BuckEyes ~ 5111/195
When analyzing the Merits of a prospective CornerBack, this is how I personally break things down:
Intangibles: Diagnostic Acuity, Field Vision, and, above all: Processing Speed. And of course: Motor. Motor Matters.
Agility: Acceleration, Fluidity, and Closing Speed. And of course: Verticity!! Turning & Burning in Direct Coverage.
Pass Prevention: Combat Skills in Coverage, and Timing, Vertical Burst, and WingSpan at the Catch Point.
Run Support: Appetite, Tactical Discipline, and Combat Skills ~ working through Traffic & Tackling Mechanics.
Agility: Magnificent. Tremendous Acceleration, extraordinary Closing Speed, and serpentine Fluidity.
Pass Prevention: Phenomenal. Arguably the most intoxicating thing about Roby is that he is a rough, physical, nasty, and highly effective Press Corner and an incredibly agile Bail & Trail Corner possessed of unworldly Viscosity.
Run Support: Impressive. Not an idiot out there, but more than willing to take an hand.
I preach Trajectory, and remorselessly.
I place enormous emphasis not simply on Tape, but on what the Tape tells us about where a Prospect has been and where he might be going. The most obvious Manifestation of this Approach is to get drawn to Prospects who've engineered enormous Improvements in their Game during their last College Campaign.
And that is very well.
Yet yet another infinitely less manifest Manifestation of this Approach is that I seek out Prospects who have exhibited extraordinary SkillSets yet have, for reasons that vary far and wide, taken on water, as it were.
The most compelling recent example of this that comes to my mind is Vontaze Burfict, Lunatic & MadMan.
For those of us imbued with an arguably unhealthy Obsession with The Draft, that name is quite familiar, indeed, as a MidFielder ~ "Middle LineBacker", to you Earthlings ~ who entered the 2012 Draft Season as a Consensus 1st Rounder...and who subsequently suffered a PreDraft MeltDown of Epic Proportions!!
By the time the 2012 Draft came around, there wasn't a Soul on Earth who was willing to lay down even a 7th Rounder on this Lunatic. Indeed, I'm pretty sure that many would've cheerfully surrendered a 7th to avoid the guy.
I, on the other hand, being Emperor of Planet X, am not constrained by Earthly Considerations.
And that's why I mocked Vontaze Burfict to the Patriots ~ my Earthly FootBall Team ~ in the 7th Round of the 2012 Draft.
Bradley Roby is not Vontaze Burfict.
Please do not imagine that I am drawing that comparison.
What I am doing is suggesting that sometimes ~ often, in fact ~ Top Tier Prospects suffer what I, who love to trade Stocks, like to call Retraction Action, which in EarthSpeak amounts to One Step Backwards for Every Two Steps Forward.
There is a natural tendency, yet one that almost never seems to register with most Earthlings, for Growth Stocks, whether they be Stocks themselves, or Earthlings, to intersperse torrid bursts of Growth and Improvement with periods of Consolidation, which often appear to be Regression and are often mistaken as Lassitude or Decay.
But that's generally not the case.
Bradley Roby was generally considered a Top Shelf Talent 8 short months ago.
Most of the Chatter, back in the misty days of September, 2013, was centered not around whether he was a Top Shelf Talent or not, but pursuant to determining exactly how high on the proverbial shelf his Stock ought be.
Fast Forward to Modern Times, and Bradley Roby is considered a dubious Prospect, indeed.
I'm not suggesting that Bradley Roby's struggles, ere this past Campaign, ought be marginalized, mind you.
What I'm suggesting is that my Tea Leaves are telling me that his struggles are not the Manifestation either of a Top Shelf Talent who lacks the fundamental Will To Win to forge Greatness out'f'is cerebral and athletic Gifts, nor of a falsely perceived Top Shelf Talent who is turning out to've been significantly overrated.
My Tea Leaves are telling me that the struggles we've seen with Bradley Roby, ere his recently completed Campaign, are those of a young kid who got caught zigging when The Great Wheel of Time decreed that it was Time To Be Zagging.
I'm suggesting that Roby is a young man who, unlike Justin Gilbert, who got caught Leaning Off The Bag in 2012, but had time enough ~ a full Campaign, in fact ~ to realize The Error Of His Ways and dedicate himself to'is Craft at a previously unprecedented level, has entered the Draft just when he got caught Leaning Off The Bag.
I'm suggesting that my Impression is that Bradley Roby has exhibited, through his Tape and his Resume in general, that despite a Campaign that I believe caught him at a Moment In Time when he started to Believe His Press and thus consequently eased off on the gas pedal, that he possesses The Will To Win in abundance.
And I'm suggesting that it was the foolishness of his easing up this Year that caused the Erosion in his Play.
And I'm suggesting that that Erosion is uncharacteristic of this impressive young man.
And I'm suggesting that his Talent is every ounce of what it was perceived to be 8 short months ago.
And I'm suggesting that I really like the odds that Bradley Roby has learned his lesson.
I am suggesting, Ladies & Laddies, that Bradley Roby is every bit the Top Shelf Talent that he was just about universally perceived to be, way back in the Misty, Murky Past of early Autumn of 2013, whenever that was, and that that Top Shelf Talent is in the hands of an exceptional young man who I believe will make the very most of it.
Thanks, as always, to the extraordinary Work by the men of Draft BreakDown!!
Bargain!!
Consensus Market Value 2nd Round | Yankee Grade Top 10!! |