I'm no NFL expert, but I really find this interesting. With all the hype over quarterbacks in college this year, and the Heisman and everything, prolific Big XII offenses, etc... I got to thinking about how that translates to the NFL. Sam Bradford, for example...I predict he'll be yet ANOTHER Heisman bust. For all the great, highly touted QB's that play in college every year...there sure are some obscure players who end up starting at the next level who seemingly beat out your guys from Texas, SC, Oklahoma, Florida, etc etc etc.

SEA - Matt Hasselbeck (Not a terribly highly touted college QB from Boston College, has developed into a very good pro).

SF - Who the hell is even starting for them right now? It sure isn't former top pick Alex Smith from Utah (Utah??).

STL - Marc Bulger (so I guess he had a nice career at WVU...but I don't remember seeing him on Sportscenter a whole lot).

ARI - Kurt Warner (We all know his story...and we also know a former Heisman winner from USC who is half his age currently warms the bench for him).

SD - Philip Rivers (Good college career at NC State, but never in the Heisman running as far as I can recall).

DEN - Jay Cutler (Very good in college and doing a nice job for the Broncos...but he played at Vandy for crying out loud!)

KC - Tyler Thigpen (Never heard of this guy, nor his school - Coastal Carolina - for that matter...starting ahead of a UW Husky and a 'Bama QB)

OAK - JaMarcus Russell (Here's a guy who was hyped in college in a great program at LSU and went #1 in the draft...and his team is f*cking terrible).

GB - Aaron Rodgers (Fell in the draft after starring at Cal, backed up Favre, finally getting his chance and doing OK. Not much to really say good or bad).

CHI - Kyle Orton / Rex Grossman (Purdue & Florida...good football schools...but neither of these guys can take the starting job for their own).

DET - Jon Kitna? (Or is it some other guy now? Either way, Kitna started there for a while. Does anybody here besides me know where Central Washington University is? Didn't think so).

MIN - Tarvaris Jackson / Gus Frerotte (I never heard of either of these guys when they were in college - Alabama State / Tulsa).

PIT - Ben Roethlesberger (Great in college from what I remember, and doing well for the Steelers...so why did he end up at Miami of Ohio?)

CLE - Brady Quinn / Derek Anderson (Notre Dame and Oregon State...neither have really established themselves in Cleveland, even if Anderson did make a Pro Bowl...I feel like Quinn is getting special treatment just cause he's the hometown boy and a Golden Domer. In other words, I like Anderson better)

CIN - Carson Palmer (OK, here's an exception to the USC / Heisman thing...though his team has fallen apart)

BAL - Joe Flacco (Raise your hand if you followed this guy in college or even heard his name before the first mock drafts came out...and be honest! He played college football in the state of Delaware "Hi...I'm in...Delaware" and oh by the way, he starts ahead of a Heisman winner from Ohio State)

ATL - Matt Ryan (Another exception to the high draft pick / college hype scenario...he's playing really well out of Boston College)

TB - Jeff Garcia (San Jose State...undrafted...yeah, I'd never heard of him before the NFL either)

CAR - Jake Delhomme (Lousiana-Lafayette - aka Southwestern Louisiana - ...undrafted...yeah, I'd never heard of him before the NFL either)

NO - Drew Brees (Nice career at Purdue and killing it in the NFL...2nd round pick)

JAX - David Garrard (East Carolina...and be honest, you never heard of them either until they beat V-Tech and WVU to open this season)

IND - Peyton Manning (Another exception from Tennessee)

TEN - Kerry Collins (Penn State...great football school...but this guy has bounced around the league like a damn pinball)

HOU - Matt Schaub (U of Virginia. At least he's getting better pass protection than David Carr ever did).

DAL - Tony Romo (Eastern Illinois...put him on the Lions roster and he's A. not dating Jessica Simpson, and B. you've never heard of him either, and C. certainly not doing commercials for Sportscenter. Fuck the Cowboys.).

NYG - Eli Manning (Had some college hype and a nice career at Ole Miss...high draft pick...got a ring last year. OK, so another exception).

WAS - Jason Campbell (Unproven, but he is from a good program - usually good anyway - at Auburn)

PHI - Donovan McNabb (Good pro career and he was well known at Syracuse, too...but they haven't exactly been a football factory as of late)

NWE - Matt Cassel / Tom Brady (Undrafted from USC / 6th round pick from Michigan...two good QB's from two great football schools...who nobody ever heard of until they got to Foxborough)

MIA - Chad Pennington (Nice college career, but Marshall was Division II when he got there)

NYJ - Brett Favre (Legendary pro career...but quick, somebody name another NFL player from Southern Miss!)

BUF - Trent Edwards (Stanford has had a good QB or two in its day and it's too early to make a call on his pro career)

OK, so my point is that there's all this hype around players (QB's, mostly) from big-time programs but they RARELY develop into successful pros. The list above only has a handful of QB's who are playing well and are from top-notch football schools. I just find it really interesting.

<rant>

I hope Graham Harrell has a great NFL career and Bradford/McCoy/Tebow can suck it. Those guys are all great players, but Harrell got screwed by the Heisman system and it's simply because of the fact that he plays at Texas Tech. Note to Heisman voters...look at the list above. A player does NOT have to be from a historically great football school to win the Heisman. And they certainly don't have to come from a football factory school to start in the NFL.

</rant>

NYE - Matt Cassel / Tom Brady (Undrafted from USC / 6th round pick from Michigan...two good QB's from two great football schools...who nobody ever heard of until they got to Foxborough)

Also, figure that Cassel played behind two great QBs at USC and Cassel is finding more success in the NFL than the two.

Palmer was actually doing fantastic before he blew his knee out, but can't argue with Cassel outperforming Leinart.

And I think I should add the Heisman is a college award, based solely on what a player did in college, not on pro prospects.

*Booty is who he was referring to, I believe.

Yes - agreed - the Heisman is a college award. But it's also pretty gay to give the award to the QB of Oklahoma this year...a team absolutely LOADED with talent. Whereas a guy like Graham Harrell did more with less, in my opinion, and didn't even get invited to the ceremony.

Cassel never backed up Booty though.

Yeah you shouldn't think that a Heisman winner (or any College Award) will translate the same into the pros.

Oops...NWE, not NYE. My mistake.

wrong, Schaub played for the Virginia Cavaliers. maybe you confused him with Matt Mauck or Matt Flynn.

anyway regarding Harrell, let's not forget he had the best WR in college football to throw to. not to mention he plays for one of the best/smartest coaches in college football and had 5 whole years to absorb everything in his system. most tech QBs get a year or 2 max to start there and always put up gaudy stats. lastly, Harrell had the assistance of a decent rushing attack, something novel since Leach's arrival, as well as a good D.

i really don't want to take much away from the guy, however big a douche he may be (is), but this year he had the fortune of playing on the best tech team overall in years, if not ever. he possesses many assets that matter the most in being a successful NFL QB: intelligence and adaptability to schemes, decent arm strength, deadly accuracy, and the ability to keep his offense on the field. a glaring weakness would be how he performs when a defense can get a good pass rush, as exemplified in the assraping by ou. he looked like a totally different player once he was rattled and never recovered til far too late. he's still the best tech QB ever by a lot and would prob get more attention had he played for a true big-name school, so i'll give you that. doesn't help though that he had to split Heisman/national attention with Crabtree.

Schaub was pretty good in college, too.

Thank you...my mistake and yes, I confused him with another Matt. Will fix.

He's getting special treatment because he's not shitty Derek Anderson.

FYI:


Kerry has certainly bounced around quite a bit...5-6 teams?...but I just wanted to add that he was very highly touted coming out of PSU. He won many awards and was fourth in the Heisman voting and was the 5th pick in the draft...albeit 15 years ago, but I just wanted to include his college credentials.

I agree with the assessment about college QBs in the NFL. It seems the no-namers shine and the big names crash. Any theories on why?

Harrell also plays in an offense that lets him throw the ball 50-60 times a game. They've gone games where Shannon Woods might get two or three carries... period. Harrell is a great QB, but there isn't an offense in the history of football that's set up to allow a QB to succeed like Tech's. Look at the guys they've had that've ripped the fuck out of the league. Sonny Cumbie, BJ Symons, Kliff Kingsbury, Cody Hodges... you don't believe me, look at some of the ridiculous stats those guys posted, and you tell me how good you really think those guys were. They were all system QBs because the system is QB-heavy.

And yeah, OU is better than Tech and has more talent, but it's not like Tech is hurting for offensive firepower. That team is pretty damn loaded, they're just not as "mainstream" as OU. Leach has been building there for quite awhile.

And nice unbiased account of Romo, there

Translation: Jake Locker will be better than most of them in the pros.

OK, now that that joke's out of the way, I don't know why this is surprising you enough to start a thread about it, Bammer. It's a well established fact that NFL defenses are much quicker and stronger than in the college game, and as such that opens up the playbook for a wide array of offenses that can perfectly accommodate certain QBs where it wouldn't in the pros.

Another NFL thread? There must be room for at least 2000 more.

Well it started because I thought Harrell (and other guys like Crabtree, Maclin, Daniel) got screwed out of the Heisman process just because they don't play for powerhouse football factories like Oklahoma or USC. For Harrell not to make the trip to New York is a slap in the face. And Bradford didn't deserve it, in my opinion. He has great stats, but to me he's not the best player in college football. I would have voted for McCoy or Tebow over Bradford if those were my only choices. They DO more. Not just stand there, look pretty, and toss it to a wide open Jermaine Gresham.

Anyway...I digress. Then it got me thinking about how all these players who win the Heisman end up going nowhere in the pros, and half the starting QB's in the NFL are people that you really never heard of in college.

So....A) It was a rant about Bradford and the Heisman "hype", and B) It was an observation of NFL QB's and the fact that so many of them come from no-name schools...struck me as interesting.

I think it was insulting to Harrell that he wasn't invited, and I think they should have invited a fifth player as well, either Shonn Green or Crabtree.

This topic definitely has validity, but then if you look at the all time great quarterbacks a slightly different image emerges

Dan Marino: Pittsburgh. Early Heisman Candidate before a host of things almost destroyed him.
John Elway: Stanford. 2nd Place in Heisman Voting
Joe Montana: Notre Dame.
Fran Tarkenton: Georgia.
Dan Fouts: Oregon.
Steve Young: Bringham Young. 2nd Place in Heisman Voting
Bart Starr: Alabama.
Troy Aikman: Oklahoma and UCLA. 3rd in Heisman Voting
Jim Kelly: Miami.
Roger Staubach: Navy. Heisman Winner
Archie Manning: Ole Miss. 4th in Heisman Voting
Johnny Unitas: Louisville.
Joe Namath: Alabama.

Yes, only one winner there, but a whole lot of premiere college athletes. Seems worth a shot for the opportunity to get one of these guys.

I was factoring injuries...how can't you, specially in the NFL...it's all about staying healthy and efficient.