Flutie who?

[RuthlessBurgher]

Re: Flutie who?

As for immediate emotion during a draft, my most joyous reactions recently were for Ben, Heath, and Mendenhall in the first round, and Woodley and Sweed in the second round (I would have picked every one of those guys if I were in the war room at that time). I was not nearly as excited about the Timmons and Hood picks (I was hoping for Adam Carriker and Alex Mack with those picks, but both were gone by the time we chose). As for Troy and Santonio, I liked both players and were pumped that we got them, but the jubilation was not as high as it was for Ben, Heath, and Mendenhall, because I was also concerned about whether or not we gave up too much in order to move up to draft those guys (and since I didn't think we'd have a shot at getting either of those, I was not as emotionally invested in them as prospects during the pre-draft period).

Wow. Take out Mendenhall and substitute Polamalu and this was EXACTLY how I felt about all of those picks. I admit to giving the nod to Phillip Rivers, but I thought just as much of Roethlisberger and it was the most thrilled I'd ever been for a draft pick.

As far as Polamalu...I called the shot :P . I was still on the radio back then and we used to do these mock drafts each year. As the "GM" for the Steelers, I couldn't make the pick because no trades were allowed, but I was adamant that we would make the move on draft day and get him. It was rather bold considering we had never drafted a safety with our first pick and if I remember correctly, we had never moved up in the first round at that point in team history either.

By the way, if I had ever seen the Ben video before, I certainly don't recall it.

I figured we'd just stay put in '03 and take Mike Doss instead of trading up to get Polamalu (because, as you noted, we had never traded up in the first at that point). I was very happy with the Polamalu pick once it sank in (just not the huge celebration immediately, because it caught me somewhat off-guard at the time). Mike Doss played in the UFL last year, by the way. D'Oh.