OT: Worst Draft Picks Ever
ESPN listed some of their most forgettable draft moments, since it's OMG TOM BRADY GOT DRAFTED IN THE 6TH ROUND season, and Detroit teams make the list twice (Pistons with Darko, Tigers with Miller over Kershaw).
What's your worst pick of all time? Charles Rogers with Detroit in 2003 comes to mind (Andre Johnson the next pick. Terrell Suggs went #10, Polamalu #16.)
Ryan lief, the WSU qb
Ryan lief
What!? C'mon XM, how do you misspell Leaf??
I couldn't resist, just giving you hard time.
XM got him mixed up with his teen idol, Leif Garrett. Or was it Leaf Erickson?
Lief me alone. Auto correct on my phone has a bug. Really. It wasn't me. I can spell leef.
leef made my day.
Thanks
April 17th, 2020 at 11:08 AM ^
I can’t beleaf you did that
Is there any other Leaf? Your mind has turned to mush!
Ryan Leaf had drug and alcohol problems throughout his career. That’s pretty horrible to call out a player as a bust because of those kind of issues. Maybe you should take time to re evaluate the kind of person you are. I wouldn’t want you to be a hypocrite or anything.
Now that you mention it, Len Bias was a bigger bust.
edit: LOL. Guess I have to read ALL the comments before posting.
I think your link is routing incorrectly. Here is the correct link.
As a Packer fan, Jerel Worthy (2nd round). Eff his stupid tattoo.
So many bad draft picks throughout the years.
Jamarcus Russell
Darko
Kwame Brown
Tim Couch
Tony Mandarich
Mandarich was my pick -- gotta give it up to Sparty's long-standing tradition of extralegal performance enhancement.
Also, Anthony Bennett going no. 1 to the Cavaliers in 2013 is a big one to me, as even at the time most NBA folks thought it was absolute madness. Out of the NBA in four years, currently a G-leaguer.
The thing with Bennett is that the rest of that Draft is insanely weak. Oladipo went second overall and made an All-Star team, but isn't exactly a superstar. The rest of the lottery that year are basically just guys in the NBA, so it's not like there was a huge cost to taking a bit of a gamble reaching for someone with higher upside.
All fair points, but even at the time I remember most of the reactions I read were about how that kid was going to be available way later in the draft. If you're gonna reach, I think Nerlens is the reach that year. Crazy that arguably the two best players from the draft are two late round foreigners with very unpredictable NBA paths in Steven Adams & Giannis.
I think they were trying everything to trade that pick and no one wanted it. That’s how bad the draft was. No one wanted the #1 pick.
Bennett was still projected in the top 5-6, but it was definitely a big surprise. A lot of people had them taking Otto Porter because they really needed a wing, but they decided to hope Bennett could learn to shoot 3s instead. Nope.
I wouldn’t call Giannis just a “guy” - he was a lottery pick in the draft.
He is a top 3 player in the League.
Lions.
Reggie Rogers.
Charkes Rogers.
Andre Ware.
javid Best.
Aaron Gibson.
Chuck Long.
Eric Ebron.
Titus Young.
Drew Stanton
Lions: Pretty much everyone in the last 50 years except Barry Sanders, Billy Sims, Megatron, Matt Stafford, and Jason Hanson.
At least it sure feels that way.
How could you leave Joey Harrington and Mike Williams off that list?
Terry Fair going one pick before Randy Moss?
Laken Tomlinson who didn't even finish his first contract before getting shipped out?
Jared Davis who is one of the worst starting LBs in the league?
Too many guys, you can't help but forget a few.
True. But Harrington......Holy shit was he ever a total bust.
I hadn't thought about Harrington in a long time so I looked at his Wikipedia page. Oh man is it clear that he, his wife, or his agent authored that page!!
I always felt like the Loins broke Harrington. Like he may have been a decent QB almost anywhere else. I could be wrong.
Nice guy. 2 or maybe 4 amazing come back scores as a college player but word is that he really didn't enjoy playing football.
Jeff Backus was a good pick.
Hutchinson went the pick before Backus to Seattle. Backus was fine but Hutch...shit man. Hall of Fame.
The guy Lions fans nicknamed Sackus?
I know he has his moments of madness but he did start for like ten straight years in the NFL without missing a game.
Lions fans? That says all you need to know.
April 17th, 2020 at 12:39 AM ^
He was ok, not terrible. The first of a long line of Lions averageish Big Ten 1st round LTs.
Dang. I meant to have Williams.
I was giving Harrington a pass. He started 4 years on really shitty teams. It’s tough to throw running for your life.
Mike Williams was the pick that made me realize, beyond any doubt, that Matt Millen had no fucking clue and wouldn’t be a good GM in a hundred years.
Ebron was picked ahead of OBJ and Aaron Donald ??♂️
The late 80s/early-90s Lions drafts were generally pretty solid in the first few rounds, but they didn't much value in the back end of the draft.
Bennie Blades
Chris Spielman
Barry Sanders
Mike Utley
Ray Crockett
Herman Moore
Robert Porcher
Jason Hanson
Wayne Fontes wasted some serious talent.
Edit. Wayne Fontes has some serious talent getting wasted!
Yeah but he sure was fun as hell to listen to.
I would have liked to party with Wayne that’s for sure.
He did make it to the NFC championship game by beating a Cowboy team that went on to win 3 Super Bowls.
Cmon man. He won one playoff game and lost more games than he won with a shit ton of talent on the roster. Very likable guy.
Spindler was a good pick in the [3rd] round.
As a non-Lions fan, I don't know how so many people have subjected themselves to this franchise for so long. I feel bad for the suffering the Fords have put you all through
Wasn’t Aaron Gibson literally like 500 lbs?
Taking Vince Young at #3 in 2006 doesn't look so good, considering all the future Pro-Bowlers the Titans passed on.
I recently watched a rerun from 2007 of NFL network's top ten show the other day, the topic was best coaches who never won a super bowl and Jeff Fisher came in at number eight or something. Weird how the public perception of these coaches can change over time. Yeah the Titans were awful post Steve McNair with the exception of the Chris Johnson year.
Blew all that sweet draft money on Cheesecake Factory:
I mean, I like Cheesecake Factory and make the occasional trip there, but 5k a week? Come on Vince.
That's a weird draft. It was thought to be the Reggie Bush sweepstakes, but then the Texans surprised everybody by committing to Mario Williams early.
There are a lot of future pro-bowlers in there, but there are in every draft; it's not THAT hard to get into the pro bowl. Young himself was a pro-bowler. It's more telling, to me, that of the QBs available in that draft, none were ultimately good enough to justify a #3 draft spot. The best QB to come out of that draft was Jay Cutler, who... well, yeah.
Matt Leinart was the next QB drafted after Young, btw, and the Titans thought about getting him instead. Young at least won ROY; Leinart never did anything notable.
Leinart lasted a little longer in the league though. Was a solid backup for a while. And the #10 pick is a fair bit less valuable than the #3.
Inasmuch as they were busts, both Leinart and Young were an interesting sort of bust. They both looked really good as rookies and then got worse as time went on. Leinart kept getting injured at the wrong time, and Young just seemed disinterested. I thought both of those guys were talented enough to make it, but things never came together for either of them.
I don't remember Leinart looking good as a rookie. It was a huge red flag when he didn't come out as a junior (even though he was projected to go higher than the 10th he did the following year), but returned for his senior season at USC and took exactly one class- Ballroom dancing.
So hear me out... Vince Young wasn't really that big of a bust.
In his five years with Tennessee
- 2 Pro Bowls (2006, 2009)
- Rookie of the year 2006
- 30-17 record as a starter (64% winning percentage)
- 12 game winning drives and 7 4th quarter comebacks (4 and 5 as a rookie)
- Comeback player of the year 2009 (after knee injury in 2008)
I think he gets beat up for some of his post playing career legal/financial issues, but while he was in the League he was actually pretty serviceable. I think he probably came about a decade too early.