BipolarFuk
Demoted
- Joined
- Apr 7, 2013
- Messages
- 11,464
Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones has long been known for the twinkle in his eye at the mere thought of making a draft splash. He’s the guy at your fourth of July party who loudly announces his coming splashdown, then cannonballs onto the inflatable glazed donut with sprinkles.
That’s his favorite draft party trick, and everything works out just fine when the Cowboys’ success as a brand is also connected to their success as a football team. In the 2016 NFL draft both of those sometimes competing interests worked together in perfect harmony.
The latest example of Jones’ willingness to chill poolside and let the party come to him was his patience at quarterback while waiting to choose Dak Prescott. He now slides into an ideal situation to grow, learn and develop, before possibly becoming Tony Romo’s successor.
Prescott was selected with the Cowboys’ late fourth-round pick (135th overall), which meant that Jones wisely stuck to a blueprint laid out long before names started tumbling from draft boards. That earned him an A+ grade from Bleacher Report's Matt Miller:
Back in February Jones told ESPN.com’s Todd Archer he plans to call Romo his quarterback for the next four-to-five years. That’s a comically unrealistic statement about a 36-year-old who has busted the same collarbone three times, and only played four games in 2015.
But even if Jones' long-term projections for Romo are misguided, the short-term approach at quarterback in this draft was the right one.
Dallas had multiple other glaring needs with their fourth overall pick, and both Carson Wentz and Jared Goff were always going to be long gone. So if Romo can stay healthy for a few more seasons, the logical plan was to wait and draft a developmental project.
Jones hinted strongly at that path when he spoke to Katie Hairopoulos of the Dallas Morning News. He said drafting a quarterback was “certainly not a high enough priority to make a bad decision or a forced decision.”
And the Cowboys didn’t make a bad decision or a forced decision. Instead, they made the right decision.
The Cowboys did what the New York Jets are attempting with Christian Hackenberg. They selected a prospect with enough promising tools to make talent evaluators excited and intrigued. They also selected a prospect with enough flaws to fuel concerns about his development trajectory, and ability to succeed at the next level.
The difference? They did it 84 picks later, an area of the draft when you’re supposed to begin the next project with your project quarterback.
That’s when risk is sufficiently mitigated with a sparkling yet raw prospect. And as Miller noted, that’s when you find value for your high-ceiling potential successor to a four-time Pro Bowler:
An uncertain future lies ahead for Romo. Sure, he’s still under contract through 2019, which will be his age-39 season. But the accumulated dings of football are turning into dents. In addition to those three collarbone injuries, Romo also needed back surgery in 2014.
However, since the supply of top-tier quarterbacks doesn’t come remotely close to meeting the demand, Jones has little choice but to keep whispering sweet nothings into Romo’s ear while trotting him out.
The depth chart behind him needed some youthful promise and a safety net, though, as prior to Saturday only Kellen Moore and Jameill Showers were listed behind the battered Romo. There was no place to put your hope and wishful thinking.
Now Prescott will gladly take it.
He’ll take it all, because Day 3 quarterback picks are nothing without a whole lot of hope, and a foundation of talent that can be massaged into something great. The Cowboys were long overdue to have someone who meets that description on their roster. They’ve drafted the fewest quarterbacks since 1989, according to ESPN’s Ed Werder:
In Prescott they have a multi-tooled talent who has often been attached to a famous college name for the right reasons, and for the wrong reasons. The name? Tim Tebow.
Like Tebow, Prescott is a tremendously gifted athlete. He has the chiselled upper body to withstand punishment, and the agility to create missed tackles in the open field.
He was named a first-team All SEC player twice at Mississippi State. He did that while joining Tebow to become one of only two players in conference history to lead their teams in both rushing and passing during consecutive seasons. You can look at pretty much any major statistical category from those years and feel your jaw involuntarily drop.
Between 2014 and 2015 Prescott threw 56 touchdown passes with only 16 interceptions. He also averaged 3,621 passing yards in those years, and 8.3 yards per attempt. Then as a runner he scored 41 touchdowns throughout his college career, all while averaging 630 rushing yards per season, peaking at 986 yards in 2014.
Which brings us to another Tebow name drop. Alongside Tebow, he’s the only other player in SEC history to exceed 60 TD passes, 40 TD runs, 8,500 passing yards and 2,000 rushing yards, according to Dane Brugler and Rob Rang of CBSSports.com.
Then there’s the bad Tebow parallel, and the reason why Prescott became a Day 3 project. But if you trust the opinion of a talent evaluator legend like Gil Brandt (and you should), the bad isn’t quite that bad with Prescott.
Prescott is an accurate thrower at times, and sprays balls at others.
That inconsistency rises to the surface when he faces pressure. He becomes sensitive to any pocket traffic, and fights the desire to flee. Pro Football Focus gave him a -7.0 grade when facing disruption in the pocket during the 2015 season, with John Breitenbach also observing that Prescott’s falling interception total was partly due to a favorable dance with lady luck. He threw just five interceptions during his final college season, but was helped when defenders dropped 11 wayward balls.
His downfall as a passer lies in consistency, and less so in technique. Although he lacks some polish and comes with rawness—as any fourth-round quarterback does—Prescott provides a much better skill base to work with as a passer.
“He has enough natural arm strength and hip snap to fit throws into an NFL window,” wrote NFL.com’s Lance Zierlein in his scouting report. “He stands tall and delivers a tight spiral with over-*the*-top delivery. Has very little wind*up and gets the ball out with the flick of a wrist. When the pocket is clean, he can deliver accurate strikes around the field.”
He needs to clean up his mechanics a bit, making them more repeatable under duress. And overall he needs to become more refined as passer.
Sounds like Tebow still, doesn’t it? Sure, until you watch film and see the more coachable traits Prescott provides. Eventually, you’ll see Prescott the same way Cowboys offensive coordinator Scott Linehan does.
“He has great ability to ascend at the position,” Linehan told KRLD-FM Radio in Dallas, via Eric Prisbell of USA Today. “He did unbelievable things in college.”
The Cowboys desperately needed both short-term insurance behind Romo, and a long-term answer once he fades away. That’s why they were aggressive initially, and tried to trade back into the first round for Paxton Lynch, according to Ian Rapoport.
But after that failed they saw the swift drop in talent at the position, and waited. Then they waited some more.
Eventually they found a dynamic quarterback who can, at worst, be a high-upside option if Romo breaks again. Then in two or three years time he could also grow to become an offensive cornerstone.
That’s his favorite draft party trick, and everything works out just fine when the Cowboys’ success as a brand is also connected to their success as a football team. In the 2016 NFL draft both of those sometimes competing interests worked together in perfect harmony.
The latest example of Jones’ willingness to chill poolside and let the party come to him was his patience at quarterback while waiting to choose Dak Prescott. He now slides into an ideal situation to grow, learn and develop, before possibly becoming Tony Romo’s successor.
Prescott was selected with the Cowboys’ late fourth-round pick (135th overall), which meant that Jones wisely stuck to a blueprint laid out long before names started tumbling from draft boards. That earned him an A+ grade from Bleacher Report's Matt Miller:
Back in February Jones told ESPN.com’s Todd Archer he plans to call Romo his quarterback for the next four-to-five years. That’s a comically unrealistic statement about a 36-year-old who has busted the same collarbone three times, and only played four games in 2015.
But even if Jones' long-term projections for Romo are misguided, the short-term approach at quarterback in this draft was the right one.
Dallas had multiple other glaring needs with their fourth overall pick, and both Carson Wentz and Jared Goff were always going to be long gone. So if Romo can stay healthy for a few more seasons, the logical plan was to wait and draft a developmental project.
Jones hinted strongly at that path when he spoke to Katie Hairopoulos of the Dallas Morning News. He said drafting a quarterback was “certainly not a high enough priority to make a bad decision or a forced decision.”
And the Cowboys didn’t make a bad decision or a forced decision. Instead, they made the right decision.
The Cowboys did what the New York Jets are attempting with Christian Hackenberg. They selected a prospect with enough promising tools to make talent evaluators excited and intrigued. They also selected a prospect with enough flaws to fuel concerns about his development trajectory, and ability to succeed at the next level.
The difference? They did it 84 picks later, an area of the draft when you’re supposed to begin the next project with your project quarterback.
That’s when risk is sufficiently mitigated with a sparkling yet raw prospect. And as Miller noted, that’s when you find value for your high-ceiling potential successor to a four-time Pro Bowler:
An uncertain future lies ahead for Romo. Sure, he’s still under contract through 2019, which will be his age-39 season. But the accumulated dings of football are turning into dents. In addition to those three collarbone injuries, Romo also needed back surgery in 2014.
However, since the supply of top-tier quarterbacks doesn’t come remotely close to meeting the demand, Jones has little choice but to keep whispering sweet nothings into Romo’s ear while trotting him out.
The depth chart behind him needed some youthful promise and a safety net, though, as prior to Saturday only Kellen Moore and Jameill Showers were listed behind the battered Romo. There was no place to put your hope and wishful thinking.
Now Prescott will gladly take it.
He’ll take it all, because Day 3 quarterback picks are nothing without a whole lot of hope, and a foundation of talent that can be massaged into something great. The Cowboys were long overdue to have someone who meets that description on their roster. They’ve drafted the fewest quarterbacks since 1989, according to ESPN’s Ed Werder:
In Prescott they have a multi-tooled talent who has often been attached to a famous college name for the right reasons, and for the wrong reasons. The name? Tim Tebow.
Like Tebow, Prescott is a tremendously gifted athlete. He has the chiselled upper body to withstand punishment, and the agility to create missed tackles in the open field.
He was named a first-team All SEC player twice at Mississippi State. He did that while joining Tebow to become one of only two players in conference history to lead their teams in both rushing and passing during consecutive seasons. You can look at pretty much any major statistical category from those years and feel your jaw involuntarily drop.
Between 2014 and 2015 Prescott threw 56 touchdown passes with only 16 interceptions. He also averaged 3,621 passing yards in those years, and 8.3 yards per attempt. Then as a runner he scored 41 touchdowns throughout his college career, all while averaging 630 rushing yards per season, peaking at 986 yards in 2014.
Which brings us to another Tebow name drop. Alongside Tebow, he’s the only other player in SEC history to exceed 60 TD passes, 40 TD runs, 8,500 passing yards and 2,000 rushing yards, according to Dane Brugler and Rob Rang of CBSSports.com.
Then there’s the bad Tebow parallel, and the reason why Prescott became a Day 3 project. But if you trust the opinion of a talent evaluator legend like Gil Brandt (and you should), the bad isn’t quite that bad with Prescott.
Prescott is an accurate thrower at times, and sprays balls at others.
That inconsistency rises to the surface when he faces pressure. He becomes sensitive to any pocket traffic, and fights the desire to flee. Pro Football Focus gave him a -7.0 grade when facing disruption in the pocket during the 2015 season, with John Breitenbach also observing that Prescott’s falling interception total was partly due to a favorable dance with lady luck. He threw just five interceptions during his final college season, but was helped when defenders dropped 11 wayward balls.
His downfall as a passer lies in consistency, and less so in technique. Although he lacks some polish and comes with rawness—as any fourth-round quarterback does—Prescott provides a much better skill base to work with as a passer.
“He has enough natural arm strength and hip snap to fit throws into an NFL window,” wrote NFL.com’s Lance Zierlein in his scouting report. “He stands tall and delivers a tight spiral with over-*the*-top delivery. Has very little wind*up and gets the ball out with the flick of a wrist. When the pocket is clean, he can deliver accurate strikes around the field.”
He needs to clean up his mechanics a bit, making them more repeatable under duress. And overall he needs to become more refined as passer.
Sounds like Tebow still, doesn’t it? Sure, until you watch film and see the more coachable traits Prescott provides. Eventually, you’ll see Prescott the same way Cowboys offensive coordinator Scott Linehan does.
“He has great ability to ascend at the position,” Linehan told KRLD-FM Radio in Dallas, via Eric Prisbell of USA Today. “He did unbelievable things in college.”
The Cowboys desperately needed both short-term insurance behind Romo, and a long-term answer once he fades away. That’s why they were aggressive initially, and tried to trade back into the first round for Paxton Lynch, according to Ian Rapoport.
But after that failed they saw the swift drop in talent at the position, and waited. Then they waited some more.
Eventually they found a dynamic quarterback who can, at worst, be a high-upside option if Romo breaks again. Then in two or three years time he could also grow to become an offensive cornerstone.
