It’s been a few days since I posted here.  Stupid work getting in the way of what’s really important.  Anyway, we’re on to part 8 of the 11-part series.  This time we look at the Silvertips, who arguably had the best draft of all.

Weldin made tons of offseason moves and seemed to be trading guys willy-nilly.  I for one was like, “What the fuck is he doing?”  It seemed clear that he wanted to go into rebuilding mode.  He ended up with three draft picks in the first round.

Sullivan’s Island Silvertips

Studs

Holy crap, I can’t believe how good Cam Newton is.  As a rookie, he finished fourth overall in scoring.  He’s bound to improve.  When Adam was engineering a trade to move up in the draft so that he could get Daniel Thomas (oops), Weldin expressed concern that he would miss out on drafting Cam Newton.  Adam assured him that Newton would be there at pick 6, and that he would likely fall out of the first round entirely.  And here was Weldin, who wanted to draft Newton in the top-3.  Adam and I had a chuckle about that.

Well, guess what.  THE JOKE IS ON US!  Newton is a fucking beast, and Adam and I are jackasses for ever questioning Weldin’s scouting report on him.

AJ Green also showed a lot of big-play capability.  It’s amazing that the NFL has evolved to the point that rookies can contribute in such a big way.  Whatever happened to the 3-year receiver rule (you know, that receivers always break out in year 3?)  That’s garbage, now, with the likes of AJ Green and Julio Jones making instant contributions.

Misses

I think Weldin learned a bit too late that paying a defensive tackle anything more than a few dollars is wrought with peril.  Nick Fairley may end up being a great player, but paying $10 for him is too steep a price.  Scoring under 30 points this season made that a bitter pill to swallow.

I think Plaxico Burress in the third round is a bit of a reach.  Burress never topped 100 yards receiving, though he did have 8 touchdowns.  Still, he was fairly pedestrian for most of the season.

Weldin has a history of drafting Terrell Owens, and like Owens himself, Weldin is too stubborn to realize when it’s time to hang it up.  Owens didn’t even make an NFL roster in 2011.

Too Soon to Tell

The hyped up running backs were both riddled with injuries this year.  Whereas I deemed Daniel Thomas a miss (for sucking even when he did play,) I’m not quite ready to write off Mark Ingram.  Though Ingram only appeared in 10 games, he did seem to have a knack for punching it into the end zone when he was in there.  I don’t know if he’ll ultimately prove himself worthy of the number one overall pick, but it’s too soon to tell if he’s a bust.

Likewise, second round defensive end Robert Quinn might end up being good.  But it seems that finding hero defensive ends must have been more about the Giants’ GM than about Steve Spagnuolo, who seems to have missed on DEs each year of his Rams tenure.  I don’t mind the call of getting a DE in the second round, where they were flying off the board.

Whatever

Getting a 5-TD tight end in Greg Olsen doesn’t really impress me.  But it doesn’t bother me that much either.

The Grade

Dude, Weldin went to the playoffs in his “rebuilding” year.  Cam Newton and AJ Green are only going to get better, and Mark Ingram might decide to join the party as well.  The Newton pick alone (he’s fucking holdout proof!) means that Weldin gets an A+ for this draft.

The Silvertips will be a force to be reckoned with, especially if Weldin can duplicate his drafting magic in this year’s draft.

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