I don't know about others, but my opinion of his draft position is based off of the title game. It's obviously the exception to his season because no player "lucks" into having his career stats. What I thought going into the game was that Te'o was tremendous in pass coverage (his INT total is sick), but I wondered how he would do against our running game. I think he's a first rounder, but not a top 10 guy. I see him like CJ Mosley; he can play the pass well, is very intelligent, and has no character issues, but has problems with the more physical running teams. That'll hurt CJ in next year's draft too.I don't understand...the guy had one bad game, literally, in like three years at Notre Dame.
Were people saying these things about Luke Kuechly after he played against horrible competition for years at BC?? No. And Manti is known to be just as good a tackler as Luke, but actually better in pass coverage. I'm not sure that anyone here is an NFL scout.
Most scouts with years of NFL knowledge say that the awards circuit took a lot out of Manti, plus getting a serious bout with the flu the week after he came back. When you train insanely hard for 6 months and then have to work out in hotel gyms for 8 days in a row, then get the flu, it is going to have some short-term effects.
And give 'bama some credit!! Your offense knew our formations, and, according to Barrett, knew what matchups they would face when we would shift. His lack of solid lay was a product of our entire D's inability to stop you. Manti won't go that high, but he is a first rounder: my sources are NFL scouts. I'm just not understanding the hate on the kid. Obviously I am biased; feel free to rip me apart.
This is the most outspoken I have ever been on this board, but I really like it here, so hopefully this doesn't ruin any kind of reputation of respectability that I may have established here.
I think you're still going to be in good standing with the mods. They may just give you a barner avatar for a bit