Can He Get a Redo On His Redo?

Fred linked Peter King's grades of the 2001 Draft (from a 2006 MMQB) in the Saturday post and it piqued my interest to the point I decided I have to cover the entire thing. I don't like to do a post about the same sportswriter more than twice in a week so I am going to try and make this the Peter King limit for the week. Before we get to Peter's 2001 grades I wanted to show everyone Peter's infamous talent evaluation skills.

Here is a 1997 NFL draft review that Peter did one year after that draft (1998 for those that have trouble counting). Let's let Peter show off his talent evaluation skills in sentence form. Remember he had seen these guys play in the NFL for a solid year already. I am not even going to provide any commentary (ok, I will provide some) because it is really not necessary.

TAMPA BAY Warrick Dunn is terrific, Reidel Anthony a good-enough No. 2 NFL receiver,

WASHINGTON Linebacker Greg Jones, plucked in the second round, will make three Pro Bowls before he retires,

Well Greg Jones did play for 3 NFL teams and have 22 tackles and 6 sacks for his career. I am sure some other player was blocking him from those Pro Bowl appearances and that is why he never made one.

Quick props to Peter:

PITTSBURGH Corner Chad Scott played well in December, and front-seven contributor Mike Vrabel turned out to be a third-round steal.

Good call on Vrabel.

Back to no props:

HOUSTON Kenny Holmes should be a double-digit sack guy this year, and Joey Kent should turn into a solid receiver.

INDIANAPOLIS The Colts tried to rebuild line in the first two rounds with Tarik Glenn and Adam Meadows. They failed.

I am pretty sure they both turned into good NFL tackles for Indianapolis and I have sincerely never heard of Kenny Holmes (as rightly pointed out by HH in the comments, I have heard of Kenny Holmes and he was never a double digit sack guy but also wasn't horrible so I retract the insinuation he wasn't good) or Joey Kent (I don't think).

BUFFALO Running back Antowain Smith is a great acquisition for a team that will live and die on the ground. The rest of this draft means very little.

Other than Marcellus Wiley of course who became a solid NFL defensive end.

DETROIT Bryant Westbrook and Kevin Abrams, picked in the first and third rounds, respectively, should make for a good NFL corner tandem.

GREEN BAY Green Bay seems to fancy Darren Sharper at safety. That love affair will be short-lived.

As you can see, this year when Peter refuses to consider Sharper as Defensive Player of the Year isn't the first time he has hated on Sharper. I wonder why Peter hates Darren Sharper?

BALTIMORE Peter Boulware, who led all rookies in sacks, won't be a 12-sack guy consistently, and there's not another impact player in the 12-pick bunch.

Other than Jamie Sharper and Jeff Mitchell of course, both of whom were good NFL players.

NEW YORK JETS James Farrior will be a solid if unspectacular NFL player, but the best player in this nine-man draft will turn out to be running back Leon Johnson, who was tabbed in the fourth round.

Leon Johnson was just so-so but Jason Ferguson was taken in this draft in the 7th round and he and Farrior turned into good NFL players.

OAKLAND Defensive tackle Darrell Russell was an easy pick.

Easily a bad pick. Along with Gerard Warren he is the prototype for defensive tackles who have little motivation and bust after being drafted early in the 1st round.

So that's just a small sample of Peter's evaluation abilities. Let's get to his 2006 NFL draft redo. Pay special attention to the fact Peter's "I'm better than you" attitude didn't seem to be as present. I don't really have a set evaluation method to determine how the grades should have gone (3 starters = B+, etc.), but when Peter gives a grade I don't agree with, I will link the roster and then begin arguing. Sounds like fun huh?

Readers of this space know how much I hate grading drafts a day or two after the draft. It's like going to law school, passing the bar, and the next day someone says: You're going to be an "A'' lawyer. How in the world does anyone know who the "A'' lawyer is going to be until he or she has been out in the real world for a while?

So that must be why Peter waited five years to evaluate the draft. Peter starts with teams that get "A's." As always, if you think I missed anything just go ahead and tell me.

2. Carolina.

Then-director of football operations Marty Hurney (now the GM) should have gone straight to Vegas after the first day. Dan Morgan, Kris Jenkins, Steve Smith. Wow. And even though Chris Weinke has flamed out since a rookie year when he earned the starting job, he has started 16 games and remains a decent backup for Jake Delhomme.

Ok, maybe an A- because Weinke was a backup to Delhomme but he wasn't even a good backup. In fact, when Delhomme missed a game in 2006 the Panthers officially introduced the Wildcat into the NFL against Atlanta with DeAngelo Williams running it because they in no way trusted Weinke to throw the football or be the quarterback. Chris Weinke was not a decent backup. This was after Weinke started for an entire year and had 5 years to learn the offense. That should tell us something about Weinke's ability as a quarterback.

Peter really needs to give some more "+" or "-" in his grades. Just giving letter grades without them is misleading in many of these redo grades.

Now, onto the "B's"...

3. Atlanta. The Vick pick is still being debated, and I don't think he's going to go down as an all-time great, but the fact is, he's an electric presence every time he plays and helped change the culture from mediocre to threatening in Atlanta. In Round 2, Alge Crumpler has turned into a top-three NFL tight end and has started all but 13 of his Falcons games in five years. Seventh-round pick Kynan Forney has started 68 games and is a fixture at right guard. Two other decent players from Round 4 -- offensive lineman Roberto Garza and linebacker Matt Stewart -- started for the Falcons before leaving as free agents. Not a bad haul.

If you are going to give Carolina an "A," you have to give Atlanta an "A" as well. 2 guys went on to become a Top 5 players at their position and the other three picks that panned out were solid starters. Atlanta should get an "A" for this draft.

4. Baltimore. Picking last because of its Super Bowl win only adds to the shine of this draft. It's a shame the cap-ravaged Ravens couldn't have kept these guys when they got good. The top four picks -- Todd Heap, Gary Baxter, Casey Rabach and Ed Hartwell -- are all average or better NFL starters.

This draft is a borderline B+ for me. Plus, Ed Hartwell and his wife later appeared on "Real Housewives of Atlanta" on Bravo after Hartwell had gotten injured and been releasd by the Falcons, which when I found out led to this exchange.

(Me) "Please tell me this isn't another 'Real Housewives' show."

(Loved one) "Yeah and this girl is married to an NFL football player."

(Me actually semi-interested) "Oh yeah, who is he?"

(Loved one) "Ed Hartwell."

(Me no longer interested and walking away disappointed) "He is not a football player, he may have played football at one point in Baltimore, but he is no longer a football player. He was signed to a big contract and then got injured repeatedly."

(Loved one wondering why I was born to be an asshole) "He's making a comeback."

(Me) "Which is why he and his wife agreed to be paid to be on a reality show. No one wants him and the only thing he is coming back to is a world of disappointment about ever playing in the NFL again and signing up for a second season of this show."

Despite my anti-love for Ed Hartwell, this Ravens draft is still a B+.

5. San Diego. I struggle giving a "B'' for a two-person draft, but what put me over is the impact of the two.

No, no, no. A draft that pulls two Hall of Fame type players is an A. Throw in Carlos Polk who was a serviceable player and this is an "A" draft and there should never be an argument about this. It is hard to give a two player draft such a high grade but it was a great two person draft.

6. Arizona. Picking second, it's pretty hard to screw up. Leonard Davis has been a good piece of the puzzle, though not the dominant player everyone predicted he'd be, in his 75 starts in the desert. Fitting that the Cards gave up on maybe the best player in this crop, defensive end Kyle Vanden Bosch, who they let walk (to Tennessee) after two knee injuries. Vanden Bosch turned into one of the league's best pass-rushers last year and signed a lucrative deal with the Titans to stay. Third-round Adrian Wilson has turned into a strong up-the-middle presence at strong safety in his 61 starts,

This draft is a "C" simply because both Davis and Van Dan Bosch played their best football for other teams. Usually I try to ignore this, but the Cardinals blew the 2nd pick and don't have too much else to show for it once Davis and Van Dan Bosch left.

Now we get to the C+ teams...

10. New York Jets. Poor Jets. A nice little draft and nothing to show for it. Look at the top four picks. Santana Moss is beating the Cowboys for Washington. LaMont Jordan, when he can hang on to the ball, is running reasonably well for Oakland. Kareem McKenzie is an anchor on the line for the team across the Hudson River.

I don't even count LaMont Jordan as a good running back and the other players are nobodies who have never done anything, or play well for another team. This draft is a "D" because there is no one out of this draft who helped the Jets while they were actually on the Jets roster.

11. Detroit. Jeff Backus, Dominic Raiola and Shaun Rogers came in the first three picks and have all been regular starters.

The Lions had six picks in this draft. Three of those picks became NFL starters and Mike McMahon looked like he had promise for a while. Hitting on three of six picks gets a "B-" at the very least from me.

Onto the "C" teams...

13. Denver. Willie Middlebrooks was a poor first-round pick, followed by second-round DE Paul Toviessi.

A "C" for the Broncos? They hit on one draft pick out of six and blew their 1-3 round picks. Ben Hamilton saves this draft from being an absolute disaster. If there is a draft that deserves a big fat "D" it is this draft. Reggie Hayward is just a guy and the first two picks were busts. Peter has Denver with the 13th best draft in 2001. He must have been high when he wrote this.

15. Kansas City. On the surface, this draft is horrendous, with first-day picks Eric Downing and Snoop Minnis total flops. But the Chiefs sent their first-round pick, 12th overall, to St. Louis for Trent Green and a pick that netted backup back Derrick Blaylock. And without Green, this team would have been floundering at quarterback.

I can respect they traded their 1st round pick for Trent Green...but my question is what would they have done with that 1st round pick? Probably blow it like they blew every mid-to-late round pick they had here.

It's a draft of nobodies, so even assuming they get credit for a decent 1st round pick that would have been the sum total of their draft. This draft gets a "D-" from me and the only reason it doesn't get an "F" is because they did get Trent Green for a 1st round pick they would have screwed up anyway.

17. Philadelphia.

As I said, strange draft, and helpful to the franchise in spurts.

Here I go being a hardass again. Assuming I give them credit for what Correll Buckhalter could have been and the fact Derek Burgess is just average, we still have to acknowledge the fact the Eagles blew their 1st two picks and none of these players started for the Eagles for more than a year. What does a draft with no starters get from me? A "D+" and I am being kind.

19. Seattle. Weird, weird draft. Immature misfit Koren Robinson with the ninth overall pick. Steve Hutchinson, the best guard in football, was the 17th. Good corner (albeit overpaid now with Carolina) Ken Lucas in Round 2, and Hutchinson's heir, Pork Chop Womack, in Round 4. Heath Evans and Orlando Huff have been serviceable NFL players, decent mid-round picks.

Seattle had 12 picks that year and they broke down into 6 "where the hell are they now" picks, 1 bust (Robinson), 1 great All-Pro player (Hutchinson), 2 valuable starters (Lucas, Womack), and 2 good NFL players (Evans and Huff). Considering 8 of the 12 picks were from Rounds 4-7 and the Seahawks got 2 good players out of them and hit on 3 of their first 4 picks, I am a little bit more kind. I give them a "B-" for this draft.

22. Green Bay. This was the Jamal Reynolds debacle at No. 10. A useless pass-rusher now out of football. Robert Ferguson has been an OK part-time starter, a decent second-round pick. Bhawoh Jue was mostly a nickel safety in his four years in Green Bay before leaving for San Diego as a free agent last year. Seventh-rounder David Martin has been a good No. 2 tight end. Martin, in fact, saved this draft from being a D.

No, no, no. This is a "D-" draft, if that. Green Bay had 4 picks in Rounds 1-3 and missed on every single one of them except one and he was just an decent player. A #2 tight end is great in Round 7 but there is no way this is a "C" class when there isn't a starter to be seen on the roster and the best pick is a part-time starter. This could have been an "F" in my book.

23. Tennessee. Not a bad draft, just a totally non-impactful one for today's Titans, and one of the reasons they're struggling again. With no first-round pick, Tennessee took Andre Dyson, Shad Meier and Justin McCareins in Rounds 2, 3 and 4.

So how the hell did this draft get a "C?" Look at the players who were drafted and tell me there is a player on that list who made an impact. I will give it a "D" because the first pick came at #60.

24. Oakland. Give the Raiders credit, just a little, for getting some value for picking so late -- 28th in the first round -- and getting a usable safety, Derrick Gibson, in the first round. After that, some blah roster-fillers. Marques Tuiasosopo, DeLawrence Grant, Chris "I Got Bad Advice from Romo'' Cooper.

I will do no such thing as to give the Raiders credit. Other than Gibson, who when picking at #28 a team should still be picking players who are better than "usable," this was a draft full of nobodies and never-have-beens. As much as I would love to raise the grade since they drafted Ken-Yon Rambo (what a great name) I can't do it. This draft is another "D" in my mind.

25. Washington. First-rounder Rod Gardner was a stiff from Day 1. Fred Smoot, of Love Boat fame, was a risk-taker and at times a very good corner for three-plus years. Sage Rosenfels, now in Houston, might have a future somewhere -- Phil Simms raves about him -- but he never did a thing for the Skins.

Fred Smoot was a decent player and in typical Redskins fashion they had traded away all of their draft picks and only had 5 picks. It's hard to grade such a small draft where a team only has 2 picks in the Top 108 picks. I give it a "D+" for lack of a better way to grade the draft.

I find it interesting Peter mentions Sage Rosenfels could have a future somewhere because he did get his chance for about a week in Minnesota this past offseason and we all know how that ended up.

Now onto the teams who Peter gave an "F" to...

29. Minnesota. The only player of any value from this draft was Michael Bennett, who rushed for 3,174 yards in 49 starts. That is one mediocre running back. The last seven picks in this crop? Valueless.

The funny part about calling Michael Bennett a mediocre running back by gaining 3,174 yards in 49 starts is that it averages out to 64.8 yards per game, which comes to about 1,036 yards for a season. This "mediocre" running back is a 1,000 yard rusher. Kind of devalues the idea of a 1,000 rusher during a 16 game schedule a little bit doesn't it?

If there was a grade I could give lower than "F" I would do it here...so I will make up a lower grade. The Vikings get an "F-" for having an absolutely terrible draft.

30. Cleveland. One decent pick: fourth-round corner Anthony Henry, now playing for Dallas. Among the horrible picks here -- Gerard Warren over Richard Seymour, Quincy Morgan over Chris Chambers -- is one grand champion.

31. Chicago. I'll give you Anthony Thomas, a role-playing running back who's not great at anything. Decent second-round pick. But none of the six choices are still in Chicago, and David Terrell, eighth overall, dropped more big passes than he caught.

Cleveland and Chicago's drafts were absolutely horrible. I wanted to give you Peter's comments to underscore this. I would show you the draft picks they actually chose, but I wouldn't want it to hurt your eyes like it did mine.

Now let's look at what Peter thought about the 2001 NFL draft without 5 years to evaluate how the players did. First, we will see Peter's thoughts halfway through the first round.

The Browns, quite simply, picked the best player for their team right now. Gerard Warren has the biggest upside of any player in this draft except for Michael Vick. Warren could be another Warren. Warren Sapp.

Or he could be one of the biggest busts in the history of the NFL draft.

You need to help Tim Couch. You will. You’ll get a receiver or back at the top of the second round.

They did draft a receiver in the 2nd round. Congratulations Browns fans! It's a Quincy Morgan!

Take my word for it: This is the right pick at the right time.

Just Peter King, Browns fans and everything will be fine. Gerard Warren was the right choice over the other 12 other legitimate Pro Bowl choices you could have had in the 1st round alone, which doesn't include Drew Brees, Chad Johnson, or Kris Jenkins.

This is what happens when you trust Peter King.

5. I think this pick brought me out of my seat, and not in a positive sense: Casey Hampton to the Steelers at 19. Huh? You mean you couldn’t trade down again to pick up some more lucre, Bill Cowher?

Casey Hampton has two Super Bowl rings and four Pro Bowl appearances. I wonder if Peter still thinks Cowher should have chosen someone who would actually make an impact in the NFL on a meaningful level.

Here are Peter's post-draft thoughts.

1. I think these were the best values in the first round:

a. Kenyatta Walker to Tampa Bay at No. 14. Incredible. He’s a more versatile player than Leonard Davis and will cost $1.5 million less per year.

b. Nate Clements to Buffalo at 21. Great cover guy and physical enough to be the type of run supporter head coach Gregg Williams demands out of his corners.

c. Heap to Baltimore at 31. He’s the best receiving tight end to come out in five years. And he’s got an Ed McCaffery -esque bag of moves too. Now, he’ll need to learn to block.

While I am being hard on Peter, I may as well acknowledge that he got all three of these "value" picks right.

4. I think Tony Dungy is the happiest man in the NFL right now. He started the day with the 21st pick in the first round. He ended the day with a Pro Bowl left tackle. Those are rare, you know.

Ok, I think Peter is going a little overboard now. Kenyatta Walker is a solid left tackle but he isn't a Pro Bowl type left tackle.

5. I think, inching into round two, that the Chargers are very, very lucky. The Drew Brees availability and pick get them off the hook for ditching Michael Vick. Brees, coached right, will be the second coming of Brian Griese.

The second coming of Brian Griese huh? At one point in the past I think that was a compliment and not an insult. I think this may have been that point...but as of today, that's a huge insult.

Let's look at Peter's thoughts pre-draft. Look at the his picture too. He looked so young and innocent...what happened?

As someone who has studied Michael Vick quite a bit over the past month and come to the conclusion that he might be the biggest boom-or-bust prospect in NFL draft history (I mean that), I have a problem with the team that traded the chance to pick him ... and the one that acquired that chance Friday.

Peter studied Vick for A WHOLE MONTH before the draft. This makes him an expert since he started evaluating Vick two months after the college football season was over. What I don't get is how Peter King can evaluate a college player after the season is over and believe he has an actual knowledge on the skill of this player. Yesterday, he mentioned he had never heard of Jeremiah Masoli, so how can he evaluate Masoli when it comes time for his mock drafts or when it comes time to give his opinion on college quarterbacks? I can't believe he watches that much (or any) game film after the season.

Peter wants credit for studying Vick but there are many who have watched Vick's every college football game, so they would know as much as Peter King does. I think Peter just hears what people tells him about college players and then parrots it in his MMQB. That's how he came up with the "Aaron Curry can sack the quarterback" theory he had.

The San Diego Chargers, the traders, now move into the fifth spot in the first round. That puts them in jeopardy of missing out on the best quarterback of this draft and maybe the best playmaking-quarterback prospect ever. But it also probably puts them out of range of drafting the top player on their board, TCU running back LaDainian Tomlinson.

Of course the Chargers drafted LaDainian Tomlinson.

They also got poor value, the fifth and 67th picks, for the first overall pick -- in addition to a second-round pick in 2002.

The Chargers got LT, Tay Cody, Reche Caldwell, and Tim Dwight for Mike Vick. So pretty much Vick and Tomlinson were traded for each other. I will let you decide how much value the Chargers got (no matter how poorly they drafted the players at the Falcons' spots) but I never thought this was a bad trade for the Chargers.

The Atlanta Falcons, the tradees, just might have given away second- and third-round picks plus Tim Dwight (I know, whoopee) for nothing.

Anytime a team moves up in the draft to take a player they are risking giving away picks for nothing, so this pretty much goes for any team that does this.

4. I think the Green Bay Packers might surprise a lot of us Saturday if they pick -- as I hear they might -- the No. 1 man on their draft board, risky North Carolina State wideout Koren Robinson.

The Packers ended up drafting Jamal Reynolds, so basically whoever the Packers decided to draft he was going to be a bust.

That's about all the interesting insight we got from Peter.

-I am not going to cover Bill Simmons Friday column this week, but to no one's surprise he chimed in on the Bill Belichick decision against the Colts. I know Bill only writes once a week nowadays but he posted this on Friday and the decision was made by Belichick on Sunday night. We were all pretty talked out about it at that point. I know Bill feels the need to write about anything Boston area related, but there comes a point when a sports event is sort of in the past. I would say 5 days after the decision was made is almost reaching that point.

Before reading, I expected the Boston-centric comparisons and I wasn't disappointed:

After my beloved Patriots threw away Sunday's Colts game with one unnecessarily dangerous decision, my educated opinion was this: "That's the second dumbest thing I have ever seen any Boston team do." It trumped Darrell Johnson pitching Jim Burton in Game 7 of the 1975 World Series. It trumped K.C. Jones playing Fred Roberts ahead of Reggie Lewis for the entire 1988 playoffs. It trumped Raymond Berry starting Tony Eason in Super Bowl XX. It trumped everything except Grady/Pedro in 2003.

Because any comparison that needs to be made has to be compared to another New England related sporting event since the entire world revolves around what happens to those sports teams.

The Patriots have five monster defeats since winning Super Bowl XXXIX -- 2005 (Denver, playoffs); 2006 (Indy, AFC title game); 2007 (Giants, Super Bowl XLII); 2008 (Indy, regular season); 2009 (Indy, regular season) -- in which they self-destructed in decidedly un-Belichickian ways. Five years of bad luck and bullet-ridden shoes are starting to add up.

Oh God! The Patriots haven't won every single big game they have played over the last 5 years. What a horror for the Patriots! No other team in the NFL is as cursed as the Patriots are. There must be a curse that goes along with these happenings.

Nevermind Bill is too self involved to see that nearly every single one of these games, except the two games against Indy, took place in the postseason which is a place not a lot of teams get to go in year after year, that doesn't matter. To Bill, the Patriots are a New England team so they have to win every game every single year and anything less is bad luck.

Also, not shockingly Bill spends the entire Friday column talking about the Belichick fourth down call and puts his picks to the side without comments. The picks are much less important than hearing what Bill has to say about Belichick's fourth down call, even though it has been covered by more qualified individuals in a much better fashion 3-4 days earlier.

Just don't tell me this Sunday night didn't mean … something. In the aforementioned Game 6, I remember watching those Yankees fans celebrating after the seventh and thinking, "There is absolutely nobody in my sports fan life now that makes me feel as secure as those Yankee fans feel with Rivera right now."
I used to feel that way about the Patriots. I did. And now we're here.

Oh no! The Patriots haven't won a Super Bowl in five years. The world is over, let's get back to pitying Bill Simmons due to his team's bad luck because that is what he wants us to do. Bill doesn't feel secure because he sort of feels like his team doesn't have the best NFL coach anymore and this is something he feels like he deserves pity for. The world as he knows it is over.