Mr. Scot

I don't know of anyone who was "born and raised a scout". I do know of several people who have proven themselves capable of personnel evaluation by working for years as scouts. I'm not a subscriber to the goofball notion a lot of corporate America has that if a guy is good at one thing, you can put him in a job doing something else and he'll be good at that too. If a guy's going to be hired for a job, I'd like some evidence that he can actually do that job, not something else.

Marty Hurney worked hard and spent years training for the GM job too. And his mentor during that process was one of the best GM's in NFL history. That's how he got the job despite not being a football guy. How'd that work out? If a guy's main job is finding the right personnel to assemble a winning roster, then what you want is a guy with actual experience evaluating players and a record of doing it well. That's why we got Dave Gettleman after Hurney failed. We've seen what a money guy can do and what a football guy can do. Which would you choose?

I need to stop watching highlight reels. I start off watching what's going on, check the graphics of the other scores that were happening at the time, listen to the announcers talking about the team, get completely into it and start feeling like it's game time... ...and then realize it's not gonna be football season for a while yet.

I've forgotten that guy. I think his name was Holmes or something.

That's one of my favorite Delhomme memories. Another one like that is the time he took a shot from Lance Briggs and it looked like he was down, but then he got up yelling, cursing and pounding his chest. We went on to win that game too. Good times.

I'm shocked. Up to now he's been such a boy scout.

Great thing to do.

John Fox has the weirdest career path I've ever seen. He's on his third head coaching job, but he's never actually been fired from any of his prior jobs. Teams just keep deciding to 'part ways' with him. It's like watching a guy who keeps getting married but gets annulments rather than divorces. The Bears team philosophy certainly suits his MO, so maybe it'll work. I guess we'll see.

Understood, but he got Delhomme prior to the start of training camp. Do you see a Delhomme on the Bears roster right now? Yes, it's possible he could - in time - build the Bears into contenders, but I'm not seeing it this year with these QBs.

Important thing to remember when making this list: Obviously you're going to need a certain quota of players at each spot, but per his own words Gettleman doesn't subscribe to a formula of preset numbers at any position. As with the draft where his philosophy is 'best player available' Gettleman's roster building is based on the 'best 53'.

You've seen his current quarterback options, though.

​If they keep drafting like they have been, those decisions will only get tougher.

​Yep. And looking back on them, they were kind of 'right place, right time' picks. That game made him look better than he truly was. Future games dispelled the myth.

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Absolutely. The Giants have a 'football guy' as their GM and a 'money guy' as their assistant GM. Titles aside, when the time comes for them to get a new GM, it'll be another football guy.

I was starting to think I was the only person here who still liked Brian Folkerts.

Think of it like fighting with your brother. You might beat the snot out of each other, but when it's done you're still brothers.

Pretty much. Not hard at all for a block, a jam or a push off to escalate into a shove. Competitiveness and ego come into play here too.

Most likely fights: O-Line vs D-Line Wide Receivers vs Defensive Backs

Practice fights happen at every level of football from Pee Wee on up on a regular basis. It's just what happens when you get a bunch of competitive guys going hard at each other. Just part of the game.

I get the feeling it's more like the Giants assistant GM. The Giants have a guy with that title, but he doesn't have a scouting background. He does some of the 'grunt work' but if the time came to replace Jerry Reese, it'd be Marc Ross taking the job while the 'Assistant GM' stayed where he's at. Pretty sure Dave Gettleman will have a lot of say in who his successor is. I'd be extremely shocked if it was a guy who didn't have scouting experience.

I thought you were talking about Ricky Henry. Love stuff like this.

That route is a staple in a lot of NFL offenses. Nice to see them doing it well.

Hadn't had a chance to sit down and read this whole thing till now. Good post, Phil. I've noticed that over the last few years, "nickel back" has come to mean "fastest short guy in the secondary" to a lot of NFL teams. These things change as teams adapt, of course. And I would agree that over the next few years, some adaptation is likely to become necessary.

Rotate by quarters? Probably not. Shift around to get the best matchupsmatchups, though? Maybe. It'd take three guys who are smart enough to handle such switching around, of course.