Previewing the Combine: The Quarterbacks The annual rite of passage is upon us: The NFL Scouting Combine. In just over a week over 300 hopeful NFL players will descend upon Indianapolis to participate in perhaps the world’s strangest job interview process. For the quarterbacks, the process is relatively simple. They’ll take to the podium and…
Four year starters aren’t as common as they used in college football. Players are leaving school early more and more with each passing year. Some teams, when it comes to the draft, value experience higher than others. After enrolling at USC in the spring of 2015, Cameron Smith became a starter that fall and refused…
Offensive linemen are often the forgotten men. In a game where statistics and accolades can draw your attention toward certain players, it is often those that do the blocking for the guys racking up the statistics who go unnoticed. However, it’s difficult not to notice Northern Illinois offensive tackle Max Scharping (#73) and not just…
If you were asked to build a football player he would end up looking like Josh Allen (#41). He didn’t always look this way. He was lightly recruited out of high school, until his senior season he was mainly a wide receiver, and he was an all-state selection as a junior. As a senior, he…
Very long and very short can both be used to describe the tenure of Rodney Anderson (#24) as a football player at the University of Oklahoma. A 4 star recruit out of Katy, Texas, Anderson arrived in Norman in 2015 after choosing the Sooners over many other highly touted programs and came ready to hit…
Before I start writing and you start reading, let us bow our heads in a moment of silence for our fantasy football cohorts who drafted Le’Veon Bell in the first round this year. Though Week 11 is here and it’s time to start preparing for the playoffs, we should be grateful we are not one…
After taking a sabbatical to cover the Brownsian fall of Hue Jackson, it’s back to fantasy football in Week 10. Last week saw a plethora of fantasy story-lines from Julio Jones’ first touchdown, to the potential emergence of total wildcard Nick Mullens, to the long awaited re-emergence of Duke Johnson. This week I’ll be looking…
Week 8 takes us to the halfway point in the fantasy football season. Thus far the Rams, Steelers, and Chiefs have been the most fertile grounds for fantasy points. While the Bills, Cardinals, and 49ers have proven themselves too volatile to trust. I do not fault these 3 teams, as injuries and rookie errors have…
Week 7 in the fantasy football season finds Green Bay, Pittsburgh, Oakland, and Seattle all on their bye weeks. Bad news for Rodgers and Roethlesberger owners, perhaps good news for Derek Carr and Amari Cooper owners. At least they’ll be spared the aggravation. Raiders jokes aside, it’s not just Rodgers and Roethlesberger; James Conner, Antonio Brown,…
Week 5 was another strange week in the NFL. Graham Gano kicked a game winning 63 yard field goal, Greg Joseph kicked the ugliest game winning field goal in recent memory, and one of the NFL’s best kickers, Mason Crosby, missed 5 kicks against the Lions. The Jets running game rose from the ashes, the…
In 2017, the Oklahoma State offense was a machine that marched up and down the field at will. Quarterback Mason Rudolph and wide receivers James Washington and Marcel Ateman are gone this year. However, a key cog to the machine remains this year. Running back Justice Hill exploded onto the scene in 2016 by leading all FBS freshman in rushing with 1,142 yards. He would follow that up in 2017…
On the day of the kickoff for the 2018 NFL season, I’m pleased to present the 3rd edition of my NFL Roster Valuation model. Please throw your stones and hurl your insults now! For those not familiar with the previous iterations, the goal of my roster assessment isn’t to fall in line with others that…
Most season previews are rendered meaningless weeks, even days, after publishing. But our approach to a season preview doesn’t have the goal of predicting exactly what will happen. The ultimate goal is to lay out a template of what COULD happen based on the information we have available. That way any fan could jump into…
The wide receiver corps is usually one of the most diverse position groups on a football team. It’s one of the only positions where 5-foot-9, 180 pound slot and return specialists are training with 6-foot-4, 225 pound red zone targets. In the case of the Miami (OH) Redhawks, head coach Chuck Martin and his staff…
Versatility means everything in football. Being a player that can assume multiple roles and attack from anywhere on the field at the safety position can keep offensive coordinators up the whole night before a game. We saw it in the 2018 NFL Draft with Minkah Fitzpatrick, arguably the most versatile defender in the draft, being…
“You know nothing Mark Schofield.” Let’s just pretend this whole piece did not happen, okay? NEVER HAPPENED. If you were a quarterback prospect in the 2018 NFL Draft season on Friday night, or a draft analyst who stakes his career on analyzing quarterback prospects, Friday evening was a long…long night. After five quarterbacks came off…