Peter King or Todd McShay certainly don't have it out for Rutgers football, although I have my own complaints about each about times. Much more so when it comes to McShay, who ESPN promotes relentlessly, with an eye on eventually replacing Mel Kiper Jr. and his high salary.
However, a lot of the Scarlet faithful aren't too pleased with either right now. For them, this find from the Big Lead was too good not to pass along. They ranked each self-proclaimed NFL Draft expert by the number of direct hits in their mock drafts. For a moment, put any methodological concerns aside. Guess who finished next to, and dead last?
Mike Mayock (NFL Network): 10-32
Mel Kiper: 8.5-32
The Big Lead: 8.5-32
National Football Post: 8.5-32
Gosselin (DMN): 8-32
Don Banks (SI): 7-32
Union-Trib: 7-32
Draft Headquarters: 7-32
Todd McShay 6-32
Peter King 5.5-32
Let's be clear about one thing: we're not scouts. I'm not a scout, you're not a scout (or at least, I'd hope you would have something better to do with your time than peruse this site if you were, even if it is the offseason). Journalists are not scouts, although a couple like Mike Tanier have come into their own. Mike Mayock played professional football. When it comes to talent evaluation, I'm more interested in what he has to say. Rick Gosselin specifically does not evaluate players, instead working his expert sources and producing better information as a result. The quality of information out there can run the gamut, and there isn't a simple yardstick to help the layman out in sifting through it all. Even the best will make their share of mistakes.
if you have ESPN Insider (it's not that great, but it plus the magazine costs like $2 if you look around), you can read Mel Kiper rip Mike Teel. Really? He was a sixth round pick. Mike should print out that paragraph and hang it in his locker for motivation. I haven't seen all the quarterbacks that went undrafted, but in my opinion Teel was far better than several of the bigger names that weren't. Kiper has his own draft grades; he doesn't know what a team thinks of a player, and he wasn't at Teel's workout in Seattle that reportedly went well. Nothing's stopping Seattle from signing an undrafted free agent quarterback. The only difference between that and going late for a team is that a draft pick is the only way to guarantee landing a player. How can you remotely criticize a sixth round pick?