Mike Williams has shown a surprising ability to "keep at it". In Oakland and Detroit he had his moments where he hustled and showed a good work ethic but, those were just moments. He was signed roughly 6 months ago and he's kept it up. He weighs 242 pounds and would like to get to his college weight of 230-235. In November he weighed 270. He shows up at 7am at the training facility and is the first player there. I'd be the last one to fall for his prospects as they've been like fool's gold in the past, but...this is different. He is figuring it out. It's not time to get excited but it is time to keep an eye on him again.

Lendale White played last year with a torn meniscus. Layman's explanation- it's a loop of a muscle that surrounds your kneecap. 1100 plus yards on a bum knee sure makes me curious about how he'll fare in 2008 with a healthy knee.

Many say the Titans drafted Chris Johnson too early. It seems the competition is going to be pretty fierce in the Titans backfield this summer. If it seems that way as they run thru some plays in shorts in May, that pick could pay enormous dividends.

Jim Wyatt has a very well done interview with Mike Heimerdinger over at the Tennessean's website http://www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?aid=/20080514/sports01/805140400/1027/sports01

He discusses each Wide Receiver briefly. This Wide Receiver corps has been frowned upon by many but, Heimerdinger sure seems to have enthusiasm. It's great to read that and builds up hope for 2008.

Roydell Williams is still recoverring from a broken ankle. Justin McCareins and Justin Gage have been the starters thus far.

Jevon Kearse has been well motivated thus far and seems to be practicing with a big chip on his shoulder. He's received his share of criticism from his days in Philadelphia.

Ryan Fowler is not fully healed from his shoulder injury in 2007. He is on schedule, which is 4 to 6 months. He's determinned to play regardless and has been participating in their minicamp.

The Titans are using a new blocking bag to force the blockers to keep their feet "alive".

There was one minor problem: Walsh had no such tape. He turned over 8 tapes to the NFL and there was no St. Louis Rams walkthrough. To sum it all up, the Pats admitted to taping games from 2000-2008. They turned over tapes to the NFL and got punished by Roger Goodell. Walsh had nothing to add but more of the same tapes the Pats had already admitted to.

In this sue or get sued world we live in,(or so it seems sometimes) it's the Patriots turn to consider if there is any lawsuit type repercussions here. Is Matt guilty of defamation of character or any of those type lawsuits now? I have no idea, I'm not a lawyer. I'd like to see this guy sweat now though. It's only fair after what he claimed and what he produced.

The Titans selected a runningback, Tight End and 2 Defensive Ends with their first 4 picks. In this era of free agency, it's hard to tell if shuffling of the Defensive Ends was a good move. They let two productive Defensive Ends go in free agency. They drafted two to replace them. On the surface that's a 2 for 2 swap. However, not every college prospect "pans out". What they really swapped was two players that could produce for 2 players that have the potential to produce. Then there's the contracts and salary cap. Their drafted Defensive Ends will make less than the two that left in free agency, so there's a savings there. What did they do with that money that was freed up then? They signed Albert Haynesworth to an enormous franchise tag level salary. In time, we'll see if Albert's impact is more than the two Defensive Ends that left. Last year he was my Defensive Player of the year so I think it's a good move. It is, however, hard to bring a team to the next level when they can only fit so many contracts under the cap.

The runningback they drafted is Chris Johnson. He's fast and has some "cat-quick" moves that players rarely posess. Last year, they drafted Chris Henry. Chris made some sense then because Lendale White was stirring up the nickname "fatdale" and the Titans seemed to be concerned. Now that he's rushed for 1110 yards in his second season, I don't see the reason for concern. Chris Brown left in free agency but, he was hardly an impact player last year. Chris Henry should be more than capable of replacing Brown's production. Where's Johnson fit in then? I don't see it. The only glaringly obvious point is they have two extremely fast runningbacks now in Henry and Johnson. Does Fisher have something up his sleeve to utilize their speed?

Tight End Craig Stevens was supposedly the best blocking Tight End in the draft. A team can never have enough good blockers, so naturally I think this is a fine pick.

Wide Receiver Lavelle Hawkins I wonder about. Should we expect he'll be as productive as Courtney Roby, Paul Williams, or Tyrone Calico? After the last handful of drafts, I'd rather the Titans just don't draft Wide Receivers. It's their achilles heel, it's the one spot they just don't draft well at. Best of luck to Lavelle though.

Last pick Cary Williams reminds me of Cortland Finnergan in that I don't want to discredit some late pick just because he's a late pick. The Titans have shown an especially strong ability to find late gems in the draft especially at Cornerback.

The best pick might have been the one I purposely skipped in the draft order. Linebacker Stanford Keglar has excellent speed and very good size. He played 3 years at Purdue. He has stirred up the term "sleeper" in me. In re-reading some draft profiles and rankings it seems some question his toughness. I will always find it laughable that anyone questions the toughness of a Linebacker or Fullback that could literally smash heads every single play. Maybe Stanford should have bent steel to show his toughness. Whomever started this toughness chatter may have done the Titans a wonderful favor as he fell to the 4th round. I think he might be the gem of this draft for the Titans.

In Fantasy Football, if you can fill a position with a good player later in the draft, you wait. The NFL draft is the same in this regard. Everyone's drafting tendencies will dictate when players will likely be picked. General Managers use a similar predictive method for their own mock NFL draft, to gauge where a player may be picked. I thought I'd take some time to go thru the last ten drafts, from 1998 to 2007, to see what trends I come up with.

Is it important for a Fullback to help open up a hole for a Runningback? For a Fullback to save the Quarterback from getting sacked by making a key block? For a Fullback to be a safety valve of sorts and catch a dump off pass by the quarterback? There have been 42 Fullbacks taken in the last ten years. 1 in Round 2, 5 in round 3, and the rest are all seconday day picks. That sure seems unimportant to NFL GMs doesn't it?

Well that isn't the case. If they can get a good player later(including as an undrafted free agent signee) they get them then. What's the rush?

The issue I would have is with the high quality of these Fullbacks. A large percent(relative to other positions) make the pro bowl. An even larger percent start for many years for their team. On top of that, in this era of free agency, few of the drafted Fullbacks change teams so there's also a strong sense of team loyalty as well.

For the combine, for pro days, for everything that a scout looks at, the most important characteristics always seem to be size and speed. For a Wide Receiver, you could throw in some others like route running ability or catching ability. For Offensive Linemen you could throw in their ability to pass or run block. For Defensive Linemen it would be their burst off the line of scrimmage, their ability to stop the run, and their ability to get after the Quarterback. You can go on and on with what scouts would also look for, but the primary attributes are clearly size and speed.

What positions do you think of when you think size and speed?

Offensive and Defensive linemen? There have been 445 Offensive Linemen drafted in the last ten years. There have been 432 Defensive linemen drafted in the last ten years. That big guy with nimble feet just makes those GMs and Coaches excited with anticipation.

Wide Receiver? There have been 325 Wide Receivers taken. NFL GMs sure like those big tall players that run like the wind.

Tight End? There have been 145 Tight Ends drafted in the last ten years. Big nimble guy that can both block and catch.

To recap, there have been 445 OL, 432 DL, 145 TEs, and just 42 FBs. To look at another way: On the average, 44 Offensive Linemen,  43 Defensive Linemen, and 14 Tight Ends are drafted each year to only 4 Fullbacks.

In theory, the best players in college make the NFL right? Top ten players would be the best too then, right? Clearly, if a team wants one of the best Fullbacks, they can very easily draft one at almost any point in the draft. Sadly, they can have a top ten Fullback, even a top five Fullback, with the very last pick of the draft. How can that be?

For now, NFL GMs are thinking if you won't draft one, I won't draft one. I can still land a top ten Fullback as an undrafted free agent so why waste the pick. NFL teams can change this trend. For now, the best Fullbacks in college will be left virtually ignored on draft day.

I used Pro Football Reference's draft querier to get these statistics.  http://www.pro-football-reference.com/draft/draft_querier.htm

Enjoy this link then

http://www.onnetworks.com/videos/draftguys-tv/the-worlds-worst-workout

Chris Henry was released after getting arrested for what seems like the "zillionth" time. Yes he has all world talent to play the Wide Receiver position and that must be enticing on draft day. However, there's alot of people that would say they saw this coming. In my opinion, the Bengals could have handled Chris and their other troubled players quite differently.

One of the NFL's great owners, Wellington Mara, was concerned about the fans perception of a spousal abuser they drafted. Christian Peters' wife died from labor complications.  They were, like many teams, faced with the possibility of drafting his immense talent at a position they sorely needed to fill but, also taking on all the issues that come with that. Several teams just passed on Peters and it's assumed they just didn't want to deal with it.

Mara had an idea though. He spoke with Peters and got the impression he was worth the risk. Here was a guy that could turn his life around and "straighten out". Keep in mind, any low character draftee would probably try to give off that perception. Mara took a chance on Peters but, on a few conditions. He had to go to counselling sessions and all sorts of those type things to "shrink his head". The Giants had people meet with Peters to make sure he was going and discuss such meetings. While it may have been for Peters benefit, I believe it was also for the fans. So that they knew, the Giants may be taking a chance on this kid but, they're also trying to do the right thing here as well. After the initial "oh my" when they drafted him, the fans seemed to be OK or content with the idea of all that extra counselling and monitorring. This was a good model to follow. This scenario setup by Mara shows alot. It shows the tremendous risk involved in drafting a "troublemaker" and what that could do to the public's perception of the team as a whole. It shows the effort needed to be made to make sure the player gets "on the right track". It involves the player displaying some humility, an admission of guilt, and a desire to improve himself.

The Bengals completely missed it on alot of players, not just Henry.
There's a fine line between drafting a troublemaker and drafting some rough tough almost evil type guy the opponent will fear.  There's another fine line as to whether it's a good risk or bad risk to even get involved with such a player by drafting or signing them. Mara drew that line in front of anyone that would pickup a paper or watch the news. The Bengals never did. Their reactions have always been after the fact.

Their reactions have always been answers to problems not solutions to problems. The Bengals players were (more or less) told don't let it happen again. If you draft a troublemaker, you spell it out on day 1. Then maybe maybe MAYBE it'll work out with that player. Reacting when a problem comes up isn't a solution, it's a reaction. They should have had some foresight to say this may be an issue in the future so let's deal with it now. Instead they waited for a problem to happen.

I'm confident some will say but at that point the player didn't do anything. It doesn't matter. Name an American that would mind being paid millions to play a game but, the employers are going to set some personal ground rules about not misbehaving? The draftees lives and bodies are picked apart so much before the draft it's a wonder there's ever something we don't know about them. The teams get a reasonable picture of the person's character and it was the Bengals job to react to those findings before something happenned.

Ironically, when Marvin Lewis became coach of the Bengals he addressed a problem before it affected his team. The Bengals had an old fashioned routine and scouting department that dated back to the days of Paul Brown. While some NFL teams had dozens of scouts, the Bengals still expected the coaches to do most of the leg work. Some say the Bengals only had 6 scouts before Marvin came on board. Marvin, of course, wanted to see and meet players but felt that a large scouting department was needed. This new large scouting department also needed to work year round and gather up as much info as possible on the players. Marvin showed he had some wise foresight when he revamped the Bengals scouting department. Where was that foresight when he drafted these players?

There's times Marvin Lewis gets upset with a player's misbehavior and says that he's setting a standard. The problem with that is we've read that a few times. Marvin is an experienced coach, but has only been a head coach for a relatively brief time. Inexperienced coaches make mistakes and lets hope he's learned from them. He seems to have. There's not many of these troublemakers left on the team. There's holes in the lineup where they should be, but at least they're moving forward. Let's hope for the sake of the fans and the players and the NFL that they've learned their lesson.

The NFL owners have several rule changes to vote upon. One of which is whether to allow long hair. The issue gets a little deeper as we don't know exactly what has stirred up this rule change. Is it injury? Is it concussions? Is it a professional vs non-professional look?

Many college kids have long hair, many more did years ago and were called "hippies". Some of them found out that prospective employers didn't much care for long hair and they didn't get the jobs they wanted right out of college. When they trimmed their hair short and went to their next interview, they were perceived as the potential employee they wanted to be perceived as. Is that right? Should hair be a detractor? Whether you agree or disagree about it unfortunately doesn't seem to matter. It happenned and was a fairly common occurence years ago. "Blue collar america" believes short hair is better on a man as it's more professional.  The NFL has strict uniform policies and they have fined players for what could be conceived as the most minor of infractions. A player's appearance in uniform is taken seriously by the NFL "powers that be". Is the rule change about long hair, about the professional vs unprofessional look of it?

A concussion is caused by the slightest of movements(less than a quarter of an inch) by the brain almost rattling within it's "shell" that we call a skull. Riddel, the maker of the NFLs helmets, plan for the average player to wear their helmets. A bunch of hair tucked in would be a softer cushion than those pads. Is that better or worse at stopping that rattle from happenning? Does Riddel have to develop a different helmet for long haired players?

Here's a video of Troy Polamalu intercepting a pass and running the ball back. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVO93amUv7Y

Did you see his head get jerked toward the ground? It's a half second of that live play and it catches your eye. It probably stirs up "Ouch that's gotta hurt" in your thoughts. Could the offensive player tackling him like that injure his neck? I figure it has to be a possibility. Would the neck break? Would it just be a muscle pull? NFL players have neck injuries called "stingers" all the time. Would it be worse than that and considerred severe or would it be yet another common injury in the NFL world?

Now remember in the beginning when you read "grab someone's hair and pull them to the ground"? You wouldn't just go do that. Who would? Maybe a little kid that doesn't know better or a caveman but not some adult that lives in society, right? It's just plain wrong isn't it?

Maybe it could be a uniform rule. Maybe it could be a rule about the player's well being, let the doctors dictate that. However, tackling by the hair should not be a rule they have to work up and vote upon. You can't punch someone to tackle them, you can't kick someone to tackle them, you shouldn't be allowed to pull them down by the hair to tackle them. It's unsportsman-like conduct which is already in the rules. There's nothing sportsman-like about it.

The problem, the offender, is the tackler not the player with the long hair. That is what should be addressed. No one in their right mind thinks pulling someone down by their hair is a decent thing to do. No one in their right mind can watch that video and think Troy is to blame. The NFL rules committe is "off target". They need to look at the tackler, not the one being tackled.

Arlen Specter was recently on Rush Limbaugh's show. Rush is well known for "stirring the pot" and his audience finds that entertaining. "Stirring the pot" creates discussion and return listenners to his show. During interviews, he asks questions that will furnish this "stir the pot" methodology. Arlen was asked about the NFL and cheating when he was on Rush's show.

Arlen was one of several senators, including Pat Leahy of Vermont, that demanded some answers from the NFL. Initially the conversation was in regards to the Patriots cheating and this whole "spygate" controversy. It shifted to the NFLNetwork blocking out some fans for a brief time, then went back to "spygate". We have not been privvy to all of their findings or their lack of discoverring information. We've only been given little bits of information from those meetings.

On Rush's show, Arlen said there was filming for the 2002 Superbowl. Which leads most to infer-The Patriots filmed the Rams in 2002, in preparation for the game; an unknown advantage or cheating.

Where is the proof? The proof that backs up those statements.

Rush went on to discuss how the NFL has publically encouraged videographer Matt Walsh to come forward but "behind closed doors" they are telling Matt not to. He says there are letters out there from the NFL proving this. He says he was allowed to read them but signed a letter of confidentiality.

This confidentiality agreement is something we don't know the details of as well. I imagine that means he can't show the letter but, he thinks he can discuss it. That strikes me as odd and not very confidential at all. The oddest part is that a member of our government feels compelled to sign an agreement that keeps information about cheating in our favorite sport private.

Here is this member of Congress willingly stirring the pot with a well known pot stirrer. It's time to produce then Arlen. Congressional members keep their jobs or lose their jobs based upon their ability or inability to improve America and their perceived integrity. A congressional member should not say something like "there was cheating in America's favorite sport" without backing it up. Congress represents the people. Don't you think the people will want to know more now?

Arlen Specter has a new book out. That was the reason he was on Rush's show, to promote his book. Well, the purpose changed in the interview and he'd better get some facts out to the public. I don't think the public will appreciate him stirring up controversy to get his name out there, and thus sell more books as their curiousity is piqued. He must continue with the NFL angle discussed in the interview and must produce some facts.

Pat Leahy has not said much lately. His silence is eery in this. His silence could mean he stopped getting involved, which might make Vermont football fans wonder. His silence might mean there's nothing new to talk about, which might mean Arlen is just throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks. I think Leahy will be a good barometer thru all this to find out what really is going on.

Either the Patriots or Arlen Specter won't have continued success from this. This can of worms is the beginning of the end for one of them.

The Cowboys, Lions, and Patriots are interested in Adam "Pacman" Jones and have had discussions with the Titans.

Matt Millen(Detroit News) has reneged and the Lions aren't pursuing Pacman anymore. That leaves the Pats and Boys.

Pacman is willing to renegotiate his salary of 1.292 million in 2008. That's relatively low as is and is a great sign for this trade. I imagine any team "landing" him would prefer to get some wording into his contract where if he misbehaves he will be penalized. Also, of course, cheaper is always better.

The third point, the Cowboys are offerring a late round pick. Every team seems to have late round picks and seems to be thrifty about the idea of trading them away; since few players drafted with them make their NFL team.

The fourth point, the NFL has given it's OK on the Titans trading Pacman while he's suspended.

To summarize-NFL says the trade is OK, Pacman is willing to redo his contract, and it seems to only involve a late round pick.

What more could a team want tied into this if they're interested in Pacman? It's all set up perfectly. I figure a deal is imminent.

The common theory in this scandal is that the Patriots videotaped play calls, practices, or workouts and were thus well prepared on gameday. This has been going on for years and so Eric, like all Patriot coaches, benefitted from this while he was a defensive cooridinator.

It came out that the Dolphins, in 2006, supposedly bought tapes of cadence from the Patriots games. Nick Saban was Bill Belichick's friend and a former defensive cooridinator of Bill's while with the Cleveland Browns.

This taping was supposedly going on in 2006 when Eric Mangini was doing well, but not with the Patriots anymore. The claim is the Patriots did it. 

So let's recap the claims:The Patriots did it. Bill's former defensive cooridinator Nick Saban did it, to a smaller degree but he did it. Why hasn't anyone wonderrred if Eric Mangini did it?

Nick Saban can coach college ball and like many struggled in the pros. Bill Belichick can clearly coach NFL ball without the tapes and still do extremely well. Since the day Mangini "blew the whistle" his team suddenly played poorly. His team with a very high percentage of the same players from 2006 (when they did well) to 2007(when they did not).

It leads me to ask: Can Mangini coach well without tapes?