You sit there and watch Mel Kiper put out his big board with Fernando Mendoza at the top and Ty Simpson's name floating around and you just think about what the NFL Draft used to mean for us. Back in the early 90s, you knew a guy was special because he stayed four years and won a national championship. Now they're projecting kids after one season of starting and it's all about measurables and potential instead of what they actually did on the field. I remember when we sent a whole linebacking corps to the league in 1993 and every single one of them had played in multiple Iron Bowls. That's how you build a resume.
This QB battle they're talking about on Finebaum's show, with Doering weighing in, just reminds me of 1994 when we had to replace a legend and nobody knew who would step up. We didn't have a transfer portal to grab someone's backup from another conference. You developed your own guys, you watched them grow in the system, and by the time they got their shot they knew the offense better than the coaches did. Now we're sitting here in April wondering if the new offensive line can even protect long enough to let a quarterback make a read.
I'll tune in for the draft tonight and I'll root for our guys because they wear the crimson and white. But I cannot get excited about a system where a kid plays one year, leaves for the league, and we have to go shopping in the portal for his replacement. The 1992 defense would have never worked in this era beacuse half of them would have transferred out after their sophomore year looking for playing time somewhere else. The game has changed and not for the better.