San Jose Bills Fan

Gotcha. Or a Big Ben type with his height.

I really respect your honesty here. The thing about Kaep in the 2nd and Russell Wilson in the 3rd is that to me, at those spots you no longer have reservations about drafting them because the price is not too high (as it is in the first round). When coupled with the importance of the position, it rankles me to this day that these two were passed over by the Bills. To not take them in the first round is understandable. After that, the decisions are virtually unforgivable as far as I'm concerned.

As far as what to do with Aaron Williams, many players have turned the corner in their third seasons after appearing clueless in the first two. If they think they can make a cornerback out of him, I'm on board. If they think he's better suited to safety, sign me up. I just want our 2nd rounder to become a strong player. It would be very painful to acknowledge that the Bills whiffed on another second rounder. Let's hope the third season's the charm, at whatever position.

Jimbo who?

Yeah I don't think he'll play the prima dona act. I think he's wise enough to know that for the money he's getting paid, that he'll do what he's told and shut up. Besides that, he has to buy-in to the new coaching staff in order to help lead the team to success. I believe that he'll be a good soldier.

Having picked the Ravens, this is the one scenario where I can see the Niners winning. With Kaepernick beating the Ravens with his arm and not his feet.

Reading through this thread before my last post, I re-state that Alex Smith is getting short shrift here. Having watched his career here in the Bay Area pretty closely, I think (like Tcali and a few other Bay Area posters) that Smith is better than most of the people here are saying. It seems like the naysayers simply went running to his career stats to construct an argument that he's the same player as Fitz. IMO Alex Smith is MUCH better than Fitz. Digest all the stats you want, unless you've watched him play a lot you'd be wrong saying he's inaccurate or has a weak arm. Smith is actually a strong and accurate thrower IMO.

To follow up on your point, football has always been big, fast, and violent enough for me from the very time I started watching it as a kid in the late 60s. I don't need to see comically-oversized players achieving never-before-seen speeds and sizes to be entertained. I remember when Ang Lee came out with The Hulk movie and thinking how ridiculous it was with the hyperbolized and computer-enhanced new Hulk. I didn't really like The Lord of the Rings movies because having read the books, I didn't appreciate that some of the characters exceeded my imagination of them. The Balrog for instance was ridiculous, IMO. I don't need to see inhuman looking human beings playing football. If I needed that I'd spend my time watching the latest gladiator movies out of Hollywood. I'm not sure that I've made my point well. Ten is high enough on the dial. I don't need 11.

I like EJ Manuel and agree that he has tremendous upside. But others have pointed out that characterizing him as a "scrambler" is not really accurate. As a 4-year starter he did rush 298 times for 827 yards, an average of 2.8 ypr. But while he ran the ball often, he didn't do so very effectively except that he did have 11 rushing TDs. I think what we saw in the Senior Bowl is probably indicative of Manuel's rushing abilities: He ran for a TD although it was a short distance from the goal line, he didn't look particularly good doing it, and it was unclear whether he had broken the plane. Probably he's an opportunistic rusher more than an effective one.

A few days after Jim Harbaugh said that Alex Smith's wishes "would absolutely" be taken into consideration regarding his future, the rumors here in the Bay Area are that Smith wants to be a starter and that the Niners will try to trade him before cutting him. More here: http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2013/02/03/report-49ers-will-try-to-trade-alex-smith/

Probably the thought is that safeties are a bit more run-centric players and their flaws in the passing game are not quite as exposed at safety as they are at cornerback. Three of the starting 4 safeties in today's Super Bowl are average to poor pass defenders: Whitner, Goldson, and Pollard. Also, safeties typically play a much different type of coverage than do cornerbacks, playing deeper, backpedaling less, etc.

I think that because Mario had 5 sacks in 5 games as a LB in 2011 (before going on IR) that people here are hopeful that he can make the transition.

My recollection is that I was pretty strongly pro-Kaepernick and that my only reservation was that he had a bit of an odd throwing motion. I remember spouting a fondness for him being a 2-sport athlete and taking over the starting job as a redshirt freshman. I loved that he was essentially a 4-year starter. As a sophomore he was conference player of the year and was the bowl MVP. He was the first player in NCAA history to pass for over 2000 yards and rush for over 1000 yards, in 3 consecutive seasons and he joined Tebow as the only FBS QBs to both throw and run for at least 20 TDs in one season. Kaep is the only FBS QB to pass for over 10,000 yards and rush for over 4000 yards in a career. He graduated with honors with a business management degree. At just under 6'5" and 233 pounds, he ran a 4.53 at the combine and had the highest-velocity throws of any quarterback since they started measuring that in 2008 with throws over 60 mph. Kaep played well in big games with the exception of the 2009 Hawaii Bowl. Besides his throwing motion and the level of competition, there was nothing to not like about the kid. Nothing. There was talk whether he should go in the first round. In the second round he was a steal.

Two excellent, closely-matched teams. I'm expecting a great Super Bowl. The Ravens did some O-line shuffling late in the season and with Bryant McKinnie finally playing to near his HOF talent and Oher on the right side where he belongs (the non-Blind Side ironically) the Ravens line has been outstanding. With Justin Smith still not 100% and Ahmad Brooks a bit hobbled, the Niners could have a hard time pressuring Flacco. This is bad news for the Niners who have decent cornerbacks and two safeties (Whitner and Goldson) who are good run players but mediocre to bad in pass defense. I expect the Ravens to be able to exploit the Niners pass defense and "take the top off the defense" enough to score some points. Flacco has played well lately as he's found his groove after the firing of Cam Cameron and promotion of Jim Caldwell in mid December. On the other side of the ball, Kaepernick has endured growing pains pretty seamlessly but nothing he's experienced will prepare him for what he'll see from the Ravens today. Baltimore's D is probably the best that Kaep will see this year both from a talent and a coaching standpoint. He'll have his moments but so will the Ravens D as they game plan to confuse the young quarterback. I expect the Niners to win a Super Bowl or two under Jim Harbaugh but I have the Ravens covering and winning outright and I would play the over 48 points. BTW, the line opened at Niners -2 and is now Niners -4. I'm a bit surprised by that.

I love skills competitions, especially among highly-regarded, draft eligible prospects. Too bad there was not much publicity for this event. I would have watched it.

I'm glad you re-visited and qualified your comment because it was ridiculous.

http://forums.twobillsdrive.com/topic/154887-2013-hof-finalists%3B-update-andre-reed-did-not-make-it/

I understand all of your points John and we're not really at odds here. Our discussion is taking place in a maelstrom of hypotheticals. What I'm saying concretely is that I'd rather the Bills draft Von Miller or Aldon Smith than Christian Ponder, Jake Locker, or Blaine Gabbert.

I'll give you that talent is important. That said Wanny was the worst DC in the league last year IMO. Gaughan's recent Buffalo News article was confirmation of all the criticisms of Wanny that we had here on this board. Complete lack of complexity to his scheme. Opposing teams could easily solve the Bills defense without any effort. Contrast that to the top DCs who besides having good players, beat opposing OCs in the mental chess game part of the sport. That's why the players quit on Wanny, because they knew he was hanging them out to dry every week, placing them squarely in the seat of failure. I think a DC would have made a huge difference last year. In four decades of watching the NFL, I've seen dozens of cases of new coaches coming in and making significant differences in the performance of their players. In watching pro sports it's always pretty obvious which teams overachieve and which teams underachieve. That difference is easily 3-4 losses turning into wins. What do you think would happen if Jim Harbaugh and Jim Schwartz switched jobs? That's why Gaughan concluded his piece saying that if Wanny had done a decent job, Gailey would still be the Bills Head Coach. A good head coach makes 50+ players better. A good OC or DC directly makes 20+ players better and indirectly makes the whole roster better. JMO but the "players make the coach" argument is one I vehemently oppose.

When I have time I'll dig up some video for you. As for stats, I think Clay Matthews had 4.5 sacks as a senior. Stats mean zilch to me. I don't know which games I saw of Jordan's but he was unstoppable. The only thing preventing him from sacks was the QB panic throwing the ball away. I commented repeatedly about Maybin that there was no videotape of him on Youtube, only the Rose Bowl game against USC where he essentially sucked. Many people here were very skeptical of Maybin because there was no visual proof of his skills AND because he was a one-year wonder. I didn't like the Maybin pick but hoped that the Bills were right about him. As for Jordan, when you watch the video you'll see a freakish athlete (Aldon Smith, Jevon Kearse) who seems to defy the laws of physics. His length, speed, quickness and agility are elite. Few if any can turn the corner like this guy with his body lean incomparable to my memory. I believe he was even used as an offensive rusher and receiver from scrimmage getting TDs in both roles. Yes he has to bulk up but if you're measuring this guy conventionally you'll fail to understand him. edit: FWIW, I loved Aldon Smith leading up to the draft last year, and publicly had him ahead of Robert Quinn who I also liked. While Quinn will become a fine player, mine was a distinct minority viewpoint.

Git 'er done!

To the bolded above, I remember scouts saying that this was the exact reason that Talib and Rodgers-Cromartie were better prospects. Also at the combine, McKelvin's Parietal Node measured small.

Russ Brandon's salary? No. But I hear he has small hands.

It would really sulcus if we lost McKelvin.

Fingers crossed for #83.