North Macedonia stun Germany as Elif Elmas' late goal secures a shock win in World Cup qualifying.
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Wednesday, March 31, 2021
'Child among four dead' in shooting at office building in Orange, California
Police say the suspect was shot and wounded and the situation has now been "stabilised".
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Google pushes start button for reopening offices
The search engine giant is keen to get people back into its offices while promoting bringing dogs to work.
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Hong Kong: Media mogul Jimmy Lai found guilty over 2019 mass protests
The Apple Daily founder is among seven people found guilty of unauthorised assembly in 2019 protests.
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Brazil: More than 60,000 people died of Covid-19 in March
Despite the rising cases, President Bolsonaro urges local governors to ease lockdown measures.
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Covid vaccine manufacturers should work with poorer countries, says WTO chief
WTO head Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala says the AstraZeneca deal with India is a good example.
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New on SI: Robert Kraft Voices Praises Cam Newton, Shows No Regret for Letting Tom Brady Leave
Patriots owner Robert Kraft discussed Cam Newton, free agency and Tom Brady in his first meeting with the media since the end of last season.
Patriots owner Robert Kraft touched on a variety of issues during Wednesday's Q&A session with the media members, his first since the end of the 2020 season. Among the biggest topics discussed was the Patriots' quarterback situation—which Kraft called an area that the team still must solidify—despite also offering praise for incumbent starter Cam Newton.
"In fairness to Cam, I'm not sure he had the proper weapons around him last year," Kraft said,
per ESPN's Mike Reiss. "I really do believe Cam getting COVID, and what it did to the team, it changed a lot. Now we'll get a chance to see."Players on the team, in the locker room, really love the guy. In the end, I trust Coach Belichick's ability to build a team, and put the right players in the best position to succeed."
Newton re-signed with New England on a one-year deal this month after starting 15 games for the team last season. He completed 65.8% of his passes for 2,657 yards, eight touchdowns and 10 interceptions. He also rushed for 592 yards and 12 scores.
Kraft also addressed his uncharacteristic shopping spree in free agency this offseason, during which he spent a league-record $165 million in guaranteed money. Kraft said his preference is to build a team through the draft, but cited his team's poor performance in recent drafts—as well as the NFL's reduced salary caps handcuffing other teams—as factors that led to his unprecedented spending.
"What happened here last year was not something to our liking. We had to make the corrections," Kraft said. "In all the businesses we're involved in, we try to take advantage of inefficiencies in the market. We were in a unique cap situation this year and it allowed us to try to [fix] things we missed, to a certain extent, in the draft. So this was our best opportunity."
The Patriots will pick 15th in the upcoming draft, their highest pick since 2008. That year, the team took linebacker Jerod Mayo with the 10th pick.
Kraft also said he did not regret letting Tom Brady leave via free agency, rather than retaining him using the franchise tag. Brady went on to lead the Buccaneers to a Super Bowl title, winning the title game's MVP honors in the process.
"After 20 years, I'll make this commitment to any player in the future. Anyone who spends 20 years with us, and helps us go to win six Super Bowls, we're not going to keep; look, we could have contract-wise, kept him in our camp," Kraft said. "But it's not the right thing."
Runway dining at $540 a meal proving hit in Japan
Japan's biggest airline is making the most of grounded planes while Australian carriers are cutting prices.
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Facebook bans 'voice of Trump' from platform
An interview with the ex-president was posted by his daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, on Facebook.
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Covid: Brisbane lockdown ends ahead of Easter weekend
The Australian city of two million residents has seen a low infection rate, but concerns remain.
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Facebook bans 'voice of Trump' from platform
An interview with the ex-president was posted by his daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, on Facebook.
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Covid: Brisbane lockdown to end ahead of Easter weekend
The Australian city of two million residents has seen a low infection rate, but concerns remain.
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George Floyd: What witnesses have said in the Chauvin trial
Witnesses in Minneapolis have given emotional testimony about being at the scene of Mr Floyd's arrest.
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Tiger Woods crash: Los Angeles police determine the cause of golfer's car accident
The details of what caused Tiger Woods' car crash will only be released if the 15-time major winner gives permission for police to share their findings.
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New on SI: Indianapolis Hotel Serving as NCAA Tournament Bubble to Host a Different Kind of NFL Combine
Indianapolis's Marriott Downtown hotel will welcome NFL prospects next week for the league's medical combine after the NCAA tournament ends.
INDIANAPOLIS — Three weeks ago, during the second week of March, Big Ten basketball teams started to arrive at the Marriott Downtown hotel for an open-ended stay ahead of the Big Ten and NCAA tournaments, each happening in this city.
Not long afterward, this 650-room, 16-floor place transformed into a veritable bubble, completely closed to the public while shielding two dozen teams from much of the outside world for nearly a month. The Marriott Downtown hosted an initial 16 teams during the NCAA tournament’s first weekend, like three other hotels here, before being designated as the home for all those that advanced to the Sweet 16 and beyond. The Final Four participants are the only ones left, each using an entire floor until they’re bounced from the Big Dance.
But this bubbled hotel won’t be popped when the national champion and runner-up leave after Monday’s title game.
There are more high-profile athletes on the way.
Some of the most talented NFL prospects, 150 in all, are scheduled to descend upon Indianapolis next week for a strictly medical portion of the combine, business leaders and city officials tell Sports Illustrated.
“I have 220 rooms booked,” says Michael Moros, the 54-year-old general manager of the Marriott Downtown, which will serve as the central hub of the event. “I’m excited to have it. It keeps my team working. It’s my job to get people back to work here.”
As soon as basketball players exit, rooms will be readied for stars of another sport to be isolated in a similar type of bubble. From April 8-10, NFL personnel will conduct medical evaluations of the draft’s biggest prospects here, similar to those they’d normally administer during the combine, the on-field portion of which was canceled this year. Two people from each team are invited to the event, but the league is limiting those people to team doctors, orthopedic specialists and other medically related personnel.
A total of 322 prospects received combine invitations this year, but about 175 of them are only being allowed to hold medical evaluations virtually. The other 150 will be here in Indianapolis, where a busy month rolls on.
“Indianapolis is delighted to have major sporting activity after the NCAA tournament wraps up,” says Leonard Hoops, the president and CEO of Visit Indy who confirmed the news Wednesday.
For the players and teams, next week’s unique combine experience is essential. In a year where the NFL is prohibiting prospects from visiting team facilities, Moros’s hotel will be one of the only spots that club medical personnel can evaluate players in a face-to-face environment.
That’s important for those highly-touted prospects who are returning from injury, such as Virginia Tech cornerback Caleb Farley (shoulder) and Alabama receiver Jaylen Waddle (ankle), and those who opted out of the 2020 college season, like LSU receiver Ja’Marr Chase and Penn State linebacker Micah Parsons.
“The medical exams are always the most important part of the combine,” says Jim Nagy, the executive director of the Senior Bowl. “The workouts have been the glitzy, TV thing, but when you talk to football people, it’s really only the interviews and the medical exams. Next week will be another touch point for the staffs even if the football people aren’t there. I’m sure the GMs and coaches will sit down with their medical staff and fill them in on the players.”
For NFL clubs, the normal pre-draft process features three parts: (1) in-person interviews/psyche assessments, (2) physical evaluations and (3) medical exams. Most teams have already completed interviews and psyche evaluations during virtual meetings with prospects who received a combine invitation. Clubs are mostly relegated to relying on college pro days for the physical evals, aside from the Senior Bowl, which held a largely normal week despite the circumstances. The event hosted 135 prospects in Mobile, Alabama, and 31 of 32 teams were represented, says Nagy.
The medical portion is more complicated. Combine invitees were sent for in-person testing at independent healthcare facilities near their home or where they are training. After those test results, teams conducted telehealth exams with the prospects. Each team is assigned eight to 12 players. The results of both the tests and exams are shared among the entire league.
The exams in Indianapolis are more orthopedic in nature. The NFL selected the 150 prospects based on both their draftability (higher-touted prospects) and those who may have been flagged for medical risks after their general in-person exams.
Most teams are sending their head athletic trainer and team orthopedic surgeon. Players and personnel who have not been vaccinated (roughly 85% of team personnel have been vaccinated) must pass a COVID test before arriving and will be tested each day in Indianapolis.
All personnel and players will be isolated to the Marriott Downtown. Players will arrive in two waves. Day 1 will include imaging tests, and Day 2 will feature personal exams.
For the first time in 33 years, the Indianapolis Crowne Plaza, the central location of the annual combine, is not hosting the prospects. For space purposes and because of the Marriott’s familiarity with bubbling personnel, the league chose Moros’s property.
Players and staff will be in a more flexible bubble than the one that NCAA tournament teams find themselves. In fact, Moros says he’s being allowed to open his hotel restaurant, coffee shop and bourbon bar for event guests. For now, they are closed as the Final Four participants isolate before Saturday’s games. It’s part of the NCAA’s bubbled approach to this year’s tournament, all of which
took place in the Indianapolis area.The near month-long event has provided a much-needed cash infusion to the local hospitality industry that's been rocked by the pandemic. The Marriott was closed for nine months starting last March and only reopened for weekends in January before wrapping itself in an invisible bubble with a surge of clients starting with the Big Ten tournament.
It will, finally, reopen to the public on April 13, Moros says. By that time, his hotel would have hosted two dozen basketball teams, more than 500 basketball and football players, another 300 college coaches and staff members, nearly 100 NFL personnel and blocked off more than 1,200 rooms over 33 days—all the while operating with 300 fewer hotel employees than normal.
It's another sign that the country is emerging from the COVID cave, and Moros couldn’t be more ecstatic.
“We’re seeing light at the end of the tunnel,” he says.
Honduras drugs: President's brother gets life in prison
Tony Hernández, the brother of the Honduran president, will spend life in prison for drug trafficking.
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Niger 'coup attempt foiled' ahead of inauguration
The presidential palace is attacked two days before the nation's first democratic handover of power.
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France fire: Young heroes climb building to save family in Nantes
A group of young people scale the outside of a building to rescue a family from a fire in Nantes.
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New on SI: Debating the NFL's 17-Game Season: Is More Better?
Two MMQB writers duke it out, taking sides on if the 17-game season is a good thing.
Conor Orr: Mitch, hello. I think we should write something on the 17-game season. Would you want to fight about it? I remember we had a spirited back-and-forth about the expanded playoffs last year. I said you were wrong and kind of inadvertently called you a nerd in
the lede of my column. And then you were right. Perhaps by including both perspectives, there’s less of a chance I look like a dolt.Mitch Goldich: Conor, hello. Thank you for finally admitting that “Shut up, nerds” was directed at me.
Yes, this is every editor’s dream: To suggest a writer write something and have that writer say, “Actually, you should do half of it.” I don’t know if it’s going to be a fight fight, but count me in.
CO: Perfect! Just make sure to put my byline first. Glad you've caught on to my increasing laziness.
What I'm about to write sounds incredibly selfish, but if 2020 taught me anything, it's that sometimes you just have to be honest. I like the 17-game schedule for a completely singular reason: It's good for me because I want to watch more football. I am in no position to turn down additional football games. I miss football when it’s not on television.
This may seem like a bit of a startling admission for some people given how loudly I waved the flag for not playing football in 2020. The draft felt gross. The beginning of the season felt horrifying. The game where Dez Bryant, then unwittingly COVID-positive, walked around chatting with all of his old friends and coaches, made me throw my hands up in the air and wonder what we were doing here.
But I watched every single game. And, it was cathartic. And it was three hours where I could complain about Brian Schottenheimer and not think about a pandemic, a political firestorm or the fact that I hadn't seen anything that wasn't the inside of my house for six months. You might say that this kind of intense appreciation will fade once we return to normalcy. It's a fair counterpoint. But I like having the option. If one good thing grew out of 2020 it was hopefully an intense, full-bodied appreciation for the things we love.
MG: I’m not totally surprised to hear you say that. I know who I’m talking to … The MMQB’s foremost expert on the AAF. I know how much you love watching football, and you know I’m the same way.
But I’m still very much against the expanded season. So now I’m in the same weird position you were last year (and which I was at times last year too) of arguing for less football. Who wants to be that guy? It’s not the fun position.
Though I can say—as a guy who once, at the conclusion of a high school wrestling season, attempted to eat an entire Ben & Jerry’s Vermonster bucket in one sitting—that more of something is not always better.
My concern is that it will make the games we actually get worse.
I wrote in 2019 about how lengthening the season will stretch out the final standings. (Think about how teams in other sports get eliminated with so many games left on the schedule.) Mathematically, it should lead to teams clinching earlier, teams having meaningless games earlier, teams engaging in shenanigans by pulling certain players off the field earlier in the season, etc., etc.
You went off on the Eagles after what they did in Week 17 last year. We’re very likely to have even more teams in those situations next year. Does that not concern you?
CO: It does concern me. But a lot of people read that Eagles column (including a note of encouragement I got from a famous, mystery luminary who was really mad at Doug Pederson!) and so I feel like I’d be costing myself some clicks by not trying to circle the wagons around my faux self-righteousness.
See, I would gladly accept the argument in your scenario for two reasons:
One, there will be something to play for in “Week 18.” There will be some reason for the NFL to suck us back onto the couch. I don’t need much. Maybe Week 18 is when we’ll see one or two of the rookie quarterbacks (the guys sitting behind Jimmy Garoppolo and Matt Ryan, for example). Maybe there is another division as sordid and hapless as the 2020 NFC East and we get to drag that out for another week. I think—think—this is the precursor to more flexible scheduling, as I would assume the NFL has digested your concern and found a way to maniacally flip it into a positive for itself. For the most part, bad NFL football is still pretty phenomenal football. The Broncos game last year where they didn’t have a quarterback kind of cemented that for me.
Two, it extends the fantasy football season by a week. I’ve been in the same league for 10 years now with colleague Jenny Vrentas and some other football friends. I love it. I agonize over it. And I’m always, for some reason, getting hosed by some guy who picks up Kenyan Drake on the waiver wire for lulz and pounds me for 120 points.
The elephant in the room here, which you curiously did not lead with, is player safety, which I would guess you’re wielding like a hidden, Shakespearian dagger. It is the biggest counterweight to my take and the most troubling part of this ethical tradeoff I make as someone who earns a living talking about football.
Is this what’s coming next? Do you care about player safety, or is it just about you wanting something more exciting to watch in Week 18?
MG: I do appreciate you pivoting to making points on my side of the argument, but I hope you’re not inferring that I don’t care about player safety just because it wasn’t the first thing I brought up.
I think you’d agree that we are all complicit to some degree in putting aside concerns about health and safety when we gorge on the NFL and consume a 16-game season, which I figure is what you’re referring to when you call it an ethical tradeoff.
I actually think that’s one of the more interesting parts of this news cycle over the last few days. Players like Alvin Kamara, Adrian Amos, Darius Slay and David Johnson, among others, have voiced their opposition to the extra game, and good for them. I think it’s a little too late, given that we’ve all known this was coming since the CBA was signed last year. In Johnson’s defense, he says he advocated against it at NFLPA meetings. And I know others, like Richard Sherman, have spoken out against it before. I’m not saying it was just a wave of guys reacting after the fact. Sherman has said specifically that expanding the schedule is hypocrisy, coming from a league claiming to care about health and safety.
So I was responding more to your “more is better” line of thinking that you started with.
On the topic of injuries: Of course, we know all about the long-term issues that can be caused by adding football games (we as a culture know so much more about the dangers of repeated subconcussive head impacts than we did when the schedule was expanded from 14 games to 16 in 1978). But I also should have clarified that additional injury risk is a big part of the reason I say the product will get worse. More games means more wear and tear on players' bodies, and fewer players left standing upright by the time the playoffs roll around.
Part of the reason I say there will be more shenanigans is because teams will be smart to pull players to prevent injuries. We’re going to see teams play Nate Sudfeld because they don’t want to risk a catastrophic injury to their young starter. We saw a ton of players held out of Week 17 last year, as we always do, either because of a major injury sustained earlier in the season, a minor injury they may have played through if the game was more meaningful or simply to prevent an injury (like, notably, Ben Roethlisberger in Week 17 for a Steelers team that had no chance to earn a bye). And also in tanking situations, let’s be honest.
It’s interesting you bring up fantasy football, because I would argue the fantasy season should not necessarily extend an extra week for the same reason most leagues already exclude the final week and the same point I made above. The last week (and now potentially the penultimate week) will be even more compromised. Let’s see a Week 18 first before move our championships to the new Week 17.
CO: This was always going to come back to Nate Sudfeld, wasn’t it? He’s got to be high on your list of random Philly sports icons.
MG: Conor, did you know the word antepenultimate means third-to-last? I didn’t know that word existed until a few weeks ago when my wife and I were binge watching something and I said we were on the episode before the penultimate one, which prompted us to look up if there was a word for that. Now I plan to use it as much as possible. Also: my lame joke from 2016 that I retweet myself every year is ruined.
Sorry where were we?
CO: There truly is a Mitch tweet for everything.
MG: What do you think about the idea that the quarterback of a team that’s, say, 15–2, might sit for a whole month if his team finishes the season with two meaningless games and then has a first-round bye?
CO: I think that, unless that quarterback is like an aging Ben Roethlisberger or a flailing Eli Manning type in the final stages of his career, it's a silly thing for the coach to do anyway! If he wants to give a player who thrives on rhythm and control a month off, then he is free to expose himself as someone who doesn't understand his team very well. I honestly don't think we're going to see a lot of garbage games sans stars. Not nearly as many as you might think.
Also, all this civil discord has made me hungry. Let’s wrap this up. I’m about to order a Poke bowl.
MG: O.K., I’ll let you go. I guess I’ll finish by saying that of course I’m going to watch all the games. I’m sure I’ll even enjoy them. An extra day of RedZone, and fantasy and coaches emptying the playbook with gadget plays … I mean, you know me, you know I’m in.
I will also concede that if they insisted on adding an extra game to the schedule, the way they did it is smart. I like having the conferences alternating the extra home game and teams playing interconference games against a division they haven’t faced in two years, if we must do something. That’s all fine.
But to bring this full circle, I’m glad you started with our argument last year about the expanded playoffs because I view these moves in tandem and think it’s all connected. I said this on Twitter on Tuesday—and, fine, you can make fun of me for being That Guy who writes an article just to talk about his Tweets—but the NFL’s formula with 32 teams, eight divisions, 16 games and 12 playoff teams just worked so beautifully. It was mathematically perfect, and it bugs me that they are tinkering with a system that worked so well because everyone always needs more.
This is a trend across sports, and probably across all forms of media and entertainment, that everything just has to keep growing forever. The NFL season will eventually be 18 games and go until President’s Day weekend. In the last decade, every sports league became obsessed with the phrase “12-month" league and we are gradually creeping closer to a world where every sport is just on all the time.
But one thing I love about the NFL is that it’s the only sport where you can really watch and digest every single game. We enjoy it as a community—we all watch the same games, and see all the same highlights, and know the broadcasters and the referees and the fantasy players, and text our friends when something big happens, and you can assume most of the people who care about football as much as you are watching. But with the league obsessing over extra weeks, extra playoff games, Saturday doubleheaders, Monday doubleheaders, Tuesday games, 9 a.m. games, Thanksgiving games, Black Friday games, Christmas games … at some point the majority of people are not going to sit down and watch all 285 games. People will find reasons not to watch the games, and I think we’ll lose something that’s really special about the NFL.
CO: Too much of a good thing is indeed detrimental, which is why I'm very carefully crafting this Poke bowl. I think NFL fatigue was a hot button topic a few years ago, but there doesn't seem to be a ton of data supporting that over the long-term. I think the NFL has the advantage of making most people feel like their games are a treat. It can be a treat on a Monday or Tuesday or Wednesday. Will it eventually reach the point of peak saturation? Yes. Is one more game, especially, as you said, a game against an opponent we rarely see the team play, going to tip the scales? No. That feels like another treat. And after last year, I am accumulating treats and savoring every bite.
Suez Canal: Egypt begins inquiry into cargo ship's grounding
Investigators will try to establish why a giant container ship, Ever Given, ran aground last week.
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Rochelle Hager: TikToker killed after tree falls on her car
Rochelle Hager was on the phone to her future wife when she was killed in the US state of Maine.
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Rapper reptiles: Alligators make a splash at new home
Flavor Flav and Tupac are among the new arrivals at a reptile park in New South Wales, Australia.
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New York City hunt for man who repeatedly kicked Asian American woman
The attack left the victim, 65, in hospital and police said the suspect made anti-Asian statements.
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BBC China correspondent John Sudworth moves to Taiwan after threats
The BBC's Beijing correspondent moves to Taiwan after pressure from the Chinese authorities.
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Italian officer 'caught selling secrets to Russia'
Military police detain a navy officer and a Russian in the act of exchanging secret documents, say police.
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Britney Spears 'cried for two weeks' over Framing documentary
The singer says she did not watch all of Framing Britney Spears but was nonetheless "embarrassed" by it.
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Indonesia crash: Sriwijaya Air plane's voice recorder recovered
The "black box" could explain why the Sriwijaya Air jet crashed into the sea in January.
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Why Narendra Modi's visit to Bangladesh led to 12 deaths
Narendra Modi's visit to Bangladesh tuned deadly last week as violent protests erupted on his arrival.
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Tuesday, March 30, 2021
Terrace House: Japan man fined $80 over Netflix star's suicide
Before she died, Hana Kimura had written social media posts implying she was cyberbullied.
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Chauvin trial: 'I called police on the police'
The prosecution called several witnesses - some becoming emotional - on day two of the proceedings.
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Nashville floods kill four people
The storms in Tennessee required 100 people to be rescued from vehicles and buildings.
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Watergate mastermind G Gordon Liddy dies aged 90
G Gordon Liddy served nearly five years in jail for his role in the scandal that toppled President Nixon.
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Chinese-owned Volvo takes on Sweden's family values
The carmaker will offer a generous paid parental leave scheme to its 40,000 employees globally.
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Google Maps to start showing eco-friendly routes
The driving app will highlight journeys with lowest emissions based on factors such as traffic.
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Covid: Australia falls 85% short of vaccine delivery goal
The slow rollout sparks concern as Brisbane faces a possible extension of a citywide lockdown.
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Biden's dog Major in second biting incident at White House
Major had been sent to Delaware for training after nipping a White House employee earlier this month.
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New on SI: 'We'll Do What We Feel Is Best': Texans GM Discusses Deshaun Watson | The Albert Breer Show
After months of insisting Deshaun Watson is Houston's QB, new Texans GM Nick Caserio comments on the recent lawsuits alleging sexual misconduct from Watson.
For three months, amid a trade request, and then a slew of lawsuits alleging sexual misconduct, the Texans' new brass declared that Deshaun Watson was and would remain Houston’s quarterback.
Things are changing.
On a Monday taping on The Albert Breer Show, Texans GM Nick Caserio was our guest for a wide-ranging conversation, starting with the news that’s engulfed the organization he’s been charged with turning around since he took over in early January. After a couple months of sticking to his guns in saying that Watson is Houston's quarterback, I asked directly if he still feels that way.
“I think we'll take it one day at a time. And I think everything is pretty fluid here,” Caserio responded. “And we'll adjust as we go. And ultimately, I think we'll do what we feel is best for the Houston Texans organizationally.”
So, I then asked, you’d be open to trading Watson?
“Ultimately,” he said, “we'll do what we feel is best for the organization.”
On the pod, Caserio talked a little more on Watson; how he sees EVP
Jack Easterby fitting into his reworked football operation; why David Culley was the right person to pair with in building it; and his own path to becoming a GM and how he plans to bring some, but not all, the things he learned in New England to Houston. Plus, in an interesting twist, he took us through how a Microsoft exec influenced his thinking on that.Listen to The Albert Breer Show
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New on SI: Reflecting on the Fantasy Success of First-Round Running Backs (2010-2020)
SI Fantasy analyst Michael Fabiano recaps the fantasy success rate of first-round running backs drafted from 2010 to 2020
Fantasy First-Round Reflections
- Quarterbacks (2012-2020)
- Running Backs (2010-2020
- Wide Receivers (coming soon)
There was a time when the running back position was considered highly valuable in the world of pro football. Back in the 1970s & 1980s, a running back was the first overall selection in the draft four times in five years. Ricky Bell went first to the Buccaneers in 1977 (Tony Dorsett went second to the Cowboys), the Oilers took Earl Campbell first in 1978, Billy Sims went first in the 1980 draft to the Lions, and George Rogers went to the Saints atop the 1981 draft (Freeman McNeil went third to the Jets).
Nowadays, a running back going first overall is about as rare as a happy Jets fan.
READ MORE:
Urban Meyer on "Direction" of No. 1 PickThe last time a runner went first overall in the NFL draft was 1995, when the Bengals took Ki-Jana Carter. If you remember how that worked out (or didn’t), well, you might know why this sort of thing doesn’t happen anymore. It’s gotten worse in recent years too. Forget about running backs not being first overall selections; we’ve had two drafts in the last eight years where a runner wasn’t even picked in the entire first round.
This all seems odd because running backs are considered so valuable in the world of fantasy football yet so replaceable in the eyes of many teams. Regardless, let’s take a walk down memory lane and reminisce on all of the first-round backs since 2010, how they fared as rookies and how many of them actually become fantasy studs.
2020
Clyde Edwards-Helaire
Edwards-Helaire was the lone first-round running back in the 2020 NFL Draft. It came as a surprise too, as most draft pundits predicted D’Andre Swift or Jonathan Taylor to come off the board first at the position. Regardless, CEH was well on his way to putting up a great season before the Chiefs added Le’Veon Bell as a free agent. An injury later in the year further deflated Edwards-Helaire’s value, leaving him as a disappointment based on the price tag. The good news is that the Chiefs released Damien Williams and haven’t re-signed Bell, so the Glyde could be in a position to break out next season.
2019
Josh Jacobs
Jacobs was also a lonely first-round running back, coming off the board to the Raiders at No. 24 overall. He rushed for over 1,100 yards and scored seven touchdowns in 13 games as a rookie, finishing 21st in points at the position. He was 16th on a points-per-game basis, however. Jacobs took a big leap forward as an NFL sophomore, finishing eighth in points. Unfortunately, the offseason addition of Kenyan Drake put a damper on Jacobs’ future stock, at least in 2021. He’s now more of a third or fourth-round fantasy pick.
2018
Saquon Barkley, Rashaad Penny, Sony Michel
Barkley was the second overall pick of the Giants in 2018, and he sure showed why he was thought of so highly. He finished first in fantasy points among running backs, and only Eric Dickerson has had more points among rookie runners in the Super Bowl era. What’s more, his 91 catches are a rookie record. Injuries have been an issue the past two seasons, but Barkley is still a projected top-five pick in 2021. The same can’t be said of Penny or Michel, however. Penny finished as the RB66 as a rookie, and his "best" finish came in 2019 in a tie for RB58. Michel finished as the RB35 as a rookie, and he’s never ranked higher than 31st among running backs in his first three seasons.
2017
Leonard Fournette, Christian McCaffrey
Fournette was the fourth overall pick of the Jaguars in 2017, while McCaffrey went four picks later to the Carolina Panthers. Both paid immediate dividends, as Fournette was the RB9 despite missing three games. His 18 points-per-game average was seventh at the position. CMC ranked 10th overall, producing 80 catches and 1,086 total yards.
After missing eight games in 2018, Fournette fashioned an RB7 finish in 2019 on the strength of a career-best 76 catches. His fantasy stock fell last season in Tampa Bay, but he did help the Buccaneers win their second Super Bowl championship. McCaffrey has gone on to true fantasy superstardom, ranking second and first in points in his next two seasons, respectively. He missed much of last season due to injuries, but CMC remains the consensus No. 1 overall pick heading into 2021 fantasy football drafts.
2016
Ezekiel Elliott
The fourth overall pick of the Cowboys in 2016, Elliott came right out and made a huge fantasy impact. His 325.4 points were good enough to finish second as a rookie, and it ranks fifth all-time among first-year runners. He missed six games the following season, but he was third among backs in points per game average. Zeke was the RB5 in 2018 and RB3 in 2019 before falling to RB9 this past season. Of course, he lost his starting quarterback, Dak Prescott, and the Dallas offensive line was an absolute disaster. In all, Elliott has established himself as a fantasy star and remains a first-round selection.
2015
Todd Gurley, Melvin Gordon
Gurley was the 10th overall pick of the St. Louis Rams, while Gordon went No. 15 to the San Diego Chargers. Gurley finished ninth in points as a rookie despite playing just 13 games, while Gordon failed to score a single touchdown and ranked as the RB48. Both backs went on to much greater things, of course, as Gurley was considered the top back in fantasy land in 2017-2018 before knee issues flared up and cost him both playing time and draft value. Even at just 26, his best days seem to be in the past. Gordon followed up his poor rookie campaign with finishes of RB7, RB5, and RB8. Now in Denver, he’s no longer considered “elite” but remains a No. 2 fantasy runner.
READ MORE: 2021 NFL Mock Draft
2014
None
The first runner off the board in the 2014 NFL Draft was Bishop Sankey, who went in the second round (No. 54 overall) to the Titans. Jeremy Hill went next to the Bengals, and Carlos Hyde went to the 49ers two picks later. No one from this trio excelled in the NFL.
2013
None
No runners were picked in the first round of the 2013 draft, and the first back taken was Giovani Bernard in Round 2 (No. 37 overall). The second back taken was Le’Veon Bell (No. 48), who turned into a fantasy football superstar during his time with the Steelers.
2012
Trent Richardson, Doug Martin, David Wilson
Richardson was the biggest name among running backs in the 2012 class, and it looked like he’d be worth the third overall pick after finishing his rookie season as the RB7. It all went downhill from there though, as Richardson was traded from the Browns to the Colts. He never rushed for more than 519 yards in Indianapolis and was out of the NFL after 2014. Martin was actually better than Richardson as a rookie, finishing second in points behind Adrian Peterson. He missed 15 games over the next two seasons but came back with an RB4 finish in 2015. He was mostly inconsistent as a fantasy option, though. Wilson never rushed for more than 358 yards in a single season in the pros as a neck injury cut his career short.
2011
Mark Ingram
Ingram was the lone running back selected in the 2011 NFL Draft, and it took some time for him to make a significant fantasy impact. He was the RB47 as a rookie, RB40 as a sophomore, and RB63 while missing five games for the Saints in Year 3. He produced three 1,000-yard seasons in his next six years and emerged into a more reliable player in fantasy leagues up until this most recent season with the Ravens.
2010
C.J. Spiller, Ryan Mathews, Jahvid Best
Spiller (No. 9), Mathews (No. 12), and Best (No. 30) were the top backs in the 2010 NFL Draft, but none of them became true fantasy stars. Mathews was the best of the bunch as rookies with an RB7 finish, while Spiller was the RB27, and Best was worst at RB41. Spiller had a breakout 2011 campaign with an RB6 finish, but it was the only season he lived up to his actual NFL draft hype. As for Best, he missed 10 games in NFL Year 2 in Detroit and never again made an impact for the Lions or fantasy footballers.
Breakdown
Since 2010, a total of 17 running backs have been drafted in the first round. Ten of them (59 percent) finished in the top 10 in fantasy points as rookies. The next best finishers were Jacobs (RB21) and Edwards-Helaire (RB22), while the remaining five didn’t have much value during their respective rookie campaigns. Still, 12 of 17 first-rounders were at least low-end No. 2 fantasy running backs based on their final season totals.
Digging a little deeper and leaving out the 2020's first-rounder (Edwards-Helaire), who has only one NFL season under his belt, we’ve seen a total of five running backs reach elite status at some point in their careers. That list includes Gurley, Gordon, Elliott, McCaffrey, and Barkley. Fournette has put up high-end totals twice in four seasons, and Ingram finished his career on a high note with the Saints and Ravens (2016-2019). Jacobs had an RB8 finish as an NFL sophomore and seemed to be a surefire top-15 pick in 2021 drafts, but that all changed when the Raiders decided to bring in the veteran Drake as a free agent this offseason. Sorry, but we now “hate the Drake.”
In all, only Penny, Michel, Wilson, and Best have been complete duds among first-round running backs in the last 10 years. Richardson and Spiller didn’t meet expectations, but each of them did at least have one top-10 fantasy season.
So, will there be any first-round running backs in the 2021 NFL Draft? Clemson's Travis Etienne and Alabama's Najee Harris seem like the best bets if you look at the draft experts. Javonte Williams out of North Carolina has snuck into the backend of some first-round mocks too. Whoever does have their name called in Round 1, the trend of backs being selected highly and finding success seems to be a positive one for fantasy fans.
MORE FANTASY ARTICLES FROM MICHAEL FABIANO
Michael Fabiano is an award-winning fantasy football analyst on Sports Illustrated and a member of the Fantasy Sports Writers Association (FSWA) Hall of Fame. You can follow Michael on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram for all of the latest breaking fantasy football news and the best analysis in the business!
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New on SI: Business of Football: Top 10 Story Lines of the New League Year
The start of the new league year is typically busy season for the business of football, and this March was no different.
The first two weeks of the NFL’s new league year are typically the busiest ones for the business of football, and this year—despite a diminished salary cap—was no exception. And not to be outdone by any player signing, it was the league—not a team or player—that made the biggest headline.
Here are my top 10 business of football stories from this March’s flurry of activity.
1. The still undisputed champion of programming
The
NFL’s new media contracts are massive, with cumulative value north of $100 billion over 10 years. The incumbents—CBS, NBC, Fox and ESPN/ABC—almost doubled their current rights fees. And, for good measure, Amazon doubled what Fox is currently paying for Thursday Night Football. The deals suggest 1) broadcast television is not as dead as people think, at least broadcast television that carries the NFL, 2) it is always a waste of time to debate week-to-week or year-to-year ratings of NFL games, as media contracts always go up regardless, and 3) NFL franchise values will now skyrocket. NFL owners secured a team-friendly 10-year CBA with the players a year ago that had a 17th regular season game as part of it; they then went to the networks armed with labor peace and 17 games and came out $100 billion richer. Now with media contracts averaging $300 million annually, combined with a player cap that may not even exceed $200 million until 2024, the math is heavily tilted for management. There has never been a better time to be an NFL owner. Remember when concussions, or player protests, or domestic violence or various other issues were expected to be the one that would knock the NFL off of its perch? That was cute.2. Contract reporting is still a mirage
The hyperbole of media reporting of NFL player contract value bothers me every year, probably more than it bothers others. It just seems disingenuous to see media constantly portray contracts in the best light possible for the agent and the player, with numbers that are not real. I get it: Relationships with agents are important. I know that well. But I do wonder about journalistic standards for reporting on contract values that, unlike guaranteed NBA and MLB contracts, don’t paint a true picture of the deal. As an example, at this time last year the Dolphins signed Kyle Van Noy to a reported “four-year, $51 million contract.” Van Noy was cut last month, having made $15 million, with no remaining obligation from the Dolphins. I know few care as much as I do, but player contract reporting around free agency is a mirage.
3. Quarterbacks: You get what you get
My previous column discussed the strength of Dak Prescott’s contract, due in large part to his being on the precipice of free agency. NFL teams never let ascending young quarterbacks hit the market; that would be franchise suicide. Thus, the group of free agent quarterbacks this year looks a lot like it does every year, with names like Ryan Fitzpatrick, Tyrod Taylor, Andy Dalton and diminished versions of James Winston and Cam Newton. When Bears fans lament the Dalton signing, my question is: Who exactly did they think was going to be their quarterback? Putting hopes into trading for Russell Wilson or Deshaun Watson (both of whom I maintain will not be traded) is like buying a Powerball ticket. The best time to find a quarterback is when you don't need one (see the Packers). Speaking of which …
4. Trading at the top
Friday saw the 49ers move up from 12th in the draft to third, giving up 2022 and 2023 first-round picks to the Dolphins. Of course, no team would trade those assets for any position besides quarterback. The 49ers are saying incumbent quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo is staying, which brings to mind the George Constanza line: “It’s not a lie … if you believe it.” The 49ers prepared themselves well to move on from Garoppolo: By front-loading $37 million of cap space in the first year of that deal, trading him would leave a dead-money charge of less than $3 million, a far cry from the $34 and $22 million albatrosses of Carson Wentz and Jared Goff. And speaking of Wentz, the Eagles moved down from sixth to 12th, securing the Dolphins’ 2022 first-round pick in the process. They now potentially have three first-round picks next year, ammunition if Watson or Wilson (or Aaron Rodgers) become available, or to package for a top quarterback next year. In other words, they have assets now to replace the quarterback (Jalen Hurts) who replaced the quarterback (Wentz) costing them $34 million against the cap this year.
5. Voidable for the desperate
Many continue to ask me about voidable contracts, such as ones signed by Taysom Hill and JuJu Smith-Schuster, among others. To put it simply: The Saints and Steelers were so desperate for cap space that they added fictitious years to those deals to spread out the cap hit. Hill and Smith-Schuster will still make the $12 million and $7 million, respectively, that they were supposed to make in 2021, but most of it will be bonus (prorated) instead of salary (not prorated) in order to push out cap room. And the fake years? They will automatically void after this season. This is what teams in desperate cap situations have to do to survive short-term. Speaking of which ...
6. Spiked cap: a false promise
The rationalizations regarding voidable years and restructuring are out there: It’s O.K. because there will be cap spikes in future years with the massive TV deals. Well, no. Anticipating cap spikes is a hope, and a hope is not a plan. It may be three years before the cap even reaches the level where it was supposed to be this year. Teams like the Saints and Steelers have been pushing the can down the road for years and look where they are now: declining teams with no Drew Brees and an aging Ben Roethlisberger. The Rams have thrown caution—plus dead cap and first-round draft picks—to the wind for a few years in their “win now” philosophy. Of course, only one team each year truly “wins now.” Here is the reality: There are 10 to 12 teams that have not had to resort to Cap restructures or voidable years. The other teams have essentially given those 10 to 12 teams a $10-20 million head start on next year or the year after. Teams that manage the cap well are always going to have an advantage over poorly-managed teams, regardless of what number the cap is.
7. Patriots’ tight end obsession
I said it for weeks: The diminished salary cap presented an opportunity for well-managed teams to separate themselves. The Patriots—among others, including the Jaguars—targeted 2021 as a year to spend liberally to gain a competitive advantage in a depressed market. However, in looking at their first-day deals, it appears they did not think the market would be as depressed as it was. They signed the top two tight ends on the market, Jonnu Smith and Hunter Henry, to contracts valued at $12.5 million per year. The Patriots never pay wide receivers, running backs or (since Tom Brady) quarterbacks, but they do pay tight ends, going back to when Rob Gronkowski and Aaron Hernandez were the highest paid duo in the league. While many NFL teams allocate scraps to the tight end position, the Patriots will be paying two of them a combined $35 million this year.
8. Deshaun’s Watson’s legal troubles
The talking points around Deshaun Watson have taken an extraordinary turn. There are no more hot takes about trades and Photoshopped jerseys, not with 19 (and counting) civil lawsuits against Watson alleging sexual misconduct, and new allegations in a Sports Illustrated exclusive Monday afternoon. The lawsuits will take much time to sort out as the two bombastic Texas lawyers spin their advocacy. Of more interest to me is an NFL commissioner who has repeatedly and consistently levied discipline against players—including high-profile ones such as Ben Roethlisberger, Ezekiel Elliott and James Winston—for conduct that did not result in criminal charges. Even with what little we know, it is hard to see Watson escaping the long arm of Goodell here, given the precedent. And, of course, no team is now considering trading for Watson anytime soon.
9. More, not less, Dan Snyder
As a native Washingtonian who grew up a diehard fan of the team, I am acutely aware of the fan base’s negative emotions toward majority owner Daniel Snyder. And that was even before reports of a hostile work environment toward women and cheerleaders being groped on junkets for season ticket holders. Now Snyder has bought out his unhappy minority partners who wanted out due to—you guessed it—Snyder. The result: The franchise is more inextricably linked to Snyder than ever before. To be fair, Snyder has made some stabilizing hires of the top of the football and business sides in Ron Rivera and Jason Wright, and that bodes well for the future. But to those wanting less Snyder: Sorry, you are getting more of him.
10. Pride in Parker’s pride
Finally, I am now in the third chapter of my career: The first chapter was being an agent, the second was being a team executive and the third is trying to give back by teaching, writing, broadcasting, podcasting and lecturing on sports from my unique perspective. I felt some pride in giving a little back this week. I have been advising Brandon Parker, a young agent working for Vayner Sports, who is the son of one of my mentors, the late great agent Eugene Parker. When Eugene—who was as knowledgeable about player value as any agent I had met—tragically passed away a few years ago, I made a vow to give back to his sons if I could. And last week Brandon negotiated a three-year, $63 million deal with the Giants for Leonard Williams. The deal has a top-of-market average, a practical full guarantee and only a three-year term for a player at a premium position, ensuring Leonard another bite of the free agency apple again at age 29. Brandon made both me—and his late, great father looking down from above—quite proud.
Covid: Italy introduces quarantine for EU travellers
People arriving in Italy from other European countries must now also quarantine for five days.
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Japan's cherry blossom 'earliest peak since 812'
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Mexico police under fire after woman's death in custody
Mexico's president said the mother-of-two from El Salvador had been "brutally treated and murdered".
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Manipur: India state reverses order turning away Myanmar refugees
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Suez Canal: Ships begin sailing through cleared waterway
Authorities hope to clear the backlog of vessels waiting to use the vital trade route within days.
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Monday, March 29, 2021
Inauguration poet Amanda Gorman: 'My life changed in six minutes'
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Covid: Brazil ministers replaced in major cabinet reshuffle
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Covid-19: World leaders call for international pandemic treaty
Boris Johnson and more than 20 leaders say another health emergency is a matter of "not if, but when".
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Hong Kong: China to pass 'patriot' electoral reforms
The changes aim to only have "patriots" in office in Hong Kong but critics warn it will stifle dissent.
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Lady Gaga dog walker Ryan Fischer 'had to have part of his lung removed'
Ryan Fischer was shot in the chest as he walked the star's three French bulldogs in February.
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Nike sues over 'Satan Shoes' with human blood
Nike sues an art collective over its 'Satan Shoes', produced in collaboration with rapper Lil Nas X.
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Hong Kong: What is China's 'patriot' plan for electoral reform?
Aiming to tighten control over Hong Kong, China wants only "patriots" to run for office.
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George Floyd: Americans react to Day One of the Chauvin trial
A black political hopeful, a Minnesota resident and a retired officer share their thoughts.
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Photographing the "endless diversity" of America by streetlight
Photographer Daniel Freeman travelled across the US to capture striking night-time shots.
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How bees and drones team up to find landmines
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Uyghurs: Xinjiang cotton ban is self-defeating, China tells H&M
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Alabama Shakes drummer Steven Johnson arrested on child abuse charges
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Facebook undersea cable to boost South East Asia internet
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Biden administration threatens tariffs on UK goods in 'tech tax' row
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Suez Canal: Giant ship blocking Suez Canal finally freed
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New on SI: Jaguars Head Coach Urban Meyer: Trevor Lawrence is 'Direction We're Going'
Lawrence will reportedly watch the draft from Clemson instead of traveling to Cleveland.
New Jaguars head coach Urban Meyer has
not been shy about his interest in former Clemson quarterback Trevor Lawrence. And it appears as if Meyer, whose Jaguars hold the No. 1 pick in the 2021 NFL draft, and Lawrence will officially be teaming up starting April 29.When asked by NBC Sports' Peter King if there was any mystery about Jacksonville selecting Lawrence first overall, Meyer said, "I’d have to say that’s the direction we’re going. I’ll leave that up to the owner when we make that decision official. But I’m certainly not stepping out of line that that’s certainly the direction we’re headed.”
Lawrence enters the NFL after a dominant three-year run with the Tigers. He threw for 10,098 yards and 90 passing touchdowns in college, while also rushing for 18 touchdowns.
2021 NFL Mock Draft 1.0: Quarterbacks Go 1-2-3-4
He won the national championship in January 2019 when Clemson topped Alabama 44-16. In January 2020, LSU defeated Lawrence and Clemson in the national championship.
“Trevor checks all the boxes, you know?” Meyer told NBC Sports. “The number one common quality of every great player, not just quarterback, is competitive maniac. He’s 34-2. Won a national title as a true freshman. Is a winner. I’ve seen him up close and in person compete.
"...What I’m really pleased with and I don’t want to say surprised, but him, his agent, his family, they’re focused on one thing. He wants to become the best version of himself for the National Football League, which is, well, it is somewhat refreshing.”
On Sunday, ESPN's Adam Schefter reported that Lawrence will watch the draft at Clemson with "a few family members and friends," instead of traveling to Cleveland, the site of this year's draft.
Lawerence would be the first Clemson player selected with the No. 1 pick if he is the first overall.
He could be one of four quarterbacks selected in the first four picks, joining BYU's Zach Wilson, Ohio State's Justin Fields and North Dakota State's Trey Lance.
South African Adrian Nel killed in Mozambique jihadist attack
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French drug company fined over Mediator weight loss pill
The drug was authorised for overweight diabetics but is believed to have killed hundreds of people.
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Galápagos tortoises: 185 babies seized from smugglers
Officials found 185 baby Galápagos tortoises wrapped in plastic and packed into a suitcase.
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Trump asks wedding party: 'Do you miss me yet?'
Donald Trump turned up at a wedding at Mar-a-Lago and railed against Joe Biden, China and Iran.
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Barack Obama's Kenyan grandmother dies, aged 99
Affectionately known as Granny Sarah by the former president, she defended him during his election campaign.
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Mozambique conflict: What's behind the unrest?
Islamic militants operating in the north have been the cause of growing concern in the region.
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New on SI: MMQB: Inside the 49ers' Bold Decision to Move Up in the Draft
When the Niners looked at the QB landscape, they decided now was the time to find Jimmy Garoppolo's eventual replacement.
Over the last three days, one word kept coming up on the blockbuster deal struck by the Niners and Dolphins, through all the digging I did, and that word is control.
Sitting at 12 in the draft, San Francisco lacked it. At three, the Niners have it.
To understand the rest, you have to look not just at the two teams involved in this big-time transaction, but the state of quarterbacking across the NFL. The Niners know, like everyone else knows, the Jaguars are taking Trevor Lawrence first overall. They think, like everyone else thinks, the Jets are taking one, probably Zach Wilson, with the second pick. There’s also plenty of reason to believe Atlanta is taking one fourth overall.
Between there and where the Niners were, just outside the Top 10, you had the Eagles, Lions, Panthers and Broncos in play to take one, and beyond that the Patriots, Washington Football Team and Bears lurking as teams that could trade up.
Now, let’s say, for argument’s sake, that Deshaun Watson isn’t traded before the season starts, and things between the Seahawks and Russell Wilson stabilize. Lawrence goes first overall. Wilson goes second overall. That would put the Jaguars and Jets in the clubhouse, with up to eight teams still swinging to find their guy, four of whom were picking ahead of the Niners, with three first-round quarterbacks (Trey Lance, Justin Fields, Mac Jones) left.
It’s right there for everyone to see. The math didn’t work for the Niners.
But it does now.
By dealing away three first-round picks (12th overall this year, plus their picks in 2022 and ’23) and a third-rounder in 2022, the Niners seized a measure of control over a chaotic quarterbacking landscape, jumping from fifth to first in line behind the Jaguars and Jets with a month left until the draft. They won’t get Lawrence, and they probably won’t get Wilson, but they will get their pick of the rest.
Of course, before seizing that control, the Niners had to figure out that they wanted control. And the process of deciding that was underway well before anyone had an idea Kyle Shanahan and John Lynch were spoiling for a splash move up the board. Which we’ll explain.
If you hadn’t turned the page from free agency to the draft, the Niners and Dolphins sure did it for you on Friday, and we’re doing the same in this week’s MMQB. Inside the last Monday morning column for March, you’ll get:
• Perspective on Zach Wilson’s pro day from the guy who scripted it.
• A full rundown from NFL evaluators on how Wilson and Mac Jones threw last week.
• A dive into the NFL meetings this week, with details on the 17-game slate and … Germany.
And much, much more. But we’re starting with the news of the week, which is the third big-ticket deal of the 2021 offseason.
O.K., so on the surface, the Niners wanting the aforementioned control seems like a fairly simple thing. Quarterback is the game’s most important position, and there are a lot of high-end prospects there in this year’s draft class. But for a couple of different reasons, the decision to make the deal was more complicated for San Francisco than for most of the others out there looking.
One, the Niners have a 29-year-old quarterback, in Jimmy Garoppolo, already on the roster. He’s going into the fourth year of the five-year, $137.5 million deal he signed in 2018 and is just 14 months removed from having started a Super Bowl. Two, they have a core of talented, and pricey, in-their-prime veterans, which makes draft capital valuable because it’s a place to find young, cheap talent to surround those stars. Three, because of the pandemic, getting a full evaluation on draft prospects is harder than ever.
And that, to be sure, is a lot to sort through. The Niners would get there, but, as you’ll see, they absolutely had to walk a tightrope to make it.
• Right after the season ended they decided to look at the idea of taking a QB in April. Shanahan, Lynch, assistant GM Adam Peters, offensive coordinator Mike McDaniel, QBs coach Rich Scangarello and offensive assistant Bobby Slowik were among those who dove headlong into quarterback evaluation in January and February.
• By the end of February, the initial assessment was complete, and the picture came clear that there were five legitimate first-round prospects. You didn’t need to be Lynch or Shanahan to know Lawrence was never going to be available to the Niners. But that still left four guys in play who would be options if San Francisco could find a way to jump the line. And just logically speaking, and based on their actions, the Niners made the determination that, in time, at least two of those four would be an upgrade over Garoppolo.
• San Francisco also got a picture from its scouts of the 2022 draft at the position, and it was bleak in comparison to ’21. That meant not taking one they liked this year would likely mean going into ’22, the final year of Garoppolo’s contract, with far fewer options on the table.
• The Niners have close ties to the Jets staff. Lynch and Jets GM Joe Douglas are friendly, and of course Shanahan is new Jets coach Robert Saleh’s old boss. The Niners did have some internal discussion on Sam Darnold. And in the process of vetting they figured that the Jets weren’t moving the second pick.
• This is where doing the early scouting would help: With the whole league playing catch-up on the draft class, the Niners were able to move early with their play, engaging the Dolphins about three weeks ago. Lynch and Miami GM Chris Grier pledged to keep the talks quiet. Teams calling the Dolphins to sniff around the third pick were told only that Miami had a strong offer for it. The Dolphins didn’t shop the Niners’ offer, and the Niners didn’t double back to the Jets or anyone else looking for a better deal.
• The Dolphins, though, were looking for a way to stay closer to where they were originally picking, which led to this becoming what was essentially a three-team trade. And Miami needed a partner that would keep the talks in confidence. So Grier called the Eagles, who owned the sixth pick, a little more than two weeks ago to ask if they would be interested in moving back to 12 if the deal with the 49ers went through. Philly said yes, and the Dolphins told the Eagles they’d circle back. Then Grier and Eagles GM Howie Roseman chipped away at the parameters of a second-order trade.
• In doing that, Miami was in a position knowing quarterbacks likely would go 1-2-3-4, which would give the Dolphins the second pick of non-quarterbacks in the draft, while keeping the extra first-rounder for 2023.
• The Eagles worked exclusively with the Dolphins, and Roseman had to keep the trade under wraps in the two-plus weeks in between to allow for the bang-bang nature of how it eventually would go down. And with a pretty good decent chance the Bengals will take LSU’s Ja’Marr Chase at five (we mentioned in our mock this week that that Joe Burrow has given Cincinnati’s brass a glowing recommendation), Philly felt comfortable with the difference in talent between six and 12—and also operated with the knowledge that it’d be hard to get a future first (this being Miami’s slotted No. 1 in 2022) in exchange for moving down closer to the draft, particularly if it looked like the top four picks would be QBs.
(Also, this allows Philly to reset its roster, with a minimum of two 1s and two 2s—and more likely, so long as Carson Wentz stays healthy, three 1s in 2022—plus a cleaned-up cap to work with then.)
• Then free agency started and two things happened in San Francisco to affect how they’d approach the quarterback still on its roster. One, the Niners were able to keep the great majority of their own players, most notably Trent Williams, Kyle Juszczyk, Jason Verrett and Jaquiski Tartt. Two, while they flirted with some veteran quarterbacks, Joe Flacco among them, they didn’t get one. Which meant they maintained a roster capable of contending for a title, but one with only one NFL-proven quarterback on it.
• And yes, the Patriots did inquire about Garoppolo earlier in the offseason. The Niners told them he wasn’t available. He still really isn’t. Why? It’s in the last bulletpoint. San Francisco believes it has a championship roster, and trading Garoppolo now would be entrusting those aspirations to a player it has, at this point, only seen on tape. The Niners don’t know for sure how the kid will come along, how he’ll learn, how soon he’ll be ready to start, etc. Remember, Shanahan sat Garoppolo for a month after trading for him in 2017 so he could learn the offense. And that was with a player who’d been in the NFL for almost four years. The quarterbacks the Niners are scouting now don’t even have that much collegeexperience (Fields started 22 games at Ohio State, while Jones and Lance started 17 apiece at Bama and North Dakota State.).
• That said, I’d say Garoppolo’s availability is subject to change. My guess is, at this point, it’d take the Niners getting a first-round pick for them to even start in on trade talks and move off the course they’ve set. Now, if a veteran they can trust as a bridge quarterback becomes available, that could well shift their thinking. Or if we get to summer, and the rookie is way ahead of schedule, and/or a Sam Bradford-in-2018 situation arises elsewhere, that could change things, too. But for right now, Garoppolo is the Niners’ starter.
• And the economics of the situation were a factor to all this too, of course. Garoppolo almost certainly won’t be a Niner in 2022, and a starting quarterback on a rookie contract will be, which will give the team more room to operate with to lock up guys like Fred Warner, Nick Bosa and Deebo Samuel. So, too, will the fact that the Niners won’t have to pay a first-round pick at another position starting in ’22 or ’23. But for now? The Niners have the fourth-most cap space in the NFL. They can carry the rookie and Garoppolo, easily.
• As for that final price in the trade, the Niners essentially gave up those two first-rounders to jump nine spots. The other pick? In an interesting twist to all this, I’m told that 2022 third-rounder is the compensatory pick connected to Saleh getting the Jets job (part of the NFL’s efforts to promote minority hiring).
• Shanahan and Garoppolo talked on Friday. Obviously, no one in Garoppolo’s shoes would be fired up with that day’s developments. But I can say that there’s a belief there that Garoppolo will react the right way and, with his future as a starter in the league on the line, work to put his best football on tape in 2021.
Put all that together, and there’s a good, logical path to how the Niners got here, and how the Dolphins and Eagles helped make it happen, while affirming their comfort level going forward, for now, with the quarterbacks they drafted in 2020 (Tua Tagovailoa in Miami and Jalen Hurts in Philly). And in the process of trying to get a jump on the market, the Niners have one other thing in addition to control, and that’s more time.
San Francisco now gets a month to dig deep into Lance, Fields and Jones (and even Wilson, though he’ll likely be off the table for the Niners), max out on allowable Zoom meetings with each without having to worry about covering their tracks, and talk to everyone around those guys to get the best feel for who they’re most comfortable tying the franchise’s future to. They’ll also have time to see if developments on the veteran market might change anything on Garoppolo—or allow for a Godfather offer for him to come.
Absent that, the 49ers are, essentially, where the Chiefs were in 2017, when they drafted Patrick Mahomes with Alex Smith as the incumbent. Only San Francisco is there a month ahead of the draft. Like the Chiefs then, the Niners have a coach and GM going into Year 5, a playoff-experienced roster in full bloom, and a quarterback they know they can win with who has two years left on his deal—allowing them to keep him now to best serve the team they’ll field in the fall, then trade him after the season (like the Chiefs did Smith) if he plays as well as they’d expect him to, to get some of the capital lost in the draft trade back.
There are, of course, some questions left to be answered. First and foremost, the Niners still have to figure out whether they like Fields, Jones or Lance best.
But how all that works out now is up to them. Which, of course, was the idea of moving this aggressive, and this early, in the first place.
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ZACH WILSON'S PLAN
Former NFL quarterback John Beck—now a coach at Tom House and Adam Dedeaux’s acclaimed 3DQB outfit in Orange County—can still remember hanging out in the parking lot of Golden West College with Zach Wilson last summer and how manageable the goals, at the time, seemed for the BYU junior as he prepared to head back to Utah for fall camp.
“We were just standing by our cars talking about being smart, making good decisions, not taking unnecessary hits, you have the ability to make the big play, know when to use it—all that just to have a solid, consistent junior year,” Beck said Friday, as he waited for his order at a Shake Shack at Salt Lake City International. “To be here, it’s pretty magical.”
At the time, Wilson was just focused on winning his job back for the season, after Cougars coach Kalani Sitake swung open the doors to a quarterback competition. Wilson had started six games as a true freshman and nine as a sophomore, but he’d been banged up and BYU didn’t play particularly well down the stretch in 2019.
Beck figured then that Sitake was just challenging Wilson, and Wilson would wind up winning his spot back (he did a month later). And he thought Wilson was positioned nicely to show all the talent that Beck first saw in the quarterback as an 18-year-old. But in no way did Beck figure that eight months after that interaction, he’d be in BYU’s field house, with the eyes of the NFL trained on Wilson, who was ready to serve up this personal mic-drop moment: a jaw-dropping throw to cap his meteoric rise into the world of pro football.
In a way, the throw was a perfect display of Wilson showing what he could do, a year after having to grapple with what his coaches at BYU might have thought he couldn’t do.
“There were days he was pissed,” Beck says. “He’s a human, he was pissed. But it motivated him, and he was super driven, I loved the way he approached that offseason—it was very much I believe in myself, I believe I’m just gonna work my tail off, and I’m gonna go out there and earn it again, like I’ve always done. We’ve had that conversation many times.”
By now, you know the story. Wilson commuted from Utah to Orange County during the pandemic. The time he’d normally have spent with his teammates was freed up for him to work on his own game, and he picked up a job at DoorDash to finance his newly-nomadic lifestyle. And Beck watched Wilson refine all the jumps that Wilson had made in their three years together.
Wilson was actually first introduced to Beck in April 2018, after he’d enrolled early at BYU (he graduated high school the previous December). Wilson’s uncle had a nephew named J.D. Neeleman who was the quarterback at Lone Peak High in Utah and had started working with Beck. Neeleman’s dad had said to Beck in passing, “I have a nephew that would really love to know about this. I’m gonna talk to his dad.”
Soon thereafter they met. And there they were together, less than three years later, in Provo—with Wilson the very likely second pick in the draft.
And if all this seems a little too Disney-movie-ish, there’s more. Just before the workout, news of the Niners-Dolphins trade broke. Beck didn’t tell Wilson about it until afterwards, but he smiled when it went down, as he thought it might after hearing rumblings that a deal was in the works. Why? Well, he’d geared Wilson’s pro day script—which had more than 60 throws and incorporated a lot of play-action and keeper-game throws, as well as downfield drive and off-spot throws—to play on tenets of Kyle Shanahan’s offense.
He did it because the teams picking second and fourth run that scheme, and because he had insight into it, having played for Shanahan in Washington in 2010 and ’11. And with the deal, the teams with picks two through four were running that offense, with Shanahan himself in the mix.
In other words, what Beck and Wilson put together was more or less built on the mission statement of whichever company he’ll wind up working for, even if the Jets were to pass on him. Even better, as Beck sees it, getting to one of said companies would be a perfect result.
“It’s the perfect fit,” Beck says. “They want somebody who can get the ball out quick, make quick decisions go through progressions and know where and why. He can do that. Once he processes it, does he have to move off the spot and deliver an accurate ball? He can do that. In play-action game, can he get out on the edge and throw on the run? He can do that. In the keeper game where they want to take their shots, can he pull up quickly and get the ball downfield in a split-second? He can do that.
“I just think what Zach brings to the table, and what that offense is asking of the quarterback, is such a great match.”
There’s no question that Wilson needed to grow over the past few years to get here. His arm, Beck says, has gotten stronger, through a combination of simple physical maturation and work (specific throwing routines, weighted-ball exercises, etc.). Conversely, they’ve also worked on Wilson’s ability to rein it in, and not take unnecessary risks with his body and the ball, gains that showed up during BYU’s 11–1 season.
All the same, Wilson’s changed Beck’s mentality a little, too, getting him to think bigger. Part of that has been being ready for the potential (probable?) result that Wilson lands in New York, and everything that comes along with that. In fact, Beck told me he’s planning to line up two friends of his—Chad Pennington and Josh McCown, a pair of former Jets QBs—to talk to Wilson about the challenges of playing in America’s biggest market.
“Zach looks forward to opportunities like that. He has traits to handle the big stage,” Beck says. “I think he wants those moments. He’s human, like we all are. And New York can be tough. But he’s been working on the tools to handle those things for a long time, and I think he’ll have the right people in his corner to help him through the ups and the downs, if that’s the market he’s gonna be in. Because there’s gonna be those.
“He’s well aware of that. When you play football, there are ups and downs, and if you’re gonna have ups and downs in that market, you have to know the reality of it.”
Another reality: Last summer, Beck didn’t see himself being in this spot, getting ready to board a flight back to California after Wilson turned heads, again, and pulled into pole position to go second overall in the draft.
And it wasn’t just that one throw, either. Which is where we’re going next….
THE VIEW FROM A PAIR OF PRO DAYS
If there are five quarterbacks likely to land in the first round, we’re now through 70% of their pro days. Math sounds a little funny, right? Well, Trevor Lawrence threw in February, Lance on March 12, Wilson on Friday, Fields throws Tuesday, and Jones threw Tuesday and will throw again this Tuesday (sort of head-to-head with Fields) during Alabama’s second pro day. And as we did with Lance and Lawrence earlier in the offseason, we’re here for you in getting reviews from those who were on the ground for the workouts.
We’ll go in chronological order, so we’re starting with Jones, who had a bit of a shorter throwing session than Wilson—partly because he’s going to throw again, and is expected to show a little more, this week. Another thing worth mentioning is that the Tide’s trio of potential first-round skills guys (receivers DeVonta Smith, Jaylen Waddle, Najee Harris) sat this one out.
NFC exec 1 on Jones: “I thought he did really well. I thought he threw the ball well, his accuracy was obvious. He had couple misses early, where you could see how competitive he is. He has a stronger arm than people think, he’s better athlete than people think. And the testing numbers show he’s a better athlete than people think. His movement in drills show it, he threw the ball well on the run.… It seems like he has a presence to him. The drawbacks may be thinking he’s a one-year guy, and there are the arguments on the talent around him. But nobody made those comments on [Joe] Burrow, right? I love Burrow, but he had a lot of good players around him.… I think Jones is a good player. I don’t think he’s elite. But he had good moments, and you saw at all year and at the pro day, the stage isn’t too big for him.”
AFC exec 1 on Jones: “He threw fine at the pro day, most guys do.… Athletically he’s just average. He fits into the pocket-passer category. Had enough arm strength, ball placement was a little off on some throws, but he’s very accurate, he showed a lot of that on film.… The guys love him. You heard ex-teammates chose him over Tua. He definitely has an outgoing personality, you could see him cheering his guys on.… If anything, you worry about the lack of athleticism, when he has to create on his own, and he’s not throwing to first-round receivers all over the place.… He’s not an upper-echelon athlete. Tom Brady isn’t either, but he compensates with anticipation, accuracy, experience. Mac will have to develop that.”
NFC exec 2 on Jones: “I thought it was an efficient workout, a workout that showed good arm strength, very good accuracy, and better athlete than you thought on tape. The impressive thing was that from the Senior Bowl to this workout, he’s improved. His footwork was better, his accuracy was better. And he was working with different receivers at the Senior Bowl, but his top guys at Bama weren’t working out either. He seemed to have more arm at pro day.… I didn’t think there was anything he didn’t do well, nothing disappointed me.… I wouldn’t say he’s a first-rounder. I think he’ll be a solid pro, and that puts him in second or third round. But for me, not the first round.”
And now to Wilson, whose workout was scripted for about 60 throws, but wound up around 70 after he asked Beck for a couple do-overs.
NFC exec 3 on Wilson: “He ended up being bigger than I thought he’d be, and that was the No. 1 thing people worried about. He was 215 pounds, his hands measured out, he was fine with all that stuff. On the field, he was really impressive. He’s an easier thrower than I realized, very smooth motion. Where some guys have a hitch or a windup, the ball jumps right off his hand.… He’s an easy thrower on the move, you can tell he’s a natural athlete. The arm strength is excellent, the accuracy was good. He got in a rhythm where he was really hot. He also missed a couple. Walking away, if you’re [Jets GM] Joe Douglas, you feel better about it, that, ‘Yup, this is the guy.’ From a pure physical standpoint, he’s all good. You have a little medical question, because there’s so much unknown this year with everyone, he had the [2019 surgery on his] shoulder. But I don’t think that’ll be a big deal.”
AFC exec 2 on Wilson: “It was really good, he’s super talented. He throws so easy, he has a really quick delivery, he can throw from all angles and zip it if he needs to. The arm strength—if there was any question I had, it might’ve been there, and he certainly answered it. There were some throws, on each sideline, you could tell where he didn’t really rip it on tape. I’m not as worried about that now.… Could it have been better? Sure, he missed a couple. But from a talent stand, it was really impressive.… [Seeing his stature] was good. He’s not a skinny-legged guy, he’s not frail, he’s put together. I’d heard the heaviest ever been before this was 205. He was 214 at pro day, and it looked good. And he has a bigger lower body than people thought.… From a tape standpoint, he wasn’t as good as [Patrick Mahomes and Aaron Rodgers] coming out. But that’s easy to say now. Some of the ability to throw from different angles, and with a release that quick is similar to those guys. Rodgers is probably more appropriate. Remember, people weren’t super [excited] with Rodgers’ arm either, which seems crazy now. So is he as talented as those guys, as an athlete? Maybe. Is he gonna be a great generational quarterback? I don’t know.”
AFC exec 3 on Wilson: “He threw it well. He missed a few, I think he was pretty pumped up going in, so that might’ve been it. He can really throw it. It’s easy for him. He can throw across his body, on the move, to his right, to his left.… You could tell he had some nerves early, but he was poised enough to get it together. If you’re comfortable with the guy and his leadership—and I think that’ll check out—he’s really good. A BYU kid going to New York, he’ll need a little work, of course.… He looked better [physically] than I thought he would. He’s over 6’2”, and he’s not a rail, he’s got a good lower body. And you can tell he’s gotten stronger since the season.”
And with that, now, the pro day spotlight shifts to Fields and back to Jones, and it sure will be interesting to see how quarterback-hungry teams staff those two workouts on Tuesday.
TEN TAKEAWAYS
The NFL’s meeting this week won’t include rules changes, but that doesn’t mean you won’t be affected by its events. In fact, in the 25-page agenda prepping owners and team presidents/executives for it, there are a lot of interesting nuggets on what they’re calling the “restructured” season. Here are some of the small details that flow into the bigger picture of going to 17 games, and what it means for football in America.
• The NFL calling it a restructured season rather than an expanded season is intentional, of course, and references the change from a 16 regular-season/four preseason game format to a 17 regular-season/three preseason game model. The league and union agreed on this in part based on injury data that broke down all football activities (regular season games, regular season practices, preseason games, training camp practices, joint practices, etc.) and found that the highest injury rate was actually in preseason games. So, as they saw it, the healthy-and-safety difference from one model to the other was seen as a push.
• As part of this restructure, the NFL calendar will simply expand a week. Camp will open around the same time it normally does, the Hall of Fame game will still be five weeks from the Thursday night opener, and the first full slate of preseason games will be four weeks out from Week 1. The difference? A two-week gap between the final preseason weekend, and Week 1. So there will be no games leading into Labor Day weekend.
• Because of the new TV deals, the NFL will need to have games in an early kickoff window (9:30 a.m. ET), and is planning to have three of those annually to satisfy the agreements in those contracts (which kick in two years from now). Obviously, those games would likely be held in, let’s say, different time zones than they normally would. We’ll get to that in a second.
• Another piece of the new TV deals included enhanced flex scheduling, and that’s being voted on too. If passed, the league (and networks) will be able to move games between the early and late afternoon windows freely “with proper notice”; flex games to Sunday Night Football with 12 days’ notice in Weeks 5–14, and six days’ notice Weeks 15–17; and flex games to Monday Night Football in Weeks 12–17 with 12 days’ notice.
• The league is also putting in some limits on TV. Teams can’t appear in prime time more than seven times in a season (including flexed game) and can be scheduled ahead of time for a max of three SNF appearances and three MNF appearances. Also, the league is now going to be allowed to schedule two teams per year to have two games with fewer than five days to prepare (which is to accommodate TNF and, perhaps, Amazon’s Black Friday game).
• The NFL will also formally vote through the scheduling formula for the 17th game—which will match divisions and pit teams that finished in corresponding spots for each team’s fifth inter-conference game. (For 2021 the divisional matchups would be: AFC East v. NFC East, AFC North vs. NFC West, AFC South vs. NFC South, AFC West vs. NFC North). The home team will rotate by conference each year.
In the end, all of this stuff is wrapped into two voting matters. Resolution JC-1 covers going to 17 games. Resolution M-1 encompasses the 11-year, $113 billion media deals the NFL struck with the networks. And on JC-1, the resolution “reason and effect” reads: “To confirm a change in the scheduling format to one consisting of three preseason and 17 regular season games per club, the manner for scheduling games within that format, and to establish the League’s authority to schedule regular season games in countries outside of the United States once a 17-game regular season schedule is implemented.” That brings use to our next takeaway….
The NFL’s international aspirations are growing again, after COVID-19 put them on hold for a year. And if you go through the aforementioned 25-page memo, that much is made clear over and over again. Tucked into the two voting proposals are pretty serious changes to how the NFL is going to conduct its international series. Here’s a snapshot of that:
• NFL teams will be required to “host” at least one International Series Game over an eight-year period, which gives the league a baseline inventory of four games each season to move outside the States.
• And here’s a really interesting twist within that: If the NFL only has that baseline of four to work with (the requirement of teams to play one international home game over an eight-year span doesn’t start until 2022) in a given year, the breakdown of “target markets” in the memo included a newcomer. It called for a goal of two games at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London, one at Estadia Azteca in Mexico City and one in Germany, either in Munich or Berlin.
• With the new requirement, the NFL will drop for future Super Bowl bidding its mandate that teams with winning bids to host Super Bowls must “give” the league a home game for the International Series.
• Also, as part of the resolution, the NFL retains the right to schedule games in Canada, Mexico, the U.K., Europe and South America. I’m the told the reason for the inclusion of South America on that list was that the league specifically has its eyes on Brazil. The reason for the exclusion of Asia and Australia? Because of the logistical issues related to time zones, going to those places would have to be part of a bigger discussion.
• When International Series games are scheduled, teams can protect divisional games, and one non-divisional game from being moved.
• The “home” teams for the four international games will come from the conference that is getting the ninth home game.
• Volunteers to play internationally could lead to their being more than four international games in a given year. Which could lead to the NFL getting to or even past the number (four) they have in London in recent years.
So if there’s one takeaway from all that, I’d say the inclusion of Germany and Brazil marks a subtle shift in the league’s strategy, from focusing on one or two markets (London, Mexico City) to trying build replicate its successes in those places elsewhere.
I wouldn’t rule out a Stephon Gilmore … extension. I do believe it’s unlikely that Gilmore plays the 2020 season for $7 million, which is what he’s on the books for. And I think, as an acknowledgment of that, and on the heels of a very newsworthy couple weeks, the Patriots will at least explore the idea of extending Gilmore. Could they still trade him? Sure. Was moving $4.5 million from 2021 to 2020 in his deal—the contractual equivalent of a cash advance—an acknowledgement on both sides that the 2019 Defensive Player of the Year was probably going to be seeking his final big NFL payday somewhere else in 2021? At the time, it was. But a couple things have changed since.
First, Gilmore got hurt, and his torn quad makes it tougher for the Patriots to get fair value in a trade, and tougher for another team to make a long-term commitment. Second, the Patriots roster are a lot closer to being a contender than they were two months ago, with Dont’e Hightower back off his 2020 opt-out, and high-end, in-their-prime free agents Matthew Judon, Hunter Henry and Jonnu Smith joining the roster, in addition to complementary pieces like Nelson Agholor and Kendrick Bourne. Bottom line: If the Patriots think Gilmore has, say, three more good years left in him (and they know better than anyone else how the 30-year-old has taken care of his body) and they don’t want to pay promising young corner J.C. Jackson like a premier DB, you can certainly see where it’d make sense. I’m also told, for what it’s worth, that Gilmore would be very open to signing a new deal in New England.
You may not know the name George Pickens, but you probably will soon, and for good reason. The Georgia rising junior is a 6’ 3”, 201-pound specimen, capable of the most outrageous sorts of catches, and possessing talent to go in the first half of the first round of the draft. He’s also tore his ACL last week during spring practice, an injury that could wind up costing him all of the 2021 season. The normal ACL timetable makes a return for the SEC title game or College Football Playoff possible. But the question now is whether or not that’s best for him. Amid the pandemic, LSU WR Ja’Marr Chase, Oregon OT Penei Sewell, Penn State LB Micah Parsons, Virginia Tech CB Caleb Farley and Miami DE Gregory Rousseau made the call to skip the 2020 season. All are (and I’ll say somewhat tentatively, because Farley’s medicals need to check out post-surgery) expected to go in the first round, with Chase and Sewell good bets to land in the Top 10. So if you’re Pickens now, and you see that missing a final college season didn’t kill those guys’ stock, would the best call be to focus on getting ready for the 2022 Draft, or on focusing on trying to make it back for the stretch run at Georgia, especially when there’s no guarantee that the Bulldogs will be playing meaningful games then? It’s an interesting question to ask. And it could signal a post-pandemic change in how star prospects handle the end of their time as college football players.
April 8–10 is going to be an important weekend in the NFL. Over those three days, the NFL is inviting 150 prospects to Indianapolis for physicals. Each team will be allowed to bring two people to the event (a team doc and an orthopedic specialist) to go through the normal checks that players would normally go through at the combine. For a player like Farley (coming off shoulder surgery) or Alabama WR Jaylen Waddle (coming off a broken ankle), that weekend looms large, and is accordingly a big one for teams going into their final set of draft meetings. On one hand, it’s great that the NFL and combine people are doing this, even if the proposed multi-site idea (where they’d have guys get physicals in four different locations across the country, with teams flying in) might’ve been more effective. On the other, it highlights the problem teams and players with injury history are facing this year. Normally, teams would have medicals on around 330 players from the combine, and the ability to bring others in for physicals, meaning scouts will be assessing somewhere around 200 players more than usual with incomplete medical information. They’ll still have “virtual” physicals from those on the list of invites the combine released last month who won’t be in Indy this weekend (I’m told 90% of those have been completed). But that’s not the same as a team getting its doc’s hands on every guy. And on Day 3 of the draft, there’s a chance that will have a very, very real impact for players whom teams have never been face-to-face with, and it will for teams, too, in how they manage risk in that area.
That weekend’s also going to present Wilson with his final box to be checked. As we’ve said for a couple weeks, the Jets wanted to be able to dot the I’s and cross the T’s on Wilson, and the other quarterbacks in the class, before really putting Sam Darnold out there for trade. And the physical is a part of it for Wilson. The BYU quarterback had surgery on his throwing shoulder between his freshman and sophomore years. The expectation is that it will check out fine next week in Indy. But if you’re Douglas and the Jets, I’m sure you’d like to know for sure, from your own doctors, that the shoulder’s going to be O.K.
As for where Darnold could wind up next? I’d keep an eye on Carolina and Pittsburgh. Darnold would represent a worthy, and affordable, dart to throw at the quarterback board if the Panthers are convinced the quarterbacks they’d want will be gone by the time they pick at wight (and Atlanta having the fourth pick doesn’t help them). As for the Steelers, if the price is right they could see some similarities in how Darnold plays to how their own quarterback did in his early 20s, and throw Darnold in there to compete with Dwayne Haskins to be Ben Roethlisberger’s heir. Washington and Denver have also come up as possible landing spots, though I know each had some misgivings on his tape.
An #asexpected for this week: The guys feeling the cap crunch are, indeed, the NFL’s older free agents. In this week’s GamePlan, I did a top 5 of available free agents, and the first four had each been in the league for at least seven years (the fifth was a running back, Leonard Fournette). Some of the guys who just missed my list: Carlos Dunlap, Melvin Ingram, Justin Houston, Casey Hayward, Allejandro Villanueva—well, you get the picture. The high-end, in-prime free agents got their money, at maybe an incrementally smaller rate than they would have normally. The second-tier, in-prime guys scrambled to find one-year or bridge deals. And the older free agents, accustomed to being paid well, wound up sitting out there on the market. Of the aforementioned, top 5, Jadeveon Clowney, DaQuan Jones and Richard Sherman remain unsigned, while Fournette (with Tampa) and Sammy Watkins (Baltimore) found one-year deals.
Time is running short for the NFL and NFLPA to come up with a plan for offseason programs. The idea that’s been floating around for some time is to allow teams to start on time 20 players in the building at a time, with things loosening up as more players get vaccinated and as long as things continue to improve nationwide on the COVID front. (There’s the potential that vaccinated players would be under one set of rules, and non-vaccinated players under another set for a time.) The 20-player limit is, in essence, how big college programs, full of players who can’t afford expensive off-site personal training, handled things last summer, and it makes sense as a starting point, to at least give players the option to go work with their strength coaches. The next question wouldbe when to pull the lever on it, and that would presumably be soon. Under normal rules, teams with new coaches would be able to start offseason programs a week from today, and teams with incumbent head coaches would be able to start on April 19.
Doing the mock draft this week gave an early look at players who I believe scouts and coaches are higher on than people realize. And three really stood out for me above the others.
• Ole Miss WR Elijah Moore: You might know him from his, uh, creative Egg Bowl celebration. Scouts are looking at him in a different light now. I think he has a shot to sneak into the bottom of the first round, and he could be the fourth receiver taken after LSU’s Chase and Alabama’s Waddle and DeVonta Smith, in some order.
• South Carolina CB Jaycee Horn: I’m not going to sit here and tell you he’ll be the first corner taken. But I won’t be surprised if he is. Farley’s back surgery is a complicating factor for some teams, and I’ve talked to a few that prefer Horn to Alabama’s Patrick Surtain II. I’d say Horn’s a pretty safe bet to go inside the top 20 and has an outside shot at the top 10.
• Alabama RB Najee Harris: I left him out of my first round, but a few people encouraged me to find a way to sneak him in there. His omission was more about positional value and the fact that last year no backs were taken in the first 31 picks, while seven went between 32 and 66.
I think this is the right time to refresh everyone on where teams stand from a salary-cap standpoint. So here are the top five and bottom five teams in cap space, as we approach April 1.
Top 5: Jaguars $40.60 million, Colts $34.09 million, Broncos $28.36 million, 49ers $23.20 million.
Bottom 5: Saints $2.12 million, Giants $3.89 million, Bears $4.08 million, Falcons $4.65 million, Packers $4.78 million.
SIX FROM THE SIDELINE
1) What a fun run from Oral Roberts (even if I didn’t like how it started). And I'm going to avoid the irony-of-it-happening-in-the-Big-Dance joke:
2) Shaka Smart must have a heck of an agent, if it’s true that he was about to get fired at Texas, and wound up with the Marquette job before anyone had to announce it.
3) This NBA buyout market is weird. That Blake Griffin and LaMarcus Aldridge can suddenly just surface on the Nets, and Andre Drummond on the Lakers would seem to further upset competitive balance in a sport that struggles to keep it. But maybe I’m wrong.
4) The Last Blockbuster on Netflix is great, if you grew up in the ’80s and ’90s like I did.
5) RIP, Howard Schnellenberger, the architect of the State of Miami and The U. Very few coaches can match the legacy of the man who led the Canes to first two of their five national titles. It’s not overstating it to say he changed college football.
6) The lack of buzz around Opening Day has to be disconcerting for Major League Baseball. That’s a pro sport that relies on people’s habits (having a game on, going to the ballpark) to maintain its audience over 162 games and through the summer months. And I think that the fact that some of those habits were broken last summer, because of the pandemic, make this season a critical one for a sport that fewer kids are playing.
BEST OF THE NFL INTERNET
Love this.
And this reaction to it, too …
… as well as that reaction.
And as for this reaction on 17 games, I’d say Kamara’s not alone.
Looks like me at the gym (except for the monstrous build and the ridiculous pushups. The same, otherwise).
Boston College has become an interesting breeding ground for scouts and coaches, and all these guys are relatively young. In addition to Flores, Kansas City’s Ryan Poles and Vegas’ Dujuan Daniels have risen through the ranks to the director level on the scouting side. And the not so young guy over there on the right? That’s Barry Gallup, who played at BC in the 1960s, coached there for two decades through the Doug Flutie years and is still around as the de facto mayor of the program.
Trevor Lawrence, also impressed.
Fun fact: If Philly wins in Week 17, they pick ninth, not sixth. And there’s zero chance that Miami is giving up a first-round pick to go from 12 to 9, so when the Eagles execute that pick next year, they’ll have Doug Pederson to thank.
You can spend a good hour on the internet researching the fallout from all this.
This is pretty cool.
As is Mahomes’ effort to keep a certain basketball coach from leaving his alma mater to go to that basketball coach’s alma mater.
If the Bears did this to drive people crazy … I love it. (And I also think Andy Dalton is a fine for-now answer).
WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW
We’re now exactly one month from a live, in-person draft in Cleveland. And after all we’ve been through over the last year, that seems like a pretty big deal.
