Wahoowa!
This is a follow-up on Matt Schaub and Michael Vick.
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In a classic case of be careful what you wish for, the Atlanta Falcons have traded quarterback Matt Schaub to the Houston Texans where he will be paired back up with his old UVA teammate Wali Lundy. The Falcons receive the Texans' first (#8 overall) and second round picks in this year's 2007 draft and their second round pick next year's 2008 draft. The Texans get the Falcons first round pick (#10 overall). Matt then signed a six year, 48 million dollar contract that included seven million in guaranteed money.
Matt finally gets to be a starting quarterback. For the worst team in the league. The Texans are so bad they passed on Reggie Bush and Vince Young. Once he was injured and put on IR, recently-cut Texan Domanick Davis went into the Running Back Protection Program and changed his name to Domanick Williams. He'll now have a career as an unassuming third-down back, probably in Florida or Arizona somewhere.
David Carr? The number one overall pick in the 2002 draft and the only starting quarterback in Texans history, went 23-53 over five seasons and was sacked 249 times. Houston wanted to trade him but could not find a taker and released him and Domanick Friday. This won't make Jake Plummer happy. The Broncos traded him to the Buccaneers last month and Jake said he'd retire before playing for Tampa Bay. The only place he would accept is Houston, now led by his former offensive coordinator Gary Kubiak. Guess the feeling there wasn't mutual...
The Dolphins are one of the suitor teams looking at David. New Miami head coach Cam Cameron's defensive coordinator is Dom Capers, the first coach of Texans. Wouldn't it be hilarious if the decision to sign David was influenced by the defensive coach? Lil bit of that old 4-12 black magic a couple seasons in a row and every body is back on the street. Oakland, increasingly becoming the very Black Hole it is famous for at home games, is the other team interested in talking to David.
How bad did the Falcons screw this one up? All the signs were there that Matt should be the Falcons starting quarterback, today and in the future. His offensive coordinator and playcaller for two seasons at the University of Virginia was former Redskins quarterbacks coach Bill Musgrave, a disciple of the west coast-style spread offense. Jim Mora Junior was his only head coach in Atlanta, Jim Junior also an offshoot of the spread offense from his seven years in San Francisco under Steve Mariucci and Dennis Erickson. Cripes the Falcons even brought Bill Musgrave back as quarterbacks for the 2006 season! (op. cit.)
Sadly though, the Falcons are saddled with Michael's contract, a behemoth (op. cit.) that they have no practical way to get out of, short of just swallowing a bigass pill. Back on 1 December 2006 I traded 5 Questions with Dave at The Falcoholic and he had this to say about the Michael Vick-Matt Schaub situation:
Owner Arthur Blank definitely cares about winning, but Vick makes him so much money that he's not foolish enough to get rid of him. Schaub has a good arm and good instincts, but there's no guarantee he's not another Doug Johnson, who basically sucked after the first couple games he played...But Vick isn't going to be riding the pine unless he becomes so awful that they can't win any games at all...Until Vick gets better, however, it's going to be fair to say that Blank and the team care more about money than winning. I can't entirely debate it.It was clear that, despite hiring a coach that ran a system requiring a quarterback with skills more like Matt's than Michael's, Arthur Blank insisted on Jim Junior playing Michael. No wonder Jim Junior wanted out of there so badly he said so on live radio (op. cit.). A real coach with a real staff, stuck with a guy in Michael Vick that can't run a gameplan, can't manage a game, can't control his own anger and who isn't a winner in the NFL.
Good for Matt. I just hope the Texans can get better around him.
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In other news, Michael Vick says the water bottle with the false bottom that was confiscated at the Miami airport in January (op. cit.) was not actually a stash box, it was a secret jewelry box. The container tested negative for marijuana and Michael thinks at the minimum he is the victim of a bad rap in the media and at worst was set up by TSA to look like a druggie. Michael was coincidentally in Miami at the same time his brother Marcus, a Dolphins player and disgraced former Virginia Tech quarterback was fighting a sexual battery and emotional distress lawsuit by the now-seventeen year old that he er, had relations with when she was fifteen, and continued to er, have relations with even when caught and a judge made him promise not to.
I'm not a publicist and I'm not a lawyer but Michael Vick is one of the highest profile athletes in this country and to believe that he was the victim of some set-up by barely-conscious TSA employees or some resentful press is beyond ridiculous. He could have come forward at any time and held a press conference, and I am guessing AirTran Airways, for whom Michael is, or was, a regional spokesthlete (op. cit.) fairly begged him to come out and clear himself, this is if they did not cashier him immediately.
I mean, it's plausible, right?. Athletes get ripped off jewelry and cash all the time. In hotels, out of luggage, even in the locker room (Albert Connell, anyone?).
No the reason we did not hear about this until now is because Michael himself was not sure the tests would come back negative. He kept a low profile and hoped for the best.
In other Michael Vick news, apparently Michael thinks new Falcons coach Bobby Petrino is eventually going to let him call his own plays. (op. cit.) Ha! Not unless they are from Doug Flutie's playbook: drop back, send everyone long, dodge til there's an open man. If that fails run.
I give Bobby two seasons.
Matt Schaub at UVA from the Sabre here.
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