Fresh off my incessant whining about the ludicrousness (no, not LUDAcrisness, I mean the bad kind) of the NFL Combine, I should move on to another topic today. But I can’t yet, there were two more stories that came out of the Westminster Dog Sh…I mean NFL Combine that I want to look at. Two topics that re-affirm my low opinion of people running most NFL teams and make me realize that NFL GMs are more like politicians than we realize. They are so insulated from real life and common sense that they lose all understanding of reality and only listen to the small circle of like-minded minions surrounding them.

Reason #4,736 I could be an NFL GM

Ok, I guess I should start by noting my blatant bias toward Myron Rolle. Not only did he attend my alma mater but also represents everything anyone (athlete or non-athlete) should aspire to be. He is incredibly intelligent and driven by an ambition to help others rather than just make money.

So it is absolutely mind-blowing to me that some NFL GMs actually look down on his academic accomplishments and his interest in the broader world. This is actually considered a negative. Some of the dumber NFL GMs out there (or Millen-esque GMs if you will) believe all of this ‘learning’ and ‘education’ and ‘intellectual curiosity’ show that Myron is not capable of being the mindless football machine that they want.

Apparently Sarah Palin is having a greater influence on NFL teams than we realized.

These guys see Myron graduating in 2 and a half years and spending a year studying at Oxford as a negative. He deserted his team and doesn’t have the focus on football.

This line of thinking ignores that his accomplishments actually mean Myron is incredibly intelligent, hard working, capable of balancing strenuous study loads while also having the full time job that is college football and driven to be his best. These are qualities NFL teams don’t want in their players? Intelligence, a work ethic and an internal drive to be great?

Yes, in the minds of these GMs, it would be much better if Myron focused all of his brain on football and rather than spending his extra time studying anthropology and preparing for a post-NFL career as a surgeon helping the underprivileged in the Bahamas, he run a dog-fighting ring or hit the clubs with a gun in his sweat pants or after said night at club run over pedestrians. According to NFL leadership, that is a much better use of his time.

If any NFL GM passes over Myron in the draft next month simply because he studied at Oxford and is smarter than that GM, I implore the owner of that team to fire him on the spot. NFL team owners are typically smart, savvy businessmen (thus can afford to purchase an NFL team). If they can’t see what Myron Rolle could bring to their team (on and off the field) then I need to find a new sport to care about.

I can’t support self-important, delusional idiots.

(see Sarah Palin joke above).

Reason #4,737 I could be an NFL GM

 In the limited coverage of the NFL Combine I have watched, one of the big winners is former Maryland offensive lineman Bruce Campbell. You probably don’t know who that is**. Which makes sense, as Campbell should not be worth spending much time thinking about. He started for a season and a half at Maryland and did not make any All-ACC teams yet declared for the draft this spring after his junior year. As Profootballtalk describes Campbell’s game film:

One league source tells us that multiple teams have applied a round-four grade on Campbell, based on evaluation of his college game film.  Another league source described Campbell’s game film as “terrible.”

Rotoworld piled on as well:

Saturday, the NFL Network showed numerous clips of Campbell missing blocks and getting overpowered at the point of attack.

So why should we care about this, sad, mis-guided soul who was apparently talked into turning pro way too early despite showing no reason for doing so?

Well, because apparently Bruce can run fast and is strong.

Here is ESPN and Scouts, Inc.’s Todd McShay (Insider subscription required)

Maryland OT Bruce Campbell has become the top workout warrior of the 2010 class, confirming everything we thought about his strength and athletic ability coming into the NFL combine.

Campbell ran an official 4.85-second 40-yard dash, turned in a 32-inch vertical jump and put up 34 repetitions on the standard 225-pound bench press.

He needs to play with better balance, his technique needs polishing and he has trouble staying healthy, but this showing proves that Campbell is blessed with rare physical tools and should make him a lock to come off the board in the bottom half of Round 1.

Read all of that again. He did nothing in college to the point he was dominated by other players (and the ACC isn’t exactly the SEC, you know?), he hasn’t been able to stay healthy yet next month, some team is going to probably draft him in the first round and pay him millions of dollars to either sit on the bench or get dominated by defensive linemen and possibly get their quarterback killed.

All because he spent the last two months working on the specific skills measured at the Combine.

I am guessing I am younger than just about every single NFL GM, yet apparently I am the only one that remembers the names Tony Mandarich and Mike Mamula. There was even film of Mandarich doing well and he was a bust because he was drafted more on his physical skills than what he accomplished on the field.

In an industry that spends millions of dollars analyzing every single aspect of every little thing – where every play of every game is broken from 5 different angles and gameplans are more complicated than the plot of Lost – how can the same draft mistakes be repeated over and over again?

Are NFL GMs just that dumb or are they so arrogant that they believe ‘I am much smarter than the people that made those mistakes, I know better’.

That was a serious question. I really don’t understand.

Because based on the math as I understand it, for the NFL it is much better to be a failure on the field that spends two months learning how to run, jump and bench press than it is to be a success on the field but have the intellect and interests to want to learn about the world outside the stadium.

** UPDATE: I am ashamed to admit that in my rush to get this post up, I neglected the greatness that is the original Bruce Campbell. I may be one of three or four people in America that still looks back fondly at The Adventures of Brisco County Jr. but I think we can all agree that Bruce being attacked by his own hand in Evil Dead Two eclipses anything this new Bruce Campbell will ever do on the NFL field.

Tagged as: bruce campbell, combine, draft, florida state, FSU, maryland, myron rolle, nfl, seminoles, terrapins