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Kevin Blackistone: Looking for QB, Jerry? Try draft's first round
09:25 PM CDT on Tuesday, August 30, 2005
It isn't difficult to understand why Jerry Jones has taken the approach that he has to filling Troy Aikman's cleats. In the new millennium, the Super Bowl winning quarterbacks have been lowly drafted (Tom Brady and Brad Johnson), undrafted (Kurt Warner) and unwanted (Trent Dilfer, who pulled off his magic trick with Baltimore six years after Tampa Bay drafted him in the first round). Any guy can pull off the incredible, it seems.
But with Jones' third baseball-back-to-football quarterback experiment having failed, with what appears to be the demotion of Drew Henson to third string, it will be hard to fathom Jones not employing the more tried-and-true method of finding a championship-caliber quarterback: plucking one in the draft's first round.
That's where Aikman and John Elway, who collectively won five Super Bowls in the '90s, were found. That's where Steve Young, who won it all for the 49ers in 1995, would have come from had he not opted for the USFL. That's just about where Brett Favre, who led the Packers to their '97 Super Bowl victory, was discovered, six picks into the draft's second round by the Falcons.
After all the success Aikman brought to Jones, Jones shouldn't have to be reminded of this, but: Quarterback is far too critical a position in which to look for a shortcut to ultimate success. As Thomas Paine, the original New England patriot, penned way back when: "What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly."
Paine employed those words to spur his fellow colonialists not to bargain with the Crown. But they are good words for all of us to follow in whatever endeavor, especially those among us who wind up fortunate enough to run a sports franchise.
Had Jones heeded those words, Henson probably wouldn't have wound up here. Chad Hutchinson wouldn't have gotten a chance. And Quincy Carter wouldn't have been baptized by blitz.
What is going on now in the NFL is an exception to the rule, or just an indictment on all the talent gurus in and around the game who are guilty, beyond a shadow of doubt, of underestimating the Patriots' Brady.
But Jones missed on Henson, for whom he spent a third-round pick and $3.5 million guaranteed. Indeed, Jones reiterated the other day that he still envisions the 25-year-old, second-year QB as a first-round pick, a steal, in other words. The only stealing going on here is by Henson, an amiable chap who now has convinced two sports leagues to stuff his pockets with more loot than his talent apparently is worth.
Before Henson, it was Hutchinson on whom Jones missed, way high and wide. To be sure, on Tuesday even the pitiful Bears conceded Hutchinson a bust. They cut him.
And poor Q can't be found in an NFL camp right now.
All of these guys haven't come up short simply because they weren't first-round picks. Being away from the game for a spell didn't help them, and they were derailed from success for reasons out of their control, too.
In Carter's case, he was thrust into his role as a starter too early and then had to suffer through new offensive coordinators and schemes just about every season, plus a new head man to boot. That wasn't easy. Had he been handled well, maybe he'd have been more successful. Still, he managed through it all to make it to the playoffs.
Henson has probably been victimized by Bill Parcells' disdain for inexperienced quarterbacks in the twilight of his coaching career. That bears the question: Why make such an investment in a quarterback such as Henson with such a short-order coach as Parcells running the show?
Hutchinson is the only one with no defense. He's just in over his head in the NFL despite standing 6-5. In his last outing Friday, he completed three of 14 passes for 33 yards, got sacked three times, fumbled (what a shock!) once and had two passes picked off and returned for touchdowns.
No matter how we cut it, though, that's three strikes against Jones' paradigm for finding a quarterback for the future. As a result, it should be out.
That isn't to say that it's easy to find a quarterback with the talent, moxie and smarts to lead a team to the Super Bowl even in the first round. But that's the best way to go. Draft one in the first round with all the guaranteed dollars and negotiating with ego-juiced agents that are part and parcel of the process.
It may not be impossible to find a Super Bowl-caliber quarterback at a garage sale. But it is much more difficult than stumbling across one off the ready-made rack at the big sale in April.
E-mail kblackistone@dallasnews
09:25 PM CDT on Tuesday, August 30, 2005
It isn't difficult to understand why Jerry Jones has taken the approach that he has to filling Troy Aikman's cleats. In the new millennium, the Super Bowl winning quarterbacks have been lowly drafted (Tom Brady and Brad Johnson), undrafted (Kurt Warner) and unwanted (Trent Dilfer, who pulled off his magic trick with Baltimore six years after Tampa Bay drafted him in the first round). Any guy can pull off the incredible, it seems.
But with Jones' third baseball-back-to-football quarterback experiment having failed, with what appears to be the demotion of Drew Henson to third string, it will be hard to fathom Jones not employing the more tried-and-true method of finding a championship-caliber quarterback: plucking one in the draft's first round.
That's where Aikman and John Elway, who collectively won five Super Bowls in the '90s, were found. That's where Steve Young, who won it all for the 49ers in 1995, would have come from had he not opted for the USFL. That's just about where Brett Favre, who led the Packers to their '97 Super Bowl victory, was discovered, six picks into the draft's second round by the Falcons.
After all the success Aikman brought to Jones, Jones shouldn't have to be reminded of this, but: Quarterback is far too critical a position in which to look for a shortcut to ultimate success. As Thomas Paine, the original New England patriot, penned way back when: "What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly."
Paine employed those words to spur his fellow colonialists not to bargain with the Crown. But they are good words for all of us to follow in whatever endeavor, especially those among us who wind up fortunate enough to run a sports franchise.
Had Jones heeded those words, Henson probably wouldn't have wound up here. Chad Hutchinson wouldn't have gotten a chance. And Quincy Carter wouldn't have been baptized by blitz.
What is going on now in the NFL is an exception to the rule, or just an indictment on all the talent gurus in and around the game who are guilty, beyond a shadow of doubt, of underestimating the Patriots' Brady.
But Jones missed on Henson, for whom he spent a third-round pick and $3.5 million guaranteed. Indeed, Jones reiterated the other day that he still envisions the 25-year-old, second-year QB as a first-round pick, a steal, in other words. The only stealing going on here is by Henson, an amiable chap who now has convinced two sports leagues to stuff his pockets with more loot than his talent apparently is worth.
Before Henson, it was Hutchinson on whom Jones missed, way high and wide. To be sure, on Tuesday even the pitiful Bears conceded Hutchinson a bust. They cut him.
And poor Q can't be found in an NFL camp right now.
All of these guys haven't come up short simply because they weren't first-round picks. Being away from the game for a spell didn't help them, and they were derailed from success for reasons out of their control, too.
In Carter's case, he was thrust into his role as a starter too early and then had to suffer through new offensive coordinators and schemes just about every season, plus a new head man to boot. That wasn't easy. Had he been handled well, maybe he'd have been more successful. Still, he managed through it all to make it to the playoffs.
Henson has probably been victimized by Bill Parcells' disdain for inexperienced quarterbacks in the twilight of his coaching career. That bears the question: Why make such an investment in a quarterback such as Henson with such a short-order coach as Parcells running the show?
Hutchinson is the only one with no defense. He's just in over his head in the NFL despite standing 6-5. In his last outing Friday, he completed three of 14 passes for 33 yards, got sacked three times, fumbled (what a shock!) once and had two passes picked off and returned for touchdowns.
No matter how we cut it, though, that's three strikes against Jones' paradigm for finding a quarterback for the future. As a result, it should be out.
That isn't to say that it's easy to find a quarterback with the talent, moxie and smarts to lead a team to the Super Bowl even in the first round. But that's the best way to go. Draft one in the first round with all the guaranteed dollars and negotiating with ego-juiced agents that are part and parcel of the process.
It may not be impossible to find a Super Bowl-caliber quarterback at a garage sale. But it is much more difficult than stumbling across one off the ready-made rack at the big sale in April.
E-mail kblackistone@dallasnews
