Quote:
Originally Posted by DJ's left nut
I think my stance going into that draft was "There are like 47 freakish power/speed linebackers in this draft so we should probably grab one of them..."
I don't know that I had a preference.
But it's interesting - is some of this, or even most of this, coaching?
I say that because Brandon Smith came out in that draft class as well. Christian Harris, Darrian Bevers, Mark Robinson, Damone Clark, Channing Tindall - there were a TON of powerful fast 'backers in that draft.
And Brandon Smith is, as near as I can see, out of the league. On tape and on paper, there's just nothing that meaningfully separates Smith from Chenal. And yet Smith got cut after one season and Chenal is just continuing to grow.
It's not like Smith's a moron - he quarterbacked Penn State's defense. He did some impressive stuff. And he washed out almost immediately. Whereas we're seeing Chenal work himself into a real key contributor for a much better defense than Smith.
Situation matters, I suppose...
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I've come to the conclusion that there are tiny differences between players that have big impacts, and they're not really measurable things (or currently measured things).
I just read an article about Hardy Brown the other day. He was some dude in the 1950s who had a reputation as the hardest hitter in the league. The players who were interviewed said that he wasn't the biggest or strongest guy out there, but he had some way of cocking his shoulder and then driving it through a guy that was devastating. (It sounds like it would be illegal today, but whatever.)
That's what I was reading about Chenal that I liked. The articles that I was reading about him said that he was able to bring an extra level of violence to his hits, without really explaining or understanding why. The other guys were big and strong, but there's just something different about Chenal's contacts.
I find this stuff interesting. You look at most players at a position who are about the same size with similar measurables, and they can have very different outcomes. It's something that we're not great at measuring, apparently, because the scouts get the rankings wrong a lot.
I do think some of it comes down to system and situation, but I think there's more to it than that. I always thought for running backs it's about peripheral vision. It seems like the top running backs always knew where everyone was on the field. It's some element of body control and the ability to quickly translate the need to move with the ability to move. For linebackers, I think there's probably some quickness in converting from running to planting and driving. Those are just my desktop theories, though.