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Why NFL scouts thought so little of Romo, Brady
October 14, 2007
As they prepare to play one another Sunday in Dallas, neither the Patriots nor the Cowboys would be 5-0 if each had not benefited from the mistakes of other teams.
NFL teams made 198 selections in the 2000 draft before the Patriots chose Tom Brady in the sixth round.
No team picked Tony Romo three years later. He signed with Dallas as a free agent.
Now that Brady and Romo have become arguably two of the three best quarterbacks in football, it seems hard to believe so many skilled evaluators whiffed on them. The Tribune asked three front-office men where they had gone wrong.
The first mistake scouts made -- and it's a mistake they have made over and over again and probably will continue to make as long as they put their eyes to binoculars -- was overrating arm strength. Neither player was judged to have a strong enough arm. Neither was a "prototype" quarterback.
"You don't need a cannon, but the arm strength has to be at the 'enough' level," one NFC general manager said. "I didn't think Brady was at the 'enough' level."
But both players make up for whatever they lack in arm strength with their deliveries.
"What both guys had and still have is a tremendously quick release, and that's more important," an AFC college scouting director said. "They can throw from different body positions and get rid of the ball quickly and accurately."
In Brady's case, he developed arm strength after the Patriots drafted him. At Michigan, he was a skinny 205 pounds at 6 feet 4 inches. Now he's listed at 225. Most scouts failed to see his potential to develop physically.
Michigan did not help Brady. Coaches there wanted Drew Henson to beat him out, and they played both quarterbacks for most of Brady's senior season. Michigan allows NFL scouts to visit their campus only one week of the year. In 2000, the week came early in the season, and Brady didn't come on until later. As a result, many NFL scouts wrote their evaluations of Brady before he had played his best football.
Romo was productive, but scouts didn't trust his statistics because he played at Division I-AA Eastern Illinois. They also questioned his unorthodox mechanics, his reliance on his feet and his unusual release.
Both players showed the instincts in college that have defined their NFL careers. But instincts alone won't get a quarterback drafted.
The other part of the story with Romo and Brady is both landed with the right teams to bring out their abilities.
"If Romo goes to 31 other teams," the general manager says, "he probably gets cut."
Copyright © 2007, The Chicago Tribune
It seems to me that the scouts sometimes overlook one important factor, the ability to do the job better than other guys.
Why NFL scouts thought so little of Romo, Brady
October 14, 2007
As they prepare to play one another Sunday in Dallas, neither the Patriots nor the Cowboys would be 5-0 if each had not benefited from the mistakes of other teams.
NFL teams made 198 selections in the 2000 draft before the Patriots chose Tom Brady in the sixth round.
No team picked Tony Romo three years later. He signed with Dallas as a free agent.
Now that Brady and Romo have become arguably two of the three best quarterbacks in football, it seems hard to believe so many skilled evaluators whiffed on them. The Tribune asked three front-office men where they had gone wrong.
The first mistake scouts made -- and it's a mistake they have made over and over again and probably will continue to make as long as they put their eyes to binoculars -- was overrating arm strength. Neither player was judged to have a strong enough arm. Neither was a "prototype" quarterback.
"You don't need a cannon, but the arm strength has to be at the 'enough' level," one NFC general manager said. "I didn't think Brady was at the 'enough' level."
But both players make up for whatever they lack in arm strength with their deliveries.
"What both guys had and still have is a tremendously quick release, and that's more important," an AFC college scouting director said. "They can throw from different body positions and get rid of the ball quickly and accurately."
In Brady's case, he developed arm strength after the Patriots drafted him. At Michigan, he was a skinny 205 pounds at 6 feet 4 inches. Now he's listed at 225. Most scouts failed to see his potential to develop physically.
Michigan did not help Brady. Coaches there wanted Drew Henson to beat him out, and they played both quarterbacks for most of Brady's senior season. Michigan allows NFL scouts to visit their campus only one week of the year. In 2000, the week came early in the season, and Brady didn't come on until later. As a result, many NFL scouts wrote their evaluations of Brady before he had played his best football.
Romo was productive, but scouts didn't trust his statistics because he played at Division I-AA Eastern Illinois. They also questioned his unorthodox mechanics, his reliance on his feet and his unusual release.
Both players showed the instincts in college that have defined their NFL careers. But instincts alone won't get a quarterback drafted.
The other part of the story with Romo and Brady is both landed with the right teams to bring out their abilities.
"If Romo goes to 31 other teams," the general manager says, "he probably gets cut."
Copyright © 2007, The Chicago Tribune
It seems to me that the scouts sometimes overlook one important factor, the ability to do the job better than other guys.
