dmq
If I'm so pretty, why am I available?
- Messages
- 7,372
- Reaction score
- 869
Paul Domowitch | No-Wayne situation
Colts took top-flight WR five picks after FredEx in 2001
by Paul Domowitch
pdomo@aol.com
AS TOM MODRAK watched the Indianapolis Colts annihilate the Denver Broncos last weekend, he thought about Eagles wide receiver Freddie Mitchell.
He thought about him because he still was the Eagles' football operations chief 4 years ago when the club selected Mitchell with the 25th overall pick in the '01 draft. He thought about him because one of the wide receivers he and coach Andy Reid didn't take that day, the University of Miami's Reggie Wayne, made mincemeat of the Broncos' secondary, catching 10 passes for 221 yards and two touchdowns in the Colts' lopsided win.
Looking back on that day now, it's easy to rip the Eagles for taking Mitchell over Wayne, who was the very next wideout grabbed after FredEx, with the 30th pick. Mitchell has caught just 90 passes for 1,263 yards and five touchdowns in his four NFL seasons. Wayne, the No. 2 wideout on the league's most prolific offense, already has 221 catches for 3,109 yards and 23 TDs.
But 4 years ago, the decision wasn't so clear-cut. After Michigan's David Terrell and North Carolina State's Koren Robinson and Clemson's Rod Gardner and Wayne's University of Miami teammate Santana Moss, who all went in the first 16 picks, most teams had Mitchell and Wayne rated about the same.
"They were very close," said an AFC West scout. "Freddie, if I recall, had a big bowl game [eight catches, 104 yards, two touchdowns in UCLA's Sun Bowl victory over Wisconsin] that helped his stock. He was a quicker, change-of-direction receiver. Wayne was a little bigger, a little more physical receiver."
While Mitchell has been knocked for his lack of speed, he actually ran faster than Wayne in predraft workouts that year. His best 40 time was 4.43, while Wayne's was 4.55.
"At that point, Freddie was the more polished receiver, the more ready to play," the scout said. "Reggie was still developing. In hindsight, Freddie probably had maxed out by the time he got to the NFL, while Reggie still had room to get better. And that's what happened."
Wayne had just six more catches than Mitchell his rookie year (27 to 21), but his numbers have skyrocketed since: 49 receptions and four TDs in '02, 68 and seven in '03, 77 and 12 this season.
Mitchell topped out at 35 catches last year. He had just 14 with no TDs in the first 14 games this season before catching eight passes and two TDs in the Eagles' final two meaningless regular-season games.
"I liked Freddie," said Modrak, now the Buffalo Bills' assistant general manager. "I was for [drafting him]. He was a good catcher. I liked his attitude about playing. I thought he would make tough plays for you. I knew he wasn't the biggest guy or the fastest guy. But I've seen guys like that [in the NFL]. At that point in the draft, I thought it was a damn good pick."
AROUND THE LEAGUE
-- The 49ers are conducting their head-coaching search like the Keystone Kops. Besides owner John York, the two 49er employees conducting the interviews both are nonfootball guys - Paraag Marathe, who is their salary-cap specialist, and assistant director of football administration Terry Tumey, whose primary responsibility is managing the organization's budgets. Player personnel director Bill Reese, the club's highest-ranking football guy since the firing of general manager Terry Donahue, has not been included in the interviews, which likely means he'll eventually be fired.
-- If USC's Matt Leinart declares for the April draft, he'll go right to the top of the quarterback class, just ahead of fellow underclassmen Aaron Rogers, of Cal, and Alex Smith, of Utah. "If Leinart comes out, he'll be the first quarterback taken," an NFL college scouting director said. "He knows how to play the game already. He appears to be an accurate guy. Rogers and Smith will go after him. I don't see any seniors that will go ahead of those three guys." Best of the seniors are Purdue's Kyle Orton, Akron's Charlie Frye, Auburn's Jason Campbell and Arizona State's Andrew Walter. None of those four is projected as a first-round pick right now.
-- Rookie first-rounder J.P. Losman will be given an opportunity to wrest the Bills' starting quarterback job away from Drew Bledsoe next summer. Bledsoe was very inconsistent this season and finished 13th in the AFC in passing with a 76.6 rating that included 16 interceptions and a 56.9 completion percentage. "Overall, he played winning football," Bills GM Tom Donahoe said. "But there also were some games where he didn't play good enough to help us to win. We need better play consistently from that position."
-- The Panthers must decide soon what to do about wide receiver Muhsin Muhammad. Muhammad is due a $10 million roster bonus on March 1 and will count $12.5 million against the cap. They can't afford to do that, which means they must either get him to agree to a more cap-friendly extension or release him.
-- Packers backup quarterback Doug Pederson, who is Brett Favre's closest friend on the team, expects his buddy to return for one more season and then call it quits. "One more year for him," Pederson said. "Personally, that's what I think."
THIS AND THAT
-- Salaries for NFL assistant coaches are wildly inconsistent. A few coordinators, including Eagles defensive boss Jim Johnson, are making more than some head coaches, such as the Vikings' Mike Tice and the Jaguars' Jack Del Rio. The Commanders will pay their new quarterbacks coach, Bill Musgrave, $500,000 a year, while the Jags' new defensive chief, Brian VanGorder, will earn just $250,000, which is about one-sixth of what the Eagles' Johnson is earning.
-- You don't get a second chance to make a good first impression. But that apparently doesn't matter to the Dolphins' new coach, Nick Saban. He and the club have banned reporters from the media work room at the club's practice facility until further notice. Team spokesman Harvey Greene explained the move by saying it will "allow us to get accurate information to our fans." Oh.
-- Now that Saints coach Jim Haslett has been assured he'll be back next season, he's lobbying owner Tom Benson to hire a football operations chief. Micky Loomis is the Saints' general manager, but his area of expertise is the salary cap, not personnel. Haslett wants the club to bring in an experienced football man.
-- Cowboys coach Bill Parcells isn't talking, but word is he's seriously considering a switch to a 3-4 defensive scheme next season. Parcells used the 3-4 at his three previous coaching stops with the Giants, Patriots and Jets.
-- Crying apparently is contagious. When the Cardinals' new offensive coordinator, Keith Rowen, was asked what was the biggest thing he learned from Dick Vermeil while coaching for him in Kansas City, Rowen began to tear up. Seriously.
By the numbers
-- The Chargers were the only team in the league this season that had a quarterback with at least 20 touchdown passes (Drew Brees), a running back with at least 10 rushing touchdowns (LaDanian Tomlinson) and a receiver with at least 10 touchdown catches (tight end Antonio Gates).
-- With a 300-yard passing performance tomorrow night against the Falcons, the Rams' Marc Bulger can join Dan Fouts as the only two quarterbacks in history to pass for 300 yards in their first three playoff starts. Bulger threw for 313 yards Saturday against the Seahawks and for 332 last season in a loss to the Panthers.
-- Patriots quarterback Tom Brady has won his first six playoff starts. Since 1970, the most consecutive postseason wins by a QB to start his career is seven by the Cowboys' Troy Aikman.
-- The Super Bowl winner's share this year will be $68,000 for each player. Members of the losing team will receive $36,500.
-- There were 14 400-yards passing performances this season. Last year, there were only three.
-- When the Falcons host the Rams at the Georgia Dome tomorrow night, it will be only the Falcons' fourth home playoff game in their 39-year history.
2-MINUTE DRILL
FROM THE LIP
-- "Jacksonville went up to Green Bay and that was supposed to be, 'You can't win with a Florida team in below-zero weather,' and they went up there and won the game. New England came in here and beat us last year. If you play better than the other team, you'll beat them, wherever the game is played, whatever the weather is." - Colts coach Tony Dungy on his dome team's chances against the Patriots in frigid Foxboro.
-- "Twenty losses in 2 years is not where I expected to be after a Super Bowl championship. Even more frustrating than that is the fact that probably 16 of those 20 were by seven points or less." - Bucs LB Derrick Brooks.
-- "It's like my SAT scores. I didn't know half the questions.'' - Steelers assistant head coach Russ Grimm, on how he did in his interview for the Browns' vacant head-coaching position.
THUMBS UP
To Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger, who plans to donate the $18,000 check he will earn from tomorrow's divisional playoff game against the Jets to the tsunami victims relief fund. Roethlisberger is hoping many of his teammates and players on the other playoff participants, including the Eagles, will follow suit
THUMBS DOWN
To me and the 27 other nearsighted reporters who helped make Chargers coach Marty Schottenheimer the runaway winner for Associated Press coach of the year. Schottenheimer easily outdistanced the Steelers' Bill Cowher (14 ½ votes), then celebrated by sabotaging his team's first-round playoff game against Jets, which they lost in overtime. Schottenheimer helped set up one Jets touchdown by drawing an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty for coming out onto the field to protest a noncall, then inexplicably shut down his offense when it had a first down at the Jets 22-yard line in overtime, preferring to take his chances with a rookie kicker who had missed two 29-yard field goals this season. "Knowing the outcome, would I have done it differently? Yeah, I would have," Schottenheimer said. "But I'll tell you what. In looking back at it, when we crossed the 25-yard line, it was exactly the thing to do, because there are any number of circumstances that could have befallen us had we tried to throw the ball or approach it a different way." C'mon, Marty. You had a quarterback - Drew Brees - who had thrown only seven interceptions all season. Have some faith in him. At least a little more than in a freaking rookie kicker.
Colts took top-flight WR five picks after FredEx in 2001
by Paul Domowitch
pdomo@aol.com
AS TOM MODRAK watched the Indianapolis Colts annihilate the Denver Broncos last weekend, he thought about Eagles wide receiver Freddie Mitchell.
He thought about him because he still was the Eagles' football operations chief 4 years ago when the club selected Mitchell with the 25th overall pick in the '01 draft. He thought about him because one of the wide receivers he and coach Andy Reid didn't take that day, the University of Miami's Reggie Wayne, made mincemeat of the Broncos' secondary, catching 10 passes for 221 yards and two touchdowns in the Colts' lopsided win.
Looking back on that day now, it's easy to rip the Eagles for taking Mitchell over Wayne, who was the very next wideout grabbed after FredEx, with the 30th pick. Mitchell has caught just 90 passes for 1,263 yards and five touchdowns in his four NFL seasons. Wayne, the No. 2 wideout on the league's most prolific offense, already has 221 catches for 3,109 yards and 23 TDs.
But 4 years ago, the decision wasn't so clear-cut. After Michigan's David Terrell and North Carolina State's Koren Robinson and Clemson's Rod Gardner and Wayne's University of Miami teammate Santana Moss, who all went in the first 16 picks, most teams had Mitchell and Wayne rated about the same.
"They were very close," said an AFC West scout. "Freddie, if I recall, had a big bowl game [eight catches, 104 yards, two touchdowns in UCLA's Sun Bowl victory over Wisconsin] that helped his stock. He was a quicker, change-of-direction receiver. Wayne was a little bigger, a little more physical receiver."
While Mitchell has been knocked for his lack of speed, he actually ran faster than Wayne in predraft workouts that year. His best 40 time was 4.43, while Wayne's was 4.55.
"At that point, Freddie was the more polished receiver, the more ready to play," the scout said. "Reggie was still developing. In hindsight, Freddie probably had maxed out by the time he got to the NFL, while Reggie still had room to get better. And that's what happened."
Wayne had just six more catches than Mitchell his rookie year (27 to 21), but his numbers have skyrocketed since: 49 receptions and four TDs in '02, 68 and seven in '03, 77 and 12 this season.
Mitchell topped out at 35 catches last year. He had just 14 with no TDs in the first 14 games this season before catching eight passes and two TDs in the Eagles' final two meaningless regular-season games.
"I liked Freddie," said Modrak, now the Buffalo Bills' assistant general manager. "I was for [drafting him]. He was a good catcher. I liked his attitude about playing. I thought he would make tough plays for you. I knew he wasn't the biggest guy or the fastest guy. But I've seen guys like that [in the NFL]. At that point in the draft, I thought it was a damn good pick."
AROUND THE LEAGUE
-- The 49ers are conducting their head-coaching search like the Keystone Kops. Besides owner John York, the two 49er employees conducting the interviews both are nonfootball guys - Paraag Marathe, who is their salary-cap specialist, and assistant director of football administration Terry Tumey, whose primary responsibility is managing the organization's budgets. Player personnel director Bill Reese, the club's highest-ranking football guy since the firing of general manager Terry Donahue, has not been included in the interviews, which likely means he'll eventually be fired.
-- If USC's Matt Leinart declares for the April draft, he'll go right to the top of the quarterback class, just ahead of fellow underclassmen Aaron Rogers, of Cal, and Alex Smith, of Utah. "If Leinart comes out, he'll be the first quarterback taken," an NFL college scouting director said. "He knows how to play the game already. He appears to be an accurate guy. Rogers and Smith will go after him. I don't see any seniors that will go ahead of those three guys." Best of the seniors are Purdue's Kyle Orton, Akron's Charlie Frye, Auburn's Jason Campbell and Arizona State's Andrew Walter. None of those four is projected as a first-round pick right now.
-- Rookie first-rounder J.P. Losman will be given an opportunity to wrest the Bills' starting quarterback job away from Drew Bledsoe next summer. Bledsoe was very inconsistent this season and finished 13th in the AFC in passing with a 76.6 rating that included 16 interceptions and a 56.9 completion percentage. "Overall, he played winning football," Bills GM Tom Donahoe said. "But there also were some games where he didn't play good enough to help us to win. We need better play consistently from that position."
-- The Panthers must decide soon what to do about wide receiver Muhsin Muhammad. Muhammad is due a $10 million roster bonus on March 1 and will count $12.5 million against the cap. They can't afford to do that, which means they must either get him to agree to a more cap-friendly extension or release him.
-- Packers backup quarterback Doug Pederson, who is Brett Favre's closest friend on the team, expects his buddy to return for one more season and then call it quits. "One more year for him," Pederson said. "Personally, that's what I think."
THIS AND THAT
-- Salaries for NFL assistant coaches are wildly inconsistent. A few coordinators, including Eagles defensive boss Jim Johnson, are making more than some head coaches, such as the Vikings' Mike Tice and the Jaguars' Jack Del Rio. The Commanders will pay their new quarterbacks coach, Bill Musgrave, $500,000 a year, while the Jags' new defensive chief, Brian VanGorder, will earn just $250,000, which is about one-sixth of what the Eagles' Johnson is earning.
-- You don't get a second chance to make a good first impression. But that apparently doesn't matter to the Dolphins' new coach, Nick Saban. He and the club have banned reporters from the media work room at the club's practice facility until further notice. Team spokesman Harvey Greene explained the move by saying it will "allow us to get accurate information to our fans." Oh.
-- Now that Saints coach Jim Haslett has been assured he'll be back next season, he's lobbying owner Tom Benson to hire a football operations chief. Micky Loomis is the Saints' general manager, but his area of expertise is the salary cap, not personnel. Haslett wants the club to bring in an experienced football man.
-- Cowboys coach Bill Parcells isn't talking, but word is he's seriously considering a switch to a 3-4 defensive scheme next season. Parcells used the 3-4 at his three previous coaching stops with the Giants, Patriots and Jets.
-- Crying apparently is contagious. When the Cardinals' new offensive coordinator, Keith Rowen, was asked what was the biggest thing he learned from Dick Vermeil while coaching for him in Kansas City, Rowen began to tear up. Seriously.
By the numbers
-- The Chargers were the only team in the league this season that had a quarterback with at least 20 touchdown passes (Drew Brees), a running back with at least 10 rushing touchdowns (LaDanian Tomlinson) and a receiver with at least 10 touchdown catches (tight end Antonio Gates).
-- With a 300-yard passing performance tomorrow night against the Falcons, the Rams' Marc Bulger can join Dan Fouts as the only two quarterbacks in history to pass for 300 yards in their first three playoff starts. Bulger threw for 313 yards Saturday against the Seahawks and for 332 last season in a loss to the Panthers.
-- Patriots quarterback Tom Brady has won his first six playoff starts. Since 1970, the most consecutive postseason wins by a QB to start his career is seven by the Cowboys' Troy Aikman.
-- The Super Bowl winner's share this year will be $68,000 for each player. Members of the losing team will receive $36,500.
-- There were 14 400-yards passing performances this season. Last year, there were only three.
-- When the Falcons host the Rams at the Georgia Dome tomorrow night, it will be only the Falcons' fourth home playoff game in their 39-year history.
2-MINUTE DRILL
FROM THE LIP
-- "Jacksonville went up to Green Bay and that was supposed to be, 'You can't win with a Florida team in below-zero weather,' and they went up there and won the game. New England came in here and beat us last year. If you play better than the other team, you'll beat them, wherever the game is played, whatever the weather is." - Colts coach Tony Dungy on his dome team's chances against the Patriots in frigid Foxboro.
-- "Twenty losses in 2 years is not where I expected to be after a Super Bowl championship. Even more frustrating than that is the fact that probably 16 of those 20 were by seven points or less." - Bucs LB Derrick Brooks.
-- "It's like my SAT scores. I didn't know half the questions.'' - Steelers assistant head coach Russ Grimm, on how he did in his interview for the Browns' vacant head-coaching position.
THUMBS UP
To Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger, who plans to donate the $18,000 check he will earn from tomorrow's divisional playoff game against the Jets to the tsunami victims relief fund. Roethlisberger is hoping many of his teammates and players on the other playoff participants, including the Eagles, will follow suit
THUMBS DOWN
To me and the 27 other nearsighted reporters who helped make Chargers coach Marty Schottenheimer the runaway winner for Associated Press coach of the year. Schottenheimer easily outdistanced the Steelers' Bill Cowher (14 ½ votes), then celebrated by sabotaging his team's first-round playoff game against Jets, which they lost in overtime. Schottenheimer helped set up one Jets touchdown by drawing an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty for coming out onto the field to protest a noncall, then inexplicably shut down his offense when it had a first down at the Jets 22-yard line in overtime, preferring to take his chances with a rookie kicker who had missed two 29-yard field goals this season. "Knowing the outcome, would I have done it differently? Yeah, I would have," Schottenheimer said. "But I'll tell you what. In looking back at it, when we crossed the 25-yard line, it was exactly the thing to do, because there are any number of circumstances that could have befallen us had we tried to throw the ball or approach it a different way." C'mon, Marty. You had a quarterback - Drew Brees - who had thrown only seven interceptions all season. Have some faith in him. At least a little more than in a freaking rookie kicker.