They drafted who?!?

As I sit in my mother's computer room at her house in Charlotte, I've just finished reading up on this Donte Whitner, a 5'10 safety out of Ohio State that, for some reason, my Buffalo Bills chose with the 8th overall pick of the 2006 NFL Draft.

Now, I have to admit. When Matt Leinart was sitting there for the taking, there was a part of me that was thinking, "End the Losman experiment. Draft Leinart! Draft him!!"

But then, common sense prevailed. Why draft Leinart? You have nobody to protect him. How can he be any more effective than J.P. when he'd only get a fraction of a second to make a decision before getting knocked on his butt?

Next, the thought of trading out of the pick entered my mind. I thought to myself, "Surely, there's a team out there who wants Leinart. Why not trade out of it and get some more picks?" Afterall, the Bills need help in a lot of areas. The more picks, the more chances to fill those needs, right?

But when the commissioner stepped to the podium and announced that the Bills had taken Whitner, I stood there confused. Mad. Disappointed. "Who the hell is Donte Whitner?", I thought.

I knew who he was, but I was not expecting him to be drafted by my team...especially at the #8 spot. Most mock drafts I saw had him going anywhere from 15th all the way to the end of the first round. So why at 8?

Enter twobillsdrive.com.

I went to the site this morning, just hoping to make sense of all the confusing tactics my Bills employed in Day One of the draft. What I found is that the Bills were concerned that the Lions may take Whitner with the #9 pick. If this is truly the case, more power to Marv for pulling the trigger.

Too many times, a team in the draft will pick the "best available" instead of a player they actually need. The Bills need a safety. They liked Whitner. Sure, they probably could've gotten some extra picks to move down and still take him, but they didn't want to take that chance.

Now, maybe I'm drinking the Marv Levy Kool-Aid here. But I'm really kind of on-board with this way of thinking. Of course, I'll reserve complete judgment until I've had a chance to see Whitner play a few games, maybe even years in the NFL.

But the last two times the Bills drafted an Ohio State DB in the draft, Nate Clements and Antoine Winfield turned out to be pretty good players. As I said...I'm giving Marv & company the benefit of the doubt.

Various Wednesday Thoughts

Okay...so maybe it was a bad idea for me to drive my Land Rover into the water. But come on! Look at the picture! No WAY I could've known it was that deep...or that the sand in there was basically quick sand.

Okay, I admit it, I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer when it comes to the outdoors, but there was no way I saw this coming. Maybe that makes me seem even more dumb, I don't know. Whatever the case, the situation sucks.

Talked to the insurance folks yesterday about it. They did officially total the car. No shock there. As you can see in this photo, there was water inside in the passenger side, basically drowning the car's electrical system. I might as well have smashed the damn thing. It's a shame, though. If you look at the car from the outside, you could never tell that the damn thing is dead.

Onto other issues, it looks like UNCW has found their man. Reports are that Charlotte 49er's assistant Benny Moss will be offered the job. As I said on the show yesterday, I like this hire. I like the way Charlotte plays, and that style will also sit well with Seahawk Nation.

I have to stick up for my fellow media members here in town. The Star-News has been catching a lot of flock from the message board community for not fully investigating the events leading to Brad Brownell's resignation. I think that the people here couldn't be more off base.

What people fail to realize is that in this business, before you can report something, you have to have a certain amount of sources, all telling you the same thing. You can't just run with a story because your uncle's gardener nephew told your barber's plumber's daughter that something happened a certain way. That sort of irresponsible reporting may exist on the internet, but in real news publications (like the Star-News), it's frowned upon BIG TIME!

So, basically what I'm saying is this. The reason the Star-News hasn't run a story explaining exactly why Brownell left is probably a pretty good one. But that reason does NOT include that they are lazy, that they aren't working hard on it, or my personal favorite, "Rountree is paying them off as well". Gotta love those message board geeks.

You know, there's a certain amount of Hatorade that you have to drink, in order to be accepted into the community of message board geeks. If you go on there, trying to be overly positive about anything, you usually get pummelled. Warning...message boards are not for the weak at heart.

That's all I got for now. I'm going to get back to updating this thing multiple times throughout the week. I just needed a little break after the trip to Greensboro and all of that. Thanks for reading!

Pack Pride has to be hurting

John Calipari? "No thanks."

Rick Barnes? "Nahh."

0 for 2. That's what NC State is batting so far in this contest of a coaching search. Well...perhaps we should make that 0 for 3, because afterall, they had a good coach that they let get away and move out west.

But my question is this. Why is NC State having such a hard time filling this vacancy? Could what we, who are close to the situation have suspected for some time, actually be true? Could NC State be as irrelevant in college basketball as most Duke and UNC fans would have you believe?

I've always been one who has thought of the NCSU basketball program as somewhat of a sleeping giant just waiting to be awoken by the right person. Was Herb Sendek the right person? Apparently not, according to what State fans will tell you. But compare Herb to who the Pack may have to eventually bring in, and is the grass always greener?

The best chance that NC State has to save face, right now, appears to be John Brady down at LSU. But why would he want to leave that place? Look at his official bio. His roots are down in the deep south. Those are where his contacts are. That is where he knows people. Why would he want to step into the fire that is the ACC, especially when he's not known as much of a nation wide recruiter? Look at his roster. It's made up mostly of kids from Louisiana.

So what's the answer? Who do they bring in? I don't know the answer to these questions. But I do know one thing. Whoever they get, it won't be as big a name as most State fans thought they were going to get.

Brownell chooses Wright State

So...Wright State it is. Trading one "Dub" for another one. Brad Brownell, tonight, announced that he was resigning from UNCW to take the head coaching job at Wright State University, located in Dayton, OH.

Many questions poor into one's head whenever a coach leaves a position like this. The first, and probably most obvious question is "why?" Why is Brad Brownell leaving a job that probably got even more prestigious now that George Mason is in the Final Four? Why would Brad Brownell give up the amount of money that was reportedly offered to him, in order to take a lesser paying job in a weaker conference? Why, Brad, why?

Simple answer. Because he had to. He had to for him. He had to for his family.

As I've pointed out on the show a number of times, it will be easier for Brownell to get a job in his dream conference, the Big 10, if he's up in the Big 10 footprint. Plus, whether you'd like to admit it or not, the Horizon League, which isn't nearly as good as the CAA, seems to be a better spring board conference for coaches looking to move up.

Look at Bruce Pearl. He went from Wisconsin-Milwaukee, a Horizon League school, to Tennessee, an SEC school. That's a big jump, but the type of one that Brownell could easily make, should he put Wright State on the map.

I'm sure a lot of you are going to direct your anger and frustration to the UNCW administration for allowing Brownell to get away. Don't. Not yet anyway. Wait until you have all the facts in front of you before jumping to conclusions. I admit, it's easy to assume that it was a problem with the administration that ultimately lead to Brownell leaving. But we simply do not know all the facts, and it's irresponsible to make assumptions as though we do have them.

The bottom line is this. The next few weeks will be extremely important for the future of UNCW Basketball. A replacement must be carefully selected, and I say carefully because the returning talent the Seahawks have in place are at the right spot to potentially earn them another NCAA Tournament spot next season. That's why whoever they put in place must first, and foremost, have an open mind. The kids in there now are used to playing a certain way. You come in and start changing things too much, you just may blow a chance to make it to another Big Dance next year.

These next few weeks will be interesting. Your thoughts? Feel free to leave comments.