If you could draft over who goes no1? After last year I would have guess mario williams or maybe cutler, but cutler has disappointed and mario has too. I would guess a big armed qb will usually go first and so I would guess cutler.
Still Mario...the dude has been banged up and YES hasn't played to the level he established but still productive. Bush - Avg to below Avg 3rd down back Cutler - Dude is all over the place. Lienhart - If he isn't smoking pot with chicks in a hot tub, he is carrying a clip board. VY- I'll leave alone I'd take Mario...
8 sacks in a down year (with 3 games left) ain't that bad. John Abraham led DE's in sacks last year and he only has 3.5 this year. And 34 sacks in not quite 3 years is pretty damned good. The only DE with more in that time frame in Jared Allen. So yeah, I'd still take Mario. No question.
Can't really rank past drafts only because productive players show up late in the draft (see Leon Washington). Texans at least drafted really well that year (Mario, Demeco, OD).
I guess we can play this game... who "should" the texans have taken with their picks if they could do it over. overall pick - original choice - revised choice 1st - Mario Williams - Mario Williams 33rd - Demeco Ryans - Demeco Ryans 65th - Charles Spencer - Owen Daniels (at the time, Spencer was a no-brainer pick to be LT... injuries happen tho) 66th - Eric Winston - Eric Winston 96th - Owen Daniels - Elvis Dumervil/Johnny Jolly (DT now an obvious problem) 170th - Wali Lundy - Antoine Bethea/Cortland Finnegan (didn't need a CB with Dunta at the time, no safety or guard talent left on the board either) 251st - David Anderson - Marques Colston (the Texans missed this one, but to be fair.. so did every other team, 251 times... Colston was picked right after D. Anderson, LOL!) So yeah... the Texans had a top 5 draft that year. I wouldn't change much about it.
You would also need to factor in Houston's 2nd rounder in 2007 and 2008 as they traded both to Atlanta for Matt Schaub. They also swapped first rounders in 2007, so Not sure if they would have drafted differently, but maybe they pick up Jamaal Anderson instead of Okoye. So the swap might be VY + 2 2nd rounders for Mario... Plus at the time, we could have got something for David Carr... not sure what, but something.
I guess that if we had drafted VY (or Cutler or Leinart I suppose), we wouldn't have traded those 2nd rounders to Atlanta for Schaub. By his logic, drafting Mario (or any non QB) cost us those 2 draft picks.
I'll take a re-draft shot: 1 Houston Texans Mario Williams (same) 2 New Orleans Saints Reggie Bush (DeAngelo Williams) 3 Tennessee Titans Vince Young (same) 4 New York Jets D'Brickashaw Ferguson (Marcus McNeill) 5 Green Bay Packers A. J. Hawk (DeMeco Ryans) 6 San Francisco 49ers Vernon Davis (Jay Cutler) 7 Oakland Raiders Michael Huff (Devin Hester) 8 Buffalo Bills Donte Whitner (Antoine Bethea) 9 Detroit Lions Ernie Sims (AJ Hawk) 10 Arizona Cardinals Matt Leinart (Joseph Addai) 11 Denver Broncos (from St. Louis Rams) Jay Cutler (Brandon Marshall) 12 Baltimore Ravens (from Cleveland Browns) Haloti Ngata (Elvis Dumervil) 13 Cleveland Browns (from Baltimore) Kamerion Wimbley (Nick Mangold) 14 Philadelphia Eagles Brodrick Bunkley (Reggie Bush) 15 St. Louis Rams (from Atlanta Falcons via Denver) Tye Hill (Antonio Cromartie) 16 Miami Dolphins Jason Allen (Cortland Finnegan) 17 Minnesota Vikings Chad Greenway Linebacker Iowa (Vernon Davis) 18 Dallas Cowboys Bobby Carpenter (lololol - bag of warm poop) all right, I have totally lost interest in this post.
Haloti Ngata has been good for the Ravens and they had, and still have, some great DEs... other than that, nice list.
I'm not saying I agree, I'm just giving you his logic. Hypothetically, if we had drafted VY, we wouldn't have traded for Schaub and thus would have had those 2nd rounders in '07 and '08. Not drafting VY made the trade for Schaub necessary and thus cost us 2 draft picks. But like I said, I think that's a foolish thing to factor into a redraft evaluation.
