Is J.Babin our Mike Mamula ?

[nunusguy]

"The year was 1995 and new Eagles head coach Ray Rhodes fell in love. He watched tape, did his research and watched in awe as Boston College defensive end Mike Mamula dazzled NFL scouts with his rare explosive ability, his hunger, and his incredible workout talent.
Mamula became the darling of that draft, vaulting from relative obscurity to a top 10 draft pick. The rest is history ... and a lesson to every team and to every fan: Sometimes, you fall in love for the wrong reasons. "

This is from the Eagles web site, and the way the Eagles felt 'bout Mamula,
a smallish DE by NFL standards (250 lb) from a relatively small school in football reputation (Boston College), sounds uncomfortably familiar to our Jason Babin situation here in Houston.
Of course there's atleast one very important distinction between the 2 situations, both are true tweeners and our guy has a 3-4 D as the vehicle
to succeed in the NFL as an OLB but Mamula had to remain a down lineman. The link to the entire article is below:
http://www.philadelphiaeagles.com/ne...l.jsp?id=10403

[Vinny]

Mamula was a "workout warrior" who excelled in the weight room, on a track field and shot up the charts based on workout numbers. I am not sure these two guys equate since Babin was so productive on the field.

[Porky]

Draft choices are like lottery tickets. You hit it big once in a while, win 3 dollars a lot, and occasionly you go home with nothing. (ok, so you USUALLY go home with nothing!) I don't really think one situation is amalgous to the other at all. So, they both played DE? There have been hundreds of DE drafted since 1995. Some hit it big, some are busts, and some in between. What some guy at Boston College did has ZERO impact on what Babin may or may not do. He may be the second coming of Lawrence Taylor, or he may be the next Mamula. More likely, he is somewhere between those two, but that will be due to his effort and talent, and not because of some guy drafted ten years ago.

[wags]

Babin is our Lawrence Taylor, without the crack.

[jgl35]

I am an Eagles fan up here in Philly and know something about why Mamula was picked by the birds. As Vinny said, Mamula was a work out wonder, might have been the best numbers man at the combine that year. What the Eagles web site didn't tell you was that Jeff Lurie had just bought the team the year before and had just hired Ray Rhodes before the 95 season. Why the second part about Lurie is important is because Lurie was from Boston and had seen Mamula play in college. Most of us old fans felt this played a big part in the Eagles thinking in the first round in the draft. The Eagles traded up to draft him. Passed on a guy named Warren Sapp. Our owner has since let the football people run the player end of things. Something which has yet to be done down the road in Washington. The Eagles second round pick in 95 was Bobby Taylor, so things work out,but Taylor and Sapp would have been nice. I think it is unfair to compare your pick to anyone right now. Let the kid be himself. It takes three years to know how a draft went. Time will tell.

[Playmaker]

All this Babin hype is great, I'm all for optimism. But training camp hasn't even started. Granted I don't follow offseason stuff on football as much and I don't know much about Babin other then we traded up to get him, but comparing and having multi-page threads about him is a bit much.

If he lives up to the hype great, if he's a bust it'll set us back but it's not like we can't replace him. I am gonna be watching him though because management traded up for him and rave about him. My eye will be more on Capers and Casserly's scouting because they wanted him bad.

[Vinny]

Originally Posted by Playmaker

All this Babin hype is great, I'm all for optimism. But training camp hasn't even started. Granted I don't follow offseason stuff on football as much and I don't know much about Babin other then we traded up to get him, but comparing and having multi-page threads about him is a bit much.

We talk about him alot because we are a 3-4 team in need of an impact OLB and he is the chosen one, hand picked by our 3-4 "experts". It's an enticing development considering that we really have not had a premiere edge rusher on our football team in the two years we have been in the NFL. He is supposed to be that guy.

[Playmaker]

Understood, but the guy is a 27th 1rst round pick (if I remember correctly) not a 7th pick. I have a more guarded optimism about him. *edit*

I'm surprised he gets talked about more then Dunta Robinson.

[Vinny]

Originally Posted by Playmaker

Understood, but the guy is a 27th 1rst round pick (if I remember correctly) not a 7th pick. I have a more guarded optimism about him. Plus, I can't remember where I read this from, but I've heard he's dabbled with steroids early in his football career. If I'm wrong I'll edit this.

I'm surprised he gets talked about more then Dunta Robinson.

3-4 defenses need outstanding outside linebackers. We don't have a 'great' OLB. We do have a solid Cornerback in Glenn. OLB has been a need here since the start. That's likely why.

[Playmaker]

Originally Posted by __V__

Why does someone have to be a 7th pick to have merit or excite the fan base? 3-4 defenses need outstanding outside linebackers. We don't have a 'great' OLB. We do have a solid Cornerback in Glenn. OLB has been a need here since the start. That's likely why.

Higher picks *usually* equates to higher expectations, from what I read Babin was a reach even at 27th. If OLB was such an importance (and I wholly agree that needed to be upgraded) then why not draft the best 3-4 LB at 11th cuz I'm sure there was a player ranked higher then Babin. I understand they drafted the best available athlete at thier need positions and came up with Dunta.

I guess it boils down to Babin being a reach at 27th pick. I *hope* he turns out what the Texans wanted him for but frankly won't be surprised if he doesn't live up to the expectations.

*edit*

[Vinny]

Originally Posted by Playmaker

Higher picks *usually* equates to higher expectations, from what I read Babin was a reach even at 27th. If OLB was such an importance (and I wholly agree that needed to be upgraded) then why not draft the best 3-4 LB at 11th cuz I'm sure there was a player ranked higher then Babin.

The 27th overall pick is a high pick. Now, it wouldn't be in the NBA draft, but it certainly is in the NFL. We don't use conventional 4-3 OLB's in our system (most are too small and that is why you don't see us draft them for the most part) and the Texans stated that Babin was the highest rated edge player on their draft board (so that would make him the highest rated 3-4 olb in the draft according to the Texans). They haven't been prone to lie too much about such things since the start of the franchise and have been as straight-shooting a management team as we have directing our sports teams since I can remember, so take it fwiw.

[Playmaker]

Sounds good, it's all good.

[nunusguy]

Thanks for the contribution from the Philly guy, but I certainly don't think it's
unfair to make this comparison. It is what we do and it's all we can do until we
see him play ( exhibition games in August will begin to supply us with the info
we need to make some valid conclutions)
And it was not a surprise to all that Babin was picked so high - for example, Mel
Kiper, the ESPN draft guru, nailed the pick: his final Mock had Babin right at 26 or 27 in the first round as I recall.
Also, Cass & Capers totally concealed their interest in Babin. They always talked 'bout drafting D this year, but mainly lineman and backs. I read in numerous places where they said there really wasn't an edge type pash rusher out there
this year that caught their eye even though they openly acknowledged it was still a significant team need.

[Number19]

Originally Posted by __V__

...the Texans stated that Babin was the highest rated edge player on their draft board (so that would make him the highest rated 3-4 olb in the draft according to the Texans)...

Are you sure about this? My impression was that Babin was the highest rated player for the #40 pick. I'm sure Will Smith was rated higher. Have you noticed, physically, Babin is a clone of Smith. One other thought, the reason many feel we paid too high a price is because Carolina moved up into the first round, from #31 to #28 for only a 4th round pick, #127. This last statement is incorrect - I meant to mention Atlanta moving from #38 to #29 ( Indianapolis) by swapping thirds and only giving up a forth, #125. And of course they swapped #38 and #29.

[DominatorDavis]

Babin was rated higher than Smith was by the Texans. They really only gave up a 3rd and and 4th to get the guy that they wanted. I'm all for it.

[A Texan]

The guy Babin usually is compared to is Kevin Greene, who by the way was a 5th round choice who was an all pro several times.

[Vinny]

Originally Posted by Number19

Are you sure about this? My impression was that Babin was the highest rated player for the #40 pick.

I posted it in the other Babin thread too.

by GM Charley Casserly
(opening statement) “We gave up a two, three, four and swapped fives. Today we will not pick again, and we will not trade up to pick in the third. Tomorrow, we’ll have a four, a fives, two sixes and two sevens. We have players rated and this was a player that we had rated highest at his position. He’s an outside linebacker for us. We had him slated to go late in the first round or early in the second. We got wind, others were trying to trade up to get him. So it became a little bit of a race to go get him. You have to make a decision if you want or don’t want the player. We wanted the player and this is the price that we had to pay. When you go into the draft, you have a wish list. Our two top guys were Dunta Robinson and Jason Babin. We accomplished the objective of getting our first two picks of our wish list.”

by GM Charley Casserly
"We thought it was a strong draft early and a strong draft late. There were a lot of players in the middle that we already had here, because we had so many draft picks in our first two years. Other teams didn’t have the draft picks like we had. They didn’t have the luxury of having a surplus of picks to trade and move up to get a player. The way I viewed the trade is that we had two fourth round picks, one of which came from a fifth round trade last year. When you have extra picks, you get them to move up. It was a throw away pick. In my view we gave up a third round pick to move up. At that point the player on our board was an offensive guard and we’ve got enough good offensive guards now. That was not a position we wanted to take. We probably would have movedout of the third round."

[Number19]

Originally Posted by __V__

by GM Charley Casserly
...We have players rated and this was a player that we had rated highest at his position...Our two top guys were Dunta Robinson and Jason Babin. We accomplished the objective of getting our first two picks of our wish list.”

My mistake was taking these two statements and taking "position" to mean drafting position and not playing position.

We will never know about Smith, but if you are correct, I'd like to know what it is about Babin that had them rate him above Smith.

By the way, Babin was off my radar. I wanted Smith as our first pick with Robinson my second choice. Had I been aware of Babin, I probably would have seriously considered Robinson & Babin as my 1-2. Anyways, I am very pleased with these choices and am looking forward to following these two.

[Fiddy]

I didnt know who Jason Babin was until the day before the draft when I was looking at the prospect videos for ESPN Motion. And I think I can say, safely, that he was off everybody's radar except Casserly's and Capers'. When they traded up I thought they were getting Karlos Dansby because he has the size to play OLB in a 34 and has played the position, but I never question C&C so I trust Babin will be a good player, just give him time...

[ArlingtonTexan]

Most draft people had Babin rated as a 2nd or 3rd rounder, but Kiper a couple of months before the draft, put out a mock draft with him going something like 19 overall.