Great? Cam Newton had a "great" rookie year. Wilkerson's was good. Solid at best. That's not a knock at all. It was FAR from "great". Easy overdoing it with the adjectives.
Wilkerson had a very good rookie season. There's no way to tell if that's indicative of a great career or just a solid one but he played pretty well last season.
A rookie season. Hopefully a good one. If he plays as well as Wilkerson did last year he'll have better stats than Wilkerson wound up with because teams will have to account for both of them.
Last January when TGG was hotly debating which team (NE or Giants) would be best to win the SB, I strongly wanted NE to lose. Either team 'winning' would suck, especially the Giants living in our house, but the Pats 'losing' (again) would bring years of joy here on TGG rubbing it in their chowder faces. I was certain a second loss to the G-men would keep the Pats trolls out-a-here.
The Pats fans have to have somebody in New York they can beat. In this case that means coming on Jets boards and preening since they'd be laughed off of Giants boards at this point.
That's what I mean about the adjectives. In describing his rookie year, you just said it was "very good" and he played "pretty well". I think he had a solid/good rookie year. Again, that's not a knock at all. I just think saying it was "great" is ridiculous. He was not great at all.
And to add to that, its not just talent, its effort, determination to be great, and the way they approach every single day. He’s been compared to one of THE best competitors in the league today in Revis, and that has to say something. Talent is clear in pads or no pads, and so is their determination to be better than great and their love for the game.
Well he definitely wasn't Ndamakung Suh incarnate if that's what you mean. Very few rookie defensive linemen are dominant their first season. There's too much going on in the trenches for them to dominate like that as they're getting up to speed on the pro game. Linebackers have a better shot at instant stardom because they're back from the action a bit or on the edge and in either case they're not spending half their effort trying to keep their knees intact against the more experienced guys.
Wilk and Ellis were both noted for having great natural athleticism, but they never hit the gym hard in college. It will be interesting to see how much stronger they got over the offseason. WIlkerson in particular has a very good frame to carry a lot of muscle.
The same Ellis who couldnt do a pullup when he made the team ? When I think of guys with natural athleticism im thinking more like Cromartie, Coples, maybe even Ducasse . I dont know what I would use to describe Ellis
Does flipping your car on the Parkway qualify as "big" SMH. I'm sorry I like Mo. For the amount of time he had to learn the defense he did quite well for his rookie year. I honestly didn't expect that out of him. The production he had was more then enough to give me something to look forward to as far as his development/improvement goes. The reason why I say this is simply because to produce the way he did, in your rookie year, while being double teamed, at times even as much as 3 OL making contact with him, he looks very promising and Its def a good addition to the team and hopefully down the line become as one of the main personelle, anchors of the Jets. Hope he's fine after the accident. It'll be stupid to end a promising NFl career due to recklessness and stupidity.
Ellis has decent bend & moves well laterally.He's a good not great athlete...but a good not great athlete with his body type/size still has a chance to be special.
The other day I was reading some old draft projections/scouting reports for Ellis, and remember some comparisons to Haloti Ngata. Although it was also worth noted that his bust potential was significantly up there as well, but he shoulda been a first rounder if not for his problems. The guys definitely got the potential, but we gotta be glad to have Pouha in front of him to give him a little more time to develop and hopefully be a football player. At least the improvements in his conditioning are massive so far, I just hope prison this/next year doesnt hinder him much
