Every summer, I start to think about NCAA two-zero-fill-in-the-blank, and Madden two-zero-fill-in-the-blank. This year will be NCAA 2010, and Madden 2010, and given that both of my teams should be good (Georgia Tech and the Falcons), I feel a little more excited than most.

[Falcons Message Board]

I’m not somebody that really cares about draft grades the day after a draft — how many times have these so-called “experts” been wrong in the past? — but since NFL is officially over, and since we’re stuck with a few boring NBA series right now and 145 more MLB games, I figure I may as well milk this post for what it’s worth.

It’s the last time we’ll be discussing the NFL until a Bengals player gets arrested in the offseason.

How’d your team do over the weekend? I’ve got lots of different opinions from lots of different people. Click here and you can see how Pete Prisco of CBS Sportsline rates the picks; click here to see how Larry Weisman, writer for USA Today, breaks down all seven rounds. Clifton Brown, writer for Sporting News Today, has his take here; for Yahoo! Sports, go here.

I’d give you Todd McShay or Mel Kiper, Jr., but they’re douche bags and charge you $39.95 a year for their services — if I could charge everyone $39.95 to be completely wrong about how a player will turn out, I would. McShay isn’t that bad, but Kiper’s looked like a weatherman with some of his recent predictions.

Enjoy the grades. They mean nothing. At the end of the day, Calvin Johnson has to catch Matthew Stafford’s passes, and DHB wasn’t a stretch by Oakland until he officially busts in Oakland. I think I speak for a lot of people when I say I’m counting down to September. Fall, you couldn’t get here soon enough.

Via The Big Lead, we dive in and take a look back at 2003, where all of Mel Kiper’s projections for greatness went way wrong. It should be noted that Charles Rodgers was in that draft, and is no longer in the league, but for all intents and purposes, we’ll glance at just the QB’s. Here they are:

1.) Carson Palmer: Good record. Hurt last year. Was a Pro Bowler. Really hasn’t been the same since he was knocked out of the playoff game against Pittsburgh.
7.) Byron Leftwich: He backed up Joey Harrington last year. I think that’s enough said.
19.) Kyle Boller: A kid I felt bad for. I always thought he’d be better, but the people in Baltimore expected him to be Joe Montana immediately. He got a tough break going to a team with very little offense.
22.) Rex Grossman: He went to a Super Bowl. Still…. he played behind Kyle Orton last year, and has been subject of many “benching” talks throughout the years.
88.) Dave Ragone: Who? The Big Lead says he’s doing a radio show with Scott Padgett now.
97.) Chris Simms: He’s probably got a good chance of being the starter this year in Denver. That said, his competition isn’t much.
110.) Senaca Wallace: He got some playing time last year with Hasselbeck hurt, but hasn’t done much through his career.

[The Big Lead]
[Six Years Later, The QB Class of 2003 Is Still Dreadful]

ESPN has a nice little piece on each team’s strength of schedule for 2009. It also notes that if you went from worst to first in the NFC South, then you’re pretty much screwed (see: Falcons, who have the fourth hardest schedule this year, with opponents’ records being a combined 150-105).

An interesting note: The Cardinals, who made the Super Bowl, have the 27th hardest schedule, or sixth easiest next year; the Minnesota Vikings, who won their division and played a first round playoff game at home, have the second easiest schedule. The Patriots, who missed the playoffs, have the third easiest schedule.

You can see all teams here. With the addition of Jay Cutler, and with the easiest schedule in the NFL, it looks as if the Bears might have an easy ride to the playoffs next year.

[ESPN]

Even had the Broncos not wanted to trade Jay Cutler, they probably would’ve had to pull the trigger on the deal if the Bears approached them with what they approached them with this afternoon. The details of the deal:

To acquire Cutler, the Bears had to give up quarterback Kyle Orton and first-round picks in 2009 and 2010, along with a third-round pick in 2009.

So: The Bears gave up their starting quarterback, their first round pick this eyar, their round pick this year, and their first round pick next year. What, you didn’t want to go ahead and throw in Lovie Smith or Brian Urlacher? I really think Chicago could’ve made this a more lopsided trade for a guy that’s 17-20 as a starter.

[ESPN]

If you’ve been living under a rock: The Broncos fired Mike Shannahan. They hired Josh McDaniels. McDaniels like Matt Cassel, whom he tried to trade for. Jay Cutler got pissed. McDaniels said he wanted Cutler as his quarterback. Cutler said that wasn’t the case. The Broncos said they’d trade Cutler. McDaniels and owner Pat Bowlen said they’d tried to reach out to Cutler for 10 days, with no success. Cutler says they never called him once.

Cutler and his agent have a different spin on the story, NFL senior analyst Chris Mortensen reports. Asked by text message whether Bowlen has directly tried to contact him, Cutler replied, “No.”

His agent, Bus Cook, said the Broncos first got in touch with him on Tuesday.

“The perception that they’ve been burning the phone lines the last 10 days is wrong,” Cook said. “In fact, the other day I asked Jay if he had heard from them and he said, ‘no.’ I didn’t hear from them until yesterday [Tuesday] morning when [GM] Brian Xanders called me and said that Mr. Bowlen needs to speak with Jay now. I told him all I can do is leave Jay a message.

Has there ever been a bigger debacle of he-said-she-said in the history of sports? And if so, would Cutler be the ‘he’ or the ’she?’

[ESPN]

Give it ’til April. That’s my guess of when Jay Cutler will be traded, and the Broncos will likely get a first rounder for him. (Do the Lions trade the pick they received from Dallas for Jay, then draft a guy like Curry to help that defense?) Things out in Denver have gone from bad, to worse, to irrepairable. The most recent, from Cutler’s side of the story, after a brief meeting with new head coach Josh McDaniels this weekend:

“I went in there with every intention of solving the issue, being a Bronco, moving forward as a Bronco,” Cutler said. “We weren’t in there but about 20 minutes, [McDaniels] did most of the talking and as far as I’m concerned, he made it clear he wants his own guy. He admitted he wanted Matt Cassel because he said he has raised him up from the ground as a quarterback. He said he wasn’t sorry about it. He made it clear that he could still entertain trading me because, as he put it, he’ll do whatever he feels is in the best interest of the organization.

“At the end of the meeting, he wasn’t like, ‘Jay, I want you as our quarterback, you’re our guy.’ It felt like the opposite. He basically said that I needed to tell him if we can’t work this out, to let him know,” Cutler added. “I thought he was antagonizing me and that was disappointing because I was ready to move on, committed as a Bronco. Really, I figured we’d hash things out, shake hands, laugh a little and move forward. What happened [Saturday] was the last thing I expected. If I didn’t think it could be fixed, I never would have come back to Denver. It was painfully obvious to me and Bus [Cook, his agent] it’s not something they want to fix.”

Translation: Cutler needs to be coddled.

What does McDaniels think of it all?

“I really have wanted to avoid a he-said, she-said thing but it’s only fair for us to present the Bronco side of the story rather than let things get taken out of context,” McDaniels said. “There’s been a pattern here for the past two weeks the way things [have been represented] in our communications. I don’t think anything that happened [Saturday] was out of the ordinary. At the end of the meeting, Jay said he had thought about things quite a bit and requested a few more hours to mull things over. He said he wanted to talk to Bus on how to proceed. He was gonna call me on my cell phone and that never happened. Instead, Bus called [GM] Brian [Xanders].

“Again, I think that’s been a pattern. I couldn’t get [Cutler] to talk to me for two weeks or to talk to Mr. Bowlen. Then when he came here this weekend, we couldn’t get a one-on-one meeting, just me and him alone. He wanted Bus in there, so I had Brian sit in, too. And it was the four of us. There wasn’t any yelling, none of that. I can’t believe we get to a totally different [interpretation].

“It’s an unfortunate set of circumstances that has cropped up, a potential distraction and we’ve done our best to limit that. The main message I want to get out is that we’re excited to start our offseason program [Monday]. It’s an exciting time for us.”

Translation: Eff off, Jay Cutler. We’ll be just fine without you.

[ESPN]

There’s been rumors for some time that Cutler was a bratty little baby. And now those rumors are starting to look true. Cutler, who wants out of Denver after Josh McDaniels acquied about a trade for Matt Cassel, apparently had things go from bad to worse Wednesday morning.

The conference call was anything but genial and the two sides are now further apart than prior to it, the source said. The source added that the Broncos’ tone of the conference call was as if Cutler created the situation by asking for the trade and not the other way around.

I’m sure there will be a hold out, then Cutler will realize the millions of dollars he’s missing out on, and will quickly report to practice. Insulin doesn’t cheap these days, y’know.

[ESPN]

The former Patriot is heading to Denver to play under former offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels. Gaffney signed a four year, $10 million contract with $3 million of it guaranteed. The Broncos also just signed JJ Arrington, formerly of the Cardinals, and Cornell Buckhlalter. Thirteen year safety Brian Dawkins is in Denver right now visiting with the GM and coaching staff.

I’ve noted many times that the NFL Combine is the most overrated event in sports when it comes to gauging talent, yet every year I get caught up in what a guy runs or what a guy jumps or what a guy throws (combine studs that probably went a bit high: JaMarcus Russell, Donte Stallworth, and just last year, Vernon Gholston).

That said, via The Big Lead, here’s some guys that impressed, and some guys that didn’t. A couple of notables on my end, from what I’ve seen on NFL Network:

Pat White, QB/WR: He ran an unofficial time of 4.49 in the 40, and then it was adjusted to a 4.55. He also jumped a solid nine feet in the broad jump, which is real important once you’re actually in the game. I know I often see guys stand in place, squat, and leap as far forward as possible. Like I said: Great gauge at talent.

Darius Heyward-Bey, WR: This guy was being talked about as a second rounder, but after running a 4.3 flat, he’s probably going to end up cracking the top 15. Michael Crabtree is still “the guy” when it comes to receivers, but Heyward-Bey is sure creeping up.

Derrick Anderson, WR: This is the guy that I think will be a solid NFL player — probably a good number two receiver — but his 4.58 40 will have schools not paying attention to whether or not he can run a route and catch the ball, and just say he’s too slow to play.

Beanie Wells, RB: I can’t tell if a 4.59 40 is good or bad for him. On one side, it’s slower than most strong safeties. But he’s 235 pounds, and at that size, how fast do you want him to run?

[The Big Lead]
Getting Listy With The Combine