Friday, May 30, 2008

Otah - Uh-Oh

Following in the steps of the plethora of Lions beat writers doing pieces on anyone and everyone who is not actually on the roster of the Detroit Lions, I saw this piece on Jeff Otah and just had to put it on here.

Funny points? That the ankle injury that was supposedly healed before the draft will likely keep him out of practice at least until training camp.

That giving up what amounts to a ransom to Philly to pick an injured RT 2 spots AFTER the Lions took Cherilus...is termed as a bold move by the national media.

All I can say is that I'm sure glad the Lions stayed away from "bold moves" like that went the timid route picking a guy who has already earned reps with the first team from Marinelli, who doesn't even hand the valet anything without the guy proving himself, and was considered the best pure RT in the draft.

My take? Their bold move was desperation because they knew once Cherilus was gone, there was going to be a run on OT's they weren't expecting until the end of the round, not the middle. Knee jerk reaction was to give up a luxury-yachtload of picks to Philly to be sure they at least got someone with a 1st or 2nd round grade...which wasn't going to happen at the end of the round where I went back and found they were rumored to be looking at trading in to (late 20's)

What is even more amusing to me is that, had the picks been reversed (Lions take Otah, Carolina moves up for Cherilus, which I think they would have done) then the Lions would be taking a massive national beatdown about how Millen always drafts hurt players, Otah was a reach and they should have taken a guy like Cherilus since their need was right tackle. Meanwhile, similar to how NE was treated for the Mayo pick (that pundits were saying would be a reach for Detroit at 15) the Lions are still being hammered for "reaching" for a dominant player who fits their scheme over an injured one who doesn't.

Tomorrow I'll rip apart Clayton's completely ill-thought presentation of who is and isn't ready for a possible uncapped season in 2010 as I continue my impromptu series on inept national sports writers who have any obscure link I can justify to the Lions in some way. Pretty much the same relation their facts and logic have to the conclusions they are making -- most likely about 4 times as much, now that I look at it. Or maybe 4.354 since it will make it sound like I did research by throwing out a random meaningless number versus actually researching something.

8 comments:

CHIEFGER139 said...

was big time dissapointed they drafted cherlius in the 1st-many thought he was a 2nd rd pick-especially with otah on board who i argued for months we should take mendenhall over him-we passed both and got cherlius-hope it turns out well-wouldnt be too hard on otah thou-hes a keeper too!! the only way i seen us taking cherilus was with the trade down scenerio where we got basically 3 second rd picks and then i think i said cherlious,forte and lofton boy was i way off-but cherlious-dizon and smith are very close to what i wanted considering lofton and forte were gone-im pleased with what they did now but was pissed at the end of day one as i seen only 2 quality runningbacks left-smith and charles-we wisely traded up and got smith(i never even considered charles-until after day 1 so was very pleased we got smith) especially considering hes a home boy-still want someone to post in the detroit area how he was so good in high school-like i said earlier being from the battle creek area we usually know about the really good detroit high school players and i dont remember him and usually the great ones mich and mich st pick them up or they at least go big ten.

CHIEFGER139 said...

wrfetish on mlive
gives a good point-many of our key players didnt show up for the voluntary mini camp-the likes of sims,roy bell and foster-in my oppinion all key players-does that mean these guys arent on board with coach rod and the team?-id like to know the full list of the no-shows-
sure they could make it mandatory but i think by making it voluntary they want to see whos really on board-like fetish says "the primadanas-dont show up" do you think these guys mentioned are actually premadannas and they dont have to do anything more than they have to and have no respect for coach rod and the team??
your thoughts??

Anonymous said...

The media will never give the Lions any credit until they actually win the Superbowl. To them, everything the Lions do is wrong and only they know what is right. It must be like pulling teeth to get them to acknowledge anything positive. The Pats pick Mayo and they are hailed as geniuses. If the Lions had taken Mayo at their spot or even traded up to get him, it would have been call a "reach" by the experts. Killer and Sharp would have ripped the Lions if they had selected Otah with his hurt ankle. I could almost see the headlines. Even though the Panthers are in pads yet, it does hurt the cohesion of the their Oline if Otah is not practicing with the other Linemen. Otah was rated higher than Cherilus only because of his potential to plat LT. We shall see if he even plays that postion for the Panthers. If he does not, the Cherlius in my opiniom is the better pick.
I just cannnot wait for the Lions to shut up all these negative media chatterboxes. I just saw NFL Access on th NFL Network an they are still all over Kitna about the "guarantee". Kitna again just said they would be disappointed if they did not win at least 10 games like every other team should be. Being confident in your own team is a positive attitude for every other city except in Detroit where it is either considered boisterous or stupid.
As to the players missing the OTAs. these events are voluntary by league rules not the Lions rules. All teams have some players not showing up but only the LIons are pointed out. Since we do not know the reasons why, it is ignorant to presume anything but to infer that Sims of all the players is not "on board" with Coach is just IMO wrong. The Lions have stated that they all have reasons for not showing. For now, we should leave it at that. This is just another ploy by the media to put a negative spin on the Lions. When Urlacher does not show up, it is because he is selfish and want more money but when the Lion players don't show it is something wrong with Lions coaching and/or management. Give me break and just let things play out. If these players do not show for mandatory training camp then things should be different. For PFT to think the Lions would trade Roy for that washed up Williams is just an effort to create some media noise. THe LIons have enough safeties and they definitely do not need one who can't cover anybody. They already have Blue in that department.
LionfaninPA

Anonymous said...

DetFan 1979

Today you really show why I LOVE THIS SITE and why Detroit Lion journalism sucks right now.

You take an article that (at first glance) has no hint of Lion"ness" to it. Then you show its relevence, reveal a very positive Lion message, and show why all the naysayers suck.

Very good job of research, very good job of thought-provoking work, and a terrific job at driving home a point that this Marinelli crew knows what they are doing and are heading in a very good, positive direction at changing this team and its chemistry.

CHIEF - Baby we love you, and we knew you were bummed on draft day, but I was very exited for some very big reasons. The draftees are going to play big roles and play HUGE dividends. These top five or six guys will make a BIG difference and so will the free agents that were picked up in teh secondary.

LionFan in PA

I'll dig a little to see this kids high school stats and all.

OTA's Chief, WRFetish is guessing. No one knows why guys are missing camps, or who, but I challenged him on Bell and he never responded. Bell showed up overweight. If he showed up overweight, how could he be a "skip"?

Ernie trains with "Bert" for an eight week period down at FSU, and he may be finishing classes as well.

False start Foster should be there as everyone knows Marinelli makes his guys "earn" the right to start. That pencils him in until that "earned" time kicks in.

Roy may also be in classes at UT.

Killer right now in snubbed and bitter. Every article has a very negative tone, even the Jason Hanson article tonight is very negative, and this is a guy who could/should be a Pro_Bowler any given year.

-nubsnobber

Anonymous said...

I commented on MLive similar to your post here 1979. That article exposes CAR as losers for trading the farm to PHI for a gimpy bust that Otah appears to be. The Lions probably did right with Cherilus. We will beat CAR at their place this year because their O-Line is a mess and our rookie RB is just as good as Stewart if not better.

I also agree that the national press takes a dump on us every chance they can get with or without a real reason. John Clayton is idiot #1, so I'm sure you'll easily rip him. He's just filling space. The owners would keep the current (or any other) agreement in 2010 over an uncapped year. An uncapped year is suicide and will never happen, but those punk reporters will write about it anyway. Keep up the good work.

CHIEFGER139 said...

thanks
nub-snobber and guys
i remember draft day one-i was hitting the booze and was very pissed off-it was all going wrong to me at the time-i think i even posted i was going to the john to puke-but day 2 was very awsome and even later on day one some guys on mlive got my hopes up that smith and charles were left and keep my hopes up-of course we all knew they traded up and got smith-then fluellen-we all knew we needed a young 300 pouner to give darby a rest and someone darby could teach-then avril-a steal-may very well be the pass rusher we wanted instead of harvy and felton really impresses me-even more than smith-i agree all these young men will contribute next year-and it was a win win draft for all lions fans-they addressed all we wanted with these picks.

JJLions20 said...

Guys, Lets remember somehting about the media. Most of them are self serving. They make predictions and if they are right they become "experts". They ahve a tendancy of following the flow and not being bold. In the past few seasons some have predicted the break out year for the lions, and when it doensn't happen they look bad. So for now, most of the medial will be down on the Lions because .... to be perfectly blunt the Lions have ben down for so long.

The media does not get to watch the OTA's, and they don't get a lot of access in training camp. It is very controled these days. So in April when we heard hints that Bell was overweight (there was nothing factual eported like the number of lbs) it was all rumor off of one statement that marenelli made. It could have been 5-10 lbs. I can drop 5-10 lbs in 5-10 days, by eating eatinging lean meats and veggies, and exercising oncen in the morning and once in the evening. My point is that it is nowJune, and Bell could very well be at his weight. Unless Rod comes out and says he is at his weight, or that he is overweight, the media really doesn't know. It's very likly he is at weight.

Until the ball is snapped this is all media fodder. Things come up and players may not attend an OTA. Some guys are recovering from off season surgery, and can't practice. If they have a funeral to attend or some type of personalmissue to take care of, it is better to giver them some slack, because the OTA's don't mean much to a guy who can't participate much anyway.

As far as he Draft goes, there is a tendancy to listen to the "experts" too much. It's hard not to because they have the microphone for 6 hours. What "ve learned in the past 6 years is the what may determine a players draft positions are the team needs and the system the next few teams are utilizing. So to that point when the Lions drafted Cherilous I remembered a coulple of things. There were some postings on this site promoting him. Also I had head a report of Otah's ankle problem and other limitations. What started to surface a little later was how Cherilous fit the zone blocking scheme.

Tom helped us by giving us a heads up on Dizon. I think we all thought it was early for Dizon, but I think Tom had some indication form somebody inside on how much they really liked this kid.

Also right after the trade down in the foirst round I was posting that the third pick in the third round was big, because unlike other years the third round started the second day in 2008. As it turned out it was big, and Millen capitalized by moving up to get the first pick of Day-2. They knew if they got Smith they did what they had to in the draft. They got the starting RT, MLB & RB. So they took all the risk out of the equasion and made sure nobody else would get Smith. Fluellen and Avril may have just been luck that they feel to a point where detroit could pick them (or move up to get them). The Lions had to get a little good luck and have part of the draft fall their way after the way the first two rounds went.

Patrick said...

guys,

the reason for Roy, McD, Redding Sims and a few others are not at the OTA AND participating is because of off season surgury. I am too lazy to go back and look on who actually had what. I know though several are there at the OTA, but they are rehabbing on the bike or receiving treatments. They are mostly veterans and Coach is not bringing them back too soon for the sake of practicing at an OTA. If you want I can actually get the website where I saw the information.