When future history is written, the BEST QBs from the 2010 class will have been drafted in the 2nd round

In the year 1923, the oregano crop failed in the southern United States. This was due to a mold blight that killed young herbs that season. This created quite a commotion in the Italian sections of New York City. Oregano is one of the most import herbs in Italian cooking. It is said that the price of Oregano first tripped and the quadrupled. Even inferior quality stuff was selling for outrageous prices. This price condition only improved when better, but not fresher, supplies were acquired from Mexico and Europe.

The story I just told you is 100% pure myth. It might have happened. It probably didn't. I decided to invent a story to illustrate the importance of the concept of scarcity in affecting the price of anything. This story does illustrate the power of scarcity to make even the price of poor products rise dramatically.

This happened a couple of years ago in the NFL when two kids name JaMarcus Russell and Brady Quinn were drafted in the first round. Russell was drafted at the head of the class. Now his name is a byword for bust. Both the Browns and the Raiders finished even lower than the Rams in passing yardage. The Rams are worst team in football, and the team that scored the least amount of points in the league. The Rams couldn't pass a lick last season. It is hard to go lower than we did. Yet both JaMarcus Russell and Brady Quinn were worse than any of our Quarterbacks. That looks pretty damn bad on the spot sheet. That fact jumps out of the HTML and bites you on the nose... painfully.

This year, we have a similar situation in play. I believe Sam Bradford, the kid at the head of the class, is vastly better than Russell. He should be successful, but he should not be the high pick that he will be. He will need a very good to AllPro line to stay healthy. Clausen, on the other hand... his fortunes might be worse than Quinn's are. That is what I think. Sorry Notre Dame fans. I think Quinn was and is a better QB prospect than Clausen.

Would it were that Sanchez and Stafford had come out on schedule, in 2010, both Bradford and Clausen would be pushed back considerably in this years draft. Bradford will be a lower first rounder. Clausen would be pushed back deep in the 2nd.

This is similar to what many said when Quinn and Russell were drafted. If those two had been a part of the previous (2006) draft class, they would have been 2nd or 3rd round selections. Scarcity forced the price of these poor kids up. The results were bad. They wound up with poor teams that they were expected to rescue. They were in deep shit, and they drowned.

I firmly believe that when history is written, the 2nd, 3rd and 4th rounds of 2010 will produce the top pros. There are a number of good kids who are misunderstood, miscast and misrepresented who will pan out like gold. Tim Tebow, Colt McCoy, LeFevour and Snead could all be in the winner's circle. I am pretty certain that Tebow and McCoy will be there.

The rule is simple: Don't take a QB in the first round this year. Get one at the top of the 2nd. Get Tim Tebow.

So the reviews for the final cut of Wolverine are starting to roll in

And it sure as fuck isn't pretty.  If you are a studio manager, you are going to have to be upset about reviews like this one.  They are calling it a fiasco.

For those of you stuck under a rock, obsessed with the NFL draft, the Jay Cutler drama, the NCAA Basketball Tournament, or the bad economy, there was another major story in March 2009. It turns out that world media piracy scored it's biggest kill ever.  They jacked an advanced working copy of the new Super Hero blockbuster X-Men Origins: Wolverine.  Of course, this XVID went straight to Bit Torrent, and from there to millions of kids around the world.

The work was unfinished at the time this cut was made.  None of the photo-realistic 3d visual effects (you can expect to see soon) are in the bootleg cut.  Super simple 3d previz graphics are in place.  DOS video game air planes fly across polygon grid sky, etc.  This is hysterical to the typical viewer.  You can also see the wires & cables attached to every character as he or she leaps across the warehouse, office, road, canyon, etc.  Wire removal is one of the most basic and important elements of action film effects these days.

As you may have gathered already, I did see a copy of this film.  Didn't manage to get all the way through it.  Time was pressing.  I needed to get home, and I was board.  The interest wore off rather quickly.  After the novelty of seeing a bad copy one month early wore thin, there was not much reason to watch it.  I refrained from reviewing the bootleg here, as I didn't finish it, and it is quite unfinished.

I wrote to some friends and told them the product was bad.  I did caution them that this work was unfinished, but with such hammy segues between critical plot-points, I couldn't see how this work might be fixed up.  A friend of mine inside the industry cautioned me not to draw any conclusion just yet.  He informed me that there are emergency editors in the world who are paid millions of dollars to fix-up would-be blockbusters teetering on the brink.  With some tweaking, the final cut can be dramatically improved.  He reminded me that the first cut of Star Wars is now a legendary fiasco among film students.  Everything was patched up by D-Day.

I respect this guy, so I heard him out, but I had a hard time believing that such an effort might fix this film.  With such fundamental mistakes in writing and direction, there is only so much magic an emergency editor can weave.

Anyway, the reviews of Wolverine look pretty nasty right now.  A preview was granted to a limited number of friendly critics.  According to Rottentomatoes.com, the number of critics there was just 17.  Right now the count is 9-8.  9 say it is good.  8 say it is bad.  Reading the 9 positive reviews will raise a lot of eyebrows.  When the review is positive, it is not very good.  When it is negative, it is pretty bad.  Based on a reading of these reviews, it would seem that there are some pissed off fanboys, and some lukewarm fanboys.

What will happen when the non-fanboys begin to review this movie?  Right now Wolverine is pulling 53% on the T-Meter, and the strength score.  I would expect that to fall right through the floor as hostile reviewers like Rex Reed begin to check in.  Expect this movie's T-Meter to finish in the 30s.

I have to say, I am most highly displeased.  I am a big fan of comic books.  This is the second bust in a row.  Worse still, this is a movie that should not have been a bust.  It could have and should have been every bit as good as Iron Man or the Incredible Hulk.  Wolverine is not like the Watchmen.  We are not talking about a vastly overrated piece of shit story here.  We're talking about one of the most favored characters in Marvel history.  They also have one of the most favored stars in Hollywood for this one.  What I see here is a missed opportunity for a terrific blockbuster.  Another one goes down the drain.

So, Dave, if you were to put a fine point on it, just what is wrong with this movie?  It is incredibly cliche.  You have a good brother.  You have an evil brother.  The two of them walk through life together, back-to-back until finally one day, the evil brother's evil becomes to terrible, and the good brother parts company with him.  Of course this means war, and the bad brother must have some revenge.  Now the good brother must kill the bad brother.

Folks, Ballywood makes 20 movies like this every single year.  I am not kidding you either.  They litterally make 20 of these movies every single year.  It is an old archetypal story.  This was just too damn similar to other basic stories I have seen.  It wore thin very fast once I identified the anchient pattern of the work.  Everything was utterly predictable.  No surprises here folks.  You knew the end from the begining.  This is why I didn't bother to finish it.