Which NFL player did you think was going to be good but turned out to be a bust?

[Bill from NYC]

22 hours ago, GunnerBill said:

 

Neither of those are busts. They might both have been poor uses of a first round pick, but neither were busts IMO. McKelvin played 9 years in the league, started 72 games, and was a starting level corner (although I agree not worth the pick they spent). Whitner played 11 years, started 152 games and went to two probowls. That isn't a bust. 

 

That is what I mean there HAS to be a way of distinguishing between a guy who was maybe overdrafted, or maybe didn't quite meet expectation, or maybe just wasn't the best player on the board when a team picked and a guy who is a flat out failure in the NFL. Aaron Maybin was a bust. 

You think and often post as a draftnik which is great and even much appreciated. The thing is, selections like McKelvin and Whitner would get you fired in the NFL. Do tell me, what difference does it make if a player is "good" when you are losing football games? 

 

As a GM or head coach trying of course to win football games, the only real goal should be to bring in players who will win you said football games. Between McKelvin and Whitner, how many games did they in fact win for us? Now, think of players such as Josh, Bruce, Kelly and Andre. These players were/are winners.

Again, inept management (Levy/Jauron for instance) said no to drafting great players to draft the likes of Whitner/McKelvin (yes I know that Levy didn't draft McKelvin) and use huge amounts of cap space to do so. 

 

We can dance around with semantics if you choose to do so but in terms of winning football games (the ultimate goal), the above mentioned players were busts, as were most of the players mentioned in this thread.

[GunnerBill]

28 minutes ago, Bill from NYC said:

You think and often post as a draftnik which is great and even much appreciated. The thing is, selections like McKelvin and Whitner would get you fired in the NFL. Do tell me, what difference does it make if a player is "good" when you are losing football games? 

 

As a GM or head coach trying of course to win football games, the only real goal should be to bring in players who will win you said football games. Between McKelvin and Whitner, how many games did they in fact win for us? Now, think of players such as Josh, Bruce, Kelly and Andre. These players were/are winners.

Again, inept management (Levy/Jauron for instance) said no to drafting great players to draft the likes of Whitner/McKelvin (yes I know that Levy didn't draft McKelvin) and use huge amounts of cap space to do so. 

 

We can dance around with semantics if you choose to do so but in terms of winning football games (the ultimate goal), the above mentioned players were busts, as were most of the players mentioned in this thread.

 

Winning football games comes down to more than one thing. When you are losing not everything you do is therefore a failure. Just as when you are winning not everything you are doing is therefore a success. The Bills could have made better picks that McKelvin and Whitner. But that does not make them busts. Otherwise almost every player ever drafted is a bust. 

[gonzo1105]

Byron Leftwich would be the biggest one. Would have gotten me fired for taking him over Carson Palmer. 

[Straight Hucklebuck]

On 4/22/2023 at 10:26 AM, Sestak4ever said:

Trent Richardson. Was unstoppable against good competition in the SEC. I think it was more mental than physical for him. Didn’t have the desire and never wanted to work at his craft.

When I watched him, he had no instincts. 

 

Commentators in Cleveland would talk about how he ran up the backs of his blockers, and you only saw the talent after contact was made and he was twisting and pulling for extra yards. 

[Green Lightning]

On 4/23/2023 at 7:51 PM, MarkyMannn said:

My choice too and it pains me as I'm Polish😕

 

Likewise. I had high hopes for him.

[Playoffs?]

On 4/21/2023 at 10:22 PM, BarleyNY said:

Courtney Brown. I thought he’d be a monster for years. Injuries and playing on a terrible Browns team did him in. 

This for me too.. he was absolutely dominant at Penn State. 

[Gigs]

On 4/21/2023 at 7:04 PM, Goin Breakdown said:

Man this is hard because if they are "sneaky" good then I can't say the word bust because there wasn't a clear "sure thing" label on them. 
 

I did have hopes for Trent edwards but....... you know. And James Hardy. 

I remember going to a kids day against the Bengals with my ex wife, Hardy was so damn sloppy that day. Told her he was going to get cut. Bonehead flash start nailed it for me. 

 

I liked him and thought he'd be pretty good

[Sierra Foothills]

On 4/24/2023 at 3:51 AM, SirAndrew said:

This is where I view it differently. I’d say that not living up to one’s draft selection is the exact definition of bust. 

 

It's that simple? It's binary?

 

There's no grey area? What if the player lives up to one person's expectations but not another's?

 

Was John Fina a bust? Lee Evans? 

 

[BillsfaninSB]

Even though he was a 2nd rounder thought Cody Ford was a great pick.  Many did mock him late in the 1st round. 

[K-9]

Chance Warmack. Several league guys told me he was a can’t miss blue chipper. Hyped him up like he was the next John Hannah, Joe D, or Larry Allen. Never been more wrong about a prospect coming out. Just didn’t have the fire. 

[SirAndrew]

6 hours ago, Sierra Foothills said:

 

It's that simple? It's binary?

 

There's no grey area? What if the player lives up to one person's expectations but not another's?

 

Was John Fina a bust? Lee Evans? 

 

There’s definitely some grey area, because living up to expectations is subjective. I’m just saying that most draft picks can’t be considered busts. No one expects the seventh round pick to be a starter, while people expect top ten picks to change the franchise. This puts more expectations on the first rounder, making him more likely to be considered a bust.
 

I think of our QB situation over the years. I’d easily consider Losman and Manuel as busts, while Trent Edwards wasn’t a bust by my standards. Third round QB’s aren’t expected to be franchise guys. Lastly, would I consider Evans or Fina a bust? No, we got seven good seasons out of Lee Evans, and Fina was average, but as a guy taken lower in the first round, he contributed to this team for a decent amount of time. 

Edited April 26, 2023 by SirAndrew

[LEBills]

Everette Brown, DE, Florida State. He put poor Ed Wang when he was LT at VT on his butt with a sick bull rush and I was sold. Got drafted in the second by Carolina and was trash. Turned out Ed Wang was just awful haha

[BuffaloBillyG]

On 4/21/2023 at 7:00 PM, Magox said:

I got to thinking the other day, which player did I believe was going to be a sneaky good player in the league that was a complete bust?

 

For me I was sure that Andy Isabella was going to be a good WR in this league, and he hasn't done jack squat.

I actually thought Christian Ponder was going to surprise a lot of people.  

[BarleyNY]

I’ll do a reverse example of a player I thought would bust: Deshaun Watson. Didn’t think his game would translate to the NFL, but the NFL changed. 

Edited April 26, 2023 by BarleyNY

[Ridgewaycynic2013]

2 minutes ago, BarleyNY said:

I’ll do a reverse example of a player I thought would bust: Deshaun Watson. Didn’t think his game would translate to the NFL, but the NFL changed. 

Paying off lawsuits? 🤔

[BillMafia716ix]

Sammy Watkins for sure. He was a beast at Clemson. I wasn’t even mad we traded up for him. He was that good.

[JohnBonhamRocks]

As an Irish fan, I thought Brady Quinn was going to be a good NFL QB.

 

Side note, I still wonder how Jeff Samardzija would have fared as a WR in the NFL, even though he made the right choice in going instead to the MLB.

[dave mcbride]

13 hours ago, Playoffs? said:

This for me too.. he was absolutely dominant at Penn State. 

Brown got injured and it ruined his career. He looked amazing beforehand. I think injuries disqualify someone from being a bust if they looked good before the injuries. Steve Emtman was dominant early on, but his injury rendered him a shell of himself. If not for the injuries, both Brown and Emtman would have been excellent players, I believe.

[dave mcbride]

On 4/23/2023 at 7:35 AM, Bill from NYC said:

OK, I'll say it.........Rob Johnson

 

I saw him play once when he was in college, and I caught an NFL game he was in before we traded for him. I was impressed by his size, accuracy, arm strength, and ability to run.  RJ had everything.....except  a head for the game.

 

Even after it was apparent that he would never amount to much (to be kind), I was waiting in the back of my mind for RJ to step up one day and to watch his tremendous skillset take over. Obviously this never happened. 

 

The scouts seemed to know about RJ before we did. Iirc, he was the 1st pick of round 4.  One would think that a QB with his talent would be selected FAR earlier. RJ made me rate QBs in a different way today. Let's see how Anthony Richardson fares in the NFL. He has all the talent in the world but does he have a feel for the game? I know I wouldn't touch him if I were a GM.

In three seasons as a starter on a loaded USC team with Tony Boselli as his LT and a sequence of #1 receivers that included Curtis Conway, Johnny Morton, and Keyshawn Johnson, he never beat ND or UCLA and repeatedly choked in those games. His brother Brett was the number one QB coming out of high school and flamed out at UCLA too (he blamed the program, transferred to Michigan State, and flamed out there too). There was something about RJ: despite the obvious physical talent, he dropped to round 4 for very good reasons. I was never a believer.

 

In his final performance against UCLA in 1994, he was sacked 6 times and turned the ball over three times in a 31-19 loss. And USC was WAY more talented than UCLA that year. The six sacks were a harbinger of things to come. https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1994-11-20-sp-65097-story.html

Edited April 26, 2023 by dave mcbride

[Shortchaz]

1 hour ago, JohnBonhamRocks said:

As an Irish fan, I thought Brady Quinn was going to be a good NFL QB.

 

Side note, I still wonder how Jeff Samardzija would have fared as a WR in the NFL, even though he made the right choice in going instead to the MLB.

Funny, I heard him talk about his nfl experience just the other day. He talked about how the team that drafted him changed coordinators multiple times in his first contract and also lost a lot of talent. I.e. he was set-up for failure or not good enough to overcome those obstacles. 

[JohnBonhamRocks]

51 minutes ago, Shortchaz said:

Funny, I heard him talk about his nfl experience just the other day. He talked about how the team that drafted him changed coordinators multiple times in his first contract and also lost a lot of talent. I.e. he was set-up for failure or not good enough to overcome those obstacles. 

Yeah Cleveland especially at that time was probably not a great place to start his career, although I think he was from near that area so was probably cool for

him. 

[SoMAn]

Mike Jasper I believe is the guy I'm thinking of.  2011 7th round pick of the Bills. If I'm thinking of the right guy, he was a physical freak with incredible speed and agility for a guy that stood 6' 4' and weighed close to 400 lbs. I thought he'd be a monster on the D-line.

 

Just goes to show, having size and/or speed is no guarantee a player will cut it in the NFL.  He never amounted to anything more than camp fodder.

 

Another one I had high hopes for was RB Derrick Holmes, 1995 draft pick I'm pretty sure. Like so many RBs, looked great in Pre-season, but didn't have too much of a career with the Bills. Backup for a bit.

Edited April 26, 2023 by SoMAn

[Paup 1995MVP]

On 4/22/2023 at 12:19 PM, BarleyNY said:

What level you want your first round picks to play at? No. But his career is pretty much what you’d expect from a DE picked later in the first round. 

 

Here’s the other thing about these arguments - players don’t choose where they get drafted. I don’t ding overdrafted players for that. The fault is that of some GM. Clowney has had a long, solid career as a player. That’s not a bust IMO. 

You talk about Clowney like he has been a big time difference maker over his career.  I would not put him in that category.  Like I said earlier, he hasn't sucked.  But he has been just a guy for the most part.  But not every player is going to be a star regardless of where they get drafted.  I have watched a lot of football over the years.  And he really hasn't moved the meter for me.  But we can agree to disagree on our assessment of Clowney.

[BuffaloBill]

On 4/21/2023 at 9:52 PM, BigdaddyinOrlando said:

Brian Bozworth, he was an animal in college, pros he was an ordinary joe

 

 

Yeah, same thing with Tony Manrdarich, nearly everyone thought these guys would be absolute monsters in the NFL.  Guess at some point talent and will > PEDS.   

[BuffaloBill]

On 4/22/2023 at 5:27 AM, DaBillsFanSince1973 said:

karlos williams

 

 

We’re you high on him?

[jethro_tull]

On 4/23/2023 at 6:58 PM, Orlando Tim said:

Good point, lesson learned is not to draft any Mike Williams.

To call him a bust you must have expected him to be top 5 every year. He is top 25 in total receiving yards since joining the league, with two 1100+ yard seasons while being a great down field blocker. 

Woods is hardly a bust but he has bounced around quite a bit (third team in 9 seasons) and isn't a legit no. 1 at this point.  High expectations for sure but he deserved them.   

[DaBillsFanSince1973]

6 minutes ago, BuffaloBill said:

We’re you high on him?

he did smoke if I recall. why he ate so much. serious note though, I thought he was going to be kind of like henry is now, or in his prime. running backs, especially work horses seem to have a shorter career. as for karlos, he really disappointed me as my expectations, yes were high. hard to really judge on such a short nfl tenure but he did have potential.

[Prospector]

Laquon Treadwell, I was convinced he was going to be better than Julio Jones

[jaybills]

On 4/21/2023 at 6:00 PM, Magox said:

I got to thinking the other day, which player did I believe was going to be a sneaky good player in the league that was a complete bust?

 

For me I was sure that Andy Isabella was going to be a good WR in this league, and he hasn't done jack squat.

Trent Richardson

[teef]

i remember thinking corey moore would be great for us.