Damn... Billy Devaney sure is batting 20,000% during this baseball season, isn't he?
First, he takes Sam Bradford #1 overall in the draft. I want to go on the record and declare that bad teams take Quarterbacks #1 overall in the draft. I am talking about really bad teams. I am talking about really bad teams interested in cementing their position in the history books as one of the notoriously bad teams. I am talking about bad teams that have an interest in remaining bad for a long time to come.
It would seem that a franchise QB is an ideal cornerstone for your rebuilding program. Empirically speaking, that notion is a farce. It is hogwash that cannot be validated by any empirical or ration research process. Selecting a QB #1 overall leads to bust-ville more than 70% of the time. Most general managers who execute this move find a new place to dwell: The Heartbreak Hotel. Selecting a QB #1 overall is an act of desperation, executed by desperate teams, and it leads to no where more than 70% of the time.
Only three teams have ever gotten away with this stunt and turned into champs. Only one prospered exactly as they hopped they would. That case was Troy Aikman and the Cowboys, a fellow Devaney is trying to cast Sam Bradford as, right now, as we speak.
With such a low percentage of success, I can honestly say--with scientific merit--that if any team drafts a QB with the #1 overall pick, I am more than 70% confident they have made a mistake. I can say that a-priori, without consideration of any of the other details of the case, and I will be right more than 70% of the time. With such terrible odds, why do you tempt fate?
But this was only Act 1 of the disaster play. Are you ready for act 2?
Then Devaney deletes two starters from a bad offensive line, and only replaces them with a single round-two selection in 2010 draft (Rodger Saffold of Indiana). It doesn't take an MBA in accounting to understand that these transactions don't balance at the bottom line. The Rams are now (at least) two starters short of an offensive line; the right and the left guards to be specific. The Rams need two new guards, period point blank. If you think they don't, you're just absolutely and completely wrong. Sorry bitches, you're 100% wrong with a 100% chance of being 100% wrong and 0% chance of being 1% right. I mean totally wrong. The Rams need two new guards.
Now, are you ready for the cherry on top? I had early warning this weekend that Rams were considering tendering Terrel Owens an offer, and "the offer may come as early as Monday." Well, it is Monday, and we have apparent confirmation that the Rams and the Bengals are both offering Terrel Owens a contract. This is according to USA Today, and you can read it here.
I need to keep reminding myself that I dropped this team like a bad habit. 30 years is enough. I am done. Still the shockwave of horror from this move freezes my soul.
In the run up to the 2010 draft, I published about two dozen articles warning the Rams and Ram fans that selecting Sam Bradford would lead to tragedy. I warned that he would become the next Jim Plunket. I warned that the Rams would kill him just as they did Marc Bulger. I warned everyone that the problem was less the QB than the offensive line and the receiver corp. I warned that the Rams very probably have the worst offensive coordinator in the NFL in the form of Pat Shurmur. I warned everyone that this was a rooty-poot organization that had no intention of fixing its real problems.
I told everyone that the Rams' offensive line was nowhere near ready for a move like selecting Sam Bradford. I told everyone we needed at least one more year of concrete and steel in the basement before we could contemplate making a move for a future franchise QB. I openly worried that this was a Public Relations stunt, a splashy, press-saavy, Hollywood A-List move, straight from NFL HQ on Madison Avenue, just designed to sell some tickets at the box office. I knew we reached for Sam when Ndamukong Suh was the #1 athlete on the draft-board.
So much for Act 1 and 2. Are you ready for the third and final act of the disaster play?
Now we get the grand cherry on top of the mess! The Rams are making an offer to T.O. Let's make it clear: as great as Warren Sapp was--and he should be in the Hall of Fame shortly--he was not the most effect quarterback killer in the league during his time. Terrell Owens was the real quarterback killer.
Now I know full-well that T.O. has matured. I understand that he wasn't quite the high-problem guy he was in the past during the 2009 season. He does seem to have a different attitude these days. He has had to deal with the sobering fact that he is not quite a hot commodity anymore. Retirement is not far away. Mortality issues are just on the other side of that coin. All of these things have a tendency to change hearts and minds. Terrell was still the end of Trent Edwards now wasn't he?
In view of all these things, I think the Rams making T.O. an offer is an exceedingly stupid move. You really are trying kill Sam Bradford, aren't you now? Fortunately, T.O. will sign with the Bengals. What would you do if you were T.O.? Of course you won't sign with the Rams. The Bengals are a contender.
Ergo, we might even suspect that this is a bit of a faky; the 'ole trickerooski. The Rams may not have an intention of signing T.O. Devaney may only want to claim that he tried.
I don't even want to address possible ways in which T.O. might be employed by Pat Shurmur. I don't want to go into ways in which T.O. might distract NFL DCs from young Donnie Avery and Mardy Gilyard. None of this has any importance or significance.
A like-minded fellow professional at Bleacher Reports currently has the top story in the Rams section, and he pretty well summarized exactly what I think on this subject. This is another PR stunt to sell some tickets at the box office. This is not about improving the team. This is not about giving Sam Bradford a fighting chance at success.
Man... I feel really terrible for Sam. You don't know how bad I feel for the kid. I can't imagine drafting a kid to waste his talent. I can't imagine taking a kids life and hopes and dreams in the draft, and then not giving him an ultimate fighting chance to make it big. Especially when the kid has great talent, it is tragic to select him and waste him in the name of PR and ticket sales.
This situation sucks. The methodology Devaney is using in 'rebuilding' the Rams is anything but good scientific football engineering.
I would never even 'take a flier' on kid, even in the 7th round. Surely, there are enough good college stars you saw and liked during the season that you can find one name you would really like to have on your team in the 7th. Surely, there are such kids (like Jevan Snead) around every single year in the 7th round.
Man... I sure hope Kroenke completes his deal on August 25th and then busts some skulls. I have a nice F. Dick meat cleaver I would like to lend you, Stan. It would work great on...
Believe me, this 3.5 pound cleaver will bust some skulls.
