Smegma
Last edited by a moderator:
Draft Forum post draft thoughts?
- Thread starter xXwarXx
- Start date
Smegma
Last edited by a moderator:
xXwarXx
☠️ Banned ☠️
Vernon Adams is going to the Canadian league. It was pretty mind boggling how high some people were on him.
Josh Norris had him in his top 50. I use to really respect his work because he didn't follow any draft trends and stuck to his opinions. But his rankings the last 2 years show me why he's not in the NFL anymore.
Josh Norris had him in his top 50. I use to really respect his work because he didn't follow any draft trends and stuck to his opinions. But his rankings the last 2 years show me why he's not in the NFL anymore.
ckparrothead
Premium Member
Before coverage of the draft went social media oriented (and therefore kind of reader- and participation-driven), media draft boards showed a tendency toward convergence. Kind of like the beer industry before craft beer became a thing. Because of the tradition of convergence, people aren't properly used to the idea of individual evaluator draft boards varying WILDLY from one another, which they do.
I don't blush at something like having Vernon Adams top 50 and then him ending up a CFL quarterback. That's not something that makes me lose respect for the evaluator. It counts as one player in your top 50 that turns out to be a bust. Just one. Isaiah Pead was drafted #50 overall. What's he been? A bust. He could've gone to the CFL immediately like Vernon Adams and you couldn't really account that much less successful than what he's done from 2012 to 2015 in the NFL. Should it be less embarrassing to have had Isaiah Pead in your top 50 than Vernon Adams? No.
I don't blush at something like having Vernon Adams top 50 and then him ending up a CFL quarterback. That's not something that makes me lose respect for the evaluator. It counts as one player in your top 50 that turns out to be a bust. Just one. Isaiah Pead was drafted #50 overall. What's he been? A bust. He could've gone to the CFL immediately like Vernon Adams and you couldn't really account that much less successful than what he's done from 2012 to 2015 in the NFL. Should it be less embarrassing to have had Isaiah Pead in your top 50 than Vernon Adams? No.
ckparrothead
Premium Member
Where I do take a little bit exception is where I heard people start talking after the Shrine Game about how anyone who was actually paying attention to Shrine practices knows that Vernon Adams was the best quarterback in camp, and shouldn't be surprised by his success during the game itself. I was at those practices. None of the QBs stood head and shoulders above the others but it was pretty clear that the most accurate of the bunch was Brandon Doughty. He ran into trouble during the game, a couple of bad plays. One where he wasn't expecting blitz pressure (because blitzing is against the rules) and then all the sudden a middle linebacker blitzed him and that led to a bad decision.
The second bad play had a couple things going on. Someone smart on the defense called out the pick route before the play even started. You could hear it audibly, I think it was the same MLB Joe Bolden who had blitzed illegally earlier in the game. Bolden was working the offense's left side, and the right side was where the two receivers ran a pick route, so maybe Bolden calling it out like that didn't alert Doughty to get out of it because he was on a different side. Or maybe Doughty had zero ability to get out of it because this is an All Star game not Western Kentucky. The latter is probably the case. Either way the defense played it very well, as if they knew what was coming. And then the receiver Geronimo Allison sat down on his slant instead of running it through, and Doughty threw the ball as if he were going to run it through. That miscommunication created the conditions for the interception. Admittedly Doughty could've thrown the ball lower and had Allison dive for it. That would have been safer.
Aside from the two plays I thought Doughty had the best showing in the game, even compared to Adams who had the touchdowns. He was executing and operating the offense, whereas I felt like Adams was making big plays off broken execution. The ability to do the latter is great, IF you can show first and foremost that you can execute and operate the offense, and then you can add that stuff in after. I'm not sure Adams showed that, during the week or game.
I like Adams though. If he proves himself in the CFL then he'd be a good one to bring back to the NFL in training camp and see if he can make it.
The second bad play had a couple things going on. Someone smart on the defense called out the pick route before the play even started. You could hear it audibly, I think it was the same MLB Joe Bolden who had blitzed illegally earlier in the game. Bolden was working the offense's left side, and the right side was where the two receivers ran a pick route, so maybe Bolden calling it out like that didn't alert Doughty to get out of it because he was on a different side. Or maybe Doughty had zero ability to get out of it because this is an All Star game not Western Kentucky. The latter is probably the case. Either way the defense played it very well, as if they knew what was coming. And then the receiver Geronimo Allison sat down on his slant instead of running it through, and Doughty threw the ball as if he were going to run it through. That miscommunication created the conditions for the interception. Admittedly Doughty could've thrown the ball lower and had Allison dive for it. That would have been safer.
Aside from the two plays I thought Doughty had the best showing in the game, even compared to Adams who had the touchdowns. He was executing and operating the offense, whereas I felt like Adams was making big plays off broken execution. The ability to do the latter is great, IF you can show first and foremost that you can execute and operate the offense, and then you can add that stuff in after. I'm not sure Adams showed that, during the week or game.
I like Adams though. If he proves himself in the CFL then he'd be a good one to bring back to the NFL in training camp and see if he can make it.
ckparrothead
Premium Member
As for the thread subject, I've already given some thoughts on the themes that they hit. They were very internally consistent with their coaching themes and coaching wants, which is probably a good thing. I guess it remains to be seen if the coaches are good enough to be dictating so much of what they want on personnel but for now the benefit of the doubt is appropriate.
Like I said, the same thing that brought us Byron Maxwell also brought us Xavien Howard and Jordan Lucas. Xavien Howard will compete with Tony Lippett for the outside start. What they see in Xavien Howard is the consistent ability to disrupt via the press, to play the receiver from a trail position, and then good ball skills thrown in the mix. And if people had seen the few occasions at Penn State when Jordan Lucas got a chance to play press back when he was a corner, I think they'd have gotten more excited about that pick. I'm sure Slimm saw it. As I recall he rated Jordan Lucas high as a pure corner a year in advance.
Don't count out Tony Lippett because when Gase and Joseph came on board one of their top priorities was to research the hell out of Lippett's background, talk to Gase's former boss Mark Dantonio, talk to people in Lippett's past and get their arms around just what they had in Tony because he fits what they want at that position extremely well. He's 6'2.5" and has the movement skills to play press-man and four trail, which is what the Dolphins want to do under Vance Joseph (I think), and if you look at his strengths as a wide receiver coming out of Michigan State, they were his physicality getting off the press and his ball skills at the catch point. Now that he's a corner he's going to be pressing receivers instead of getting off the press, and now if those great ball skills he had as a receiver translate then you could have something because that's why they drafted Xavien Howard so high. That's the rarity, probably the difference between a Jordan Lucas and Xavien Howard. Lippett had a bunch of interceptions if you recall during training camp last year. He didn't have any during games but he only played probably 100 pass snaps. The experience that Lippett had at corner at Michigan State, in practice and in games, also prepared him pretty well for the system Vance Joseph will put him in with the Dolphins.
From the standpoint of Jakeem Grant, Thomas Duarte and Kenyan Drake, it's clear that the front office is letting Adam Gase have a lot of fun with personnel, playing fantasy games. There is nothing wrong with those selections, I've gushed quite a bit about Jakeem Grant and Thomas Duarte specifically, but there is also a theme going on. Gase is an offensive coordinator with a reputation for exploiting rule-based defensive packaging, aligning and assigning by using those established rules to isolate personnel and spacing mismatches. So you give this type of offensive coordinator a bunch of gimmicky mismatch players. It fits.
But I'm glad they showed they can also break their thematic approach to go after players that represented opportunities for them relative to their draft board. Neither Laremy Tunsil nor Leonte Carroo or Brandon Doughty were thematic from a coaching standpoint in the ways that Xavien Howard, Kenyan Drake, Jordan Lucas and Thomas Duarte were. Tunsil was one of their two best players in the entire draft and he fell to pick #13 so they quickly pounced on him. Now they're stuck in a little bit of scramble mode trying to figure out how best to use him, but they accepted that as a problem they will take on in exchange for the talent.
Leonte Carroo does not represent the same kind of gadgety skill set you see in a Jakeem Grant, Thomas Duarte or Kenyan Drake. But was their #2 rated wide receiver in the whole draft, rated above guys like Corey Coleman, Josh Doctson and Will Fuller. The only receiver they had above him was LaQuon Treadwell. Now could have a tough choice to make with respect to Kenny Stills because they selected Carroo, and that's a problem they were willing to take on because the talent was so compelling.
Brandon Doughty very much fits what Adam Gase wants in a quarterback, but he was just as much a nod to Dan Marino as he was Adam Gase, and he was also a player they thought shouldn't have fallen that far. He was still around after 14 quarterbacks got drafted and the Dolphins thought he should've gone above half of them. He wasn't part of the plan. They already had four quarterbacks, and now they're actually going to have to let one go before camp even starts.
So even though I like the coaching themes in this draft, you kind of wonder if the players they're going to have the most success with are going to be the guys they went off the coach theme script in order to get. But that may not be fair because pretty much by definition if a player's value is so compelling that you go off script to take him, he probably should have a higher than normal chance of making it by virtue of the fact his value was so compelling.
Like I said, the same thing that brought us Byron Maxwell also brought us Xavien Howard and Jordan Lucas. Xavien Howard will compete with Tony Lippett for the outside start. What they see in Xavien Howard is the consistent ability to disrupt via the press, to play the receiver from a trail position, and then good ball skills thrown in the mix. And if people had seen the few occasions at Penn State when Jordan Lucas got a chance to play press back when he was a corner, I think they'd have gotten more excited about that pick. I'm sure Slimm saw it. As I recall he rated Jordan Lucas high as a pure corner a year in advance.
Don't count out Tony Lippett because when Gase and Joseph came on board one of their top priorities was to research the hell out of Lippett's background, talk to Gase's former boss Mark Dantonio, talk to people in Lippett's past and get their arms around just what they had in Tony because he fits what they want at that position extremely well. He's 6'2.5" and has the movement skills to play press-man and four trail, which is what the Dolphins want to do under Vance Joseph (I think), and if you look at his strengths as a wide receiver coming out of Michigan State, they were his physicality getting off the press and his ball skills at the catch point. Now that he's a corner he's going to be pressing receivers instead of getting off the press, and now if those great ball skills he had as a receiver translate then you could have something because that's why they drafted Xavien Howard so high. That's the rarity, probably the difference between a Jordan Lucas and Xavien Howard. Lippett had a bunch of interceptions if you recall during training camp last year. He didn't have any during games but he only played probably 100 pass snaps. The experience that Lippett had at corner at Michigan State, in practice and in games, also prepared him pretty well for the system Vance Joseph will put him in with the Dolphins.
From the standpoint of Jakeem Grant, Thomas Duarte and Kenyan Drake, it's clear that the front office is letting Adam Gase have a lot of fun with personnel, playing fantasy games. There is nothing wrong with those selections, I've gushed quite a bit about Jakeem Grant and Thomas Duarte specifically, but there is also a theme going on. Gase is an offensive coordinator with a reputation for exploiting rule-based defensive packaging, aligning and assigning by using those established rules to isolate personnel and spacing mismatches. So you give this type of offensive coordinator a bunch of gimmicky mismatch players. It fits.
But I'm glad they showed they can also break their thematic approach to go after players that represented opportunities for them relative to their draft board. Neither Laremy Tunsil nor Leonte Carroo or Brandon Doughty were thematic from a coaching standpoint in the ways that Xavien Howard, Kenyan Drake, Jordan Lucas and Thomas Duarte were. Tunsil was one of their two best players in the entire draft and he fell to pick #13 so they quickly pounced on him. Now they're stuck in a little bit of scramble mode trying to figure out how best to use him, but they accepted that as a problem they will take on in exchange for the talent.
Leonte Carroo does not represent the same kind of gadgety skill set you see in a Jakeem Grant, Thomas Duarte or Kenyan Drake. But was their #2 rated wide receiver in the whole draft, rated above guys like Corey Coleman, Josh Doctson and Will Fuller. The only receiver they had above him was LaQuon Treadwell. Now could have a tough choice to make with respect to Kenny Stills because they selected Carroo, and that's a problem they were willing to take on because the talent was so compelling.
Brandon Doughty very much fits what Adam Gase wants in a quarterback, but he was just as much a nod to Dan Marino as he was Adam Gase, and he was also a player they thought shouldn't have fallen that far. He was still around after 14 quarterbacks got drafted and the Dolphins thought he should've gone above half of them. He wasn't part of the plan. They already had four quarterbacks, and now they're actually going to have to let one go before camp even starts.
So even though I like the coaching themes in this draft, you kind of wonder if the players they're going to have the most success with are going to be the guys they went off the coach theme script in order to get. But that may not be fair because pretty much by definition if a player's value is so compelling that you go off script to take him, he probably should have a higher than normal chance of making it by virtue of the fact his value was so compelling.
ckparrothead
Premium Member
One guy that I specifically can't help but like is Brandon Doughty.
When you get right down to it there isn't a whole lot of difference between Doughty and the guy that went #1 overall. I know that sounds ridiculous but it's defensible.
As I said, Jared Goff has more pure ability to deal with pressure and trash in the pocket, but the thing to keep in mind about that is it doesn't mean that Goff actually did it better than Doughty in college. He just has more ability that way. In college there wasn't anyone in the draft who put the ball on a receiver's hands under pressure more consistently than Doughty.
http://www.milehighreport.com/2016/4/11/11392352/pffs-pre-draft-qb-analysis
On pressured plays, Doughty got a completion or drop ~55% of the time (84 of 153). That was the best in the group, about +1.8 standard deviations above the mean. Goff's percentage was ~47% (75 of 160). The big difference is Goff took a sack ~16% of the pressured plays while Doughty only took one about ~10%. Also on pressured plays, Doughty only got a negative result (sack or interception) ~12% of the time which is about +1.1 standard deviations better than the mean (best in the class). Goff's percentage was 20%. He got sacked more (~16% vs ~10%), he threw interceptions more (~4.4% vs. ~2.2%).
And of course, he was best in the class in success percentage on non-pressure plays. He completed or had dropped 342 passes on 414 drop backs (~83%). This was best in the class and +2.7 standard deviations above the group, nobody else in the group even hit 75% on this mark. But I suppose that goes without saying. When you're accurate, you're accurate. Doughty is clearly accurate and was very good at executing at WKU.
Doughty also on got the ball out quicker than anyone else in the draft class:
And it's not as if he was accurate at only short distances. Consistently, Doughty has been cited by coaches as being especially good throwing the deep ball (30+ yards downfield, and the film bears it out). You can hardly find a hair of difference between Goff and Doughty at all these distances, and the one that stands out is how much better Doughty is on the 30+ yard ball:
Level of competition is clearly an issue, with the C-USA hardly known for good defense. But I will say this. In 2015 he faced decent defenses in Vanderbilt, Southern Miss, LSU, Marshall and South Florida. I think objective observers would call those defenses decent. They certainly qualify from a statistical standpoint. He got good results against them (149 of 226 for 1,775 yards, 15 TDs and 4 INTs; 105 passer rating). And that interception against LSU was not his fault, receiver fell down on the route. He also had a pick against South Florida that wasn't his fault, guy popped it up right off his hands and defender came down with it. I'm not going to back them out of the data (they don't make that much of a difference in the passer rating believe it or not) but considering there are only 4 picks I think it's notable half of them weren't on him. Doughty was better against the crap defenses (239 of 314 for 3,280 yards, 33 TDs and 5 INTs; 137 passer rating), as you'd expect.
The point is he kept a pretty high standard of personal performance even when the defenses got better in 2015. If you're looking at whether Doughty got any better in 2015 than he was in 2014, I think that's the difference. Objectively speaking in 2014 he really only faced two decent defenses, Louisiana Tech and Marshall. He cut through the Marshall defense like a hot knife through butter with an incredible 8 touchdown passes to only 2 interceptions, but he threw only 1 touchdown against La Tech and was intercepted 4 times.
In terms of surrounding cast, you have to give it to Jared Goff, right? Before TE Tyler Higbee was drafted, Western Kentucky hadn't had an offensive player drafted in over a decade. And Higbee missed 5 games this year. Goff had WR Trevor Davis, WR Kenny Lawler and RB Daniel Lascoe all drafted this year and only Lascoe missed games (two of them). I suppose Western Kentucky might get WR Taywan Taylor drafted next year.
As for the system, you can't look at Cal's system, the Air Raid, and then look at Western Kentucky's system which is derived from Petrino's power spread but incorporates a lot of other elements (including a bunch of pro and WCO elements), and say that Doughty's experience was less NFL-translatable. Opposite. I'd take Jeff Brohm on as an NFL offensive coordinator right now. I'm not sure I'd touch Sonny Dykes. Doughty goes through his reads, full field, gets through them in a timely fashion, turns his back to the defense on play-action which is used a ton in that offense, uses the tight end, and his offense isn't 50% screens. I'm not saying that's what you see from Goff but that's the complaint about the Air Raid or even its modifications, basically shotgun four verticals or screen.
Going back to Jared Goff's better physical ability to deal with pressure...let's not pretend Goff is Russell Wilson or Robert Griffin. He's not even Andrew Luck or Carson Wentz. Goff will have to deal with pressure the way that Doughty deals with pressure which is to know the offense and defense inside and out, know what you're doing with the football and get it out of your hands, work within the pocket, etc. Let's not pretend Goff's physical advantages give him extra options. They don't really.
https://3sigmaathlete.com/rankings/qb/
Goff is a -0.6 standard deviation athlete. The argument would be more or less that Doughty being a -1.7 standard deviation athlete means he's going to sink instead of swim at the NFL level. And that is totally valid. It could happen. But it's encouraging that unlike quarterbacks like Christian Hackenberg, Cardale Jones and Jacoby Brissett (the other QBs to enter the AFC East this draft year), he learned to deal with pressure properly in the pocket and he showed that in a college setting. Those other guys never showed it in college, it's something they'll have to develop in the pros. Maybe Doughty fails on this front in the NFL but you won't be able to say it's because he never showed it in the first place. The other guys if they fail to deal with pressure at the NFL level you could hardly act surprised, because they sucked under pressure in college too.
The question to me is whether Brandon Doughty, who probably never trained to be an athlete going all the way back to high school, can actually hit a fancy pro training program and get faster. I'd say that Goff's 4.8 speed is probably about the best he's ever going to get. Is Doughty's 5.2 the best he's ever going to get? I'm not so sure. I do think it's all downhill from here for Goff and his speed/athleticism. These pocket passers get fatter and slower. Remember when Ben Roethlisberger was actually an ideal physical specimen at the position coming out? Now...
https://twitter.com/toremymcl/status/729403703342432256
This is not an exercise in finding every bit of couch cushion rationalization out there to be a Dolphin fan with aqua colored glasses and say man we got a guy better than the #1 overall pick in the 7th round. That's not the mission. This isn't so much compare-and-contrast as it is compare. The point of this is to say that Miami got a deal inasmuch as they got a quarterback in the 7th round who compares favorably to the one taken #1 overall, and that if he ends up a whole lot better than his draft pedigree (top of the 7th round means the NFL doesn't even necessarily think he's a primary backup), you should be able to step back, look at all these things and say well that shouldn't have surprised us that much.
Incidentally if you want to know the game that made me start thinking of Doughty as a legit NFL prospect, this is it. He threw 8 touchdown passes against a defense that to that point had been absolutely dominating the previous 11 opponents. He also threw the 2 point conversion to win the game in overtime, and had two other passes right on the mark that should've been touchdowns. Don't know that I've seen a QB put the ball in the end zone that many times in a game.
[video]https://youtu.be/SBwEcLHyDU4[/video]
Also as I alluded to earlier in the thread this pick was as much a nod to Dan Marino as to Adam Gase. Marino was a particularly strong backer of Doughty's and this year he took a more active role in evaluation of draft players, similar to 2004 which was the year Wayne Huizenga hired Dan to be part of the organization and potentially end up the de facto GM. That year Marino eval'd the quarterbacks and concluded that Miami should do everything they could to try and get Phil Rivers. Of course, this was back toward the Senior Bowl, and at that time Rivers was being considered a borderline 1st/2nd round prospect. Many said he should be 3rd round, that Losman was better, etc. Marino has known Doughty since he was in high school though the relationship wasn't at all a close one. Doughty was friends with a kid that Marino hosted for a year as a foreign exchange student. But Marino took such a shine to Doughty's tape that he personally gave Brandon the tour of the facilities during his visit.
When you get right down to it there isn't a whole lot of difference between Doughty and the guy that went #1 overall. I know that sounds ridiculous but it's defensible.
As I said, Jared Goff has more pure ability to deal with pressure and trash in the pocket, but the thing to keep in mind about that is it doesn't mean that Goff actually did it better than Doughty in college. He just has more ability that way. In college there wasn't anyone in the draft who put the ball on a receiver's hands under pressure more consistently than Doughty.
http://www.milehighreport.com/2016/4/11/11392352/pffs-pre-draft-qb-analysis
On pressured plays, Doughty got a completion or drop ~55% of the time (84 of 153). That was the best in the group, about +1.8 standard deviations above the mean. Goff's percentage was ~47% (75 of 160). The big difference is Goff took a sack ~16% of the pressured plays while Doughty only took one about ~10%. Also on pressured plays, Doughty only got a negative result (sack or interception) ~12% of the time which is about +1.1 standard deviations better than the mean (best in the class). Goff's percentage was 20%. He got sacked more (~16% vs ~10%), he threw interceptions more (~4.4% vs. ~2.2%).
And of course, he was best in the class in success percentage on non-pressure plays. He completed or had dropped 342 passes on 414 drop backs (~83%). This was best in the class and +2.7 standard deviations above the group, nobody else in the group even hit 75% on this mark. But I suppose that goes without saying. When you're accurate, you're accurate. Doughty is clearly accurate and was very good at executing at WKU.
Doughty also on got the ball out quicker than anyone else in the draft class:
And it's not as if he was accurate at only short distances. Consistently, Doughty has been cited by coaches as being especially good throwing the deep ball (30+ yards downfield, and the film bears it out). You can hardly find a hair of difference between Goff and Doughty at all these distances, and the one that stands out is how much better Doughty is on the 30+ yard ball:
Level of competition is clearly an issue, with the C-USA hardly known for good defense. But I will say this. In 2015 he faced decent defenses in Vanderbilt, Southern Miss, LSU, Marshall and South Florida. I think objective observers would call those defenses decent. They certainly qualify from a statistical standpoint. He got good results against them (149 of 226 for 1,775 yards, 15 TDs and 4 INTs; 105 passer rating). And that interception against LSU was not his fault, receiver fell down on the route. He also had a pick against South Florida that wasn't his fault, guy popped it up right off his hands and defender came down with it. I'm not going to back them out of the data (they don't make that much of a difference in the passer rating believe it or not) but considering there are only 4 picks I think it's notable half of them weren't on him. Doughty was better against the crap defenses (239 of 314 for 3,280 yards, 33 TDs and 5 INTs; 137 passer rating), as you'd expect.
The point is he kept a pretty high standard of personal performance even when the defenses got better in 2015. If you're looking at whether Doughty got any better in 2015 than he was in 2014, I think that's the difference. Objectively speaking in 2014 he really only faced two decent defenses, Louisiana Tech and Marshall. He cut through the Marshall defense like a hot knife through butter with an incredible 8 touchdown passes to only 2 interceptions, but he threw only 1 touchdown against La Tech and was intercepted 4 times.
In terms of surrounding cast, you have to give it to Jared Goff, right? Before TE Tyler Higbee was drafted, Western Kentucky hadn't had an offensive player drafted in over a decade. And Higbee missed 5 games this year. Goff had WR Trevor Davis, WR Kenny Lawler and RB Daniel Lascoe all drafted this year and only Lascoe missed games (two of them). I suppose Western Kentucky might get WR Taywan Taylor drafted next year.
As for the system, you can't look at Cal's system, the Air Raid, and then look at Western Kentucky's system which is derived from Petrino's power spread but incorporates a lot of other elements (including a bunch of pro and WCO elements), and say that Doughty's experience was less NFL-translatable. Opposite. I'd take Jeff Brohm on as an NFL offensive coordinator right now. I'm not sure I'd touch Sonny Dykes. Doughty goes through his reads, full field, gets through them in a timely fashion, turns his back to the defense on play-action which is used a ton in that offense, uses the tight end, and his offense isn't 50% screens. I'm not saying that's what you see from Goff but that's the complaint about the Air Raid or even its modifications, basically shotgun four verticals or screen.
Going back to Jared Goff's better physical ability to deal with pressure...let's not pretend Goff is Russell Wilson or Robert Griffin. He's not even Andrew Luck or Carson Wentz. Goff will have to deal with pressure the way that Doughty deals with pressure which is to know the offense and defense inside and out, know what you're doing with the football and get it out of your hands, work within the pocket, etc. Let's not pretend Goff's physical advantages give him extra options. They don't really.
https://3sigmaathlete.com/rankings/qb/
Goff is a -0.6 standard deviation athlete. The argument would be more or less that Doughty being a -1.7 standard deviation athlete means he's going to sink instead of swim at the NFL level. And that is totally valid. It could happen. But it's encouraging that unlike quarterbacks like Christian Hackenberg, Cardale Jones and Jacoby Brissett (the other QBs to enter the AFC East this draft year), he learned to deal with pressure properly in the pocket and he showed that in a college setting. Those other guys never showed it in college, it's something they'll have to develop in the pros. Maybe Doughty fails on this front in the NFL but you won't be able to say it's because he never showed it in the first place. The other guys if they fail to deal with pressure at the NFL level you could hardly act surprised, because they sucked under pressure in college too.
The question to me is whether Brandon Doughty, who probably never trained to be an athlete going all the way back to high school, can actually hit a fancy pro training program and get faster. I'd say that Goff's 4.8 speed is probably about the best he's ever going to get. Is Doughty's 5.2 the best he's ever going to get? I'm not so sure. I do think it's all downhill from here for Goff and his speed/athleticism. These pocket passers get fatter and slower. Remember when Ben Roethlisberger was actually an ideal physical specimen at the position coming out? Now...
https://twitter.com/toremymcl/status/729403703342432256
This is not an exercise in finding every bit of couch cushion rationalization out there to be a Dolphin fan with aqua colored glasses and say man we got a guy better than the #1 overall pick in the 7th round. That's not the mission. This isn't so much compare-and-contrast as it is compare. The point of this is to say that Miami got a deal inasmuch as they got a quarterback in the 7th round who compares favorably to the one taken #1 overall, and that if he ends up a whole lot better than his draft pedigree (top of the 7th round means the NFL doesn't even necessarily think he's a primary backup), you should be able to step back, look at all these things and say well that shouldn't have surprised us that much.
Incidentally if you want to know the game that made me start thinking of Doughty as a legit NFL prospect, this is it. He threw 8 touchdown passes against a defense that to that point had been absolutely dominating the previous 11 opponents. He also threw the 2 point conversion to win the game in overtime, and had two other passes right on the mark that should've been touchdowns. Don't know that I've seen a QB put the ball in the end zone that many times in a game.
[video]https://youtu.be/SBwEcLHyDU4[/video]
Also as I alluded to earlier in the thread this pick was as much a nod to Dan Marino as to Adam Gase. Marino was a particularly strong backer of Doughty's and this year he took a more active role in evaluation of draft players, similar to 2004 which was the year Wayne Huizenga hired Dan to be part of the organization and potentially end up the de facto GM. That year Marino eval'd the quarterbacks and concluded that Miami should do everything they could to try and get Phil Rivers. Of course, this was back toward the Senior Bowl, and at that time Rivers was being considered a borderline 1st/2nd round prospect. Many said he should be 3rd round, that Losman was better, etc. Marino has known Doughty since he was in high school though the relationship wasn't at all a close one. Doughty was friends with a kid that Marino hosted for a year as a foreign exchange student. But Marino took such a shine to Doughty's tape that he personally gave Brandon the tour of the facilities during his visit.
Last edited by a moderator:
EJay
Scout Team
Well done per usual, CK :). Tremendous insight!
The Hound
Practice Squad
Nice work!
Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk
Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk
The Hound
Practice Squad
Great writeup
- Joined
- May 27, 2005
- Messages
- 24,396
- Reaction score
- 32,726
Nice write-up CK. Nice to know that Dan Marino was part of the process.
Tks CK...I don't know if Doughty will make it or not...but I do know the major reason quarterbacks don't make it at the pro level is the accuracy required at the NFL level...that doesn't appear to be his downfall.
ckparrothead
Premium Member
If he fails it won't be accuracy. You can watch game after game of his and he's throwing 40 to 60 passes in the game, and you can count the number of pure misses on one hand. Probably 90 to 95 percent of the balls he throws go where he wants them to go, depending on his mixture of deep throws that particular game, and depending on how much he's throwing under pressure. If he's not pressured and he's not taking an abnormally high number of shots down the field, I think he throws catchable balls at over 95 percent.
That's not to say he's never throwing deep. You should always keep in mind that he's one of the most productive deep throwers in college football.
01. Brandon Doughty had the most 50+ yard pass plays (15) in the NCAA in 2015
02. Brandon Doughty had the 5th most 50+ yard pass plays (9) in the NCAA in 2014
03. Brandon Doughty had the 3rd most 40+ yard pass plays (21) in the NCAA in 2015
04. Brandon Doughty had the 4th most 40+ yard pass plays (16) in the NCAA in 2015
05. Brandon Doughty had the most 30+ yard pass plays (40) in the NCAA in 2015
06. Brandon Doughty had the 3rd most 30+ yard pass plays (32) in the NCAA in 2015
07. Brandon Doughty had the most 20+ yard pass plays (75) in the NCAA in 2015
08. Brandon Doughty had the most 20+ yard pass plays (74) in the NCAA in 2015
09. Brandon Doughty had the most 10+ yard pass plays (187) in the NCAA in 2015
10. Brandon Doughty had the 2nd most 10+ yard pass plays (185) in the NCAA in 2015
So like I said if he fails it won't be accuracy or the consistency of his mechanics that produce accuracy over a sample. If he fails, it's just going to be that he couldn't handle the speed or complexity of the game, couldn't hack it physically in an NFL pocket.
That's not to say he's never throwing deep. You should always keep in mind that he's one of the most productive deep throwers in college football.
01. Brandon Doughty had the most 50+ yard pass plays (15) in the NCAA in 2015
02. Brandon Doughty had the 5th most 50+ yard pass plays (9) in the NCAA in 2014
03. Brandon Doughty had the 3rd most 40+ yard pass plays (21) in the NCAA in 2015
04. Brandon Doughty had the 4th most 40+ yard pass plays (16) in the NCAA in 2015
05. Brandon Doughty had the most 30+ yard pass plays (40) in the NCAA in 2015
06. Brandon Doughty had the 3rd most 30+ yard pass plays (32) in the NCAA in 2015
07. Brandon Doughty had the most 20+ yard pass plays (75) in the NCAA in 2015
08. Brandon Doughty had the most 20+ yard pass plays (74) in the NCAA in 2015
09. Brandon Doughty had the most 10+ yard pass plays (187) in the NCAA in 2015
10. Brandon Doughty had the 2nd most 10+ yard pass plays (185) in the NCAA in 2015
So like I said if he fails it won't be accuracy or the consistency of his mechanics that produce accuracy over a sample. If he fails, it's just going to be that he couldn't handle the speed or complexity of the game, couldn't hack it physically in an NFL pocket.
Tks for the great data and insight on Doughty CK.
It would be great if this team could strike gold on a late round QB pick as either a hedge on Tannehill taking the next step...or as valuable trade bait if Ryan does fully arrive.
I'm a believer in always having a young prospect your high on in development and always looking for late round potential at QB.
Green Bay and others have profited well in the past with this philosophy.
It would be great if this team could strike gold on a late round QB pick as either a hedge on Tannehill taking the next step...or as valuable trade bait if Ryan does fully arrive.
I'm a believer in always having a young prospect your high on in development and always looking for late round potential at QB.
Green Bay and others have profited well in the past with this philosophy.
- Joined
- May 27, 2005
- Messages
- 24,396
- Reaction score
- 32,726
Not about to compare him with Brady, but accuracy was Tom's ticket to the NFL and the primary reason for his continued success.