[DJ's left nut]

One more thing, and it's a point I'm not sure I've made yet, but it involves running mechanics.

Watson is obviously very tall and long legged; he's a long-strider. Now that doesn't mean he's slow to get up to speed because he isn't. But the way he gets his speed to is just eat up turf with every stride, like say Usain Bolt. And on a track there's no downside to that at all.

But in football, with another guy trying to disrupt your stride and/or knock you off your route, it creates an issue.

I was a shitty football player (only bad ballplayer on CP) but I took to coaching well. And one thing I was always taught as a DB was that when you're alongside a receiver, what him in the hands as he's running. You'll never get a flag thrown (I never did) but as he's pumping those arms, if you have a hand down by your hip just giving him a little chuck, you'll throw his running mechanics off. You'll disrupt his stride.

Now when you're a little guy like Austin, literally every time your foot hits the ground again, your body will 'self-correct' and get you back in line. Because the movements were small and precise. You can't really get disrupted much when you're constantly correcting via small movements.

Meanwhile if you're someone that gets his speed like Watson, getting your stride disrupted just ruins the route. You're going to have a much harder time self-correcting because in that 20 yards you run (for example), you took 15 strides with larger, more levery movements. As opposed to a little sparkplug with rapid footfires like Austin who's constantly correcting.

Think of it as making a small correction to catch a skid through a turn vs. power-sliding through it. Oh sure, by the end you're still pointing the same direction, but if you're making smaller and quicker corrections in the skid, you'll come out of the corner in far better shape than if you kick the ass end out and than catch it.

If you give me 2 guys with the same speed but one of them is 6 inches shorter than the other, that shorter guy is going to have more functional 'football' speed damn near every single time.

And when you see Austin out there playing the Z at Memphis, you can see exactly what I'm talking about. People just thought they could body this little dude off his route and then they realize real fast that this guy is damn sturdy and uses that shorter stature to make himself damn near impossible to re-route.

Whereas Watson, that IS one of the concerns I've read about him. He's a guy you can knock off his route - and that's just not terribly surprising. It makes all the sense in the world when you think about the physics that have to be involved in a 6'5" guy's running mechanics.

And it won't show up on the highlights we watch because you just won't see the plays where the QB doesn't go his way on those tapes because he got taken off his route.