I devalued top 10 safeties. Look at the franchises who keep drafting them: Redskins (twice), Bills, Chiefs, Raiders, Cowboys, etc. That's like a who's-who of underachieving teams and they're across the financial spectrum from underachieving cheap to underachieving daddy warbucks. The teams that have really profited from taking safeties have been in the teens and twenties and the Seahawks may add to that list this season.
Skins Sean Taylor - was an All-Pro before his murder Laron Landry - Injury prone, but a stud when healthy Bills Donte Whitner - Reach at the time, and turned out he wasn't much of a safety Chiefs Eric Berry - Stud as a rookie, and will be an all-pro after recovering from his knee injury Cowboys Roy Williams - One of the best in the game for 3 years. Then his style of play phased out of the NFL in a heartbeat, the injuries began to mount, and he became an afterthought Raiders Michael Huff - Bad pick, never really became a good player in Oakland. Those safeties for the most part worked out to be very good players. The reason those teams never succeeded were not because they took a safety top 10. It's because they had inconsistent management, constantly changed systems, and never found a QB worth a damn during the time those safeties were on the roster.
Also, more so than just drafting safeties high (even though it's not something I'm on board with unless they're freaks like Taylor and Berry), the misevaluation/reaching on some of those safeties is a sign of a much greater problem.
exactly. Its not the fact they drafted a safety high, its the organizational dysfunction thats the problem. I'm with you on drafting a safety high, they need to be a game changer, like Taylor and Berry were/will be. Barron is not that guy, not even close.
