Mack Injured, No go at Combine

[Iron Shiek]

Re: Mack Injured, No go at Combine

We need warriors not prima donas trying to game the system.

That's a bit shortsighted isn't it??? From what I recall, Lamar Woodley was invited to the combine but had a hamstring injury and chose not to workout. He worked out later at his own pro day.

I'd challenge anyone who thinks Woodley's a prima donna. In fact, it's funny how overrated the combine actually is. Here's a recap of Woodley from before the draft from Scout.com:

[quote:2u2irqmb]Lamarr Woodley/Michigan: We wrote last week that Woodley's workout performances had been so poor it was decided he would not participate at the combine. That is exactly what happened today as he did nothing. People close to the situation told us Woodley has been intimidated since the first day of Senior Bowl practice, when he was beat up on then came up lame with a hamstring injury. That injury is questionable to many. The same people told us there is a fear on Woodley's behalf of performing poorly. Regardless, his stock is taking a major tumble and right now he is a stretch to stay in the top 60 picks.

I'd have a hard time negatively judging Mack because he isn't working out in Indy.[/quote:2u2irqmb]


That makes you wonder how much the future of an athlete is based on the situation he lands in. Does Woodley become the beast he is on, say, the Cowboys....or the Jets or some other team. Under the tutelage of our LB coach, our DCOR, and others maybe he excelled sooner than he would've normally. Just food for thought...who knows.

[Chadman]

Re: Mack Injured, No go at Combine

Didn't Woodley sprain his ankle at the Senior Bowl? Pretty sure that was the tip of the iceburg as far as his fall from the First Round.

Sometimes, you have to look past a prepared practice session (combine) & a livestock show (Senior Bowl) & look more at the college career (when you try to assess anything, don't you use history as a guide to the assessment? Surely an excellent college career holds more sway than a one-off 40 yard dash?)

[calmkiller]

Re: Mack Injured, No go at Combine

Didn't Woodley sprain his ankle at the Senior Bowl? Pretty sure that was the tip of the iceburg as far as his fall from the First Round.

Sometimes, you have to look past a prepared practice session (combine) & a livestock show (Senior Bowl) & look more at the college career (when you try to assess anything, don't you use history as a guide to the assessment? Surely an excellent college career holds more sway than a one-off 40 yard dash?)

For the Steelers yes. What we are hoping is its no for everyone else!! FALL BABY FALL

[stlrz d]

Re: Mack Injured, No go at Combine

The Ravens pick before us. If they lose their center (Jason Brown) to FA do they take Mack ahead of us? If so who do we take then? Or do you think we try to trade up to get him before the Rats do?

[Iron Shiek]

Re: Mack Injured, No go at Combine

Didn't Woodley sprain his ankle at the Senior Bowl? Pretty sure that was the tip of the iceburg as far as his fall from the First Round.

Sometimes, you have to look past a prepared practice session (combine) & a livestock show (Senior Bowl) & look more at the college career (when you try to assess anything, don't you use history as a guide to the assessment? Surely an excellent college career holds more sway than a one-off 40 yard dash?)

Yeah, if you are going to weight everything (which I'm sure some teams have some kind of weighting system), I'd put on field play as 70% of my interest in a player. Any interviews at Senior Bowl/Combine/Visits as 20%, then scheduled workouts (or Livestock shows as Chadman puts it) at 10%.

Does that sound like a fair classification and am I missing anything. I considered "off-field" issues/behavior but lumped that into the interviews category.

[RuthlessBurgher]

Re: Mack Injured, No go at Combine

The Ravens pick before us. If they lose their center (Jason Brown) to FA do they take Mack ahead of us? If so who do we take then? Or do you think we try to trade up to get him before the Rats do?

If we make the same exact trade that we made with the Giants after the last Super Bowl to get Santonio (give up a 3rd and a 4th to go from 32 to 25), we would be one spot ahead of Baltimore. Parcells already has 2 picks in the 2nd round...I'm sure he would love to have 2 picks in both the 3rd and 4th round as well just to move back 7 spots.

I would rather trade #32, a 3rd, and a 5th for #25
or #32, a 3rd, and a 4th for #25 and a 6th
(since both work out more evenly that #32, a 3rd, and a 4th for #25, according to the draft trade value chart), but sometimes you have to give up a bit more if you are the aggressor in wanting to move up.

[WoodleyofTroy]

Re: Mack Injured, No go at Combine

The Ravens pick before us. If they lose their center (Jason Brown) to FA do they take Mack ahead of us? If so who do we take then? Or do you think we try to trade up to get him before the Rats do?

Good observation. Hopefully they'll sign him them. However CB and LB are a need for them as well, and in the first they might get better value with all the talented 1st round Corners and 3-4 Outside Linebackers expected to go in the top 40.

[WoodleyofTroy]

Re: Mack Injured, No go at Combine

If we make the same exact trade that we made with the Giants after the last Super Bowl to get Santonio (give up a 3rd and a 4th to go from 32 to 25), we would be one spot ahead of Baltimore. Parcells already has 2 picks in the 2nd round...I'm sure he would love to have 2 picks in both the 3rd and 4th round as well just to move back 7 spots.

I would rather trade #32, a 3rd, and a 5th for #25
or #32, a 3rd, and a 4th for #25 and a 6th
(since both work out more evenly that #32, a 3rd, and a 4th for #25, according to the draft trade value chart), but sometimes you have to give up a bit more if you are the aggressor in wanting to move up.

Kind of ironic, the year we traded up for Holmes, I was keeping my fingers crossed for Nick Mangold around this time. Another Center. But he wasn't the value Alex Mack is today. I didn't have that feeling like I did with Ben and Heath, that he would be the pick. Chad Jackson, LenDale White, Sinorice Moss, etc. were also in the mix (by others). Santonio Holmes to me, was like getting Mendenhall. It never even crossed my mind. Wasn't realistic.

Anyways, hopefully we don't trade up for anyone else. We need the Center this time lol.

[RuthlessBurgher]

Re: Mack Injured, No go at Combine

If we make the same exact trade that we made with the Giants after the last Super Bowl to get Santonio (give up a 3rd and a 4th to go from 32 to 25), we would be one spot ahead of Baltimore. Parcells already has 2 picks in the 2nd round...I'm sure he would love to have 2 picks in both the 3rd and 4th round as well just to move back 7 spots.

I would rather trade #32, a 3rd, and a 5th for #25
or #32, a 3rd, and a 4th for #25 and a 6th
(since both work out more evenly that #32, a 3rd, and a 4th for #25, according to the draft trade value chart), but sometimes you have to give up a bit more if you are the aggressor in wanting to move up.

Kind of ironic, the year we traded up for Holmes, I was keeping my fingers crossed for Nick Mangold around this time. Another Center. But he wasn't the value Alex Mack is today. I didn't have that feeling like I did with Ben and Heath, that he would be the pick. Chad Jackson, LenDale White, Sinorice Moss, etc. were also in the mix (by others). Santonio Holmes to me, was like getting Mendenhall. It never even crossed my mind. Wasn't realistic.

Anyways, hopefully we don't trade up for anyone else. We need the Center this time lol.

The only other trade I would be amenable to (it is even more of a stretch, though) is if one of the top 4 potential franchise LT's unexpectedly fell. I mentioned this before, but say Michael Oher was not picked in the top 13 picks. I would trade our 1st, 2nd, and 3rd round picks to the Saints for pick #14 to take Oher. Our top 3 picks are worth a combined 976 points on the trade value chart while the Saints' 1st round pick is worth 1100 (but they may be willing to give up those points since they only have a 1st, 4th, and 7th round pick in this draft because of previous trades with the Giants, Jets, and Packers. You simply cannot come out of the draft with only 3 players...especially the Saints, who had the imfamous one player Ricky Williams draft. After the trade, they could have a respectable draft class with picks at the ends of round 1, 2, and 3, plus picks in the middle of rounds 4 and 7). We would still have the untradeable 3rd round comp pick for Faneca, plus our regular picks at the end of rounds 4-7, plus the extra 7th rounder from Tampa, still giving us our usual 7 pick draft class. We could still possibly get another quality player in the trenches with the Faneca pick like G Kraig Urbik, C Eric Wood, DE Fili Moala, or NT Terrance Taylor.

[steeler_george]

Re: Mack Injured, No go at Combine

I don't think it will effect him. It's after all he is not a "skilled" position player.

But if he happens to fall, then all that means the draft just got whole lot deeper for us. Because most have him rated as the top interior OL, if he he slides so do the other OL.