close to this program now knows Gene Smith is the man. He “has the conn,” according to Del Rio.

Personally I really liked your draft. I thought the Pettigrew pick was ingenious. I agree that Oher had some value in that range, but to me Pettigrew was rated higher anyhow.
Second, the chances are you are going to be in the bottom of the league next year too. You might as well get next years top LT.
Third, Pettigrew is an excellent blocker. Putting him along side of Backus or Gosder(Who I thought was a horrible pick that high in the draft.), makes either one of them better than any OT in the league.

you don’t want Beatty. He looked really good at the senior bowl, or at least his feet did. Turn the tape on though. He just gets mauled by anyone with any power.

I’m leaning to the 32 side.

I’ve been hard on Marcedes in the past, but he really is one of my favorite Jaguars. He has been a success for this team, and I really see him catching 60 passes next year as well.

All that talent and needs individula coaching and still doesn’t get it. He is the next to go, watch and see.

that he’ll help you out. Where your lucky is that his weaknesses are not a huge need for you, like WR. He did ok IMO with the big guys. I still like Harvey and Hayward. I also like G Uche Nwaneri (Starter worthy in the 5th) and G Vince Manuwai (a Third round pick, that happens to be one of the best in the league).

Evaluating defense. Daryl Smith was a second rounder, Rashean Mathis, Clint Ingram, Justin Durant is from a small school…

My frustration with Shack is attributed to several different things. Comparatively, and I know it is WAY too early to judge, Gene Smith has done wonders in his first draft. The picks make me feel like we overachieved in the draft, when I always had a million questions about our picks in the Shack era. Shack was more interested in acquiring picks at skill positions in the first round, particularly wide receiver. You look at the picks, it goes Leftwich, R. Williams, M. Jones, M. Lewis, Nelson, and then Harvey. The first four are at skill positions. Nelson and Harvey are Gators, which to me begs the question, “Were they picked for talent or for their talent and because they went to Florida?”

I believe Harvey of course was targeted since we moved up to get him. But in the case of Nelson, I think it was dumb of us to pass on Brady Quinn twice. It doesn’t matter whether Quinn pans out or not, because nobody knew any of that at the time.

The frustration with Shack has nothing to do with last season’s failures, in my mind. It is the repeated failures of first round draft picks…the guy who was picked too early and was a reach (Williams), the guy who was drafted as a 1st round developmental project (does that even sound like it makes sense?), the lack of attention to deteriorating talent on the lines that went unaddressed for years, the high priced free agents for players that should have never been compared to the likes of Randy Moss (Porter), and the inability to trust in his head coach. Also, need I say that all of these guys had character issues or made very poor decisions? Must I bring up Khalif Barnes who is a complete and total worthless piece of a human being (Read my old posts if you don’t know what I’m talking about). Of course, I didn’t even bring up Drayton Florence or Cleo Lemon (who really was horrible). It’s sad to say that players from our team gets cut or leave via free agency only to find nobody wants them. It’s sad. We hang on to players in an attempt to develop when they only team they should see playing time with is my old high school.

Shack let our lines get old while chasing after wide receivers and attempting to fill holes with our first round picks and drafting out of need. One could argue that Gene Smith drafted out of need with Eugene Monroe, but was there ever ANY doubt that he was the best available player at the time? That would be a negative. Gene seems to know how to wheel and deal. Shack, I never could understand what he was thinking or why he did some of the things he did. The one piece of gold he struck was in MJD, and we even passed on him the first time. Maybe if we would have taken MJD in the first, we could have struck gold again on someone else in the 2nd, since it’s the only round we seemed to be good at.

1st round picks are like gold. We have seemingly squandered every one of them. Out of our first round picks in the last 6 years, 3 are gone, and the only player of the three remaining that I think we could even trade to recoup a first round pick on is Harvey. This is only since he is one year into his professional career and is largely an unknown at this point. Marcedes Lewis is worth what if we were to trade today? A 5th at best? That’s kind of my opinion on his worth. Nelson we could probably get a 2nd for, but only maybe. I feel I’m being too optimistic on that one. Where are our first round picks that we can let leave in free agency and appreciate the compensatory picks? Where’s our franchise players? Where are the players we can deal and pick up a couple 1st rounders and some late round picks as well?

Shack and Jack benefited mostly from the players who were already a part of the team when they got here, and since players like Deion Grant and Donovan Darius have departed (those are only two quick examples) our defense has been in decline. I think my comment has gotten long enough. We get the point.

Feel free to post counter-arguments my peoples…..

That comment was refreshing.

that the Shack scouting department was purged as well.

and Terry, I didn’t know our scouts got fired. Could you tell me about it?

Nelson should be a Pro Bowler in a few years.

He’s super athletic, but he may not have watched enough film last year. He made a few really dumb decisions, like the one against the Browns. But generally speaking he made good decisions against the wrong QB’s (Manning for instance). Which makes me think that he wasn’t dumb like many people seem to think. Even I thought that for a while. But really he just didn’t know his competition well enough, and that comes with more film room time. There was also a couple situations where he got over excited last year against the run, but that is coachable. And I think with an improvement from the front 4 he could learn to trust his teammates more, which is huge for a safety and a defense in general.