for 843 yards, which was what Lee did in his rookie year, again, back when he had a real QB on the team.

[Thurman#1]

Nor should anyone argue that Lee Evans is a stud WR.

 

 

 

And yet outside Buffalo, pretty much all the experts believe that.

[Thurman#1]

The poster's assumption was that "rookie WRs tend to suck their first year". The implication is that Hardy can't be expected to do well at this point because of this assumption.

 

I pointed out that this is not true. Saying the referenced rookies had better QBs isn't a controversial statement, but that's a different topic.

 

 

 

No, you pointed out five guys who all did pretty well, Collie, Harvin, Maclin, Nicks, Knox (527 yards, solid, not great), even Crabtree

 

However, rookie recievers coming into the NFL that year also included: Heyward-Bey, Nicks, Britt, Robiskie, Mohamed Massaquoi, Derrick Williams, Brandon Tate, Mike Wallace, Ramses Barden, Patrick Turner, Deon Butler and Joaquin Iglesias, and those are only in the first three rounds of the draft.

 

Wide recievers DO TEND to suck in their first year

 

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Oh, and to the folks who have put down Lee Evans in this thread, not one of those six guys Mr. WEO mentioned had better rookie stats as a reciever than Mr. Lee Evans.

[Thurman#1]

B-U-S-T.

 

 

Everyone's accusing me. Gabba gabba hey. Gabba gabba hey.

[Thurman#1]

In these highlights, his jumping ability is obvious, his balance is very underrated, and he can do things that most WR's couldn't hope to try.

 

 

And note how much better he gets from the beginning to the end of the video.

 

 

Jumping ability, yup, no question.

 

But one thing I notice is that he rarely got separation. In the NFL, you'd better learn to get separation.