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National Football League
Draft King Analysis
November 29, 2007
Lou Pickney, DraftKing.com
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I can't remember ever hearing as much complaining about network availability as I did today with the Packers/Cowboys game airing on the NFL Network. This is the second year for the NFL Network to carry Thursday night games, though last year's NFLN lineup consisted of mostly low-rent games. This time around they lucked out with a classic matchup of 10-1 teams, though much of the country was unable to watch it due to limited market penetration.
Fortunately for me, we have the NFL Network at my house (in HD, no less.) Thanks Comcast! I was wrapping up a workout at the gym, watching the opening few minutes of Rutgers at Louisville, when I saw a guy frantically changing channels. I paused my iPod Nano and asked the man if he was looking for the Green Bay/Dallas game. He said yes; I informed him that they don't have the NFL Network at the gym. The guy was clearly not happy about that bit of information.
"Yeah, that sucks," piped in a younger dude from the weight section. "Stupid Dish Network!" There were maybe five things I could have corrected him on about that errant statement (that it was the Comcast general cable feed being carried in the building, that Dish Network had nothing to do with it, etc.), but I let it go; I wanted to finish my workout in time to get back to the house by kickoff time. And, as it turned out, I made it back just in time to see the spine-tingling moment of silence for Sean Taylor (where nary a noise could be heard) before the game began.
If you missed the 37-27 Dallas win (which streamed online on nfl.com), you missed an exciting battle. The Cowboys impressed me on offense, and in particular Tony Romo tore up Green Bay's secondary with pinpoint passing. As much as I think the Packers will look to running back in the first round of the '08 NFL Draft, don't count out the possibility of them taking a corner there. The Pack sorely missed Charles Woodson, who missed the game due to a toe injury sustained in the Thanksgiving Day game in Detroit.
Aaron Rodgers played well in spelling an injured Brett Favre (who hurt his arm in the second quarter), and he looks like a viable option to start as the signal caller for the Packers in 2008 should Favre retire at the end of this season. One game does not necessarily make for a complete evaluation, but Rodgers performed admirably (and, for the most part, accurately) against a blitzing Dallas defense.
One interesting question that the Dallas Cowboys will have to answer is: what will they do at the running back position following this year? Marion Barber, III is looking as good as he has as a pro, but I strongly suspect that we'll see the Cowboys either retain free agent to be Julius Jones or, more likely, draft a running back to serve as a compliment to Barber. Particularly with the possibility of smaller but faster RBs (e.g. Ray Rice, Steve Slaton) declaring early for the draft, the Cowboys may be tempted to use one of their two first rounders to fill this need.
Alternately, Dallas could look to the free agent market, or they could hope that a guy like Rice or Slaton, or perhaps Mike Hart or Rashard Mendenhall, would fall to them in round two. That involves a large number of variables that are yet to be sorted out, but which are nonetheless worthy of keeping in mind as the regular season begins to draw closer to an end.
While the bulk of my watching time went to the NFL game, we also kept up with the Rutgers/Louisville game here at the house during commercial breaks. Ray Rice may be well served to turn pro if, for nothing else, to get away from the grind that the Rutgers offense places on him. He had 30+ carries tonight, putting him at 345 carries on the year. Add that to the carries he had in 2005 and 2006, and that puts him at 875 career carries. That's a large number of miles to have on the odometer for a guy who's just 20 years old.
Give credit to QB Brian Brohm for leading Louisville back to an exciting win. With Louisville finishing the season at 6-6, his performance has been overlooked by many, but he remains the real deal when it comes to being an NFL prospect. If he ends up as the top quarterback taken in the draft in April, don't be surprised.
One interesting milestone reached in the game was Louisville placekicker Art Carmody breaking the NCAA record for most career points by a kicker when he hit a 41-yard field goal in the first quarter of the game. Season and career stats are tainted to a degree due to the inexplicable decision made before the 2002 season to allow stats accrued in bowl games (or playoff games for non Division I-A schools) to count toward season and career records while not retroactively applying that change to games in 2001 and before. But that doesn't diminish the impressiveness of Carmody's consistency, and it wouldn't surprise me at all to see him playing in the NFL next year.
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