Rodgers’ Choice

The most famous case of Pete Carroll wrongly claiming a quarterback went pro early too soon was Mark Sanchez.
But with Aaron Rodgers winning a Super Bowl, it reminds me of the fact Carroll thought Rodgers made the wrong decision and Matt Leinart the right one when Rodgers went pro early and was only the 24th pick of the draft. Leinart stayed for his senior year and was picked 10th.
Well, six years later, Rodgers seems to have done OK by his decision.

16 thoughts on “Rodgers’ Choice

  1. The 49ers have got to be sick that they drafted Alex Smith #1. How did all the NFL teams screw up so bad. And Rodgers was playing in the Bay area. You could see Rodgers arm and accuracy in college. I still remember the game against SC when he didn’t have an incomplete pass until late in the 4th quarter.

  2. You can’t tell this stuff. Nobody can. You can’t control it either. There is significant good luck contributing to the successes of Sanchez and Rodgers. There is also significant bad luck contributing to where Leinart finds himself.

    I don’t fault Caesar for being wrong. I do fault him for having a strong opinion other than graciousness that Leinart came back for his senior year or that he had a year to coach Sanchez as a starter.

  3. Don’t forget, ML had elbow surgery and had to come back to SC for his senior season. Had his elbow been ok he would have left after his jr year.

  4. Carroll said the odds were against Sanchez. As far as I know, he made no comment about Rodgers’ decision. Only a second rate journalist would predict what Carroll might have said about Rodgers (but didn’t), and then criticize him for it. Finally, be careful about drawing seeping conclusions from isolated results. For all we know, Rodgers might be richer today and have as many or more Superbowl victories if he’d returned for his senior year. After al, he didn’t see the field his first three years in the NFL. Similarly, you might win a $1000 bet from a ‘buddy’ in a game of Russian Roulette, but that doesn’t mean that playing with guns is a wise decision.

  5. Aaron Rodgers was a victim of the Tedford curse. Remember, at that time, smart money had Jeff Tedford as a quarterback guru who could turn any average quarterback into Dan Marino. The relative failure of guys like Trent Dilfer, Akili Smith, Joey Harrington, and Kyle Boller scared a lot of teams away. In retrospect, it appears that Urban Meyer’s system created Alex (or Alice as Niner fans like to call him) Smith much more than Tedford created Rodgers.

  6. Tom Brady was drafted in the what the 7th Round? I recall Jim Hill saying that Cade McNown was going to do great things for Chicago. Ryan Leaf was seen as the better prospect than Manning. Nobody knows how QBs are going to develop in the NFL. Heck who thought Tebow was worth so much to draft in the first round? QB is the hardest position to judge in the NFL.

  7. As a die hard 49ers fan, let me say this–if Aaron Rodgers were drafted by the 49ers, he’d have been dead by now. While he was standing on the sidelines for 3 years behind one of the greatest of all time, Alex Smith was running for his life. No line, no skill position players to hand off or throw to, no continuity at offensive coordinator for Alex. To make matters worse, he played for Mike Nolan and Mike Singletary, both of whom inexplicably seemed to have zero knowledge of football. Rodgers would’ve been better but he wouldn’t be the player he is today had the 49ers drafted him. The good part about being the #1 pick is the amount of money you get. The bad part is that you are drafted by basically an expansion team. The good part about being the #24 pick is that you are going to a better team and when Favre retired the first time, Rodgers took over a team that had just made it to the NFC Championship game.

  8. in other words, pete carroll never knew what he was doing or talking about — got it. message received. understood. capiche. right on. bullseye. homerun. nail on the screws. swish. touchdown. goal. strike. right down the middle. 7/10 split. hole-in-one. unreservedly spot on. yes. oui, si. oui. aloha ………

  9. So Pete was consistent in his opinion that all quarterbacks are better off staying in college through their senior year.

  10. As was Trojan Conquest, I too was at the Cal-SC game where Rodgers was extraordinary. I recall turning to a friend and saying that we cannot stop that guy. I don’t ever recall feeling so helpless with an offensive player.

    But the guy has only gotten better. He had two touchdown passes dropped in the Super Bowl, so the game could have been a wipeout with better wide-outs.

  11. TrojanPete………..sorry, I’m not buying it. Alex Smith never impressed me as a Pro Style QB in college. And don’t they test these guys in the combines?

  12. Like Lawyer John and Trojan Conquest, I attended the same Cal-USC game, won by the Trojans by I believe 4 points. Rodgers completed his first 23 passes tieing the Division 1A all time record. Fortunately, with first and goal DEEP in Trojan territory, Rodgers threw enough incompletions for us to walk away with a hard earned Victory.

    Cal did have 3 weeks to prepare for the game.

    On to a different subject, I am quite certain Aaron Rodgers stuck it far up UCLA’s Ass that year. Nothing new.

    Fight On!!

  13. Trojan Conquest,

    This isn’t so much about Alex Smith as it is the 49ers’ system. I don’t think anyone could have succeeded with the 49ers, including Aaron Rodgers. If Rodgers had 6 different offensive coordinators in 6 years, I doubt he’d develop much. His last OC was Mike Johnson, who is now UCLA’s OC. Mike Nolan passed on Rodgers because Rodgers was “cocky and didn’t appear to respect authority much.” In other words, he was self-confident and asked questions. The 49ers’ OC at the time preferred Rodgers to Smith but was overruled. Who was the 49ers offensive coordinator? None other than Mike McCarthy.

    I remember the Cal-USC game back in 2004 as well. I remember Rodgers completing all of those passes but also remembering they all seemed to be dinks and dunks. I also remember the 2005 draft vividly. Nobody wanted the 1st pick. It wasn’t until the 49ers announced that they were negotiating with Alex Smith that teams were lining up to trade for the pick. The pre-draft talk was about how high Alex Smith had scored on his wonderlic and how he was class valedictorian in HS and how he graduated in less than 3 years at Utah, blah, blah, blah. Because of these things, he’d be able to make the transition from spread offense to pro-style offense. And of course, Mel Kiper said the 49ers should draft Alex Smith–who can argue with that genius?

  14. Smith and ML went to teams that had musical coaches. This is often the case of the lucky QB’s who go high in the draft. They get coupled with teams that think drafting a QB will negate a bad OL. Poor Alex Smith, he went to a team that was ridiculously bad in all facets of the game. I remember watching a monday night game that the coaching staff couldn’t get the play into the game…ridiculously bad organization.

    ML went to a team whose coach was in transition. The current coach never liked him (a somewhat reasonable position). The Cardinals are traditionally terrible…BAD OWNERSHIP. They’ve had one good year since moving to Phoenix.

  15. jkstewart2……….Can’t blame “musical coaches” for Leinart. I live in Arizona, and yes he was drafted by Green. But he did stupid things to get on Wisenhunt’s bad side. He just lost out to a hall of fame QB. I’m no fan of Leinart as a NFL QB, but he got screwed this year. Wisenhunt just never liked him. Matt’s personality is way to layed back for Wiz. The knock on him is that he’s very accurate inside 20 yards, but he was terrible on anything longer. Wiz screwed up big time. There’s no way the Cards weren’t going to be better with Leinart. They dropped him for 2 rookies and a terrible QB in Anderson. I hope he gets a shot this year with someone.

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