We get slammed by NFLDraftCountdown.com C- Draft Grade

[Texas_Thrill]

"Now they've invested a ton of money and high draft picks in Matt Schaub and at this point they have done nothing to help keep him upright or give him many weapons to work with. Enough about what they didn't do though, let's take a look at their most recent draft effort." - Scott Wright

http://www.nfldraftcountdown.com/features/reviews/teams/houstontexans.html

[aj]

First thought: who cares?
Second thought: his poor grade is based in a large part on not executing a draft day trade down to select Staley ( I assume that to be the case since Thomas and Brown were both off the board when the Texans picked). Does he have inside knowledge that there was a willing trade down partner? Does he have inside knowledge that Spencer is done? Does he even know who Spencer is? How does he know that Staley will be a franchise left tackle?
Or is he just repeating what 4,000 other bloggers and talking heads say about the Texans and their exaggerated o-line woes?
Third thought: he could have given us an A+ and I would still care more about this stupid gnat flying around my face.

[Sprtsfanatic]

Pretty sure its thought #2 and how clueless they are to how our team really is and the improvements and moves we have made in the last 2 years with the exception to our mario williams pick last year.

[cseafous]

The guy said it himself that you could argue that Houston deserves a higher grade but he did not give them one becaus they didn't do it the way he would have done it. And since no teams are calling him about a FO position, I'll take it for what it's worth.

[Texas_Thrill]

I'm sorry but a C- is ridiculous. I mean granted our draft might not have been spectacular but he basically said we failed to do anything right. what draft was he watching?
After Brown there was no LT worth taking. Why would we go spend our first pick on a insurance policy for Spencer? What if spencer comes back fully healthy? Then we look even crazier. Staley wasn't worth a Top 20 pick let alone 10. Okoye potentially gives us one of the best young lines ala Carolina Panthers in the NFL.
Did he forget we face Manning, Young, & Leftwich 6 times a year????

[Keyfro]

you know i respect scott wright for the work he does on his website before the draft and his attempts to grade the drafts...his assessment of our team as a C- i think is off a bit but i can understand where he is coming from...i remember on draft day i was expecting and hoping for a trade down to pick up extra picks and players...so what i was thinking at the time and what scott is saying right now are the same...that we blew it and should have traded down
but that was then and this is now...now i can see why smith/kubiak didn't want to make the trade and risk losing amobi...i think it speaks volumes of the type of guy kubiak is to be an "offensive-minded" coach and draft heavily on defense two years in a row...whether that's the right choice or not has yet to be seen but i like the approach he has in the free agency and in the draft...he's an aggressive minded guy who does not like to take the conservative "safe" route in getting talent...much like shanahan...they are aggressive in nature and that's what i like about them
bottom line is expect the national media to slam us until we start winning more games than losing them...then all of a sudden you'll see people like kiper and wright and the entire espn crew say they knew we were headed in the right direction for the start...blah blah blah...in the end it doesn't matter what they say...all that matter is how our guys play on sunday

[Pantherstang84]

you know i respect scott wright for the work he does on his website before the draft and his attempts to grade the drafts...his assessment of our team as a C- i think is off a bit but i can understand where he is coming from...i remember on draft day i was expecting and hoping for a trade down to pick up extra picks and players...so what i was thinking at the time and what scott is saying right now are the same...that we blew it and should have traded down
but that was then and this is now...now i can see why smith/kubiak didn't want to make the trade and risk losing amobi...i think it speaks volumes of the type of guy kubiak is to be an "offensive-minded" coach and draft heavily on defense two years in a row...whether that's the right choice or not has yet to be seen but i like the approach he has in the free agency and in the draft...he's an aggressive minded guy who does not like to take the conservative "safe" route in getting talent...much like shanahan...they are aggressive in nature and that's what i like about them
bottom line is expect the national media to slam us until we start winning more games than losing them...then all of a sudden you'll see people like kiper and wright and the entire espn crew say they knew we were headed in the right direction for the start...blah blah blah...in the end it doesn't matter what they say...all that matter is how our guys play on sunday

The question that Scott and other talking heads failed to answer is....Who was the trade partner that was willing to compensate the Texans fairly to move into the top 10?
*crickets chiring*

[toptexanfan16]

I find it funny how this guy in the article says that the texans havent done anything to keep matt schaub up yet before he's even taken the feild as a texan. hell for all we know all those sacks could have been carrs fault because he took bad dropbacks. anyways jusy my two cents.

[TK_Gamer]

you have to remember, we are all going nuts this time of year waiting for the season to start. I think the writers have the same problem, they dont have anything solid to go off of , so they just rehash the general consensus wich is usually based on your record last year and how far off our offseason/draft turned out compared to the "experts" ideas. I never liked sports writers anyway. I'll take Texans_chick over all of them. Go Texans!

[mikeinsa]

If you grade only the draft it is hard to give the Texans a great grade when there was no #2 pick. That is if you are only talking about the draft which is what most of these guys talk about. If you include the whole draft and free agent period then the Texans made out pretty good with all the undrafted guys that we added. Go back and look we landed 3 guys who had a round 5 grade in the undrafted free agent period. If you then disregard the fact that we did not have a #2 or at least give us credit for adding our qb through trading the pick and these morons would see a much different picture of our draft period additions.

[tsip]

JMO, but there is going to be a run on towels after this season as the media tries to get all the 'egg' off their face...their stance on a certain player and how wrong they were about him is going to open some media positions...

[Zagen30]

JMO, but there is going to be a run on towels after this season as the media tries to get all the 'egg' off their face...their stance on a certain player and how wrong they were about him is going to open some media positions...
Don't forget a run on water and breath mints to get the taste of crow out of their mouths!
And this guy is just like Dr. Z, not paying a bit of attention to how Kubiak drafts O-Line or the fact that Carr caused many of those "ridiculously high number" of sacks. Meanwhile, our defense got significantly better in the future, if not the present, and hopefully we'll have our secret weapon, Big Nasty, pulling a Jammal Brown and becoming a Pro-Bowl caliber LT.

[fox]

Or is he just repeating what 4,000 other bloggers and talking heads say about the Texans and their exaggerated o-line woes?


This is quickly becoming one of my biggest media pet peeves as well. Analysts are pointing out that we didn't acquire an OL with our 1st round pick, but there just wasn't a good value there. First they'll tell you that BPA is the smartest strategy, then they'll hammer you for not reaching for a position of need. The other thing is that they like to say we didn't get any OL or playmakers to help Matt Schaub.... Umm, well at first glance they're right... we used 100% of our first round choices on defense. Oh, wait, that's right we only have one first round selection. Seems to me we drafted two OL and a WR in the 3rd, 5th, and 6th rounds but those rounds don't count I guess.We had too many holes to fill, even if we'd had 3 first day picks, and it seems as though the media expected us to fill all of them somehow with first day picks or else our draft was a failure.

[Exithios]

We are not going to receive a good draft grade from any of the small-time media outlets I like to refer to as "ESPN Sheep". JaMarcus Russell could have slipped to 10, been snagged by the Texans, and we would have still received a sub-par draft grade just because we are the red-headed step children in the eyes of ESPN and most of the other sports anils. We addressed ever single glaring need in the draft and in UDFA signings this offseason so that just goes to show you that the Texans can't win for losing.

My $0.02

[outofhnd]

Also keep in mind we kept almost everything pretty much under wraps unlike casserly who let the world know who we targeted. now for the last 2 years we have ruined Mock drafts around the world.

[tsip]

I think-like other posters said- the OL will be improved in '07-heck, the run blocking improved the 2nd half last year when we went 4-4.
You can tell how smart some of these guys are because they keep saying draft 'choices' for Matt. Rick and Gary decided long before the draft that Carr was toast, so there was not a better choice for us in the 2nd round-meaning next years 3rd is really all we gave up...
Too, Schaub has 3 yrs of experience already, so he is ready to 'hit' the ground.
I'll bet the stadium will be packed and the place will be rockin'.
PS Hey, TK, where you been man?

[NCSFS42]

i stopped reading when he said we have wasted 2 frist round picks in a row on defensive linemen...

its actually been four.