What Clayton thinks should happen...

From actually watching him play. If you can, find a copy of the Senior Bowl that Wp28 was talking about, as it's a perfect example. Willis had a ton of tackles, but if you actually watched the game he looked thoroughly unimpressive. He most certainly will not go in the middle of the first, and if he sneaks in the bottom of the first it will only be because some team was dumb enough to buy the hype instead of evaluating him themselves.

 

From the Huddle Report:

Patrick Willis LB Mississippi

STRENGTHS
Patrick is a high character LB with solid athletic talent. He is a head up, wrap up, squeeze and drive tackler with good instincts. He is a smart player who shows good leadership skills and makes the players around him better. Patrick has been a core player for his college program and is the type of player that will be an asset to the team that drafts him.

NEEDS TO IMPROVE
Patrick has limited athletic abilities to play the LB position at the next level. He is not fast enough for an OLB, not big enough for MLB and does not do a good job in defending against the pass. In spite of all this, I have seen other players with this type of limited talent become excellent LB’s at the next level.

TALENT BOARD ROUND: 4
First, let’s stop all the howling and screaming out there; you are insulted, but I’m just telling the truth. With all of Patrick’s limitations athletically, he could still be an excellent LB at the next level because of his work ethic and character. The real key to how successful Patrick will be is how much he wants it. How much will he truly feel the need to be a LB at the NFL level? Right now, he is a two-down LB that’s had a lot of injuries. With hard work, he could turn himself into an inside LB in a 3-4 defense and have himself a pretty good career. But he has to want it more than anything else and right now, I feel that he might be just as happy if he was coaching instead of playing. He reminds me a lot of the coach for the Northwestern Wildcats, Patrick Fitzgerald. He was an excellent college LB that won a lot of awards and was a great asset to his college team, but he realized that he would be happier coaching rather than playing. Patrick can overcome all of his limitations if he chooses to and he would be an asset to the team that drafts him; however, for the purposes of this profile and the draft, his talent ratio is as a fourth rounder. I know this will surprise a lot of people, but I profile what I see on the field. I do not profile awards and I do not upgrade or downgrade players because of awards. Players have to bring the whole package to the table to be rated as a first day pick. In Patrick’s package, the pure athletic talent is just not there to rate him as a first day pick. Of course it wasn’t there for Zack Thomas or London Fletcher or a dozen or so other LB’s that are playing and starting in the NFL and they weren’t picked in the first day either!

 

Wouldn't you think that in a game where one is not familiar with his team mates and has a short time to learn the defense that the more cerebral positions would be a bit more taxed? I tend to feel that the QB, OL, MLB positons would fall into that category. It seems the positions that play purely instinctive or have to beat "their" guy would have it a bit easier for a quickie game like that. Even so, he was named Defensive player for the south.

 

From the Huddle Report:

Patrick Willis LB Mississippi

They also have him going at 14 in their latest mock.

 

Yeah, 4th round talent @ #14 would DEFINATELY be a reach.

 

The 14th pick in the mock is from the same site you just posted that psycho analysis.

 

The Huddle Report's prediction on Sleepers/Reaches

This analysis compares THR's current prospect rankings against THR's Talent Board. When there is a difference between the talent round in which Drew Boylhart places a player and where Robby Esch places a player in the rankings, the player is displayed in either the Sleepers or Reaches category. If the player is considered more talented by Drew than shown in Robby's rankings, the player is classified as a Sleeper. And the reverse is true for those players classified as Reaches. The other factor the reader must consider is that the ranking rounds are fixed, generally in groupings of 32 (i.e. Round 1 has 32 selections, round 2 has 32 selections, etc.) whereas Drew has the liberty to place as many players in a talent round as he rates them.

SLEEPERS These players are "sleepers." Their Talent Board rankings are higher than their Value Board rankings. The players are listed from the greatest differential to the smallest.

PLAYER POS SCHOOL VALUE TALENT
Tyler Palko QB Pittsburgh 7 1
Jared Zabransky QB Boise St 7 1
Quincy Black LB New Mexico 7 2
Joe Anoai DT Georgia Tech 7 2
Mike Otto OT Purdue 5 1
Brandon Myles WR West Virginia 5 1
David Ball WR New Hampshire 6 2
Jay Moore DE Nebraska 4 1
Jonny Harline TE BYU 5 2
John Beck QB BYU 6 3
Louis Leonard DT Fresno St 6 3

REACHES These players are "reaches." Their Talent Board rankings are lower than their Value Board rankings. The players are listed from the greatest differnential to the smallest.

PLAYER POS SCHOOL VALUE TALENT
Brandon Meriweather S Miami 2 7
Tim Crowder DE Texas 2 6
Kyle Young OC Fresno St 3 7
Greg Olsen TE Miami 1 5
Tank Tyler DT North Carolina St 2 5
Patrick Willis LB Mississippi 1 4
Levi Brown OT Penn St 1 4
Josh Beekman OG Boston College 3 6
Quentin Moses DE Georgia 2 4
Michael Griffin S Texas 1 3
Aaron Rouse S Virginia Tech 2 4

 

Some of the other LBs didn't have that problem, and haven't in years past. What you say may be true, but it doesnt make him a 1st rounder. He looks like a very good risk to be a very average player, at best. He could be good. You don't know. But you try to take a guy in the round where his risk shows he should be.

 

What's confusing is that he was named defensive player (not LB) of the South in that game and you guys act like he sucked. As far as his bust potential, I guess the combine will give us a better bead on that. Those sites I posted mention his great burst, speed and strength. The HR is saying he's limited. None of them will actually give any measurables until after the combine so at this point it's simply opinion.

 

He made a lot of tackles, mostly sideline to sideline, He got abosuletly abused by anything coming up the middle.