“Let the experts handle it” - I have found out the tough way, no matter how many pre season games I watch, no matter how many two -a -days I attend (6 this year, if your counting), I still know nothing compared to NFL scouts. I imagine my advising the Giants would be like watching Jackie Chan explain to Daniel Day Lewis how to get into character. ”More kung fu Danny, less bulging forehead vain Danny.” Still I am not alone, check out the Giants message boards or the comments section on this blog, hell just call my buddy quin and he will wax poetic about  Buffalo’s Fred Jackson or James Hardy, if you could bother to listen (bills are actually underrated, but still, no playoffs in how long? - to lazy to look it up).

At some point we all consider ourselves a scouting version of George Young or Ernie Accorsi or Shemy Shembeckler (I googled one of these - guess which). How many times have you told a buddy how good a kid was based on one pre-season game? As though all the tape and college games that scouts attended were wasted time compared to the 12 plays you saw sitting on your couch at home wearing a Michael Strahan Jersey. I watched one play in 2005 to know Brandon Jacobs was going to be the next Jim Brown (obviously I was right). 

It is the summer, we pine for football, we overanalyze minicamp highlights on local news networks (in 2004 I was convinced Eli was a bust due to one highlight ESPN news played on a loop for 8 hours straight). I clamor for any practice highlights, any college game tape (a new feature thanks to al gore’s internet), any blog that mentions 6th round pick Robert Henderson (thank you Ralph Vacciano for reporting he was cut, and that he was a 7th round pick -wrong its 6th). And then somewhere along the way it happens, I transform, after watching the same highlights over and over again, after reading ScoutsInc.com, after going to Albany to see practice, after all work and no football makes me a moron, I turn into a babbling idiot who actually believes he knows what it is to scout. 

A moron who knows what it is to do something someone gets paid year round to do. An imbecile, who knows what it is to travel the country scouring game tape, scouring practices, scouring games to find that one kid who will become a star. Or perhaps due to the void of NFL action I actually lose my mind, here is the evidence, you be the judge.

In 2005 I found Jonas Seawright, a stud rookie free agent tackle from North Carolina at 6′5” weighing in at 330 pounds. I could only compare him to another immovable object, the 8th wonder of the world, Andre the Giant. Seawright or as I nicknamed him “The Manitee” (don’t judge me, it would have caught on) was set to dominate like John Randle, only much bigger and less talented. Three years later I wonder what happened to the Legend of Jonas Seawright - waived in 07′.

A similar thing happened in 2007 with an unsigned rookie free agent from Auburn. He was a lanky receiver with “Plaxico like” intangibles (a word that might get Vernon Gholston in some trouble too), his name, Anthony Mix. He wowed me with size (6′5” 235),  he wowed me with his leaping ability and he wowed me with his speed. Finally, he wowed me a couple months later, when he too, was waived.

In 2003 Rod Babers had me at hello, no that’s awful, but he did look quick in his backpedal. I mentioned it to Paul Schwartz of the NY Post (let it be known that I do not know Paul Schwartz, but I decided the scruffy man I made the comment to looked an awful lot like the pic I see of him in the post), Paul quickly agreed, of course he also told me Cornelius Griffin was the strength and conditioning coach and that Matt Bryant was a ballboy.  Babers left camp before the first round of cuts, then was asked to come back (Ha!  - I knew it), then officially got cut a week later (doh!).

Frank Walker, Ataveus Cash, Conrad Hamilton, Johnnie Harris, Wesly Mallard, Scott Galyon, Byron Frisch, Derek Dorris, Ryan Clark, Darnell Dinkins (who my buddy gshep aptly nicknamed ”the mayor”)  Chase Blackburn and James Butler are just some of the players I have overhyped through the years. To my credit, some of these guys caught on, including Butler and Blackburn, although Chase’s biggest highlight is being the 12th man on the field in Superbowl 42 (look I’m a scout not a special teams coach dammit).

I admit I have failed more then I have succeeded, and if I approached Jerry Reese with this rag tag group he would probably chuckle.  So that’s it NFL, I suck, ok? Is that what you want to here? Is that what you want me to say? That I could never be a scout? Well here is my vow -  You won’t see me on any blogs hyping some unknown any longer, you have proved me to be the idiot I am.  I am no longer holding my breath on DJ Hall, I will not let you know how phenomenal Brandon London looked in  camp (truly phenomenal - just saying).

I will not mention that Wallace Gilberry has a chance at defensive end (undersized, but with a great motor - what? I am just mentioning it), and that Dave Tollefson will get 6 sacks this year (that’s a reach, but the guy is underrated - ok ok that’s it). No, this year I will leave it to the experts, this year its all you NFL. Your smart, I’m dumb. Your manly, I get nervous when I see a man attending a movie alone…I get it.

Although, back in 2003 my brother, who lives in San Diego, called me to let me know about a kid that played basketball for Eastern Michigan, and was lighting it up in the pre-season. My response  -  ”bwwaaaahhhh - please, what do you know? The chargers? That’s funny, not gonna hold my breath.” I wish I had held my breath (well maybe not, that seems utterly ridiculous) but that kid turned out to be Antonio Gates, and my brother is now convinced he should be a scout (let it be known that he loved Ryan Leaf and would have drafted Donyell Marshall ahead of Grant Hill). Still, he brags, and rightly so.  I emailed him the day after I got back from Giants camp -  ”look out for Kenny Phillips, I see pro bowl, THIS… YEAR …JERK!”  Let the experts handle it next year.

ShareThis