Patriots select Christain Gonzalez with the #17th pick.

I am very excited about this pick. I wanted a CB with the first pick. I had been looking at Joey Porter's son but this kid seems like he has all the tools - size, speed, movement. This is a great first pick. Hopefully we add some more studs today.
 
the colts pick was 😄
never say never, but his completion % alone is bustalicious. # of starts? bustalicious.
yeah, a rb @8 is 🤯
There are off-the-field issues with him too, that may pop up in Indianapolis, once he's out of the eye of the Florida Gator Fixer Squad.

I'm not going to get into it, but there are things. Things that come out when the hush money dries up.
 
There are off-the-field issues with him too, that may pop up in Indianapolis, once he's out of the eye of the Florida Gator Fixer Squad.

I'm not going to get into it, but there are things. Things that come out when the hush money dries up.

It's the Chinese agnostic!

Yee of little faith. :coffee:

Cheers, :toast:
 
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There are off-the-field issues with him too, that may pop up in Indianapolis, once he's out of the eye of the Florida Gator Fixer Squad.

I'm not going to get into it, but there are things. Things that come out when the hush money dries up.
The OC could help him...he helped Hurts.
 
Transcript of Matt Groh's presser after the draft ended last night.
I learned a lot.
I'll put some of it here but there's a lot more.

Q: What if any input did Adrian Klemm have in the process obviously with their overlap last season? How did Christian's improvement specifically with tackling and his ball skills make him more the prospect that he was when you took him at 17?
MG: Unique situation when you've got a coach on your staff. We've got enough relations with some great coaches around the country. Certainly with Coach [Dan] Lanning and getting to know him down at Georgia and Marshall Malchow who really runs their personnel. We've got great relationships there. But you've got a coach who's on your staff you know you're getting the truth on the player, good and bad. So that allows you, again there's that comfort level. Coach Klemm was with Christian, call it eight months, so definitely a great resource. Like I alluded to, Coach [Bill] O'Brien being at Alabama not only just college players but his time with the Texans helping us out free agency wise. We spend a lot of time trying to get to know who these guys are as players and as people. So definitely appreciate Coach Klemm's input.

Q: How about his tackling and ball skills? They seemed to really make an improvement his junior season.
MG: So finished with I believe four interceptions this year. Really came on towards the end of the year. A couple of them against Colorado, one against Oregon State. Some impressive plays. You saw his ability to catch the ball at the combine. So feel pretty good about Christian and being able to bring him in.

Q: Once Washington's pick was in, can you describe how quickly things went on your end making the Gonzalez pick? You guys get 10 minutes, and it seemed like you weren't really waiting around too long on that if I saw it right based on the tv presentation of it.
MG: Again, we're trying to do our research. We're trying to stay ahead of things. Had a pretty good inclination as to who Washington was going to take. So we were able to quickly discuss which direction we wanted to go. Teams have to wait a little bit here in the first round before they get their picks in. We didn't know, but we had a pretty good feeling as to how Washington was going to play it out. So that sped things along for us. Again, it's nice when you've got a consensus on a player. So from the coaching staff, to the scouts, we're fairly unified grade wise on Christian. That just sped the process along.

Q: Christian seemed like on film he played a bunch of different coverage schemes at Oregon. I was just curious how you would describe their defensive system and some of the different things he was able to do there?
MG: He's playing for Tosh Lupoi, who's got a really extensive background being at Alabama, having experience in the pros. Tosh is a very well-detailed coach with a lot of good experience. Certainly, with his time with Coach [Nick] Saban down at Alabama. Then with what Coach [Dan] Lanning has brought from Georgia. Again, with Coach [Kirby] Smart at Georgia and again their experience with Coach Saban at Alabama. He was able to be around some of the top coaches in college football. Hopefully that experience, that knowledge, that education, will only speed his development here to the NFL. But for all these guys it's a big jump. It'll just be upon Christian to get up to speed as quickly as possible. Looking forward to working with him and helping him do that.

 
One article after another praises Gonzalez. Cosell praises him here. Bewildering how he slid

SCOUTING REPORT By Greg Cosell

Background:

Gonzalez played one year at Oregon after spending his first two years at Colorado. He came out of Texas as a 4-star recruit. In 2022 at Oregon, Gonzalez was First Team All-Pac 12

Gonzalez played left and right corner, and he aligned both to the boundary and to the field. He has extensive experience playing press coverage and off coverage. There were snaps in which he was deployed as a blitzer when aligned as the boundary corner. There were snaps throughout the season Gonzalez lined up in the slot (138 snaps, against Utah he played significant snaps in the slot), and there were also snaps in which he played back-end safety.

Gonzalez was beaten in press man by Stanford WR Michael Wilson, who effectively used a swipe-arm-over move to get him off-balance and out of phase. Overall, Gonzalez-Wilson was a good matchup with Gonzalez, winning some physical press man reps as the game progressed.

Positives:

Experience playing outside and the slot; Outside-inside flexibility; Predominantly played outside in 2022.
Long, fluid outside corner with easy transition and change of direction; Loose hips and quick feet, Smooth as silk.
Patient and composed in mirror match press man; Waited for receiver to declare release before reacting.
Played both mirror match and physical press man efficiently; Strong, active hands to disrupt routes off the LOS.
Press man snaps in which he physically drove the receiver out of bounds removing him as an option for the QB.
In mirror match press man, did an excellent job squeezing receivers to the sideline, taking away their space.
Flipped his hips in press man matching vertical routes with easy strides; Speed to stay comfortably in phase.
Plant and drive burst in off coverage; Quick transition from pedal with no wasted steps; Stride length a factor.
Played with assignment, alignment discipline and good eyes in zone coverage; Read route combinations.
Competitive as a tackler on the outside; Squared up on balance; Willing to play physically when demanded.

Negatives:

At times in press man got back on his heels negatively impacting balance; Tendency to reach to compensate.
Some routes in which he lost contact with the receiver at the top of the route stem, then had to recover.
There were times in press man he had to take too many steps to stop when the receiver broke off his route.
Needs to win more at moment of truth; Too many plays he had outstanding coverage and did not play the ball.

Bottom Line:

Gonzalez is one of the best corner prospects in the 2023 NFL draft, and he projects and transitions to the NFL very well given his overall traits and skill set to line up at boundary corner in the NFL and match the big-time boundary x receivers man-to-man in press coverage. Gonzalez has the length that is desired at outside corner in the NFL, and he is as smooth and fluid as they come, with the easy ability to flip his hips and change direction, plus the long speed to comfortably run with vertical routes out of press position. Gonzalez also played with a physical, competitive edge, disrupting routes off the LOS and driving receivers into the sideline.

Overall, Gonzalez has extensive experience playing mirror match press and physical press man, in addition to multiple zone concepts, and he showed efficiency in all coverage concepts. He also brings the flexibility to line up in the slot when needed (which he did for more than 100 snaps in 2022), so you have a corner with outstanding physical and athletic traits to play outside who can move inside as well. Few corners have his size/length/speed/fluidity/competitiveness profile, and it would not surprise me if he came off the board in the top 10 of the first round of the draft.
 
I was delighted with the Gonzalez pick until I skimmed thru the round one ratings columns and learned that nearly every asshole in the sport hack media universe is giving Bill a standing applause and a beer. Somethin' ain't right.
 
I was delighted with the Gonzalez pick until I skimmed thru the round one ratings columns and learned that nearly every asshole in the sport hack media universe is giving Bill a standing applause and a beer. Somethin' ain't right.

What about Felger?
 
I was delighted with the Gonzalez pick until I skimmed thru the round one ratings columns and learned that nearly every asshole in the sport hack media universe is giving Bill a standing applause and a beer. Somethin' ain't right.
Small touch of standards remain. refused to look at him. So I don't know. But I did say NEARLY..

Cheers, :toast:
 
Interesting to see the top CBs and TEs fall due to the overall depth at those positions.

Darnell Washington and/or Dawand Jones are probably my top targets tonight - guys who will fundamentally change the capabilities of the team. My 2nd round binkies (Forbes, Wright, Gibbs) turned out to be top half of the first rounders. There are a bunch of guys that should be great value tonight.
 
Interesting to see the top CBs and TEs fall due to the overall depth at those positions.

Darnell Washington and/or Dawand Jones are probably my top targets tonight - guys who will fundamentally change the capabilities of the team. My 2nd round binkies (Forbes, Wright, Gibbs) turned out to be top half of the first rounders. There are a bunch of guys that should be great value tonight.

I have always thought of rounds 2-4 as the value rounds.
 
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