The Consigliere

Didn't someone post his deep ball acccuracy '19-'22 and it was largely yuck as hell? Again there's an outlier piece to this, I worry about stickiness in one year production bits. I buy he was solid to good '19-'22, I don't buy the God Mode of '23 as meaningful considering it never was close to repeated in any other season. It is the essence of outlierness. People should be figuring out how much they like what he did in '19, '21, '22, '23 collectively and decide based on equal weighting of that cv, because that's who he's been over a long sample size, not god mode '23. Just as Drake has '22 in his resume, but also a bit of a dip in '23, and in season dips to boot.

In fairness, that is ugly as hell. Additionally, no matter how good you are at this, the best anyone is is generally 45-55% over a long sample size. I don't believe anyone is hitting at 60% or more over a long enough stretch to be reasonably correlated to genuine talent at eval. I'll also note, hit rate recently tends to inflate people's #'s. QB's have hit a lot more at the top of the draft since '16 compared to 1984-2015. Goff, Mahomes, Watson, Baker, Allen, Lamar, Kyler, Burrow, Herbert, (Tua Kinda), Lawrence, Stroud, Richardson. Compare that to the entire decade of the nineties where literally everyone busted who was taken early other than Bledsoe and McNabb.

Like you talked about with the Wizards. The wizards pummelled the hell out of my fandom in the eighties and nineties, and the idiotic Webber trade 26 years ago, so obviously stupid from the jump, following another previous stupid trade (Wallace for Strickland and Duckworth) smashed what was left of my faith, and I kind of turned the setting to low over the next 20 years, and then, and then the Wall fall happened in '19 and I spent four years on Realgm screaming bloody murder for the idiots to trade Beal because with Wall's fall, any attempt to finish the Wall/Beal build was utterly hopeless, and some fans (the same that would've preferred us to beat the cowboys in January, or were mad we lost to the Jets and Giants in December and November) contested the argument but over time ALL OF THEM understood what some of us knew the moment fell coming out of the shower and compounded the previous injury he had with an achilles career killer-that this build was hopeless. But the team persisted, and for years across the winter deadline, and summer trade season with the insane stupidity of trying to build around Beal as a centerpiece, finally turning what was huge value in '19-'21, into negative value by the time they finally traded him the summer of '22 after providing him that anvil contract w/a NTC. There are times when a FO can do things that cripple fandom. The handling of Beal, turned me from a passive observer to a non-observer. Of course since then they finally figured it out, with hilarious timing, having eschewed trading him 1. at his peak value 2. with the prior more reasonable draft lottery odds and 3. when there were back to back to back good to great classes, just in time for the worst Draft class in a decade ('24), and the worst system of odds for the lottery to tank (the new ones). No FO ever deserves your complete trust, and when they make cripplingly stupid decisions, well, lets just say I fully understand why you'd be interested in just turning the page and your attention elsewhere. There is a reason why my attention, and focus in sports, moved from DC Sports teams and associated teams I followed over the decades moved to the USMNT and soccer, flipping entirely over the past 20 years, even with the mismanagement at the USMNT Fed. They've earned some measure of trust, and made some drastic decisions when they've clearly screwed up after all. Not so much the Nats, Redskins or Wizards/Boulez over the years.

😄 I went by S-Bomb for decades on the CPND forums, and people used to joke "the "S" stands for "sentence" lol. As SIP loves to remind me, I was in love with Baker, Darnold and Rosen in '18 lol, and hated the McLaurin pick, I've cornered the market at times in being wrong. Thanfully, over the years I've been more right than wrong on enough stuff to win in dynasty, and argue back and forth in these forums w/some modicum of engendered respect, but you win nothing for being right, nor losing anything for being wrong, it's just debate and perspectives, and over enough time (and I've been in these forums since the mid-nineties) you are going to be right and wrong about mountains of stuff. I spent an entire offseason praying we'd draft Culpeper 25 years ago after all. I may come across as hubristic at times, but I have had my pride punctured a gazillion times over the past 28 years w/regards to my takes on these forums over the years, and it will happen a gazillion more times going forward.

That's fair, but I do think it's pretty easy to understand how and why people might be less worried about some traits than others. As an example, because I play semi-high stakes dynasty (kinda), and to an absurd degree (I usually run 15+ teams), I pay a lot of attention to metrics that are connected to both bust rate and hit rate, and ignore traits, metrics and measuresments that aren't. So some weird ones that I've mentioned before: *A WR and RB 40 time isn't really a problem on the slow side unless it's 4.65 or worse, especially for RB's. Sure it's better to be faster, but as an example, the fastest WR times correlate to nothing in terms of hits while the historically most impressive WR's have record high 4.3, 4.4, 4.5 even Jerry Rice's awful 40 time. *Athleticism metrics are a key correlated trait w/a higher hit rate than anything other than draft capital use, with TE's, while with WR's its largely meaningless, including this: historically through the early 2020's the worst you were at the bench press, the better the career over the past 3 decades, if you were a WR....so who cares about bench press. *Drops aren't sticky at all as a trait, though we are all familiar with exceptions, Will Fuller, and going back to the eighties, Renaldo Nehemiah. A weird one: WR hit rate below certain weight classes were non-existent, but over the past couple of years we've gotten multiple hits at WR at sub 175 lb guys when for decades, it was Desean, and nobody else....so it can be sticky, until it isn't, too. Otoh, there are some things Maye does that are or could be sticky, like the accuracy issues at the first level, and the pressure to sack ratio. He may not be as bad as Daniels, but he's still clearly bad there too. But yeah, you don't need to invest time. I'm a bit weirder than others in that I can change my mind about a guy, and I do my best to avoid "take lock," as an example, hated Josh Allen, but Im not sitting here years later, pretending I was right, and its smoke and mirrors. Nope, I was 1000% wrong, though I still have no idea how he became more accurate in the pros than in college, that's befuddling. But yeah, you don't need to engage at all if you don't wish too. I am just very hopeful, with Daniels, if he is the pick, that there's hidden data, propietary, whatever, that can justify it, and not just bad process, that's my only hope with this thing, and in fairness, there is another hope, that I'm wrong, which I often am at QB. I could be totally wrong. Never been more wrong more consistently at any position I can think of then at QB in terms of hits afterall.

I'm a fast typer, btw, I liked the Star Wars reference :). I just wanted to respond to it, because I think it's worth underlining, especially when we get to the silly point scoring period of ooof, you were wrong or you were right...sure to happen, that most of us are making arguments by degrees rather than by absolutes. We're all old or most of us, seen a lot, and for example from my perspective, I've missed on tons of QB's I've liked over the years, I loved Andre Ware 35 years ago, whoops, I remember how excited I was about Ricky Ervins, and than x10 about Reggie Brooks (having seen the famous run against Michigan live), I remember having no opinion on George, but being oddly high on Favre, but whatever genius I might felt for that, I also loved Dan McGuire, the San Diego State stud and brother of Mark. Whoops. Like, I've got 5 decades now of misses I can look at. I'm not 100% sure of anything in terms of prospects, and with QB's its far far less, which is part of the reason I've moved from basically a guy who had "his guys" so in '99 they were Culpepper, and to a lesser extent Couch, while I hated McNabb and McNown, I had no clue about Harrington or Carr, but I did like Vick and Brees, I had the '04 guys ranked Eli-Ben roth, and I didnt trust Rivers because so many of you semi-locals decades ago hyped them (and always seemed to hype maryland/Va Tech, Virginia, UNC, NC State etc prospects) and I always distrusted the local bias thing lol, in '05 I was all in on Rodgers having been blown away by him as a Cal alumn, and an Alex Smith skeptic, in '06 I was worried about Vince Young, so checkmark there, but I LOVED Leinart-whoops. I could go on, but it's basically utterly unreliable, for every "oooh, nailed that" there's another wtf?" so at this point instead of fixating on who I think will hit, I try to figure out who isn't worth investing my dynasty draft picks in unless they're a discount (so while I didnt like Josh Allen in '18, I still got him in an RSO league in round 3 which was a mega steal- less than 1 mill per year salary at QB through his rookie deal in a salary cap league is gold when they hit). So basically, how I look at these guys like last year is more a case of, who has the holes I really am scared of, rather than who has the studly skills I really like and I go from there. Last year, I invested heavily in Richarson, got some Stroud, got a little Young because I couldn't figure out who to hate more between Strouds awful S2 score, and Bryce Young's lollipop guild size problem, and in '22, I didn't get any of them other than Willis (dual threat QB's are gold) and Howell, because Howell I viewed as a steal. In '01 I traded the only share I had of Burrow (whoops), got a couple of Tua (whoops), and got no Herbert (----!!!) The less said about '21 the better (props to me for getting Lawrence, and Fields and avoid Zach Wilson, but no props to me for getting a bunch of Lance. In '00 I traded the only share I had of Burrow (whoops), got a couple of Tua (whoops), and got no Herbert (----!!!) That about covers it...

For Part I, I'm not as bothered because people specifically disagree. Some complain about his mechanics, some don't, and as I've mentioned before, I cannot recall many elite QB's who weren't smacked around for weird mechancis issues in their predraft process from Rivers, to Mahomes, to Herbert and almost anyone inbetween. Not only do people disagree about interpretations on footwork and throwing motion, but there also isn't any hardcore evidence that its a career killer for largely anyone. That's why I don't care. It's not because I don't care because I like Maye, it's because I've been watching for decades and I've seen a gazillion guys miss and hit, and mechanics and footwork have been critiqued add nauseum for nearly every elite QB I can think of. There are a handful that were clean, but really not many at all...It's white noise to me because I've paid attention for decades to QB's getting ripped for their feet/arm motions and then been 1000% fine, period, or at worst, like Rodgers, elite in college and elite in the pros, and maybe, or maybe not the coaching help proved the difference. So why would I care about that? Pressure to sack ratio, completion rate off platform? They are cold hard stats. You can fudge the #'s a little this way or that, but when you're one of the worst ever (Daniels) or just not good (Maye) it is what it is, you can't pretend its fine. For Part II it's just hugely freaking annoying. I've literally posted on this a billion times, even gone through the QBR rankings today. Nothing is remotely horse blank about it. He was in the 50's in QBR his debut season with Arizona State. He was inside the top 10 in his striker shorten year but the reality that it was 4 games renders it meaningless-sample size is simply too small to be helpful. He then fell to the 40's in '21. He then climbed into the top 20 (18th or 17th, I forget which) in '22. At this point he'd climbed from seemingly a day 3 guy based on '19-'21, to a later day 2 guy based on his '19-'22 cv. I've gone back and forth describing it, even this very day, not because I'm ----ing on him but because interpreting the performance depends upon what you are looking for: His on field performance '19-'22, as I've mentioned dozens of times in posts, ranged from solid to good. I've said that a gazillion times, so there's no horse ---- involved, and even steel manned multiple people who basically alluded to him being a nothing until '23, it's not true, he was solid to good before God Mode '23. The reason I plugged in meh to solid in my recent post is because that's how those seasons are regarded in terms of NFL Prospect quality, not "how good a college QB he is". He was always a good QB in college, as I've already mentioned today, the question is, how good a prospect did the NFL think his '19-'22 resume was. And we already know the answer to that, it was "meh". And then eventually, worth a day 2 pick a year ago today. The problem is, we are at times evaluating these guys based on what they did in college on the field, and also, evaluating these guys based on what that means for them as prospects. As an example, for the Daniels boosters, who rip or just aren't sold on Maye, if you think we should speak more glowingly of Daniels as a prospect based upon his '19-'22 career, what say you regarding the fact that Maye's supposedly down year is better than any of Daniels years by a good stretch other than his '23? Literally the only years Daniels came close to Maye, of appropriate sample size (4 games in '20 doesn't cut it), would be, well, just '22. In '22 he was a top 20 QB in college QBR for the first time. Maye's much easier to figure, 10th and 14th, between the two of them, his two seasons rank 2nd and 3rd on the list, while Daniels are way, way down there, two of them are sub 40th overall in QBR afterall and Maye was literally never remotely close to that bad....so....you have that. Otoh, was Daniels actually bad as a teenager in '19 and '20? No, he was fine. Just not playing like a future NFL starter or day 1 or day 2 pick. Not until '22 did he make it to those lofty airs.

I don't think even the most high volume shrill posters (certainly me) are talking about absolutes, I think people are simply interpreting it that way. If I say Daniels checks a ton of boxes associated with future busts, I'm not saying he is a bust, I'm saying he has far too many traits associated with busts to be picked this high. Similarly as much as I love Maye, and I do, and am not bothered by the negative traits/metrics nearly as much (since I view a ton of them as basically white noise, open to the eye of the beholder), I still view him as a 50-70% hit guy, with only about 50% stud at most, Daniels I view as probably 35-60% hit, with like a 40% stud chance. If I'm dealing in absolutes, or something close, I'd be saying he's a bust period, and Maye is a hit period, but nobody paying attention to QB drafting for 36 years would ever argue such a point. I was watching those drafts live in the 90s when GM's largely went 0 for the decade drafting QB's in round 1 in terms of studs, other than Bledsoe and McNabb. There's no absolute anything here, its degrees, and in my case, I've moved more from focusing on what I think makes them likely to hit, which I used to focus on, to more what sends off alarm bells that they'll miss because honestly, while I still have hunches about hits, and am right, generally about the most obvious guys (Luck, Lawrence-even if he's hitting his floor right now, he's not Zach Wilson level bust territory either), what I've come to terms with is that nobody is good at figuring out who will hit, but some are pretty good at figuring out who is most likely to miss, and I think I'm genuinely pretty good at that at this point, and that's what I'm hanging my hat on here. Ive got Caleb worries exclusively related to mental make up. Maye worries exclusively related to starts, some accuracy and mechanics (2 of the 3 issues are not big to me for specific reasons) Daniels worries due to age, years, meh to good production but never great till year 5, size, worries about not being thorough, tucking and running too much, frame etc Penix worries based on medicals, age, and accuracy issues in earlier years. JJ worries based on usage, and limited starts and arm talent (adequate but not special, maybe barely adequate) Nix worries for similar reasons to Daniels and Penix, plus bad senior bowl, lots of mehs overall, could be hidden value along with Rattler, the way they are being ignored reminds me a lot of Herbert, but like x10. But I dont think Nix is close to Herbert's physical talent, Rattler is more interesting, very good early at Oklahoma, finally pretty good at end in the SEC..... But again, it's all degrees, mitigating bust risk, and Daniels, Penix and JJ really set off HUGE bust risk alarms for me, not so much Caleb or Drake, and Nix is going so late it doesn't matter nearly as much, if you miss, its expected, QB hits where hes projected to go are sub 40%. Same with Rattler. Again, no absolutes or close to it, just box checking bust risks.

when I try to steel man Daniels, I try to remember and be honest with the idea that he was always good. It's not like he was ---- any of those seasons. he wasn't, he just didn't look like an elite NFL prospect until last year, before that he was good, but it sounds like more a late day 2 to mid day 3 guy based on his ASU performances, and LSU in '22 put him in day 2 conversations. So its not that he was bad, he just was, nothing special, which Drake was from the moment he started his first game, and generally speaking, that is regardless of position, probably the single most nfl translatable trait. As previously mentioned, Daniels was 55th in QBR in '19, '20 was a wash due to the covid shortened season (Daniels was top 10 that year though), 41st in '21, 18th in '22, and then 1 in '23. Maye was 10th in his first year as a starter in '22 and 14th in '23. Far less volatility and unlike Daniels, absolutely killed it from the jump (though the Daniels shortened season in '20 was intriguing (but again, its 4 games). If you breakout and blow up immediately, you tend to bust far far less than other guys. It just ends up being a bit more nuanced with Daniels because he wasn't Pickett level bad early on, he was fine, just not special, but like Pickett, his final season was orders of magnitude far better than any other season. It would not bother me half as much if he produced that season in '20 or '21, but it came in his fifth year, and I've seen that so many times, and literally the only example I remember of a guy who did that, and didnt bust was probably Burrow, and to be fair, Cam Newton as well, but he was a JUCO transfer, so there was a reason you didn't see those numbers from him in '08 or whatever. With Daniels, he didn't do it, period. Im highly skeptical of guys that take that long for a reason. It usually doesn't turn out well, and is a sign a guy isn't special, period. That's not always true, but it usually is.

Yeah, I've gotten the sense they kind of due a hyper more detailed version of that John Gruden QB room show back in the day where they try to diagnose details and analyze how they'd react to particular coverages, and what not.

Agreed. We're on the same page, and I remain utterly befuddled at how thoroughly Daniels has charmed teams. I cannot decide whether its just based on data we don't have access too, or if its just more of the stupid we saw in '23 with Young, '22 with Pickett, Ridder and the rest, '21 with Lance, Wilson, JOnes, '20 with incompetent evaluations of Herbert, '19 with the Danny Dimes love etc. On the one hand, maybe they know things we don't, otoh, in the past they've habitually been wrong when they have evals like this that don't make any sense. So....I'm skeptical. Only aspect of me that's hopeful (if we do make the pick) is that he was a mega recruit and he was always good in college. It's not like he was ever bad or mediocre, he ranged from above average early on to good to superb by the end. But we're in agreement in general: he ticks a gazillion future bust metrics, he's overage, he does not have the frame and so is an injury risk, could go on and on, it doesnt really make sense unless they have proprietary information we lack that would show Maye much more alarming and Daniels much more exciting or..... They're just wrong like they so often are. I tend to go with the later. The only thing that gives me pause is the processing piece which is just so so so freaking huge for QB's. If he can process information like they're selling, he is gonna hit, the question is just can he stay healthy. But I'm skeptical that they know why people are good at processing and if it transfers. Young was supposed to be a superhero of processing and Stroud was suppossed to be horrific, and then in the NFL, Young was utterly hopeless, and Stroud was a total monster....so.....I remain worried. I don't think they know what they think they know.

I agree w/you until the very end. I think its more a case of Daniels has never had to play with garbage supporting cast, it's not that he's going to be horrible w/o one, it's that we don't know how much his play falls off if he's suddenly no longer playing with a litany of top 20 caliber draft picks, and day 2 supporting cast level #2-#3 WR's etc. We just don't know because ASU and LSU did a fantastic job of recruiting talent onto his offenses. As you say, we know Maye can play no matter how ----- the supporting cast, Daniels? No idea. But yeah, similarly, I view Maye as the best investment for 2024-2036, I feel like Daniels is a lesser investment where the value is most likely to be 2024-2029. In a lot of ways Daniels just makes more sense for Minny and othe ready to win teams, depends upon if he can stay healthy, but you also lose 2 years to Maye if they both hit, plus with Daniels injury and age out horizon, just seems like a better invesment w/teams that are further along in their builds (atlanta precousins, minny, chicago if they didn't have the 1.01 etc).

It's not that, it's just more likely that Maye can become that, than Daniels and more likely that Maye if he fails, is still an NFL level QB. I think Daniels will probably hit to some extent, I just think Maye is a better investment, long term, across the board, in terms of risk, ceiling, floor. But we all know that at best, Maye and Daniels have somewhere between a 45% and 55-60% chance of being multi contract starters in this league.

I don't think anyone would argue that he wasn't spectacular in '23, he was. There's just a litany of arguments and reasons as to why, he finally put together a season like Maye's first, only in his 5th year, while playing with a guy who was the WR1 in college last year (and was excellent throughout his career at LSU, just went from damn good to god mode in '23) supporting cast etc....Debate is to why it took so long and what it means etc, but there's no arguing that part of the awesomeness in '23 of the LSU offense was 1000% Daniels, he was ridiculous.

College's are notorious for having crazy off measurements in terms of height and weight. It happens all the time. Not sure if its because the guys grow in college, or they're just inexact, or they're trying to give favorable measurements, but it would not be shocking at all to find out that he was much lighter during the season then he was if he had measured at the combine etc. There's a reason 190 lb rb's try to put on weight like crazy before the combine/pro days. They're trying to fudge the #'s. It's all of a piece. The heavier Daniels can sell himself the better as it's one of his knocks.

+10, thanks for adding that nugget.

If I recall correctly, he had the worst completion rate by far of any of the guys thrown off platform. I think Penix really excelled there, but I may be mixing that with another metric.

Yep. And it's impossible not to notice when you look at this stuff, stories like Marino tumbling down boards while guys like Zach Wilson, and Kenny Pickett and JaMarcus Russell flew up then, considering this is an antique form of social media, nearly all of us are old and have seen this countless times before. Is he gonna yet another in a long line of wtf were they thinking guys? There's a much higher chance of that w/him than wil Caleb and Drake. Is there a genuine risk that Drake is an arm talent flame out that doesn't improve? Sure....but the way the media and the quoted NFL officials are consistently ignoring this guy was a day 2/day 3 pick for YEARS, and suddenly with absurd talent and flagship offense LSU, after 4 years that didn't even put him in anyones top 60, he's now top 2? It's hard not to understand why that strikes many of us as insane. Then, after that, you can also build a case with a litany of metrics which are hugely alarming from pressure to sack ratio to completion rate when off platform, to deep ball completion rate in 80% of his college seasons (as in, largely, ---), the progressions, the run instead of stick and throw, or run and throw, not using all fields...we could go on and on. Again, feels like crazy pills. I'm torn between the part of me that wants to buy what they're selling since it sounds like we're taking him, and the part of me that thinks this is clinically insane and obviously so, that year after year the media and officials talk up guys, Bryce Young and the S2 last year (nobody mentioning either now, suddenly they forgot all about it), Kenny and Malik and Corral in '22, Lance and Mac Jones and Wilson in '21, Herbert is a mess and will take forever to fix in '20, Danny Nickels is the hot new QB in '19, the Rosen and Darnold stock I was eating up in '18, the Trubisky insanity of '17, the wentz hype train in '16, the Mariota praise in '15, the Bortles insanity before that (my stupid, but oft-accurate, "I can't see a guy named blake and Blaine winning super bowls," take still holds). Goes on and on and on....every season they sell us on guys that at least a portion of the public rightly sniffs out as utter nonsense. This time its Daniels, JJ and Drake and trying to figure out which narrative and pile of evidence, illustrates the most likely bust. The overage, 5th year senior who was nothing for 4 according to scouts, the guy who was barely used at Michigan but may actually be really good? The Golden Arm and height/size adonis, but mechanical train wreck? Who knows....but I know if I was betting on whose got the biggest chance of flaming out, I'd start with Daniels simply because of the boxes checked, with JJ close behind.

We got the tank right. The pick? Sounds like we're getting it wrong, just in terms of the taking the "least" bust potential of potential options. But the tanking piece? There wasn't a better season to implode the past decade than this one, and it would rank in the top 2-3 of the past 20 years as well. After Halloween I think most would have put us at +2500 to earn a top 2 pick, maybe +5000, we did literally everything perfectly to snatch up that top 2 pick thereafter while the Giants, Cardinals, and Patriots (and Bears for that matter) all butchered their tanks.

There is no chance. Those of us that eye RB weigh ins pre-combine are more than familiar with funny bs weigh ins. My guess would be his playing weight last year was in that 190-200 window, probably 195-200. I would trade him but it seems pretty obvious that if he's traded, it probably isn't until deadline this coming fall of the '25 offseason, if he was gonna be moved, it would have happened a month ago. In fairness (I am a trade Allen guy) to those that want to keep him: evaluating DL prospects will be made harder by going from Allen to JAG level trash at his position so there's that, but I'm also not convinced we'll be addressing say, edge guys this year. The class is simply too weak to justify the use of high end draft capital.

Mmmm, in '17 we could have gotten Mahomes, in '18 we could have gotten Allen, in '20 we could have gotten Herbert, in '21 Fields. I am ecstatic we finally got tanking for right for the first time in decades, ecstatic. I'm not so ecstatic that the rumors feel like we're gonna take the riskiest of the options. Otoh, that would have given us a huge hit in '18 and '20 so maybe they're right this time. I remain skeptical.

It's not. There's a rich bountiful vein of evidence that Daniels has an extensive collection of traits associated with higher risk of busting, and probably the single best example of this, and it was already quoted a few pages back is how often (always) when NFL exec's are asked about Daniels, they refer EXCLUSIVELY to his 5th year metrics, not his career, his fifth year metrics, whether its about deep ball compeltion as that tweeter mentioned, or people habitually acknowledging only Daniels 2023 pressure to sack ratio, while ignore 2019-2022. They are all using magic erasers, pretending he played one year, to Maye's 2, it's absurd, period. If all I had to look at was his '23 season, and he was 21 instead of turning 24 at the end of the year, 75%-80% of my concerns would be washed away, but those arguments are bull---, and nonsense. He played 5 years of college football, not 3, he's gonna turn 24 this year, not 22, and his prior seasons are vastly inferior to his '23. Why these people aren't familiar with concepts like outlier seasons, and supporting casts changing production #'s is utterly beyond me. And this isn't even a case, again, of me thinking he sucks, it's me thinking he has an absolute litany of warning signs and in key traits, and metrics, that should alarm the ---- out of anyone. Quinn comes across as an idiot in those quotes. Not great. It reminds me of ripping the Raiders for being raging morons for taking Ruggs over Lamb in '20. It wasn't that Ruggs was a dog---- prospect, and was guaranteed to suck. He wasn't, but he was not remotely The #1 WR prospect in any world and the raiders were idiots for taking him over Lamb, car crash or not, fit or not. It was raging stupidity, but NFL teams habitually try to address, fit, or particular needs even with high order fit, instead of fixating on talent first. Ruggs even in a best case scenario was not gonna be the player Lamb was, and fit or skill should've been immaterial, but it wasn't, and so they took a vastly inferior talent. Kinda feels like that is happening again here, they've fixated on some things they like, and they are again a forest for the trees argument. I should add that someone mentioned that fears with Maye could include something as simple as this dude becomes Wentz, which was an intriguing counter. He is a nice counter of a traits, tools guy like Maye failing, but I'd make one particularly relevant counter argument to that. Part of the reason Wentz has flamed out, beyond just not becoming the QB talent that was hoped is Wentz's personality, and mental make up. He's not a leader, he's not great for the locker room, he's not an ideal fit for a team's "personality" as its leader by any stretch and by all accounts, Maye and JJ have by far the best mental makeup temperament/personality for team fits of the big 4 QB's expected to go early. I think Wentz's career would have gone reasonably differently if he wasn't viewed as a locker room problem. No such concerns with Maye.

We have a track record of his work elsewhere, everywhere he's worked, his teams have been contenders for titles and/or won titles, and the higher he rose in the hierarchy the better draft classes you see w/those organizations, as he reached the highest levels with SF, they were habitually pulling elite talent with picks he's apparently deeply associated with. There's an abundance of evidence circumstancial may it be, that he's the brains behind the SF reboot, I don't believe for a second Lynch is, and the scuttlebut the past year was he was the sharpest mind in the biz at team building/draft scouting. But that doesn't mean he or anyone else is good at QB's. In the post your responding to I talk about Purdy as a home run pick, and its true, it's his one QB hit, but lets be straight here, you give them plaudits, or should for picking him but not too many. If the Niners Brass, or the Redskins with Howell, were so damn smart they would not have let the only 2 QB's worth a ---- in the 2022 class last until round 7 and 5 respectively. If they were so high on Purdy, there is no way in hell they let him drop that far. The answer is, both teams dart threw on speculative QB prospects that they liked to take a shot at very late. These were not home run swings on elite prospects, these were speculative, late draft investments of little draft capital on the best QB's they liked late. It was not a bet your job on it pick, it was as chucklehead Casserly used to say, a fun, hunch pick on a ceiling of guys that just might be better than the day 2 guys that most of us realized were meh (the ridder's and pickett's of the world). And both regimes hit big time on the selections, Howell can clearly play in this league, it's how well that's debate, while with Purdy, he 100% can play having guided the Niners to top 4 and top 2 finishes in back to back seasons in year 1 and 2 of his career.

To be fair to Daniels. All his years were good, he was always playing inside the top 50, and by his final 3 years I believe he was in the 20's, teens and then finally #1 overall in year 5, but yes, he was not dominant or very very good until the very end, and that, to me is not remotely as impressive as what Drake did, period. Again, Maye's 1st year was better than any of Daniels years by far other than his 5th, and Drake's second, regression year, was also, better than any Daniels year, save '23. This shouldn't be hard AT ALL. I am baffled as to why there's even a debate. I'd just add, to steel man, that Daniels was always good, period, in college, just not remotely at Maye's level, ever, until year 5, but that doesn't mean he didnt break out. He fit the breakout metric his first year in terms of QBR, and was always pretty good to good until he blew up nuclear style last year (as an example, he made it inside the top 20 in '22).