Here’s a look at the depth chart at the end of spring ball.  This needs to be taken with a large grain of salt because of the number of notable players (Best and Nasty Nate, for starters) out with injuries.  There is also room for some fall arrivals to make the two deep, particularly at wideout.  That said, here’s where things stand now:

CB	Free Safety	Rover	CB
(5) Syd’Quan Thompson	(2) Bernard Hicks	(20) Jesse Brooks*	(17) Chris Conte
(26) Darian Hagan	(25) Brett Johnson	(29) Marcus Ezeff	(27) Charles Amadi

Strong OLB	Strong ILB	Weak ILB	Weak OLB
(9) Eddie Young	(1) Worrell Williams	(7) Anthony Felder	(56) Zack Follett
(10) Devin Bishop	(18) Mike Mohamed	(3) D.J. Holt	(43) Charles Johnson

Strong DE	Nose Tackle	Weak DE
(44) Tyson Alualu	(98) Mika Kane	(95) Rulon Davis
(95) Ernest Owusu	(76) Derrick Hill	(97) Cameron Jordan

Owusu and Jordan were two of the most impressive guys on the entire team this spring.  They will definitely play notable minutes.

Offensive Line

Tight End	Left Tackle	Left Guard	Center	Right Guard	Right Tackle
(5) Cameron Morrah*	(79) Mike Tepper	(70) Mark Boskovich*	(51) Alex Mack	(55) Noris Malele	(58) Chet Teofilo
(83) Skylar Curran*	(71) Sam DeMartinis	(75) Matt Summers-Gavin	(57) Todd Huber	(74) T.J. Emery	(78) Justin Prueitt

The offensive line, particularly the second string, is pretty muddled right now.  I couldn’t find #54 Chris Guarnero, but it’s safe to assume he’ll be somewhere in the two deep.  Tedford and Offensive Line Coach Michalczik have always emphasized that they’re looking for the top 8 guys, so looking at the second string as a whole is almost irrelevant.  We’ll have to wait until fall to see who becomes the 7th and 8th guys.

*Cameron Morrah was sick for the last week for practice so Skylar Curran and Tad Smith shared first team reps in his place. 

*Mark Boskovich and #73 Richard Fisher Split first team reps at Left Guard, so it’s unfair to call either of them second string.  Matt Summers-Gavin ran with the second team at this position.

Skill Positions

Wide Receiver	Fullback	Quarterback	Tailback	Wide Receiver	Wide Receiver
(8) Nyan Boateng	(23) Will Ta’ufo’ou	(13) Kevin Riley*	(22) Tracy Slocum*	(3) Jeremy Ross	(84) Mike Calvin
(85) LaReylle Cunningham	(31) John Tyndall*	(10) Brock Mansion	(28) Covaughn DeBoskie	(88) Drew Glover	(40) Ian Albrecht

*First, the elephant in the room: the starting quarterback has not been determined.  Nate missed most of spring practice with an injury, but he was taking first team reps before he went down.  This battle will (hopefully) be decided in the fall, and Mansion will be third string.

*Likewise, the starting (and backup) tailbacks have not been determined due to injury.  Best participated in practice wearing the red (no contact jersey) and # 34 Shane Vereen missed a lot of time with a hamstring injury.  Slocum had a strong spring, but with Best and Vereen healthy in the fall, it will be a tough competition.  I would expect all three of them to get carries, and DeBoskie might see the field as well.

*The second string fullback appears to be up for grabs as well.  Your guess is as good as mine.

Calvin, Boateng, and Ross are clearly the top 3 receivers, but it is wide open after them and I would expect some of the new recruits to make the two deep this fall.  Drew Glover stepped in as the third receiver for Ross after Ross went down with an injury late in the spring. 

Go Bears! 

According to Scout, Cal men’s basketball has a new recruit:  Jorge Gutierrez.  ESPN says that this Mexico native may have trouble qualifying.  The world reknowned Miami Hawk Talk has this blurb about Cal’s newest Golden Bear:

2008 PROSPECT; Jorge was a former Mr. Basketball in Colorado and now runs the show at Findlay Prep in Henderson, NV.  Gutierrez does whatever his team needs for a win. His team does not need any plays runs for him on offense to keep him involved. Gutierrez has a high basketball IQ as well as great basketball instincts. He prefers to involve his teammates over scoring the ball himself, though he indeed has the ability to score. He easily finishes around the rim, using his either hand, though he shoots jumpers as a righty. He rebounds the ball well for a player of his height and seems to make the right plays at the right times. He also plays defense well and typically matches up with the opposing teams best perimeter player. Gutierrez plays with a remarkable amount of poise and maturity beyond his years and does all of the dirty work for his team.

Judging from this photo, it is true, he won’t have trouble scoring:

MAJOR HOTTIE ALERT!  Finally, Cal has found somebody with hair as amazing as my own to fill the void.  It has been many rough years since I left.  Nobody with the sort of je ne sais quoi attending our fine institution.  Nobody as attractive as me.  Such as:

"Stock TwistNHook photo used for the 50th time" 

Damn, I’m so hot, if I don’t say so myself!  Either way, hopefully this modern day Samson will qualify for school and help with our team’s diversity.  Max Zhang and Michael Cera-lookalike can only do so much.  Go Bears!

Cal’s sports report cards are out.  And the situation looks good!  Yes, the Academic Progress Report was released for 2008.  What’s the APR, you ask, hypothetical question construct?  Here is some general information:

Academic Progress Rate (APR). The APR is the fulcrum upon which the entire academic-reform structure rests. Developed as a more real-time assessment of teams’ academic performance than the six-year graduation-rate calculation provides, the APR awards two points each term to student-athletes who meet academic-eligibility standards and who remain with the institution. A team’s APR is the total points earned by the team at a given time divided by the total points possible.

Ok, so you get two points per term per athlete.  But what is the goal each team is attempting to reach?

925. This is the cut score the Division I Board of Directors approved for immediate (or contemporaneous) penalties. APR scores have already become meaningful numbers to the NCAA membership and general public. Based on current data, an APR score of 925 (out of 1,000) translates to an approximate 60 percent Graduation Success Rate.

900. This is the cut score for historical penalties. This benchmark of 900 APR translates to an approximate 45 percent Graduation Success Rate.

Immediate penalties?  Historic penalties?  Speak English!  Does this mean there’s a chance an athlete might get tarred and feathered???  Damn, calm down non-existant computo-being, we’ll answer all your questions.  You ask more questions than my wife!  But at least, fewer than my mistress.

Immediate penalties. Known also as contemporaneous penalties, these are the most immediate penalties in the academic-reform structure. They occur when a team with an APR score below 925 loses a student-athlete who would not have been academically eligible had he or she returned (an "0-for-2" student-athlete). An immediate penalty means that the team cannot re-award that grant-in-aid to another player. In effect, a team’s financial aid limit is reduced by the amount of countable aid awarded to the student-athlete who did not earn eligibility and was not retained.

Historical penalties. While immediate penalties are designed to be rehabilitative in nature, the historically based penalties carry more significant sanctions for teams that the APR identifies as chronic under-performers. The penalties will be incremental in nature, beginning with a warning once teams fall below a 900 APR cut score. Historical penalties progress to practice and financial aid restrictions, postseason bans and ultimately restricted membership in Division I. Teams scoring below 900 are subject to further examination to determine if historical penalties are warranted. Specifically, teams are compared against the bottom 10 percent within their sport, general student body academic performance, and performance expectation given the resources of the institution.

There’s a lot more information to the situation, but that is a sort of general overview straight from the horse’s mouth.  But enough of these bland generalities, what about Cal?  Here is a link to Cal’s APR.   The good news:

Cal is above both cut scores in all sports.  In some of the racing sports, like Men’s XC and Track/Field, the numbers are close.  And, the biggest eye popper is that men’s basketball is very close, too.  It posted a score of 942.  However, men’s basketball across the board is not very good.  The average score is 928, barely above the cut score of 925.  A comparison of poor scoring sports might illustrate the difference.  Men’s XC had a score of 947, which translated to a percentile rank of 20th-30th in its particular sport. 

Men’s basketball had a slighter lower score, but had a percentile rank of 60th-70th in its sport.  This is not to excuse the poor showing by men’s basketball, but instead to give a fuller context for what the number 9-4-2 means.  In better news, football has a score of 967, which puts it in the 80th-90th percentile.  Congratulations to coach Tedford for maintaining both on the field and off the field success. 

Let’s take a broader look at the Pac10.  Here are the links for the schools:  Arizona State University, Wazzu, Stanford, Oregon State, Arizona, USC, UCLA, Oregon, UDub.

Here are the rankings for the two money sports.  First, let’s look at basketball.  The average for basketball, as noted previously, is 928. 

1.  Oregon - 975 

2.  UCLA - 968

3.  Stanford - 954

4.  Washington - 943

5.  Cal - 942

6.  OSU - 935 

7.  Arizona - 933

8.  ASU - 905

8.  Wazzu - 905

10.  USC - 863 (!!!! They got dinged for this) 

Cal is in the middle of the pack here.  Now, let’s look at Football.  The average for football is 934. 

1.  Stanford - 986

2.  Cal - 967

3.  USC - 948

3.  Washington - 948

5.  UCLA - 941

6.  ASU - 933

7.  OSU - 926

8.  Oregon - 921

9.  Wazzu - 916

10.  Arizona - 903 

Cal is way up at the top.  USC was the only team to receive penalties (as noted above).   As a minor note, the score for "private schools" is higher than the score for "public schools" pretty much across the board.  Ammo for the Stanford complaintniks?????  Only time will tell!

Go Bears! 

As you may have noticed, we don’t have much Rugby coverage around here at the California Golden Blogs.  It’s not that we don’t care; it’s just that we don’t have anything particularly interesting to say about their continued excellence.  Still, a national championship is a National Championship, and you sure don’t see one of those around every day at Cal.  It’s something to be celebrated — perhaps one of those margaritas you toss back tonight could be for our beloved ruggers?

Anyway, I thought a fitting tribute for our Bears might be to compare Jack Clark’s record with the greatest dynasties in American sporting history, just to see how these guys stack up.  For the record, Saturday’s 59-7 smackdown of BYU was the Bears’s:

* 5th consecutive National Title
* 17th Title in the last 18 years
* 20th in Jack Clark’s 25 years as the Head Coach of the Bears
* 24th overall title (since a championship was first staged in 1980)

It’s also worth noting that, before the Bears lost in the 2003 semifinal, they had won the previous 12 consecutive championships.  In his 25 years of coaching, Jack Clark has compiled a 440-66-5 record, good for an .870 winning percentage.  Frankly, these accomplishments are just ridiculous.  I don’t know how the Bears live up to these impossible standards year after year, but they do.  So, how does this compare to America’s greatest dynasties?

NFL - Probably the greatest dynasty in pro football was the Vince Lombardi-led Green Bay Packers of the ’60s.  Between the ‘61 and ‘67 seasons, the Packers won 5 NFL titles, the last three in a row, including the first two Super Bowls.  In those seven seasons, the Packers ran up an 83-20-4 record, good for an .806 winning percentage.  Mighty impressive, but neither as lengthy nor as dominant as Cal has been.

NHL - The Montreal Canadiens were the most dominant professional hockey team in North America for much of the latter twentieth century.  Between 1956 and 1979, they took home the Stanley Cup 15 out of the 24 times it was contested, including 5 in a row between 1956 and 1960.  Ridiculous?  Sure.  Better than our Bears?  Hardly.

MLB - What name says domination over a sport more than the New York Yankees.  Still, the Bronx Bombers’ longest championship streak was 5, between 1949 and 1953, though they did take home 12 of the 18 titles between 1936 and 1953, and a ridiculous 20 of the 40 world championships between 1923 and 1962.  Unfair?  Perhaps, but still not as good as our Bears, who needed just 25 years to get Jack Clark his 20th championship.

NBA - Of course, the longest championship streak in American professional sports belongs to the Boston Celtics, who put together an unbelievable 8 consecutive titles between 1959 and 1966.  They also captured 11 of the 13 titles between 1957 and 1969, and 16 of 30 between 1957 and 1986.  Anyone else think this should more than make up for all those years of Red Sox futility?  Still, even the Celtics’ 8 straight titles fell 4 short of what Cal accomplished between 1991 and 2002.

NCAA Basketball - When you think of dominant college teams, you think of John Wooden and the UCLA Bruins.  Between 1967 and 1973, the Bruins took home 7 consecutive titles, and 10 of 12 between 1964 and 1975.  During those 12 years, the Bruins ran up a 335-22 record, good for an unreal .938 winning percentage.  OK, I’ll concede that the Bruins may have been as dominant as our ruggers (though I couldn’t find a winning percentage for the years of the 12 consecutive titles), but their dominant period has been for less than half the time of our Bears.

NCAA Football - Of course, the NCAA doesn’t sponsor an official championship, but even unofficial ones are hard to string together.  You have to go back to Minnesota in 1934-36 to find a team with a legitimate claim to even 3 consecutive titles.  Of course, if you want to go back to the 1800’s, you’ll find Yale.  All titles in this era have been awarded retroactively, but between 1874 and 1894, Yale went 170-7-6, good for a .966 winning percentage, winning pieces of as many as 16 titles, depending on who you ask.  Of course, some of those years involved playing only 5 games or so, but if you’re looking for a dynasty to rival the Bears, I think you’re going to have to go with 19th century Yale football.

Other NCAA sports - The record for the longest championship streak among an Division I sports belongs to Arkansas‘ Indoor Track and Field team, which took home 12 consecutive titles between 1984 and 1995.  That would certainly match the Bears.  Among all Divisions, the record is a mind-boggling 28 years, belonging to the Men’s Swimming and Diving team of Kenyon College, a Division III school in Gambier, Ohio.  That streak, by the way is still active.  Also, their Women’s Swimming and Diving team holds the women’s record, at 17 years, a streak that lasted until 2001.  Listen, that’s amazingly ridiculous and all, but I wonder if anyone at Kenyon ever thought, "You know, perhaps we should try competing in Division II next year.  You know, just to see?"

In any case, it’s clear that Cal’s Rugby team is ridiculously awesome.  Let’s enjoy it while we can, because it may not be here tomorrow.  So, my final thought:

You gotta think they’d play this song at stadiums a whole lot less if it came with video…

This title of this post is merely a rhetorical question; obviously, NFL-caliber talent alone is not enough to win college football games.  That talent must be coached and work together as a team.  Cal’s most recent draft class is a cautionary tale; 6 players were drafted off of a team that finished above just one team in the conference.  Ignoring the rhetorical nature of my title, however, I had actual, interesting questions regarding the relationship between the NFL talent on a college team’s roster and that team’s success on the field.  These questions led to some online research, as well as me playing with numbers for a couple days.  That, in turn, led to this post.

Because I only have so much time on my lunch breaks, I had to limit my research; I ended up looking at the Pac-10 during the last 10 years, encompassing the 1998-2007 seasons (1999-2008 drafts).  Also, because each team played a widely variable non-conference schedule from year to year, I limited my ‘team success’ rating to conference games only.  From there, I began to ask questions.  Which teams were the most stacked with NFL talent?  Did those teams win the most games?  Who squandered their Sunday talent on Saturdays, and who made the most out of relatively meager prospects?

The talent rating proved a little difficult to settle on.  Should I simply count the number of players drafted?  That seemed too simplistic, as a Marshawn Lynch is clearly more valuable than most 7th-round picks (I won’t pick on any here).  How much more valuable?  I don’t actually know, so I guessed.  I eventually decided to assign 7 points for a first-round pick, 6 for second, and so forth, on down to 1 point for a 7th-round pick.  Cal’s draft this year, for example, featured a second-rounder, two thirds, a fourth, a sixth, and a seventh-rounder, for a total score of 23 (6 + 5 + 5 + 4 + 2 + 1 = 23).  How accurate is this?  On an individual level, not terribly.  One can come up with all sorts of exceptions where low-round picks turned out to be better than top-rated ones (Tom Brady and Ryan Leaf being overused examples).  However, at an aggregate, team-wide level, it does tend to give us a pretty good indicator of how much pro-level talent was on a college roster.  Throughout this article, I’ll be referring to this number as a team’s ‘Draft Score’.

USC dominates the Pac-10 on the field and on draft day

By any standard, the Pac-10 was loaded with NFL talent this year.  34 Pac-10 players were drafted, the most in the past 10 years, and their aggregate score of 129 was the second-most this decade.  (The 2002 draft scored slightly higher, 132, with only 32 players selected, due to more of those players being taken in the early rounds.)  This year’s success, however, was driven almost entirely by USC, which had 4 of the conference’s 6 first-round picks, and 7 of the 11 first-day picks; their 10 picks earned a Draft Score of 53, more than double the score of the next-best Pac-10 team, Cal.

Indeed, USC’s dominance in this matter has bordered on ridiculous.  Only two teams in the Pac-10 have had more than 6 players drafted in a single year:  this year’s ‘SC team, and the 2005 edition, which had 11 players taken in the ‘06 draft.  They’ve had 40 players drafted over the past 6 years for an aggregate Draft Score of 199; Cal ranks second in the conference over that time-period, with 24 players taken for an aggregate Draft Score of 92, less than half of USC’s.  Cal’s 6 first-rounders over the past decade also ranks second, as does their 9 players in the first two rounds combined; USC has had 13 first-rounders over the past 10 years, and another 14 taken in the second round.

Over- and under-achievers

Of course, at least USC has made full-use of their ridiculously loaded roster, going 59-23 in the Pac-10 over the last decade.  The same cannot be said for Cal, which rode all those NFL prospects (36 in all) to a less-than-stellar 38-44 record, good for just 6th over the last 10 years.  Yes, Tom Holmoe was coach during the first four of those years, but underperformances like what occurred this past season played a part as well.  Other notable underachievers include Stanford (30 draftees, just a 32-50 record) and Arizona State. where 31 draftees, tied with Oregon for 3rd in the Pac-10, produced just a 40-42 conference record.

Oregon, however, was a notable overachiever.  Over the last decade, they had the same number of pro prospects as ASU (31) and a lower Draft Score (129 to 118), but went 53-29 in the conference.  In finishing just 6 wins short of USC, they did it with far less talent; USC had 55 draftees for a Draft Score of 254, more than double what the Ducks managed.  Also notable is Oregon State, who has a winning record over the past 10 years (44-38) despite having just 24 players drafted.  Only Arizona and the Washington schools had fewer, and none of them were close to finishing the decade above .500.

Team	Conference Wins, ‘98-’07	NFL Draft Picks, ‘99-’08	Draft Score
USC	59	55	254
ORE	53	31	118
UCLA	45	28	114
OSU	44	24	81
ASU	40	31	129
CAL	38	36	139
UW	37	21	81
WSU	33	17	61
STAN	32	30	100
UA	29	23	71

Distribution

For the most part, the players drafted were distributed fairly evenly amongst the 7 rounds of the draft.  Two exceptions, however, were notable:

- USC had 27 of its 55 draft picks (almost half!) taken in either the 1st or 2nd round.  I don’t know why this is, exactly, but I can think of two plausible explanations.  1) USC is *so* loaded with top talent that it doesn’t have room on its roster for even late-round prospects.  Stars at any other school end up riding some pine for Pete Carroll.  2) USC’s excellence over the past 6 years has caused teams to overdraft ‘SC players out of line with their talent; simply put, being a Trojan might bump you up a round or two.  I have no way to verify either explanation, however.

- Arizona, on the other hand, saw 9 of its 23 prospects (39%) taken in the 7th round.  For a team that has generally lacked the top talent of most of the teams in the conference, it has to be concerning that even its best players were mostly marginal pro talents.  Of course, you could perhaps argue that perhaps the Wildcats’ ineptitude on the field hurt their player’s draft status, though that didn’t stop the San Diego Chargers from taking Antoine Cason in the first round of this year’s draft.

A better assessment of roster strength

If you look at where a team finished in the Pac-10 in any given year and then compare that to how their players did in the draft the following April, you often don’t get a lot of correlation.  This, of course, is because teams are not made up exclusively of seniors; underclassmen will always play a significant role.  To get a better picture of actual roster strength (in terms of NFL-caliber talent), I decided to create a rolling Draft Score for each team, where each season would get a Draft Score that totaled the scores from that season’s draft as well as the next two drafts.  (I stopped at three because freshmen rarely make a huge impact on a football team, and when they do, they’re usually so talented that they declare for the draft after their junior seasons [i.e. Marshawn, DeSean]).

As a illustrative example, consider the 2000 Oregon Ducks, who finished that season in a three-way tie for first in the Pac-10 at 7-1, earning a Holiday Bowl berth.  However, their Draft Score for that year was just 3, as the only Duck drafted in 2001 was backup quarterback A.J. Feeley, taken by the Eagles in the 5th round.  This is because most of the best players on that team, including QB Joey Harrington, wouldn’t be drafted until 2002, after the Ducks won the conference outright and came within a Nebraska screw-job of playing for the national title.  Combining Draft Scores from the 2001, 2002, and 2003 drafts gives the 2000 Ducks a very respectable score of 37, much more indicative of the overall talent level of that team.

The strength of left-coast football

Of course, even these rolling Draft Scores don’t tell the whole story; they need to be placed within the context of the league as a whole.  As an extreme example, Stanford won the Pac-10 in 1999 with a rolling Draft Score of just 30; just two years later, Cal would go winless in the conference with the exact same Draft Score.  The reason?  In two years, the league got a lot deeper.  In 1999, the highest draft score, excepting massively underachieving Arizona State, was Oregon’s 37.  Two years later, 5 teams broke 40, and Cal’s score of 30 was better than just one team, woeful Arizona.

Season	1998	1999	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005
Total Draft Score	293	321	352	383	368	364	344	356

The chart above details the total rolling Draft Score for the Pac-10 for the seasons between 1998 and 2005.  As you can see, the Pac-10 was at a relative low point in 1998, when UCLA managed to run the conference table at the tail end of their 20-game winning streak (one that nearly put them in the national title game).  Remember, this was during a period of great parity in the Pac-10, as 7 different schools represented the conference in the Rose Bowl in the 7 seasons between 1994 and 2000.  Conference strength (in terms of pro talent) quickly swung upwards, however, jumping by more than 30% in peaking during 2001 season.  That season, of course, was the one in which a Cal team that would see 8 players drafted over the next three years, including first-rounders Kyle Boller and Nnamdi Asomugha, couldn’t manage to win a single conference game.  The talent level has remained high ever since, though never as evenly distributed as that year, as USC built its dynasty and began to horde more and more of the West Coast’s best prospects**.

** I have left the most recent two seasons off the chart, as that data is incomplete pending the next two NFL drafts, but the partial data strongly suggests that recent trends have continued unabated.

More Trojan dominance

Armed with rolling Draft Scores, USC’s dominance becomes even more apparent, and one can begin to see how it might really be hurting the rest of the Pac-10.  Between 1998-2001, only 4 teams achieved a rolling Draft Score of at least 50; ASU in 1998 (50) and 1999 (56), Oregon in 2001 (52) and USC in 2001 (52).  Even in ‘01, the most draft-loaded year of the Pac-10’s last decade, both Washington and Washington State tied for 2nd in the conference with a Draft Score of just 35.  Parity was king.

The next year, USC would tie for the conference title and earn a berth in the Orange Bowl.  Their rolling draft score?  72.  No one else topped 45 that year.  Even that, however, was nothing compared to the rolling Draft Scores the Trojans would post over the next three seasons:  102, 101, and in 2005, 127.  Cal managed a high of 48 in both 2004 and 2005, while no one else topped 44.  For the record, that’s 26 draft picks factoring into the Trojan’s 2005 score, the kind of nigh-unstoppable juggernaut that could only be derailed by some sort of super-human intervention (i.e. Vince Young and the Texas Longhorns in the 2006 Rose Bowl).

What’s more interesting is that not only is USC stockpiling talent at an unheard-of rate, but that they’re actually making the rest of the conference weaker in doing so.  Yes, USC is renowned for its ‘national’ recruiting strategy, regularly going across the country to pluck out another state’s top recruit, but the heart of their success still lies in mining the rich southern California talent pool, a vital recruiting area to any Pac-10 program with pretensions towards the conference throne.  Even as conference talent levels reside near recent highs (see the chart above), the combined pro-talent level of the 9 teams not USC has dipped below late-90’s levels, as the chart below illustrates.

The blue line represents the total rolling Draft Score for the Pac-10, while the red line represents USC’s Draft Score.  The yellow line represents the rolling draft score of the other 9 Pac-10 teams (basically, the blue line minus the red line).

Good for the conference?

One item I’ve often heard debated is whether USC’s dominance is good for the conference.  Sure, they carry the Pac-10’s banner nationally, annually debunking the myth that good football isn’t played west of the Rockies, and they’ve given the conference their only BCS National Champion, but they’ve also led East Coast critics to deride the conference as ‘USC and the Nine Dwarves’.  At best, I think it’s been a mixed bag.

While the Trojans have certainly played a part in the rise of the Pac-10’s talent level, much of their success had certainly come at the expense of their fellow conference members.  If the Pac-10 is to truly rise towards the top of the college football heap, more teams must engage in the kind of ‘national’ recruiting programs that USC has built.  Oregon has, to some extent, done this, and Cal is beginning to do the same.  However, Stanford has always been the only truly national recruiting program, and I think it’s no coincidence that the conference’s overall talent level peaked around 2001, the last year of Tyrone Willingham’s successful run on the Farm.

(Actually, Stanford’s NFL talent level would remain high for several years after Willingham’s departure, due in part to the slow dwindling of Willingham’s stocked cupboard.  In fact, given the Draft Scores for Stanford during Buddy Teven’s three years (45, 38, and 44, good for 2nd, 4th, and 2nd in the conference, respectively), it’s amazing that the Cardinal managed to win just 5 conference games, as inept as Teven’s coaching might have been.  At least he never lost to UC Davis!)

Conclusion

Anyway, I found this to be a very interesting tool for exploring the various talent levels of college teams, independent of how well those teams performed on the field.  If some of my conclusions made you go ‘duh’, then that’s a good thing; if whatever these numbers tell us jibes with what we already know, we can infer that these numbers are grounded in reality.  In general, good teams have lots of NFL talent, while bad teams have less.  Some coaches (Mike Price, Ty Willingham, Mike Riley, Dennis Erickson) were able to win with less talent.  Wherever we see relatively loaded teams do poorly (ASU and USC in ‘98-’00, Stanford in ‘02-’04), those coaches (Bruce Snyder, Paul Hackett, Buddy Tevens) are soon fired.

The lesson?  NFL-caliber talent ain’t everything, but it sure makes life easier.  Like I said, ‘duh’.

• Andy Staples (who?) at SI.com named Covaughn DeBoskie as an impact early entry.
• Stewart Mandel published his Spring Top 25.  Our Golden Bears check in at…well, they don’t check in at all.  That’s just a little depressing.
• Boom goes the dynamite!  Tasteless?  Too soon?
• Nnamdi Asomugha is probably the best corner to ever come out of Cal (except maybe this guy), and hell, he’s a great guy. 
• Not sure if this needs to be here, but Bruce Feldman weighed in on the whole bloggers vs. Bissinger thing among other tidbits, so you might as well give it a read.
• What didn’t kill Sammie Stroughter made him stronger.
• The Oregon Ducks are rolling a fat Blount.
• Andy Katz says our Bears have all the pieces to be a serious player in the Pac-10 - if Ryan Anderson returns.  I was about to say that sounded like the same old misguided optimism that we hear every year that Braun is around…thank God for Montgomery.  STAY, RYAN, STAY!
• Tosh Lupoi talks about last year’s defense, and why defensive schemes were the way they were last year.
• Belated links from last week’s draft, with conference call transcripts with Mike Gibson and DeSean Jackson.
• A bit of dirt on DeSean from a respected scout for an NFC team.
• But hey, if you still love him, here you go!  Mine’s in the mail.

Yesterday was quite a day in the blogosphere.  Monday night, Will Leitch of Deadspin, King of the Bloggers!, appeared on Bob Costas NOW, which oddly enough included very little about modern feminism.  The town hall panel consisted of Costas, NFL wide receiver Braylon Edwards, Leitch, and, author of Friday Night Lights, H.G. "Buzz" Bissinger.  I have actually read one of Bissinger’s books, the well-written, but intellectually disengenuous "3 Nights In August."  Bissinger basically took a "Hey you kids, get off my lawn" approach to blogging.  He went bonkers!  Watch it for yourself.  Video of this ambush is available here. 

Much discussion has taken place about this.  We here at the California Golden Blogs don’t want to be left behind.  We have opinions, too!  Lots of opinions.  Marshawn is God.  Nate is dreamy.  Soylent green is made out of bloggers!  We got in a bit discussion and decided to turn it into a roundtabe.

TwistNHook:   I really appreciate Bissinger’s honesty.  He just laid it all out there.  "Leitch, what *is* your mother’s basement like?"  But he’s not alone in this.  A lot has been made recently about uninformed bloggers slowly killing credentialed sports writers.  Hell, even this site has been on the bludgeon end of the "bloggers are clueless fools!" stick not too far back.

Yellow Fever:  Bissinger isn’t the only person who hates blogs.  Marc Cuban, owner of the Mavs, attempted to block bloggers from the locker-room in Dallas.  Then, the NBA forced him to relent.  Marc Cuban got all pissy.  Here’s what he had to say:

"What sports blogging has become, in most cases, is the internet equivalent of Talk Soup or VH1’s "Best ….. " series. On Talk Soup a host throws out witty comments about some TV show. On VH1, a series of guests throw out their comments about some video relevant to the show’s topic. If it is witty enough, the show draws an audience. 

On the net, the most popular sports bloggers do the exact same thing. They troll the net looking for other people’s work and then throw out some witty comments or a simple rant to complement a link to that work.. Or they sit in front of the TV and throw out posts/comments about the game."

Ragnarok:  Cuban’s view of blogging seems to stem mostly from his interactions with Deadspin’s Will Leitch, which have not been positive.  And, to be honest, his views on blogging, when seen through the Deadspin prism, seem right on.  Deadspin is not the place you go for in-depth analysis of, well, really anything.  It’s a fast paced smorgasbord of hilarious links and potentially libellous comments.  As a excited participant in many Yahoo! Fantasy Libel leagues, I love Deadspin.

CBKWit: Look, we love to be as hilarious and libellous as anybody else.  But Marc Cuban is wrong if he thinks all bloggers are like Deadspin.  There are legions of dedicated bloggers (and even vloggers!) all across the blogosphere that, in this humble bloggers’ opinion, are doing better work than credentialed sports writers.  I’m talking about the people like Lookout Landing and Athletics Nation.  They go deeper into the game than I’ve ever seen, showcasing an unrivalled level of passion for their teams.  It is about the democratization of information!

TwistNHook: It used to be that sports writers were the undisputed kings of the land.  People didn’t have the basic level of access to the games they do now.  Television didn’t exist or was in its infancy.  Games were on in the middle of the day when people were at work.  If the game was on the West Coast, you’d get results two days later!  And people wore an onion on their belt.  It was the style of the time!

Maybe you’d get a box score and a basic write up of what took place.  But the sports writers were there.  They were watching all the games.  They were riding the trains.  The box score said Player X went 0-4, but why?  Were they 4 hard hit balls that happened to find glove?  Were they 4 brutal strike outs?  Was the player slightly injured?  Did the player have a mechanical problem?  Sports writers were the only means for regular fans to get deeper into the game like that. 

HydroTech:  It’s not nineteen fifty perfect anymore (I have to say perfect, because the Kaiser stole our word for two).  Grass isn’t as comfortable as it once was.  And you can’t get 5 bees for a quarter.  Now, independent of the newspaper, fans get nearly unlimited access to the game.  You can watch any game you want at any time on your choice of medium.  Why listen to what Ray Ratto has to say about the game when you can listen to people who follow the team’s every breath?  Ray Ratto has to follow a dozen sports teams as well as possible.  AthleticsNation doesn’t care about the Sharks, the Sabrecats, the Niners, the Raiders, the Warriors, Cal, Stanford, and the Giants.  All they care about is the A’s.  Who can give you a fuller picture as to the successes and failures of the A’s than that?

As things have progressed, we’re seeing the last throes of the sports-writer insurgency. 

 

"You’re either with America or with Bill Plaschke"

YellowFever:  FireJoeMorgan chronicles these throes hilariously within the baseball context.  But it’s not just the never-ending wet T-Shirt contest between Billy Beane and Joe Morgan.  Sports writers from Rick Reilly to Bob Costas have been pulling out the good old mama’s basement line. 

Ragnarok: Right.  But whose opinion would you trust between Ray Ratto and any any old blogger out there?  or Ray Ratto and some blogger who just started a couple weeks ago?  (Maybe Ray Ratto is a poor choice for a comparison here…)

I was getting distracted while writing this post, so RemoresfulBruinBabe, probably inspired by my mom, offered to write: "How about I rank the players by their butts; they must have good butts from all the squats and lunges."  Where are you going to get pictures of their butts?  "Isn’t there a ‘men of Cal football calendar’…of their butts?"  Sadly, no.  The closest thing we have to that was the black and white picture of shirtless Ayoob and Longshore almost cuddling.  I couldn’t find it online (I’m pretty sure there are a number of people who don’t want it being seen), but lets just say that Ayoob’s eyes are more beautiful than his completion percentage.

Monday’s practice was a spirited affair with lots of hitting and shouting.

 - The offense did well during 7 on 7s, generally dominating the d-line and linebackers.  The offensive line open up huge holes for Slocum and DeBoskie.

 -  They did not fare so well during 11 on 11s when the focus was on passing.  The receivers, including Cunningham, were dropping everything.

 - DJ Holt got a bit of an earful after making a late break on a pass underneath.  Kenwick Thompson (linebacker coach) implored him to be more proactive: "Come on DJ, you saw that one; trust what you saw!"

 - The receivers got it going a bit later, sparked by a nice leaping catch by Calvin between two defenders in the corner.  He got a foot down in bounds after snatching the ball over Amadi.  Tad Smith followed with a fantastic catch between three defenders over the middle, while taking a pretty big shot.

 - Follett might have decapitated Slocum on a screen pass if it wasn’t a friendly practice

 - The DBs had a terrific afternoon, affecting almost every pass.  Jesse Brooks in particular had a nice showing.  He picked off a ball tipped by Tad Smith the play after he broke up a pass intended for Cunningham over the middle.  This was in contrast to the receivers, summed up nicely by Boateng meekly indicating incomplete pass on a tipped diving interception.  For what it’s worth, I thought the ball hit the ground too, but it was interesting to see the defensive backs playing with such confidence and the receivers failing to match the intensity.

 - The wise HydroTech refuted an oft stated belief that defensive backs should look back for the ball.  On Monday, Hydro received validation from Al Simmons, our new and seemingly very good (the secondary is looking much improved) DB coach.  After an incompletion (ball was slightly overthrown to a moderately open receiver), Simmons instructed Charles Amadi, the defender on the play, "Don’t look early - look late, or don’t look at all."  The lesson, as always: Hydro, you know more about football than anyone, except coaches and maybe TwistNHook.

 - As practice closed, Worrell laid a big hit on Smith in traffic, and Vereen had a big gain down the sideline for the best offensive play of the practice.

On Friday, the team practiced without helmets, taking it easy for a situational scrimmage the next morning ala Cal day.

 - The Defensive backs practiced adjusting to overthrown or underthrown passes on fly.  Chris Conte showed a nice burst to catch up to a ball and snare it with one hand.

 - The QBs and receivers practiced deep passes.  In general, I thought the QBs did a better job than the receivers - there were a number of passes that I felt should have been caught but weren’t.  If you’re wondering why Boateng and Calvin, guys who have never caught a ball for Cal, are ahead of someone like Cunningham, who’s played well in the past, it’s because of speed.  They are clearly faster than any of the other receivers, excluding Jeremy Ross who is hurt at the moment (he practiced catching balls without making any cuts).

 - A few days after Tedford said "He’s as sick as I’ve ever seen anybody," Cameron Morrah was back at practice and caught a nice pass on a Riley bootleg.  I’ve noticed that our QBs have tended to be a little more accurate when throwing on the run this spring than when standing in the pocket; maybe they’re not overthinking it when they’re moving around?

 - On one of the less accurate bootleg passes, Skylar Curran made a slick one-handed catch on pass thrown behind him.  

 - The funniest play in practice was a short pass that hit offensive lineman Matt Laird in the back.  Somehow, I doubt he was the intended target.

 - Calvin had a nice catch on the sideline, using his body to shield the defender from Riley’s pass.

 - Covaungh DeBoskie impressed with a nimble run down the sideline.

 - Syd Thompson, continuing a great spring, nearly picked off a pass to Boateng on a square in.  Boateng later had a sweet leaping catch over the middle.

Go Bears! 

Continuing on with part two of The Dunbar Year (2006) and the four part analysis of how Tedford’s offense has changed in the past four years. 

Part I: Tedford’s Evolution of the Offense: The Tedford/Cortez Years
Part II: Tedford’s Evolution of the Offense: The Dunbar Year (2006): New Formations

So in this second part analysis of The Dunbar Year (2006) I’m just going to show the famous zone-read plays that are becoming more prevalent among shotgun spread option teams. 

So what is the zone-read?  Well, if you watched Texas use Vince Young, or Oregon use Dixon and Stewart, then you’d probably know what it is.  It’s a bit hard to explain so I’ll just give you an example.  As the old adage goes: a picture is worth a thousand words.

Below is the pre-snap picture.  Notice, Cal is in shotgun.  Ayoob is the quarterback.  Notice the TE is to the right of the OL, thus the strength is to the right.  Notice the RB is in a "weak" position - the side opposite of the TE (to the QB’s left).

 

Below is a picture of the play just after the snap.  I have highlighted the Tennessee right defensive end (RDE).  Notice he is unblocked in the picture.  The Cal left tackle (LT), instead of picking up the RDE has crashed in on the Tennessee defensive tackle (DT). 

 

The offense has purposely left the RDE unblocked.  The quarterback then "reads" the RDE (hence the name "zone read").  See, the runningback is going to run across the face of the QB, meaning right in front of him, to the right, and prepared to take the handoff.  If the RDE dives in to pursue the RB, then the QB will not hand off the ball, keep it, and run to the outside to the area vacated by the RDE.  If the RDE stays home or jumps outside to cut off the QB, then the QB will hand the ball off to the runningback who will be running to the right behind the strength.  This decision has to be made in a split second.  In the picture below, the blue line shows the Cal RB’s running route, and the green line shows that the QB is "reading" the RDE. 

 

Essentially, if the QB reads the DE properly, the DE will always be wrong.  Meaning, if the DE dives in to pursue the RB, the QB will run the ball to the outside towards the area that the DE vacated.  If the DE stays home or jumps outside, then the runningback will get the ball and the DE has been taken out of the play.

Let’s do a little math.  If you go back to the first picture (the pre-snap picture) you’ll see Cal has 6 blockers on the line of scrimmage (LOS).  They have the 5 OL-men and 1 TE (5+1=6).  You’ll see that Tennessee has 8 defenders in the box.  Like said in the previous paragraph, if the QB makes the correct read, then the DE will be wrong every single time and essentially be taken out of the play.  Thus, if the DE is taken out of the play then the defense only has 7 defenders (8-1=7), against 6 Cal blockers.  Six blockers versus seven defenders is better than six blockers versus eight defenders, right?  I didn’t major in math, but I think that’s right. 

Below is the next picture in the play.  As you can see, the Tennessee RDE has focused on the RB, and crashed inside (represented by the green line from the RDE to the RB).  Ayoob correctly read the RDE, kept the ball, and now is running (represented by the blue arrow) to the area that the RDE has vacated (represented by the green area).  The only defender who has a chance of stopping Ayoob is a Tennessee linebacker (assuming the Cal WRs adequately block off their defenders).

 

And in the final picture of the play, you can see the Cal WRs adequately blocking off their defenders.  Ayoob beats the Tennessee LB and gets in the endzone. 

 

That was an example of the zone read.  Oregon used it with Dennis Dixon and Jonathan Stewart.  Texas used it with Vince Young. 

For the zone read from shotgun to be as effective as possible, it helps to have a fairly quick and fast quarterback.  Such speed helps the quarterback avoid defenders and outrun them for yardage gains.  Longshore’s foot speed has long been dissected on many Cal forums so I don’t feel any need to really go into detail about how his athleticism didn’t quite suit the shotgun zone-read that well.  So obviously, there was some concern as to how effective the zone-read play could be with Longshore as the quarterback.  Had Longshore been the QB above, do you think the play would have been as effective?  Probably not.  Ayoob’s quickness helped him beat the Tennessee LB and get into the endzone. 

But one thing I have noticed, is that Dunbar ran a different type of run from the shotgun when Longshore was the quarterback.  In fact, I’m not sure it’s even a zone-read.  I will illustrate that below.   

Below is the pre-snap formation.  Notice Cal is (more or less) in the same formation as the previous play (the exception being that there are two WRs to the side of the TE in the picture below instead of one WR in the picture above).  The TE is again, on the right side of the OL.  The RB is in a "weak" position - to the side opposite of the TE (meaning to the QB’s left).  I have already shown what makes this play different than the zone-read illustrated above.  Below, I have shown that the Cal RT will pull on this running play.  In the zone read above, none of the OL blockers pull.  They zone block, hence the name "zone read." 

 

In the picture below, I highlighted the Cal RT pulling.  I also illustrated the RB’s running route.  The RB first cuts across the QB to take the handoff, then cuts back to the opposite side to run behind the pulling RT. 

 

Unfortunately, this play didn’t work so well this instance and things get messy.  In the picture below, the Cal RB (Marshawn Lynch) cuts back (as designed) behind the pulling RT.  But the Tennessee DT gets unblocked and into the backfield - he is barely visible just right above the pulling RT.  Had the OL picked up that defender, this play probably would have gone for a gain.  Lynch would have snuck up behind the pulling RT, and been on his merry BEAST MODE way. 

 

Anyways, this was the other run from shotgun that Cal used in 2006.  I don’t think this is even a zone-read because I don’t believe there is a "read."  Why?  Because of the tackle pulling.  Why would the offense pull a tackle from the right to the left, if it possible that the run could go to the right.  That is taking a blocker away from the point of attack.   It just doesn’t make sense.  As I’ve noted in previous posts, a pulling OL-man is indicative of a run in the direction that the blocker is pulling.  So I don’t think this running play was ever designed to go right although it appears like it.  In fact, I think it is supposed to appear like it to the defense - which is aided by the fact that the RB runs to the "back side" (the side opposite of the direction of the run; the run is designed to go left thus the "playside" is left and the "backside" is right) before he cuts back behind the pulling RT. 

So by using this play to run from shotgun with Longshore, Cal never really placed Longshore in a zone-read situation.  In fact, during 2006, I noticed Dunbar called this pulling backside tackle play all the time when running from shotgun instead of a zone-read.  This, I believe, was in acknowledgement of Longshore’s lack of footspeed to run the zone-read.  What supports my conclusion is that in the 2006 Tennessee game, Dunbar called the pulling backside tackle play for Longshore 2 times that game.  Then once Ayoob came in, Dunbar immediately called a zone-read play since he had a QB who had the speed to effectively execute the play (should the QB have to keep the ball).   Furthermore, in subsequent games, Dunbar continued to call these backside tackle pulls when Longshore was the QB and rarely, if ever, called a zone read from shotgun for Longshore. 

So what does this all mean?  Well, because Longshore rarely if not ever ran the zone-read, then his lack of footspeed was never really a factor.  Because Dunbar mostly called these backside tackle pull runs from shotgun where the direction of the run was predetermined and it was predetermined that Longshore would hand the ball off to the RB, then Longshore’s speed was never essential to the play.  This situation differs drastically from the zone-read where the QB’s speed is crucial in maximizing the effectiveness of the play by (1) outrunning the defenders; and (2) keeping the defense "honest" and not just pursuing the runningback because they know the QB is slow enough to where even if the DE doesn’t play the QB that a LB can prevent the QB from picking up a large gain. 

To explain that second point, imagine if Longshore was the QB in the first play, the zone read.  The RDE knows that Longshore isn’t fast enough to outrun the Tennessee linebacker.  Thus the RDE can just crash inside and pursue the RB because he knows the QB really isn’t a threat to beat the LB to the outside for a touchdown.  Furthermore, the RDE knows that even if he pursues the RB and the QB reads the RDE properly and keeps the ball and runs to the spot area that the RDE vacated, the RDE is probably fast enough to change directions and run down the slow QB (as long as the RDE doesn’t commit too much to the RB fake).  Thus, the QB’s lack of footspeed has put the RDE back into the play. 

Just imagine if you’re the RDE and Longshore is the QB.  Would you bite on the RB or sit tight to prevent the QB keeper?  Personally, I’d bite on the RB and take my chances that Longshore wouldn’t be able to out-run the LB behind me, and furthermore I might be able to actually run down Longshore despite biting on the RB fake.  But imagine if the QB was Dennis Dixon.  If you bite on the RB, there is a very good chance Dennis Dixon beats the LB into the endzone.  If you sit tight and prevent Dixon from taking the ball outside, then Dixon hands it off to the RB who has a good chance of getting into the endzone because you’ve taken yourself out of the play by covering a "ballcarrier" (the QB) who doesn’t even have the ball. 

So this is what Dunbar brought to Cal.  Lots of new formations, plays, and these two running plays from shotgun.  As we’ll see in Part III of this four part analysis, Tedford kept much of what Dunbar installed in 2006 and carried it over into 2007 (The Tedford Year). 

Part III to come in a few days… 

So after all the smoke has cleared, our Golden Bears are now scattered to the winds.  Of course, some more players will be picked up as undrafted free agents (Robert Jordan, Andrew Larson, et al) later this week, but for now, let’s focus on what’s been said in the local papers about each of our former players.

DeSean Jackson:

• The Trenton Times writes that THA1 indeed has a chip on his shoulder, but is happy to have landed in Philadelphia because they were high on his list.  The primary concern cited is his (lack of) size, something that has been dissected to death both here and elsewhere, though the article also mentions that one NFC team took him off their draft board entirely due to character concerns.  Now that seems a bit harsh.
• Another article from the Trenton Times which says that THA1 comes with great speed, no size, and questionable character.  He also figures to take time to develop as a receiver.
• The Philadelphia Daily News calls THA1 a playmaker, and THA1 is also quoted as saying he’s 175 pounds right now but would like to get to 180.  It also includes a gushing quote from Jerry Rice saying he has all the talent in the world to do whatever he wants to do.  He’s also expected to handle kick return duties as well.
• The Philadelphia Inquirer’s draft roundup says that we can expect THA1 to handle punt return duties and perhaps see some time as the third receiver, although there remains speculation that because Lito Sheppard is still on the team roster, he may be packaged with a high pick next year to get a receiver such as Roy Williams which would push THA1 even further down the depth chart.
• And finally, the question that needs to be answered - what does Donovan think about all this?

Craig Stevens:

• The Tennessean reports that Craig Stevens has enjoyed a much better return to the state, in light of the last time he and the rest of our Golden Bears went to visit.  He projects into the role that Ben Hartsock had with the Titans, and will be regarded as more of a blocking tight end that a receiving tight end.  Which is good, because that’s what he probably should be doing.

Thomas DeCoud:

• The Atlanta-Journal Constitution says that new Falcons GM Thomas Dimitroff knows his safeties, and that DeCoud must have the qualities that he likes.  He could end up being the top backup at both safety spots.
• What did those in Atlanta learn from the draft?  Jimmy Williams better watch out, or DeCoud could end up being the top backup at strong safety instead.

Lavelle Hawkins:

• You might have heard that Pacman Jones was traded to the Cowboys for a fourth round pick…you may have also heard that Hawk went to the Titans with a fourth round pick.  So yes, Hawk was taken with the pick they received for Pacman.  He talks about the fact that he’ll likely be remembered for that, or at least that he’ll initially be known that way, and realizes that will put some additional pressure on him.  He also went to high school with current Titans and former Arizona Wildcat RB Chris Henry.

Mike Gibson:

• Philly.com likes his phyiscal frame, but not his leg strength.  It’s expected that he’ll reside on the practice squad for a while and work out along the interior line, rather than tackle.

Justin Forsett:

• The Seattle Post-Intelligencer spent three lines on Forsett.
• The Seattle Times spent one.  Clearly, the Emerald City is excited.

Look at it this way - it can’t be any harder catching passes from Vince Young than it was catching passes from Joe Ayoob.  BOOYA~

EDIT: The Hawk is going to be joining good old Hands of Stone in the Music City. Mike Heimerdinger loves him some Golden Bears!

While watching the NFL draft unfold last year and seeing all the puzzled looks on Mel Kiper’s face as he talked about how teams were reaching (according to…who?  A non-GM such as yourself?), I decided it might be instructive to study exactly how accurate the mock drafts are, especially since the guys making them purportedly have some inside information.  Of course, it may just be all smokescreens, but shouldn’t they be able to see through that?

Apparently not.  I compared the final mock drafts put up this year by the ESPN group of Mel Kiper, Todd McShay, Matt Mosley’s Hashmarks blog, ESPN Sportsnation, the SI.com contingent of Peter King, Don Banks, Dr. Z, local beatwriters via SI.com, and then the CBS Sportsline crew of Pete Prisco, Clark Judge, Charley Casserly, and Vic Carucci.

Some results:

• Mel Kiper completely whiffed on eight first rounders, meaning there were eight actual first round picks that he didn’t have going in the first at all.  The first one of those chosen was Gosder Cherilus at 17.  Hashmarks and Dr. Z whiffed on Jerod Mayo though, at tenth overall.  No one else whiffed on as many first rounders as Mel, with Charley Casserly doing the best by missing five.  Vic Carucci and the beatwriters coalition at SI.com missed six, and everyone else missed 7.
• Clark Judge was off by the lowest average amount on his picks - his picks were off by an average of 5.10 spots, and the beatwriters and Charley Casserly were off by 5.55 and 5.58, repsectively.  King was off by 9.39.
• Kiper came in with the most picks nailed right on, at 9.  The local beatwriters finished the worst at 4, and Peter King had 5.  Sometimes the more you think you know, the less you actually do.
• Dr. Z was the only prognosticator to pick even as many as the first four picks correctly.  Everyone except ESPN Sportsnation picked at least the first two picks correctly.  The collective wisdom of the masses is a load of BS.
• Still, those were the only top 10 picks that Dr. Z hit on.  Todd McShay got the most top 10 picks correct, with 6.
• Peter King had Chad Henne going at 20; he went at 59.  It took the longest for each of his projected first round picks to be selected, while Dr. Z’s first round picks were all taken when Malcolm Kelly went 51st, making for the shortest time for each of his projected first round picks to be selected.
• Everyone had Devin Thomas to the Bills at 11.  WHOOPS!~
• Everyone had Phillip Merling somewhere in the first.  That would merit a WHOOPS!~, but at least he was the first pick of the second round.
• No one had Joe Flacco, Sam Baker, Chris Johnson, or Duane Brown in the first.  And while we’re talking about Joe Flacco, honestly, how good can the guy be if the he himself came to the conclusion that he couldn’t beat out Tyler Palko?  We’re talking about Tyler Palko here.  Reading all these glowing reports about his arm strength makes me think of everything that led to Boller landing in Baltimore.  Which would be ironic, if only it weren’t just sad.
• Finally, ten of twelve mocks had THA1 going in the first.  Go Bears.  And Eagles!