Get ready for Brian Gaine

[Ron Swanson]

I like Gaine. Learned under Parcells.

[Dcat]

Originally Posted by southparkcpa

Anybody have the skinny on Angelo?

Originally Posted by jetlifer

Angelo is an experienced GM with some success on his résumé. But there are failures also. I guess it would be a good hire and certainly better than what we had.

some of the worst drafts ever. See the Angelo thread, post #20 for the depressing list. http://www.jetsinsider.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=253099

[Conkboy]

Originally Posted by intelligentjetsfan

I have no problem with selling out to acquire a franchise QB. And Phil Simms calls Cutler an elite QB. The Redskins paid a lot to move up to get their franchise QB.

But what I have an enormous issue with how Angelo could not provide a solid offensive line or weapons for him. Part of it was bad luck due to injuries to his first round OL choices. And I HATE mike martz as a OC because his schemes always leaves the QB vulnerable.

[Jetitude]

Originally Posted by Seth

Even a blind squirrel finds a nit eventually. Look at his draft record and then come talk to me. It is horrific.

A blind squirrel? Angelo may have some bumps in his road, but let's not ignore the fact he did rebuild the Bears, that one of his teams has gone to the SB, and his entire body of work as an NFL exec.

Fans are wrapped up with a "name" guy from a "name" team or a team with recent success. Coaches and execs are recycled all the time, fans have shortsighted memories IMO.

I found this article interesting on Angelo

Top Draft Philosophies In The NFL Today - Part 5: How Does Jerry Angelo Measure Up?

By Timothy Hockemeyer on Mar 24, 9:00p 18
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Welcome, my friends, to the fifth and final installment of the Top Draft Philosophies Series. Today we are going to look at our very own Jerry Angelo and his 10 years of draft history. How does he rate when compared to the four draft guru's before him? Follow me to the clearing at the end of the jump to find out......

Complete disclosure time. I have to be up front about the fact that I am a former feature writer for the now-defunct FireJerryAngelo.com and have been a vocal critic of Angelo's for years. That being said, I am no extremist, nor do I see everything in black and white. There are many shades of gray in terms of Angelo's performance as a GM.

And I won't turn this into a crucifixion of Jerry Angelo and all of his personnel mistakes. This post is specifically about the draft. If there is enough interest shown in the comments thread, then maybe we'll take a more all-inclusive and in depth look at all things Angelo in a future post (or more). But for now, let's just focus on the draft.

Angelo was hired in 2001 as the Bears general manager. Funny thing about that, though, was the Dick Jauron had final personnel power as a clause in his contract, which made the hiring seem a bit weird. Many people like to tout that clause as reason to discount Angelo from the first two drafts he was a part of (2002 and 2003). I do not make that distinction, as Angelo most certainly had plenty of input into the drafting. He may not have wielded ultimate power, but he did have a say, much like Lovie Smith has had since his 2007 contract extension.

But how has Angelo done in terms of drafting? Because of the muddied circumstances surrounding Angelo's tenure, it's hard to separate his performance individually. From '02-'03, he was not the final word on personnel. and from 2007 through the present, Lovie Smith has contractually granted powers in personnel moves, as well (though the actual weight of his opinion has never been defined outside of Halas Hall, and has been a matter of several heated debates on this very site.). So the only years that Jerry was the sole responsible party were 2004 through 2006. See what I mean?

Now, we've looked at four other successful franchises and the philosophy they follow in drafting and in building from the draft. They were all pretty similar. Funny thing is, for all of the slack that Jerry takes for his draft picks, he tends to follow the same philosophy. Draft for ability rather than for need. Character, fitting the scheme, intelligence and versatility are all keys. While the Bears often look to draft the best athletes, they have been known to overlook athletic shortcomings for football smarts (See Adrian Peterson and Craig Steltz for two prime examples) and they aren't afraid to trade down int he draft to stockpile picks.

So why the wide disparity in results? I have a three part answer to that.

Part 1: Jerry outsmarts himself. He has repeatedly taken some players who are considered "value picks" when they have fallen int he draft due to injury. Players like Mark Anderson, Airese Currey, and Corey Wootton are all prime examples. Another case of outsmarting himself was the attempt to grab CMU QB Dan Lafevour when he was still available in the 6th round last year and stash him on the practice squad. Unfortunately for Jerry and the Bears, Dan was grabbed up off of waivers by the Bengals before they could get him there.

Part 2: I'd also call Angelo the most unlucky GM in sports. I have always been amazed by the number of players Angelo drafts that have no history of injury and then turn to peanut brittle on an NFL field. Far be it from me to make excuses for Jerry, but this has happened an awful lot. And consider some of the promising players that have fell to injury after being drafted here. Vasher was fantastic before lower leg injuries robbed him of his agility. Harris was the perfect...let me repeat that...... perfect 3Tech for the Bears scheme before leg injuries robbed him of his burst. Mark Bradley was about as promising a wide receiver as the Bears have had since Marcus Robinson before injuries piled up on him. Dan Bazuin never saw the field after a major knee injury sidelined him and caused him several knee surgeries. Marc Colombo. Rex Grossman. Dusty Dvoracek. Angelo has had some very bad breaks (no pun intended) with some very promising players.

Part 3: The disparity isn't as wide as some would suggest. Let's take in a few facts, shall we?

In the nine years between the time that Mike Ditka left to the time Angelo arrived, the Bears won one playoff game, had a .444 winning percentage, 4 seasons with 6 wins or less and only 1 season with more than 9 wins. Since Angelo arrived 9 seasons ago, the Bears have won the division 3 times, have won 3 playoff games, have been to the NFC Championship twice and the Super Bowl once. They have had but two seasons with 6 wins or less and 3 seasons with more than 9 wins and a winning percentage of .514.

In the Super Loss, the Bears started 15 players that they drafted. Additionally, Hunter Hillenmeyer was drafted by the Packers, but released before ever seeing the field. The Bears picked him up and developed him, having had an eye on him on their draft board. The entire starting defense was developed by the Bears organization and all pieces except Brian Urlacher were acquired by Jerry Angelo. There's a lot of misinformation out there about those pieces being in place before Angelo arrived. It isn't true. Of the defensive starters in 2006, only Urlacher and Mike Brown were acquired before 2002. And Mike Brown was injured during the run to the Super Bowl. He never got to play in the Super Bowl. Chris Harris started in his place. That unreal defense was a product of Angelo's drafting.

I found an interesting story over at the Steelers lounge as I researched for the Kevin Colbert piece. What I came across was a comparison of draft picks using the career AV stat from pro-football-reference.com that I referenced in my Birth Of A Stat post last week. It ranked every team in the league's draft picks since 2000. Interestingly enough, The Bears rank 9th on this list.

The problem is perception. Before the championship win this year, there were a lot of Packers fans screaming for Ted Thompsons head. Patriots fans have been pretty vocal about what they consider to be a slump in draft quality by Bill Belichick. Polian has taken heat, as well. And Steelers fans seem to jump all over Colbert every year for not drafting offensive linemen high enough. Success is relative, but as fans we tend to see it as absolute.

As fans of a given team, we tend to see little else of other teams draft success or failure other than the headlines. In other words, unless a team is all Al Davis-ish in it's high picks, you don't tend to hear enough about their draft failures to get an accurate picture of the actual percentage of successful draft picks. Look at the last paragraph and just think. Polian is one of the most successful drafters of all time. Belichick has brought glory to a previously miserable franchise. Thompson has built a Super Bowl Champion in a relatively short tenure. And the Steelers are a constant player in the Super Bowl hunt. Yet, if you ask their fans, they can tell you all about the drafting failures and even ineptitude of their teams. Just google each of these teams and take a look at all of the negative stories written about these teams drafting.

Angelo falls victim to this, as well. He is by no means perfect. Don't get me wrong. But he has one of the better success rates in the league. And the Bears have improved under his leadership. And he's done it the same way the other leaders we've looked in this series have done it. There is room for improvement. But let's be fair and compare the man's body of work to his peers instead of against our own personal views of the ideal draft scenarios.

We, as fans, see our own team's drafting through a microscope, and that leads us to miss the same circumstances around the league, even from the very best drafting executives. My point is this. Angelo rates pretty well when compared to his peers. Who'da thunk?

[Beerfish]

Gaine starting to look a lot more appealing seeing as the names cohen and Angelo are being tossed around. You just gotta know that the Jets will pick the guy least wanted by the fans and most hated by the fans of the team he used to be a gm for.

[Monsterxman]

Originally Posted by Beerfish

Gaine starting to look a lot more appealing seeing as the names cohen and Angelo are being tossed around. You just gotta know that the Jets will pick the guy least wanted by the fans and most hated by the fans of the team he used to be a gm for.

Yep, not a Gaine fan from what I know (which like everyone else isn't much), but sure don't want some of the other names being tossed around.

[pcola]

Originally Posted by southparkcpa

look at what he gave up for Cutler.....


But in general, I could live with the choice.

Go review CMarts post on Angelo's drafts. Absolutely a nightmare. His choice is only marginally better than Cohen.

At this point, I would rather have Cohen, signed to a minimal contract so Woody can fire the whole lot of them next January.

If they sign Angelo, we F'd for the foreseeable future.

How the hell, after all these interviews can anyone logically think these two are the best possible candidates?

Over the GB exec????

I understood Khan is limited in his background but Idzik HAS to have more potential than Angelo and Cohen.

[C Mart]

Originally Posted by Beerfish

Gaine starting to look a lot more appealing seeing as the names cohen and Angelo are being tossed around. You just gotta know that the Jets will pick the guy least wanted by the fans and most hated by the fans of the team he used to be a gm for.

Brian Costello ‏@BrianCoz
I was told not to read much into Woody Johnson's plane being in Fla. today. Does not sound like he's picking up Gaine on the trip.


Woody out for a joyride and out on the South Beach scene Saturday night..

[C Mart]

Originally Posted by pcola

Go review CMarts post on Angelo's drafts. Absolutely a nightmare. His choice is only marginally better than Cohen.

At this point, I would rather have Cohen, signed to a minimal contract so Woody can fire the whole lot of them next January.

If they sign Angelo, we F'd for the foreseeable future.

How the hell, after all these interviews can anyone logically think these two are the best possible candidates?

Over the GB exec????

I understood Khan is limited in his background but Idzik HAS to have more potential than Angelo and Cohen.

Yeah, but I also posted a link to the Scouting Depts moves made once Emery took over the Bears...Now evaluating the scouting dept is the GMs job too but maybe the Bears scouts sucked..Maybe Jerry learned from his mistakes...Casserly is high on the Jets scouts..

Also someone posted an article...Jauron had final say on personnel moves so we don't know what moves have been Jauron's and then Lovie's and who were Angelo's

Sounds familiar? Sounds alot like Tanny/Rex

[C Mart]

Jay Glazer ‏@JayGlazer
While I think Jets will hire some1 quickly for GM job, they have been getting rebuffed a lot and gone back to some asking them to reconsider

[intelligentjetsfan]

Well I have done some research on Mr. Angelo and here is what I think;

1. His drafts were spotty. He had some fantastic finds, some swing and misses and some bad luck with injuries to his first round draft picks. But the notion that his drafts have been mostly busts is not true. If you base the success of a draft on getting a couple starters each year then he has been okay.

2. Cutler was a good move. He recognized a need to get a franchise QB in todays NFL and went for it. Make no mistake, Cutler IS a franchise caliber QB; smarter people then me believe that (Phil Simms for one).

3. Hiring Mike Martz as OC was a mistake. I don't know how much you can blame Angelo for this as Lovie coached with Martz in St. Louis but Martz is arrogant, stubborn and kills his QBs with his schemes.

4. Super Bowls matter. He oversaw a team that went to the Super Bowl. For all his flaws, there can be no denying that.

Overall, if the Jets hire him I would not jump for joy but I will also not jump of a bridge either.

[Kentucky Jet]

Originally Posted by C Mart

I was going to post to start looking for Woody' plane within the next 24 hours...

For those that use the "terrible hire, dolphins picks sux, talent sux"...He hasn't been the final decision maker...Again, his scouting reports could be 100% accurate but if the decision makers (Ireland, HC) go with who they want how is that Gaine's fault? Or if the coaching staff sux at developing the players that not the scouts fault

True and the pundits also forget that Gaine was a Jet player for awhile as well. I think it would be best for us to hope we get a very competent GM, no matter where he was employed in the past!

[Kentucky Jet]

Originally Posted by intelligentjetsfan

Well I have done some research on Mr. Angelo and here is what I think;

1. His drafts were spotty. He had some fantastic finds, some swing and misses and some bad luck with injuries to his first round draft picks. But the notion that his drafts have been mostly busts is not true. If you base the success of a draft on getting a couple starters each year then he has been okay.

2. Cutler was a good move. He recognized a need to get a franchise QB in todays NFL and went for it. Make no mistake, Cutler IS a franchise caliber QB; smarter people then me believe that (Phil Simms for one).

3. Hiring Mike Martz as OC was a mistake. I don't know how much you can blame Angelo for this as Lovie coached with Martz in St. Louis but Martz is arrogant, stubborn and kills his QBs with his schemes.

4. Super Bowls matter. He oversaw a team that went to the Super Bowl. For all his flaws, there can be no denying that.

Overall, if the Jets hire him I would not jump for joy but I will also not jump of a bridge either.

DITTO plus we must remember that he can handle the media in a big city. That is proven by his track record in Chicago.

[phillyjet]

Don't read too much into tweets, posturing/agents during negotiations. All the chatter means the hire is close

[Vin]

Originally Posted by C Mart

Jay Glazer ‏@JayGlazer
While I think Jets will hire some1 quickly for GM job, they have been getting rebuffed a lot and gone back to some asking them to reconsider

I can just imagine Woody BEGGING one of the candidates to take the job...



"Please....PLEASE OH GOD PLEASE TAKE THIS JOB!!"