Jamal Lee a full back ?! No, he's about the furthest thing from a fullback that you can get. If the Ticats want a fullback go with Eric Lee with your fourth or ninth pick. Last year the Ticats drafted a RB with the idea of turning him in to a FB and it blew up in their face. You don't use a first pick overall to "experiment"...
As far as Toronto not drafting an Olinesman that is bogus as well. Murphy is 32 and Picard signed a 1+1. If the Ticats pass on Rottier the Argos won't. The only improvement the Ticats made on the Oline is Gauthier (a gun for hire) signed to a 1+1, draft the top tier Olinesmen damn it !
Ticats should be able to come out of this draft with 4 players that can contribute this year. They get 3 guys out of the top 9.
After Cfl evaluation camp i am not sure if Rottier is still the best o line man in the draft .Morencie the windsor kid might have shown a little more.Might be 3 or 4 real good o linemen in this draft.With all the interest south of the border for lee the rb might be another wasted draft pick like last year with gigure.With only 1 canadian on the d line starting he would have to beat out kania,reid,kirk to play.If the first pick is o line he must beat gauthier lt marcouxlg hage c hudson rg DAVIS imprt dyakowski back up orBeksiak the experiment or Remple the kid. :?
Ok so if Lee can't play FB stick him at KR/RB. He's still a can't miss pick. you saw how Dorsey burned every single team with kick returns last season, imagine what Lee could do.
I'd like to see Lee return kicks in Hamilton, too, but he'll be invited to an NFL training camp, and may stick there, so the pick wouldn't pan out until late in the year, if at all.
Obie has a chance to get 3 players who can add depth to areas of the team where we are starting Canadians, but presently have no depth. Or he can trade the top picks for some import talent to fill other holes. Either way, Lee won't be picked by us, but we will get a pretty good talent infusion.
Word on the street is Rottier is too nice.
Does not have that mean streak that teams like with O-Lineman.
Not to say that he will not be a solid pro, but IMO you do have to play with a bit of an edge on the O-Line.
Black would be a project.
He definetly would not be filling a need with Hamilton probably going All American with our LBs and Mariuz and Auggie already in place, and Glavic and Matechuk fine special teamers.
Lee also would be a luxury with the fine stable of 4-RBs we already have.
Legare would be playing behind hopefully Mace, Kirk and Reid and there is no way we will be starting more than 1 non-Import on the D-Line.
Bottom line is whoever we pick in the draft is for the future. Pick the best athletes. They will not be starters this year.
I have no problem trading one of the picks for an Import starter (Right tackle), or an established non-import fullback or receiver.
Let trust the staff does their homework and does the best thing!
I think once he starts getting roughed up in the CFL his fighting instincts will come out. Morencie, Steenbergen and probably Carlson are all fine choices but these four guys will likely be gone in the first round.
Completing the mix would be Lee, Carter, Black,Bacheyie, Morris...best players by position
I’ve seen Lee play plenty in the Q and twice live here in the AUS matchups. Lee still needs a lot of work to be a pro running back. He’s a luxury pick just like Giguere. If he’s there at #9 maybe but the first two picks should be as sure a thing as can be. Morencie being an Ontario boy might be the way to go as well. Successful Olinesmen can play 1o to 13 years, you get so much more mileage from a linesman then you get from a RB.
By all accounts both Rottier and Black didnt not have strong camps. To the point that people are suggesting Rottier my need to be switched to guard and Black is weak in coverage. I wouldn’t be surprised if one or neither of those players are selected.
NCAA is a semi pro org, Players coming out of ncaa are NOT any better than CIS players who have natural ability.! IN fact Ticats have drafted ncaa linemen who are not as good as CIS draftees!! Ticats should stop drafting from ncaa and stick with CIS draftpicks! NCAA is set up to make money for the schools, NOT to educate or better the Players!
Are you kidding me. The players in the NCAA get far superior coaching to those in the CIS. The players coming out of the NCAA are closer to starting than most of the CIS players. Now of course there are exceptions to it, but for the most part the NCAA are better coached so unless there is a drastic difference in actual athletic ability I’d be taking the NCAA guy over the CIS player.
Look at it this way , All imports and most ncaa are Players who didnt get into the nfl, so they try the cfl to make a name and get a shot at nfl, they are a WASh for cfl teams (all= its the CFL teams that compiile the best CIS players who are succesfull in the W column. :cowboy:
The NCAA players who are getting drafted don’t have very good odds of making the NFL and most know that. Most Canadians are playing in low level D1 or D2 schools so the NFL interest is minimal. Where they hold the advantage in regards to the CFL is the coaching they receive.d
The CIS players get the most scouting done on them because they are much cheaper to scout as you don't have to send a scount down using planes etc. to scout for a game and can just have him drive to a loca CIS game instead of spending hundreds of dollars extra on a trip to the states. Sure, a few hundred bucks isn't much, but having tons of those trips a year adds up quick for CFL teams who don't have as much income as NFL teams or teams in other sports, and therefore their strengths and weaknesses are more well known, and are popular as the team picking them knows what they are getting.
Drafting an NCAA player, although they are likely to be slightly more skilled due to better coaching does have more potential, but since there wasn't as much scouting done, you have to rely on game film, which is not as relyable, meaning that you may noy have as good of an idea of the player's strengths and weaknesses, meaning you might pick the better D-lineman for example by drafting the NCAA player, but if you wanted a pass rusher and got a run stopped, that is also more likely to happen than if you choose an NCAA player as he is less scouted than the CIS player. The NCAA player will also get slightly more NFL attention due to the fact that most NFL fans would rather see a player who played college football in the states rather than one who has played in CAnada all his life, and therefore, you are more likely to end up loosing him to an NFL team. Also keep in mind that NCAA players would have spent a the last few years of tehir life playing by NFL rules and CIS players would have played under rules similar to the CFL (as there are minor differences between CIS and CFL rules) meaning that a Canadian from the NCAA may have to "re-adapt" to Canadian football rules.
So in conclusion, although NCAA players are more skilled, in the long run the teams with the best CIS players will do better than those who draft Canadians from the NCAA.
I honestly don't buy that. When it comes right down to it, QB is the spot where a true adaptation to CFL rules is needed. Talented football players at the other positions can pick up the little nuances of the CFL game in training camp through good preparation.
Typically the better Canadian athletes are recruited to American Universities.
Add to that they have more and better paid coaches, better facilities, and spend more time every week dedicating themselves to football and you would think better players would as a rule come out of the US college ranks.
Sometimes...But then you get an athlete like Rottier who didn't play football till he got to college, so NCAA scouts don't even get a snif at some of these guys. There are lots of examples like that. Gary Ross at Mount Allison who was out of football for years working while his young wife went to school.
Then there are all the guys who get picked up at combines in southern Ontario who end up as practice squad fodder in NCAA programs while they could have progressed in the CIS by having playing time.
Then there are guys like Cahoon who had no idea about their NI status but are found by scouts grinding it out.
Scouting in the CFL IMO has improved a lot in the last decade. There are still a few teams that don't invest much in their scouting because you can only get a 1+1 commitment from a rookie so they feel they can get what they want or need on the FA market instead of investing in scouting and development but these teams keep finding themselves at the bottom of the league now days.