Maturity Matters
by abender20 on Mar 18, 2009 8:51 AM PDT
in Seahawks News & Rumors
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PrintThe draft is 5 weeks away. On April 25/26th we'll learn the identities of the next round of young Seahawks. If you are unaware that Tim Ruskell avoids drafting players with character issues, you are probably new to, well, reading. Yes, Tatupu and Hill have had isolated incidents lately, but they are the exception to the rule on a fairly quiet Seahawks team.
With the latest developments in the Matt Jones story, we see again why there is value in drafting mature and responsible NFL players. Not everyone who skips a few practices in college will be as troubled as Adam Jones, but he had some known character issues coming out of West Virginia. Matt Jones, too, showed a lack of maturity in college.* As marvelous an athlete as he was on the field, Jones demonstrated a deficit between the ears.
Later in his career, Matt would, among other things, turn his back on a reporter, bend over and pull down his pants. In most places that childish game is called mooning.
The Jacksonville Jaguars did not get the benefit of all of Matt Jones' tremendous talent because Jones himself was unable to fulfill his end of the deal. Committing yourself to the value system of a team requires maturity.
The inherent risk in finding a future success on the field is only further compounded by the potential for problems once a player steps away from the turf. Professional sports is littered with examples of transcendent athletes who could not put it together due to maturity issues. While the Ruskell selection criteria mean that the Hawks will not draft any of the high character risk / high reward players, sleep well at night knowing that the next batch of Seahawks are very unlikely to break your heart off the field.
*Source - The Arkansas Democrat Gazette: Northwester Arkansas Edition. Honestly.
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I think Ruskell takes it to a whole other level.
He doesn’t just exclude bad character guys, he actively seeks ‘extremely high’ character guys, guys who were leaders of their teams, guys who earned high grades, guys who were members of FCA (Fellowship of Christian Athletes), etc.
I’m not saying FCA = high character, I just remember one draft where we had I think 3 picks that were the leaders of their college’s FCA. I btw, hated FCA at my college, thought it was a huge waste of time.
I don't think it's that bad
IMO, the character = choir boy angle gets overplayed in the press. I don’t think that’s what he’s looking for.
What I think he’s looking for is “work ethic” or like abender said, maturity. A guy that’s going to practice/play hard and is likely to maximize his potential.
It just so happens that guys who have that work ethic tend to have their act together off-field as well, so the “team leader”, charity work, high grades, etc are a by-product or indicator
Good point.
Perhaps he’s just looking for maturity on and off the field, and that correlates highly with grades/charity, etc.
I think that's exactly it
and for the reasons that jteckmann mentions. It’s enough of a roll of the dice how/whether college players’ skills and physical abilities will translate to the NFL, especially once you factor injuries into the equation (both in terms of luck and in terms of susceptibility to injury); when you have a player about whom you can’t be certain that he’ll work hard enough to be good, that only multiplies the risk. I think Ruskell’s main concern is keeping that multiplier out of the equation.
by The Ancient Mariner on Mar 18, 2009 11:18 AM PDT up reply actions
And I should add
not just “work hard enough to be good,” but also, be humble enough to let coaches coach him and use him in ways that will get the most out of his ability and skills.
by The Ancient Mariner on Mar 18, 2009 11:19 AM PDT up reply actions
In short, you stay away from players who moon reporters.
That sort of respect for authority does not bode well.
Of course there are also examples of players with perceived character issues
that went on to become dominant players. Sapp, Moss, Coles come immediately to mind.
That's the high reward portion.
Winning the genetic lottery in terms of athletic ability AND intelligence AND maturity is the rarest of rarities.
Ego and Character?
Not to hijack the thread-
Wheres the line between ego and character? Sapp seemed to have a healthy impression of his skills, and wasn’t going to let anybody walk on that. Same thing for Shaq in basketball (the somewhat messy leaving LA saga is an issue, I suppose). I tend to think some players get labeled as having character issues who don’t; who just think they are good.
Of course, leaving the combine is dumb. So is mooning reporters.
by Jerikantilles on Mar 18, 2009 1:14 PM PDT up reply actions
That's an excellent point, and there is a difference.
One problem with this: “character” is frequently a manifestation of ego. Three years ago, Chad Johnson was a lovable loony who would do and say all sorts of outrageous things, and we found this entertaining. Now, Chad Johnson is nearing status as a total distraction.
Sapp failed drug tests for coke and marijuana before the draft.
I’m guessing his ego is not out of line with his peers.
All about Ruskell
If you want to understand Ruskell’s draft philosophy, you have to read: The Draft
This book specifically discusses Tim Ruskell at length.
There are quite a few reasons why character is a lot more important in football than it is in baseball and basketball. The biggest issue is that in football, there are far fewer individual statistics, and they are extremely difficult to isolate from the play of the surrounding teammates, the scheme, and the opponents. So instead of walks, homeruns, 3 pointers, and rebounds, NFL teams lean on height, weight, and 40 times- these are individualized measurements. However, these quantities don’t readily translate into a good NFL player. Whereas a reputation as a hard worker has a stabilizing influence on a player’s future.
Ruskell will lean heavily on stats that matter- actual production on the football field. He will also stay away from character red flags for obvious reasons. Character red flags in football are incomparable to say, baseball, how many gun related arrests have there been in football in the past few years?
He still values combine performance, but weights it much less than on the field performance.
Holding the college stats fixed, Consider one player had a great combine but had off-the-field issues, and another had a mediocre combine, but a reputation as a hard worker. Many NFL GM’s would lean towards the former player because he has more upside. Ruskell would lean towards the latter because, on the average, he will be a better player.
I agree and disagree.
There are quite a few reasons why character is a lot more important in football than it is in baseball and basketball
Football is more of a team sport than baseball, and it is important that people get along, but as many in the Mariners’ FO said, ‘makeup’ is also very important when drafting for baseball, simply because they draft high school players, or the success rate in baseball is lower and you need makeup because you’ll continually be challenged, when moving up for A to AA to AAA then to the majors.
Probably a run on sentence.
Million Dollar Arm
Ten Cent Head. Where is Crash Davis when you need him? (Or at least Annie Savoy.)
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