I'm never going to be a general manager in the National Football League (Please cue Ron Jaworski voice and smile). I don't know what it takes to correctly evaluate talent and have trouble blaming certain franchises from passing on certain players. They have a group of scouts who know a lot more about football than I do. Sometimes these scouts really miss. Sometimes the players they select just can't handle the biggest stage in the athletic world.
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| You can see his two Super Bowl rings if you look hard enough. |
With that being said, let's look back at the 2004 and 2005 NFL drafts. Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger was taken 11th in 2004 and Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers was taken 24th in 2005. These are two men who are in the top five for their position in the league. If you want to argue whether they deserve to be there or not, that's another post for another day. What you can't argue is they have led their teams to the Super Bowl this year. That's something Tom Brady, Drew Brees, Peyton Manning, Eli Manning and Phillip Rivers failed to do.
Looking back now, there is no way these guys slip out of the top five picks. Below is a list of the teams that selected other players before Roethlisberger or Rodgers were drafted in their respective years. The * means that player is no longer with the team that drafted him. The ** means that player is out of the league. The *** means that player was killed in a tragic shooting.
2004
- San Diego - Eli Manning (Traded to New York Giants for Phillip Rivers)
- Oakland - Robert Gallery
- Arizona - Larry Fitzgerald
- New York Giants - Phillip Rivers (Traded to San Diego for Manning)
- Washington - Sean Taylor***
- Cleveland - Kellen Winslow II*
- Detroit - Roy Williams*
- Atlanta - DeAngelo Hall*
- Jacksonville - Reggie Williams**
2005
- San Francisco - Alex Smith
- Miami - Ronnie Brown
- Cleveland - Braylon Edwards*
- Chicago - Cedric Benson*
- Tampa Bay - Carnell Williams
- Tennessee - Adam "Pacman" Jones*
- Minnesota - Troy Williamson**
- Arizona - Antrel Rolle*
- Washington - Carlos Rodgers
- Detroit - Mike Williams*
- Dallas - DeMarcus Ware
- San Diego - Shawne Merriman*
- New Orleans - Jammal Brown
- Carolina - Thomas Davis**
- Kansas City - Derrick Johnson
- Houston - Travis Johnson*
- Cincinnati - David Pollack**
- Minnesota - Erasmus James**
- St. Louis - Alex Barron*
- Dallas - Marcus Spears
- Jacksonville - Matt Jones**
- Baltimore - Mark Clayton*
- Oakland - Fabian Washington*
Of course, you can't blame all of these teams for passing on Roethlisberger and Rodgers when they did. In Roethlisberger's case, the two quarterbacks taken before him have had good careers, and most of the other players have been to the Pro Bowl for their positions. But some of these teams probably leave you scratching your head. In 2004, Oakland had Rich Gannon (39) and Kerry Collins (32) starting games for them; Washington has Patrick Ramsey and Mark Brunell (34) splitting starts; and Cleveland had Jeff Garcia (34), Luke McCown and Kelly Holcomb start multiple games. None of these franchises had legitimate starters or prospects, yet they didn't think Roethlisberger could help them quickly or in the long run. Oops.
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| Rodgers is mocking the 49ers for taking Alex Smith instead of him. I think. |
The 2005 draft was much worse. Miami, Cleveland, Chicago, Tennessee, Minnesota, Carolina and Oakland have all had issues with quarterbacks since that year. Try and tell me you would rather Vince Young or Jay Cutler to start for your team instead of Rodgers. I'll call you a Skip Bayliss wannabe and slap you.
It's easy to use hindsight and question these teams for skipping over franchise quarterbacks who will be playing for a Super Bowl in two weeks. Who knows what they saw or didn't see in these players? Maybe the GMs' decisions made perfect sense after they saw all these players and spoke to them. Maybe they were drunk on draft day. Either way, it's just fun to look back and bust their chops a little bit from our couches.
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