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unclescurvy · 5 years ago

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2020 NFL Mock Draft-FINAL

April 22, 2020

ROUND ONE

1. Cincinnati - QB Sam Burrow, LSU

They might as well start working on the contract now. It’s been a long time since we had a slam-dunk pick like this one. The team will need to focus on acquiring an offensive line to keep him from a David Carr-style early collapse though.

2. Washington – DE Chase Young, Ohio State

I’m still not 100% convinced the Redskins won’t trade this pick away, but if they hold on to it, they’d be ridiculous to pass on hometown guy Chase Young. He’d be an instant star in Washington, which is exactly what they need to start luring fans back into the stadium.

3. Miami (PROJ. TRADE W/DET) – OT Andrew Thomas, Georgia

Tristan Wirfs and Mekhi Becton were the stars of the Combine, but that’s not what motivates front offices. They want someone who’s excelled on the field, over and over again. Wirfs certainly qualifies there, but Andrew Thomas has been a star at both right and left tackle practically since he first suited up for Georgia. Don’t be surprised if he’s the first tackle off the board this year. Miami gives up picks #5 and 18 to move up two spots).

4. NY Giants – OT Tristan Wirfs, Iowa

This could be an epic run on tackles starting here. Wirfs can excel at any spot on the offensive line, but the Giants may need his help at left tackle sooner than later.

5. Detroit (PROJ. TRADE W/MIA) – DT Derrick Brown, Auburn

Detroit could do any number of things with this pick, but I like the current rumor that they’re very intrigued by Derrick Brown. He’s one of my favorite players in this draft, and if you fall in love with a prospect, you take him and damn the criticism.

6. LA Chargers – QB Tua Tagovailoa, Alabama +

No one expects him to start immediately in LA, where Tyrod Taylor is well liked by the coaching staff. But like his tenure with the Browns, Taylor’s time in the starting role will be short lived. Tua can be brought along slowly as he adjusts to the pro game and heals from his hip injury.

7. Carolina – CB Jeffrey Okudah, Ohio State

Carolina parted ways with James Bradberry, so they make up for his departure with Okudah, clearly the top CB available this year. If he lasts until pick #7, this will be a steal for the team.

8. Arizona – OT Jedrick Wills, Jr., Alabama

Kyler Murray is great at running for his life, but he shouldn’t have to. They did re-sign LT D.J. Humphries to a new deal – but only a one-year contract with RT Marcus Gilbert. They seem to have decided to part ways with free agents Jordan Mills and A.Q. Shipley. And in 2021, J.R. Sweezy’s contract expires too. Loading up on offensive linemen would be a good idea. Wills could either serve as a reserve swing tackle his first year, or they could move Gilbert to guard and insert Wills at right tackle.

9. Jacksonville – LB Isaiah Simmons, Clemson

Jacksonville needs help at multiple positions, so why not grab the best player available. Simmons might not fit the team’s most immediate needs, but he’s the sort of dynamic playmaker you rebuild your defense around. Whether he lines up at Will or safety, he’ll have an immediate impact with a clever defensive staff.

10. Cleveland – OT Mekhi Becton, Louisville *

The Browns made a horrible mistake by ignoring their problems at offensive line in the 2019 off-season. They gambled and lost on left tackle bust Greg Robinson (who is currently in legal trouble for allegedly being in possession of a ridiculous amount of pot). Time to correct that mistake. Becton enters the NFL with questions about possible drug use, but that’s nothing new for the Browns.

11. NY Jets – WR CeeDee Lamb, Oklahoma

The Jets have been targeting left tackles since early in the pre-draft process, but they don’t pull the trigger on a trade up to acquire one of the blue-chip candidates. CeeDee Lamb ain’t a bad fall-back option though.

12. Las Vegas – WR Henry Ruggs III, Alabama

You need to be flashy if you want to stand out in Las Vegas. There is no player with better big-play potential this year than Ruggs. In a nod to former owner Al Davis, the team eschews the more polished route runner in his teammate Jerry Jeudy for the speediest player available at his position. Ruggs is more than just a fast receiver though; he’s got amazingly-reliable hands.

13. San Francisco (THRU IND) – WR Jerry Jeudy, Alabama

Losing Emmanuel Sanders hurts a little bit, but the pain recedes when Jerry Jeudy comes to town. Perhaps the best pure receiver in the draft, and he lands with the NFC Champions.

14. Atlanta (PROJ. TRADE W/TB) – CB C.J. Henderson, Florida

The Falcons move up two spots to snag Henderson away from Denver (they sacrifice pick #95 in the 3rd round to move up). They’ve coveted both Henderson and Jeff Okudah for a while now, and while they don’t possess the ammo to get up for Okudah, they pounce when they see Henderson drop this far.

15. Denver – LB Kenneth Murray, Oklahoma

The Broncos very much wanted to land one of the top cornerbacks, but Atlanta snaked the last one away. Kenneth Murray is a player coaches can easily fall in love with though. He’s brilliant on the field but he’s even more valuable as a motivational team member. He’s got leadership skills like Jamal Adams and he seems destined to be a great coach someday.

16. Tampa Bay (PROJ. TRADE W/ATL) – DT Javon Kinlaw, South Carolina

With Tampa spending their free agency dollars on offensive players, they need to focus most of their attention in the draft on that horrid defense. Kinlaw can provide a serious push from the inside to help out the edge players, and he’s got some run-stopping talents to boot.

17. Dallas – CB A.J. Terrell, Clemson

The Cowboys got hit hard by free agency this year, and 2021 won’t be much easier. They need youth at multiple positions. Start with trying to replace Byron Jones in the defensive backfield. Terrell has great length, speed and experience at a winning program.

18. Detroit (PROJ. TRADE W/ MIA THRU PIT) – DE/LB K’Lavon Chaisson, LSU

The Lions continue to rebuild their defensive line with an outside pass-rush threat to complement the interior push provided by Derrick Brown. Chaisson on one side and Trey Flowers on the other could be a disruptive force.

19. Las Vegas (THRU CHI) – LB Patrick Queen, LSU

The Raiders go offense with their first pick; now, the defense. Queen can man the weak side of the linebacking corps and pair with newcomer Cory Littleton to form a speedy, lithe combination.

20. Jacksonville (THRU LAR) – WR Justin Jefferson, LSU

The Jaguars have many needs, so they could go in any number of directions. Bolstering the receiving corps makes sense though. Jefferson paired with D.J. Chark could prove to be tough to defend.

21. Philadelphia - S Xavier McKinney, Alabama

The Eagles have many needs along the defensive backfield as free agency is hitting them hard this year and next. McKinney and Grant Delpit are far and away this year’s best safeties; either one could go here.

22. Minnesota (THRU BUF) – DE A.J. Epenesa, Iowa

Everson Griffen opted out of his current contract, and he’s now entering his 11th year in the league. There is no obvious starting talent on the roster to replace him. Even if the Vikings bring him back on a 1-year deal, having a developmental guy like Epenesa in a rotation behind him makes total sense.

23. New England - QB Justin Herbert, Oregon

Herbert is a reluctant passer, so I’m not 100% sure he’ll be a fit for Belichick, but the Pats have never been shy about gambling on draft picks. The Pats stick with Jarrett Stidham (at least for now) as the starter until they can assess Herbert’s ability to read a defense and deliver a ball with confidence and anticipation.

24. Indianapolis (PROJECTED TRADE W/NO) – QB Jordan Love, Utah State

Indy sees Herbert finally go off the board, and they can’t wait anymore to grab their favorite QB. They find a willing trade partner in New Orleans; they have the fewest picks in the draft this year, so they’re happy to trade out of the first and accumulate some extra selections (the Saints get Indy’s #34 and 75 picks). The Colts hope Love can develop behind Jacoby Brissett and Philip Rivers – both are only likely to stick around for one year.

25. Minnesota - WR Brandon Aiyuk, Arizona State

The Vikings need to replace Stefon Diggs quickly if they want to take advantage of an AFC East without Tom Brady. Aiyuk can slide into the starting lineup immediately.

26. Miami (THRU HOU) - RB J.K. Dobbins, Ohio State

Jordan Howard is not a long-term option, and Kalen Ballage has fallen out of favor. The Dolphins want to bolster their backfield, and Dobbins is a darkhorse candidate to be the first RB off the board. Though he shouldn’t be. In hindsight, Dobbins will appear to be the obvious choice here.

27. Seattle - CB Trevon Diggs, Alabama

The Seahawks need to get back to their Legion of Doom ideals and draft big DBs again. At 6’1”, Diggs will hope to satisfy their craving for a Richard Sherman-type cover corner.

28. Baltimore - C Cesar Ruiz, Michigan

I love a good curveball. Ruiz displayed tremendous skills at the Combine and made a strong case that he’s the top pure interior lineman available this year. With the retirement of Marshal Yanda, there is a serious need along the offensive line.

29. Tennessee - CB Jaylon Johnson, Utah

With Logan Ryan in question and Malcom Butler wearing out his welcome, the Titans need to dip into the draft to solve their cornerback problems.

30. Green Bay - DT Ross Blacklock, TCU

The Packers have had serious problems stopping the run recently. Blacklock has an amazing motor and is highly prized among scouts.

31. LA Chargers (PROJ. TRADE W/SF) - RB D’Andre Swift, Georgia

The Chargers want to get ahead of Kansas City for their preferred replacement for Melvin Gordon (they give up pick #112 in the fourth round as well as #37).

32. Kansas City - RB Jonathan Taylor, Wisconsin

Kansas City needs more help along the defense obviously, but Taylor put to bed the notion that he has too much tread on his tires with an amazing Combine workout.

ROUND TWO

33. Cincinnati – TE Cole Kmet, Notre Dame

34. New Orleans (PROJ. TRADE W/IND THRU WAS) – CB Noah Igbinoghene, Auburn

35. Detroit – QB Jalen Hurts, Oklahoma

36. NY Giants – DE/LB Bradlee Anae, Utah

37. San Francisco (PROJ. TRADE W/LAC) – OT Austin Jackson, USC

38. Carolina – DE Yetur Gross-Matos, Penn State

39. Miami – S Grant Delpit, LSU

40. Houston (VIA ARZ) – DT/DE Marlon Davidson, Auburn

41. Cleveland – LB Jordyn Brooks, Texas Tech

42. Jacksonville – OT Ezra Cleveland, Boise State

43. Chicago (THRU LV) – CB Kristian Fulton, LSU

44. Indianapolis – WR Tee Higgins, Clemson

45. Tampa Bay – RB Clyde Edwards-Helaire, LSU

46. Denver – DT Justin Madubuike, Texas A&M

47. San Francisco (PROJ. TRADE W/ATL) – DE/LB Zack Baun, Wisconsin *

48. NY Jets – WR Laviska Shenault, Colorado +

49. Pittsburgh – QB Jacob Eason, Washington

50. Chicago – G/C Lloyd Cushenberry, LSU +

51. Dallas – S Antoine Winfield, Jr., Minnesota

52. LA Rams – DE/LB Julian Okwara, Notre Dame +

53. Philadelphia – WR Denzel Mims, Baylor

54. Buffalo – WR Jalen Reagor, TCU

55. Baltimore (FROM NE THRU ATL) – NT Raekwon Davis, Alabama

56. Miami (THRU NO) – OT Josh Jones, Houston

57. LA Rams (THRU HOU) – S Jeremy Chinn, Southern Illinois

58. Minnesota – CB Jeff Gladney, TCU

59. Seattle – DT Neville Gallimore, Oklahoma

60. Baltimore – G Shane Lemieux, Oregon

61. Tennessee – DT Jordan Elliott, Missouri

62. Green Bay – QB Jake Fromm, Georgia

63. Kansas City (THRU SF) – CB Damon Arnette, Ohio State

64. Seattle (THRU KC) – DE/LB Curtis Weaver, Boise State

ROUND THREE

65. Cincinnati – CB Cam Dantzler, Mississippi State

66. Washington – TE Hunter Bryant, Washington

67. Detroit – OT Isaiah Wilson, Georgia

68. NY Jets (THRU NYG) – OLB Darrell Taylor, Tennessee

69. Carolina – WR Chase Claypool, Notre Dame

70. Miami – S Kyle Dugger, Lenoir-Rhyne

71. LA Chargers – WR Michael Pittman, USC

72. Arizona – WR Devin Duvernay, Texas

73. Jacksonville – RB Cam Akers, Florida State

74. Cleveland – CB Troy Pride, Jr., Notre Dame

75. New Orleans (PROJ. TRADE W/ IND) – WR K.J. Hamler, Penn State

76. Tampa Bay – C Matt Hennessy, Temple

77. Denver – WR Gabriel Davis, UCF

78. Atlanta – RB Zack Moss, Utah

79. Washington (PROJ. TRADE W/NYJ for OT Trent Williams) – OT Prince Tega Wanogho, Auburn +

80. Las Vegas – LB Akeem Davis-Gaither, Appalachian State

81. Las Vegas (THRU CHI) – S Ashtyn Davis, California +

82. Dallas – DE Jon Greenard, Florida

83. Denver (THRU PIT) – G Ben Bredeson, Michigan

84. LA Rams – DE/LB Terrell Lewis, Alabama +

85. Detroit (THRU PHI) – CB Bryce Hall, Virginia +

86. Buffalo – S Terrell Burgess, Utah

87. New England – TE Adam Trautman, Dayton

88. New Orleans – DE/LB Jabari Zuniga, Florida +

89. Minnesota – LB Malik Harrison, Ohio State

90. Houston – WR Van Jefferson, Florida

91. Las Vegas (THRU SEA VIA HOU) – DE Khalid Kareem, Notre Dame

92. Baltimore – DE/LB Josh Uche, Michigan

93. Tennessee – WR/RB Antonio Gibson, Memphis

94. Green Bay – TE Harrison Bryant, Florida Atlantic

95. Atlanta (PROJ. TRADE W/DEN THRU SF) – DT James Lynch, Baylor

96. Kansas City – G John Simpson, Clemson

97. Cleveland (THRU HOU) – LB Willie Gay, Jr., Mississippi State

98. New England – LB Anfernee Jennings, Alabama

99. NY Giants – C Tyler Biadasz, Wisconsin +

100. New England – WR Bryan Edwards, South Carolina +

101. Seattle – QB James Morgan, Florida International

102. Pittsburgh – OLB Alex Highsmith, Charlotte

103. Philadelphia – LB Logan Wilson, Wyoming

104. LA Rams – CB Josiah Scott, Michigan State

105. Minnesota – CB Amik Robertson, Louisiana Tech

106. Baltimore – LB Evan Weaver, California

ROUND FOUR

107. Cincinnati – LB Davion Taylor, Colorado

108. Washington – LB Troy Dye, Oregon

109. Detroit – RB A.J. Dillon, Boston College

110. NY Giants – OT Lucas Niang, TCU

111. Arizona (THUR MIA) – DE/DT Jason Strowbridge, North Carolina

112. San Francisco (PROJ. TRADE W/LAC) – CB Harrison Hand, Temple

113. Carolina – TE Albert Okwuegbunam, Missouri

114. Arizona – OT Matt Peart, Connecticut

115. Cleveland – C Nick Harris, Washington

116. Jacksonville – DE/OLB Bryce Huff, Memphis

117. Tampa Bay – DT Leki Fotu, Utah +

118. Denver – CB A.J. Green, Oklahoma State

119. Atlanta – QB Anthony Gordon, Washington State

120. NY Jets – LB Jacob Phillips, LSU

121. Las Vegas – DT Davon Hamilton, Ohio State

122. Indianapolis – G Solomon Kindley, Georgia

123. Dallas – TE Jared Pinkney, Vanderbilt

124. Pittsburgh – G Damien Lewis, LSU

125. New England (THRU CHI) – DE Alton Robinson, Syracuse

126. LA Rams – OT Robert Hunt, Louisiana

127. Philadelphia – CB Michael Ojemudia, Iowa

128. Buffalo – OT/G Saahdiq Charles, LSU

129. Baltimore (THRU NE) – WR John Hightower, Boise State

130. New Orleans – WR Donovan Peoples-Jones, Michigan

131. Arizona (THRU HOU) – TE Colby Parkinson, Stanford

132. Minnesota – S Julian Blackmon, Utah

133. Seattle – S Brandon Jones, Texas

134. Atlanta (THRU BAL) – DE Nick Coe, Auburn

135. Pittsburgh (THRU TEN VIA MIAMI) – LB Casey Toohill, Stanford

136. Green Bay – WR James Proche, SMU

137. Jacksonville (THRU SF VIA DEN) – TE Brycen Hopkins, Purdue

138. Kansas City – CB Darnay Holmes, UCLA

139. New England (THRU TB) – S Jordan Fuller, Ohio State

140. Jacksonville (THRU CHI) – C Simon Stepaniak, Indiana

141. Miami – WR Isaiah Coulter, Rhode Island

142. Washington – OT Trey Adams, Washington +

143. Baltimore – LB Cam Brown, Penn State

144. Seattle – G Jonah Jackson, Ohio State

145. Philadelphia – WR Antonio Gandy-Golden, Liberty

146. Philadelphia – RB Anthony McFarland, Maryland

ROUND FIVE

147. Cincinnati – OT Ben Bartch, St. John’s

148. Carolina (THRU WAS) – G Michael Onwenu, Michigan

149. Detroit – WR Lynn Bowden, Jr., Kentucky

150. NY Giants – S Antoine Brooks, Maryland

151. LA Chargers – OT/G Jack Driscoll, Auburn

152. Carolina – CB Kindle Vildor, Georgia Southern

153. Miami (FROM MIA VIA ARZ) – LB Mykal Walker, Fresno State

- ARZ FORFEITED PICK –

154. Miami (FROM JAX VIA PIT) – S Josh Metellus, Michigan

155. Minnesota (FROM CLE VIA BUF) – DE Derrek Tuszka, North Dakota State

156. San Francisco (FROM DEN) – LB/S Tanner Muse, Clemson

157. Jacksonville (FROM ATL VIA BAL) – CB Parnell Motley, Oklahoma

158. NY Jets – RB Darrynton Evans, Appalachian State

159. Las Vegas – RB Lamical Perine, Florida

160. Indianapolis – RB James Robinson, Illinois State

161. Tampa Bay – S J.R. Reed, Georgia

162. Washington (FROM PIT VIA SEA) – G Jon Runyan, Michigan

163. Chicago – RB Josh Kelley, UCLA

164. Dallas – WR Collin Johnson, Texas

165. Jacksonville (FROM LAR) – DE/LB Trevis Gipson, Tulsa

166. Detroit (FROM PHI) – CB Javaris Davis, Auburn

167. Buffalo – TE Jake Breeland, Oregon

168. Philadelphia (FROM NE) – S K’Von Wallace, Clemson

169. New Orleans – CB Essang Bassey, Wake Forest

170. Baltimore (FROM MIN) – DT Khalil Davis, Nebraska

171. Houston – RB Eno Benjamin, Arizona State

172. New England (FROM BAL VIA LAR) – OT Colton McKivitz, West Virginia

173. Miami – G Hakeem Adeniji, Kansas

174. Tennessee – QB Nate Stanley, Iowa

175. Green Bay – S Geno Stone, Iowa

176. San Francisco – TE Devin Asiasi, UCLA

177. Kansas City – DT McTelvin Agim, Arkansas

178. Denver – WR Jauan Johnson, Oregon

179. Dallas – P Braden Mann, Texas A&M

ROUND SIX

180. Cincinnati – RB Rico Dowdle, South Carolina

181. Denver (FROM WAS) – OT Charlie Heck, North Carolina

182. Detroit – LB Shaquille Quarterman, Miami

183. NY Giants – WR Quintez Cephus, Wisconsin

184. Carolina – S Brian Cole II, Mississippi State

185. Miami – DT Carlos Davis, Nebraska

186. LA Chargers – LB David Woodward, Utah State

187. Cleveland (FROM ARZ) – DE Kenny Willekes, Michigan State

188. Buffalo (FROM CLE) – RB DeeJay Dallas, Miami

189. Jacksonville – CB J.K. Guidry, Utah

190. Philadelphia (FROM ATL) – LB Dante Olson, Montana

191. NY Jets – OT/G Calvin Throckmorton, Oregon

192. Green Bay (FROM LV) – WR Quez Watkins, Southern Mississippi

193. Indianapolis – WR K.J. Hill, Ohio State

194. Tampa Bay – OT Yasir Durant, Missouri

195. New England (FROM DEN) – TE Thaddeus Moss, LSU

196. Chicago – TE Dalton Keene, Virginia Tech

197. Indianapolis (FROM DAL VIA MIA) – DT Benito Jones, Mississippi State

198. Pittsburgh – DT Raequan Williams, Michigan State

199. LA Rams – RB Ke’Shawn Vaughn, Vanderbilt

200. Chicago (FROM PHI) – WR Tyler Johnson, Minnesota

201. Minnesota (FROM BUF) – DT Rashard Lawrence, LSU

202. Arizona (FROM NE) – RB Adrian Killins, Jr., Central Florida

203. New Orleans – G Kevin Dotson, Louisiana

204. New England (FROM HOU) – DE Jonathan Garvin, Miami

205. Minnesota – LB/S Khaleke Hudson, Michigan

206. Jacksonville (FROM SEA) – LB Michael Divinity, Jr., LSU *

207. Buffalo (FROM BAL VIA NE) – CB Stanford Samuels, Florida State

208. Green Bay (FROM TEN) – G Logan Stenberg, Kentucky

209. Green Bay – CB John Reid, Penn State

210. San Francisco – WR Omar Bayless, Arkansas State

211. NY Jets (FROM KC) – CB/S Shyheim Carter, Alabama

212. New England – RB Malcolm Perry, Navy

213. New England – K Tyler Bass, Georgia Southern

214. Seattle - LB Michael Pinckney, Miami

ROUND SEVEN

215. Cincinnati – DT Larrell Murchison, NC State

216. Washington – CB Rashad Robinson, James Madison

217. San Francisco (FROM DET) – DT Broderick Washington, Texas Tech

218. NY Giants – FB Brady Ross, Iowa

219. Minnesota (FROM MIA) – WR Isaiah Hodgins, Oregon State

220. LA Chargers – CB Jace Whittaker, Arizona +

221. Carolina – DE D.J. Wonnum, South Carolina

222. Arizona – S L’Jarius Snead, Louisiana Tech

223. Jacksonville – QB Kevin Davidson, Princeton

224. Tennessee (FROM CLE) – G Tremayne Anchrum, Clemson

225. Baltimore (FROM NYJ) – CB Luq Barcoo, San Diego State

226. Chicago (FROM LV) – S Aholi Gilman, Notre Dame

227. Miami (FROM IND) – DE Trevon Hill, Miami

228. Atlanta (FROM TB VIA PHI) – S Kamren Curl, Arkansas

229. Washington (FROM DEN) – FB/TE Kelvin Smith, North Texas

230. New England (FROM ATL) – WR/KR Joe Reed, Virginia

231. Dallas – LB De’Jon Harris, Arkansas

232. Pittsburgh – CB Dane Jackson, Pittsburgh

233. Chicago – K Rodrigo Blankenship, Georgia

234. LA Rams – K Dominik Eberle, Utah State

235. Detroit (FROM PHI VIA NE) – P Michael Turk, Arizona State

236. Green Bay (FROM BUF VIA CLE) – DE James Smith-Williams, NC State

237. Tennessee (FROM NE VIA DEN) – DE Oluwole Betiku, Jr., Illinois

238. NY Giants (FROM NO) – LB Jordan Mack, Virginia

239. Buffalo (FROM MIN) – QB Steven Montez, Colorado

240. Houston – G Danny Pinter, Ball State

241. Tampa Bay (FROM SEA VIA NE) – DE/OLB Chauncey Rivers, Mississippi State

242. Green Bay (FROM BAL) – LB Shaun Bradley, Temple

243. Tennessee – LB Justin Strnad, Wake Forest

244. Cleveland (FROM GB) – S Kenny Robinson, West Virginia *

245. San Francisco – G Tyre Phillips, Mississippi State

246. Miami (FROM KC) – LB Cam Gill, Wagner

247. NY Giants – DE Nasir Player, East Tennessee State

248. Houston – TE Charlie Taumoepeau, Portland State

249. Minnesota – QB Tyler Huntley, Utah

250. Houston – LB Joe Bachie, Michigan State

251. Miami – QB Cole McDonald, Hawaii

252. Denver – CB Lavert Hill, Michigan

253. Minnesota – G Netane Muti, Fresno State +

254. Denver – LB Markus Bailey, Purdue

255. NY Giants – RB Raymond Calais, Louisiana

+ denotes injury concerns

* denotes character concerns

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yahoo-shutdown-corner-blog · 7 years ago

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2018 NFL Preview: The Bills ended that playoff drought, but they're still rebuilding

yahoo

Yahoo Sports is previewing all 32 teams as we get ready for the NFL season, counting down the teams one per weekday in reverse order of our initial 2018 power rankings. No. 1 will be revealed on Aug. 1, the day before the Hall of Fame Game kicks off the preseason.

(Yahoo Sports graphics by Amber Matsumoto)

We want improvement to be linear. A rookie quarterback bursts on the scene with a great season, and we believe he’ll be an MVP candidate the next year. It often does not go that way.

And when a team breaks through and unexpectedly makes the playoffs, as the Buffalo Bills did for the first time since the 1999 season, we imagine the next step being forward, not back.

The Bills are realistic. Breaking the longest playoff drought in the NFL was a great accomplishment in the 2017 campaign, but building a winner is a long process. The Bills went from seven wins in 2016 to nine last season. That doesn’t mean an 11-win season is next.

“We had nine wins this year, [and] we’re trying to get more, but it doesn’t always happen for various reasons,” Bills general manager Brandon Beane said, according to the team’s transcripts. “It’s a competitive league.”

[Yahoo Fantasy Football leagues are open: Sign up now for free]

The Bills were a weak playoff team. They were outscored by 57 points, the fifth-worst point differential for a playoff team in NFL history. They ranked 21st among 32 NFL teams in Football Outsiders’ DVOA per-play metric, and 20th in Jeff Sagarin’s analytics rankings for USA Today. The Bills were outgained by minus-0.6 yards per play, one of the worst marks in football, significantly behind the 0-16 Cleveland Browns’ mark of minus-0.2. The Bills benefitted from a 5-2 record in games decided by seven points or less, a plus-9 turnover margin and a light schedule. Oh, and a miracle Andy Dalton-to-Tyler Boyd touchdown that was a highlight for the ages.

The Bills didn’t proceed like they had arrived. In fact, the roster got turned over a little more.

The Bills traded quarterback Tyrod Taylor, who the new regime seemed eager to dump from Day 1. In came free agent AJ McCarron as the temporary starter. A couple major trades put them in position to draft Wyoming quarterback Josh Allen, a risk that will define the Sean McDermott era.

The offensive line was decimated. Tackle Cordy Glenn was traded, center Eric Wood retired and Pro Bowl guard Richie Incognito retired, un-retired, and then was cut loose before a weird public meltdown. That’s a lot to lose from one unit.

The skill positions are still surprisingly thin — if LeSean McCoy misses any time, it’ll be ugly — and the defense is good but not great. If you looked at the depth chart, you wouldn’t guess this was a playoff team last season.

Like many clubs near the bottom of these rankings, the quarterback question looms over everything. Buffalo is smitten with Allen, one of the most divisive prospects in recent draft history — either you love his otherworldly physical talent or you don’t see how he can succeed in the NFL after being average in the Mountain West Conference. And he wasn’t cheap: The Bills traded Glenn to move up nine spots and then sent that pick, their second-round selection and another second-round pick acquired in last year’s Sammy Watkins trade to move up to No. 7 for Allen.

“You’ve got to have a franchise quarterback,” Beane said before the draft. “That’s one of the main jobs of a GM is to find a franchise quarterback, it’s a quarterback league, I’ll say it every single time. You have to have one.”

The hope in Buffalo is that Allen’s amazing physical gifts lead to NFL success. If you built a quarterback on “Madden,” you’d build Allen. But he needs a ton of work. In a perfect world he’d sit and develop for a year, but that seems unlikely when McCarron is the only quarterback ahead of him. Allen is the biggest piece of the Bills’ rebuilding project.

And make no mistake: Even with last season’s success, it’s still a rebuild.

Buffalo Bills first-round pick Josh Allen poses with his jersey after the draft. (AP)

The grade mostly depends on your opinion of Josh Allen, and there are extreme views on both sides. I don’t love the price Buffalo paid for him or the situation he finds himself in, which we’ll talk about in a moment. I did love the Tremaine Edmunds pick, the second of Buffalo’s two first-round selections. The incredibly athletic Virginia Tech linebacker has a chance to transform the Bills’ defense, and perhaps do that soon. Star Lotulelei was the big-ticket free-agent addition, and he fills a role as a big and active defensive tackle. Pass rusher Trent Murphy, signed from the Washington Redskins, could pay off. I’m not an AJ McCarron fan, but the Bills didn’t pay much for him. The losses on the offensive line will be tough to overcome. The offseason moves were fine, though there’s a better chance Allen is a bust than a superstar.

GRADE: C-

While Sean McDermott’s first season also included the impossibly bad Nathan Peterman-for-Tyrod Taylor switch, you can’t argue with the overall results. Before last season people wondered if the Bills might be tanking, and McDermott took them to the playoffs. McDermott maximized his roster. We’ll see if that carries over, but it’s a nice start for the new coach.

The Bills rely heavily on LeSean McCoy. They need to because who else is there? Kelvin Benjamin doesn’t get enough separation to be a legit No. 1 receiver, Zay Jones was a disappointment as a rookie and presumed third receiver Jeremy Kerley doesn’t scare anyone. Tight end Charles Clay is fine, but he can’t carry an offense. If McCoy goes down the backup is Chris Ivory, who is 30 and fading fast. Buffalo’s quarterbacks are unproven at best, and the offensive line lost its three best players. Aside from McCoy, there likely won’t be one above-average starter on offense. It wouldn’t be a surprise if the Bills finish near the bottom of the league in many offensive categories.

Even if you didn’t like Josh Allen, who couldn’t even make first- or second-team all-Mountain West last season, you probably agreed that his best scenario for him was to sit and learn, then be surrounded by a good supporting cast when the time was right. Buffalo doesn’t check either of those boxes. AJ McCarron could hold the starting job all year, but pressure will be intense to put Allen in the lineup. And if Allen starts at some point this season – it’s a great bet he will, and we probably can’t rule out Allen for Week 1 – he’ll be surrounded by an offensive supporting cast that is as thin as you’ll find in the NFL. Allen is an intriguing prospect. He’s big, athletic and has amazing arm strength. But there has to be a fear that all of his deficiencies will be magnified in a less-than-ideal situation.

It’s LeSean McCoy in a landslide. Recall the rundown of offensive skill position talent above. Now imagine that offense without McCoy. He is still a great player, but he turns 30 this season and has a lot of mileage on his tires. And the Bills can’t decrease his workload. McCoy’s 59 receptions were 10 more than any other Bills player last season. He had 287 carries last year, 203 more than any teammate. One of these years McCoy is going to start hitting the wall, and the Bills aren’t prepared for that day. The Bills have some very good players on defense, like Tre’Davious White, Micah Hyde, Jerry Hughes, Lorenzo Alexander and even Vontae Davis, a reclamation signing, at cornerback. But McCoy is all the Bills have on offense.

From Yahoo’s Andy Behrens: Writing a Buffalo fantasy blurb just feels wrong. That fact that we’re presenting any level of fantasy spin on this flaming mess of an offense is, frankly, irresponsible. This team has conveniently paired the league’s worst receiving corps with a dreadful collection of young QBs. It’s an offense to avoid. Here’s hoping LeSean McCoy can escape from Buffalo while he’s still a productive, dynamic runner. Shady’s yards per carry dipped last season (from 5.4 to 4.0), but that wasn’t entirely on him. McCoy finished third among all backs in evaded tackles (97), which tells you there’s still life in his soon-to-be 30-year-old legs.

Unfortunately, it looks as if McCoy will be the featured runner for a team that averages 14-16 points per game. Guys like that don’t generally deliver RB1-level stats.

[Juggernaut Index: Fantasy outlook on the Bills.]

[Yahoo Fantasy Football leagues are open: Sign up now for free]

The Bills were the only team in the NFL last season that didn’t have one player record more than four sacks. Jerry Hughes and Shaq Lawson tied for the team lead with four each. The Bills need a lot more from them (or someone) this season, especially 2016 first-round pick Lawson, who has been a disappointment. There have been reports his roster spot could be in jeopardy. Rookie Tremaine Edmunds was seen as a possible situational pass rusher before the draft, but the Bills have him at middle linebacker. If the Bills’ pass rush improves, it’s probably because Hughes bounced back or Lawson emerged.

CAN ZAY JONES BE THE PLAYMAKER THE OFFENSE NEEDS?

I’m hesitant to bury any second-year player, especially one that set an FBS record for career catches. But Jones showed nothing last season, then he had a terrible offseason. The low point was a bizarre incident in which he was bloody, walking around a Los Angeles-area apartment building naked and had to reportedly be restrained from jumping out a window. Then, in May, Jones had knee surgery that knocked him out of the rest of the Bills’ offseason program. He also had shoulder surgery in January. Jones had just 316 yards last season. Buffalo needs him to take a huge step in Year 2, but that doesn’t look like a great bet.

Nobody saw a playoff berth coming last season, so maybe it’s best to not rule that out. The defense was good at creating turnovers, and McCoy is a do-it-all offensive star. It’s hard to imagine AJ McCarron or Josh Allen being a top-10 quarterback this season, but both have their positive attributes. Many of the players who took Buffalo to the postseason are back, and another playoff berth has to be possible.

I don’t want to rain on the Bills’ parade, but the worst-case scenario is really bad. The quarterback situation is not set up for success this season, and Josh Allen probably will play before he’s ready. If LeSean McCoy isn’t a superhero again, who else makes plays? If McCoy misses time, it might be one of the worst skill-position groups we’ve seen in a while. The offensive line is one of the worst in the league. The Bills don’t rush the passer well. I like the secondary, but creating turnovers isn’t necessarily a repeatable skill. It would stink for Bills fans to see their team follow up a playoff berth with a huge step back, but a huge step back could happen.

Maybe I’m not seeing the positives with this roster, the same that earned the Bills a wild-card spot. But I can see how it can all go sour. I envision a punch-less offense being led by Josh Allen before Thanksgiving (or much sooner), and him struggling because he’s not ready. The defense is solid but not good enough to overcome an offense that’s a LeSean McCoy injury away from Kelvin Benjamin being its best player. With a few bad breaks, the Bills could end up in play for a top-five pick. That might not be the worst thing in the long term. This is still a team that’s in the middle of a long build.

32. Cleveland Browns 31. Indianapolis Colts 30. New York Jets 29. Arizona Cardinals

– – – – – – –

Frank Schwab is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @YahooSchwab

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vioncentral-blog · 7 years ago

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It's an Island Ting: Kahuku High in Oahu Churns Out NFL Studs Like Schools in Florida and Texas

https://www.vionafrica.cf/its-an-island-ting-kahuku-high-in-oahu-churns-out-nfl-studs-like-schools-in-florida-and-texas/

It's an Island Ting: Kahuku High in Oahu Churns Out NFL Studs Like Schools in Florida and Texas

The harsh lights in the wrestling room came on at 5 a.m., and it wasn’t pretty. Members of the Kahuku High football team groaned and rubbed their eyes and made their way toward the men’s room muttering f-bombs, their devout faith notwithstanding. The Red Raiders moved like zombies, the difference being that unlike the undead, these teens were here of their own volition. It was their call to show up for Hell Week: meetings and practice by day, then bed down beside one another; rise and repeat the spartan cycle.

When the heavens opened just before dawn, drenching the team 15 minutes into its hour-long workout, the players embraced it, whooping, smiling and sticking tongues out, grateful for any break in the grim routine. Hell Week wasn’t quite half over on this Wednesday in late July, and everyone was on edge. Hard feelings had spilled into the weight room the previous morning when a handful of receivers and defensive backs came to blows. They were tired. They were sore. Nobody was getting enough sleep. And that was the point. “Hell Week isn’t about recovery,” explained Samson Reed, a senior D-end committed to play at Virginia. (He’s one of eight Kahuku players with FBS offers.) “It’s more of a weeding out—finding out who really wants to be here, who wants to sacrifice.”

Like many of his teammates, Reed is the descendent of Pacific Islanders, members of the Mormon church who came to Oahu as labor missionaries. His father, Tanoai, was an all-state tackle for the Red Raiders in 1990 and played two years at Hawaii. Alas, Tanoai never showed up for his senior season. One night in Honolulu he stepped in when a handful of out-of-towners were about to get their asses kicked by some locals. Those clueless haoles, it turned out, were on the film crew of the epic bust-to-be Waterworld. Fast forward a decade, to 2002, when Tanoai was serving as Dwayne Johnson’s body double in The Scorpion King and the two men discovered they shared an uncle. (They were, in fact, cousins.) Reed has been the Rock’s double ever since. Samson’s mother, Suzanne, is also a stunt-woman, and I recently posed to her a question that one seldom gets to ask: “Was that you I saw recently in a YouTube video, falling from a great height while engulfed in flames?” She smiled. It had indeed been her.

Sorry, Texas and Ohio. Apologies, Florida and Pennsylvania. The most interesting, exotic, surprising football program in the U.S. is not on the mainland, it turns out. Kahuku is located near Laie (pronounced lah-EE-ay), a town of 6,000 not far from some of the world’s best-known surf breaks. Before it became a gathering place for Mormons, it was a pu’uhonua, or sanctuary city. Ancient Hawaiians who were judged to have violated the sacred laws of kapu—mortal transgressions ranging from eating turtle to crossing the king’s shadow—found safe haven here. No such luck for visiting opponents these days.

Despite its small size—roughly 100 male graduates each year—Kahuku has fed 17 players into the NFL since 1970, and many multiples of that into the collegiate ranks. In 2006 and ’07 there were six former Red Raiders on NFL rosters, tying Kahuku with a handful of (much, much) larger schools for the most active alumni in the league.

Those success stories don’t include the local boys rustled from the district by the private academies an hour’s drive south in Honolulu: Punahou, alma mater of one Barack Obama; Kamehameha, with its $11 billion endowment; and the Saint Louis School, a QB factory that produced the Titans’ Marcus Mariota. Football isn’t combat, but Kahuku’s gridiron battles with those preppies look like a kind of class warfare. Unseen in postcards of Waimea Bay and the Banzai Pipeline, unmentioned in tours at the popular Polynesian Cultural Center, are the people in this district who are just getting by.

Kahuku draws from a handful of small communities across Oahu’s North Shore. Sure, there are horse farms, golf courses and seven-figure oceanside mansions. But tucked away on side streets, seldom witnessed by tourists, you’ll find plenty of structures that could stand some serious renovation. The pinch of privation is reflected more by the buildings that aren’t there. Hawaii’s chronic shortage of affordable housing is keenly felt in this district, where many parents work multiple jobs and where families often pack up and move to the mainland to stay with relatives in Utah or SoCal. Any place the rent’s not so steep.

That’s “the biggest struggle in this community,” says one Kahuku parent, who shares that many of his students live in homes crowded with “10, 15, 20 people under one roof, sometimes more.” Hell Week isn’t as hellish as it might seem for guys already accustomed to sleeping on the floor.

There was defensive coordinator Sola Soliai (so-lee-EYE) in the rain during Hell Week, pushing players through a series of footwork drills involving pizza-sized hoops that, ideally, remained still. A bouncing hoop betrayed sloppy footwork, earning a rebuke from Soliai. “Let’s go, guys! Slow feet don’t eat!”

One of the reasons this team has won eight Division-I state championships since 2000: When a Kahuku coach references hunger, many of his players can relate. Football isn’t just a fall sport to these guys, not just an avocation to put on college applications. It is nothing less than a passage to a better life.

That’s not an uncommon story. Making this one unique beyond its South Pacific setting is the magnitude of success. For its size (this district counts 8,000-odd people), Kahuku cranks out an implausible number of good and great players. Those state championships and Super Bowl rings—the brothers Kemoeatu, Chris and Ma’ake, have three between them—are the dividends of a closeness, of strong bonds between members of this tightly knit community. In her family, says Kaui Fonoimoana (fono-EE-mo-wan-na), mother of a pair of Kahuku players, “cousins are like siblings; nieces and nephews are like sons and daughters. We watch out for each other the same way.”

“They are so freakin’ good over there,” sighs Darren Johnson, an ex–Kahuku QB who now coaches Campbell High, on the west side of the island. In his next breath Johnson makes the point that Kahuku’s many talented players are supported, fed, sheltered—borne along—by the figurative village in which they’ve been raised. “Morals, standards, expectations—the bar in that community is very high.”

Marco Garcia

As are the stakes. “For a lot of us, this is our only way to get to college,” says Samson Kapule-Si’ilata, whom I’ve come to call “the other Samson.” Unlike Samson Reed, Si’iLata (also a senior) is scrapping for attention from college coaches. He’s a tad undersized for a D-lineman (6' 3", 255 pounds on the roster; shorter and lighter in real life), but he’s clever and tenacious, with a lot of upside. He struggled to get on the field last year, but this season he’s starting and will have, in the end, a dozen or so games to earn a scholarship, his ticket off da rock. “This is a way we can support our families,” says the son of a longshoreman. “Football is everything to us.”

I met the other Samson in May, after one of Kahuku’s spring practices. The state athletic board had recently outlawed pads and helmets during spring football. The Red Raiders responded, as far as I could tell, by pretending they were wearing pads and helmets. Collisions were frequent and serious, and it so happened that on this Monday the Samsons and their defensive linemates were getting the better of the big boys across from them, to the deep exasperation of offensive coordinator Faaesea Mailo (FAH-ah-eh-say-ah mah-EE-low), an ex–Kahuku star who made it all the way to the Jets’ practice squad in 2002. Gathering the O-line at the end of practice, Mailo offered this counsel: “Go home, say a prayer, eat your favorite meal—whatever gets your spirits up. Come back tomorrow and kick somebody’s ass!”

Behind them, evening breezes stirred a line of palm trees, the sky above streaked orange and pink—a languorous tableau at stark odds with the scene below. “I don’t need it to be perfect,” Mailo went on. “But I need it to be absolutely ape s— violent!” Then, much calmer: “Let’s see if we can do that tomorrow.”

Around the turn of this century, Kahuku became the first high school team to make the haka part of its pregame ritual. Since 2011, they’ve performed a version called the Kaipahua Kura—Maori for “We are the Red Raiders”—that was composed by Seamus Fitzgerald, a New Zealand native who also happens to be Kahuku’s rugby coach. And while many opponents admired the Red Raiders’ haka, others took umbrage. Why should we be forced to stand around for two minutes watching our foes shout at us in a foreign language? Then, shortly before the 2015 state championship, officials rendered this buzzkill verdict: Any team that did a haka while facing its opponent would be flagged 15 yards for unsportsmanlike conduct.

Having reflected deeply on the matter for about 20 seconds, Red Raiders coaches concluded, Screw it. We’ll take the penalty. The field position seemed a small price to pay for electrifying their fans and spelunking in the heads of the Saint Louis Crusaders, who got rolled that night, 39–14.

Marco Garcia

Implicit in the Maori words they declaim midway through that haka, says Fitzgerald, is a vow to compete “for our families and community, who have been through much.” Asked to elaborate, he shares a sad story. He wrote this haka after the school’s tumultuous 2010 season. Undefeated Kahuku had been steamrolling toward another state championship game, only to be disqualified because of a clerical error made several years earlier. Kahuku appealed the decision but lost. Several weeks later, one of the team’s co-captains, Keoni Tafuna, a linebacker with a 3.8 GPA and NCAA dreams, hanged himself. Distraught by the death of his friend, a second Kahuku student took his own life. And that is why, when they get to the part about families and community, they make a hoop with their arms, as if embracing a loved one. Then they point to the sky.

As H.G. Bissinger wrote about Odessa, Texas, nearly three decades ago, “Football stood at the very core of what the town was about. . . . It had nothing to do with entertainment and everything to do with how people felt about themselves.” That Friday Night Lights fervor runs just as hot on the North Shore, and it comes with a Polynesian flavor. Well over half the players on Kahuku’s roster trace their ancestry to Samoa, whose culture still hews to an old-school system of behavior and responsibilities called Fa’a Samoa (“the Samoan Way”). That, fused with the tenets of the Mormon church, exerts a powerful influence on this community.

Among the duties of a Samoan chief, or matai, is dealing with fa’alavelave (fa-AH-lovie-lovie), which translates to “much trouble,” an apt description of the intrigue and grievances awaiting any coach at Kahuku, whose many blessings—unrivaled tradition; an abundance of talent—do not include job security. The 2017 Red Raiders are playing for their fourth coach in five years. Word on the North Shore is that the new guy could stick.

Makoa Freitas slides his right foot out of a flip-flop—islanders refer to them as slippers—and points to a four-inch scar. The pink tissue covers the Lisfranc joint complex, where he ruptured a ligament during his third NFL season, thus ending a promising career on the Colts’ O-line that might have lasted as long as his father’s. (Before Rockne Freitas served as chancellor at the University of Hawaii–West Oahu, he played 11 NFL seasons at tackle.)

“I don’t know about that,” says Makoa. Like most O-linemen I’ve known, he is wise, without ego and stingy with the spoken word. But beneath his kind eyes and gentle demeanor are steel and fire. “Do you think anyone feels sorry for you?!” he can be heard bellowing during conditioning drills as his players approach the apex of their misery. “Stop feeling sorry for yourselves!”

After playing his high school ball at Kamehameha, Freitas starred on the same Arizona O-line as his older brother, Makai. The younger Freitas was known for his strength—he maxed out at 515 pounds on the bench press—and high football IQ. “Plays smart. Understands angles and positioning,” one NFL scout wrote of him before the 2003 draft. “Uses hands well, has a strong upper body and is tough and intense. Will play hurt.”

Rather than feel sorry for himself when his playing career abruptly ended, Freitas earned a double master’s in business and accounting at Indiana. By day, he’s the assistant controller at BYU-Hawaii, a few miles south of Kahuku. (“That’s right,” he told me with a smile at the end of a recent Monday practice. “After this, I’m going back to the office.”)

Befitting a CPA and former pupil of the principled, cerebral Tony Dungy, Freitas is fair, thoughtful and reserved—right up to the moment his displeasure with the O-line reaches critical mass, after which his raised voice can be heard from the Superette across the Kamehameha Highway.

On Nov. 4, Freitas’s Red Raiders will take on undefeated Mililani for the state’s OIA (or public school) championship. The winner of that game will be favored to advance to Hawaii’s “open” title game a fortnight later, where, if you had to bet, they’ll run into Saint Louis, whose best-known alumnus (aside from former governor John Burns and Saint Damien, renowned for his work with lepers on the island of Molokai) is the aforementioned Mariota, one link in a chain of excellent Crusaders QBs that includes Timmy Chang, Jason Gesser and, most recently, Tua Tagovailoa (TONGUE-oh-vae-LO-ah), now a freshman at Alabama.

But the next great passer off this island will not come from Saint Louis—not if a certain Mohawk-rocking 16-year-old has anything to say about it.

Dual-threat, quicksilver Sol-Jay Maiava made national headlines in June 2016. It was an exciting day at Laie Park, in the shadow of the gleaming Mormon Temple. Members of Michigan’s coaching staff, including khaki-clad head man Jim Harbaugh, were in town for a satellite camp. Maiava, still an eighth-grader, wanted to participate. But he had a conflict. With an eye toward his freshman season at Kahuku, he was taking part in the Red Raiders’ spring drills. To attend the Michigan camp he would have to miss a Kahuku practice. “If you’re not coming to practice,” then-coach Vavae Tata told him, half-seriously, “you better get an offer.” Maiava suspected Tata was joking, since Top 10 college programs don’t usually hand out scholarships to eighth-graders.

Usually. The Michigan camp included a QB skills competition in which Maiava, quite simply, laid waste to the field, a man among boys. Harbaugh, renowned for his ability to identify and develop passers, noticed. Throughout the day he gravitated toward Maiava, tweaking the boy’s mechanics, getting to know him. Afterward, Harbaugh offered the kid a scholarship.

Strong-armed, accurate and blessed with an afterburner-like burst, Maiava is a transcendent talent working at a distinct disadvantage at Kahuku, which has no history of grooming great passers. The school is known for mass-producing trench warriors—titanic linemen with surprisingly sweet feet—and ball-hawking, headhunting D-backs. Down through the decades, the Red Raiders’ QB has usually been a caretaker, called upon to pass five to 10 times per game. Even as run-and-shoot offenses sprung up around the island, Kahuku stuck with its Elephant package: two tight ends, full-house backfield, not even the slightest pretense that a pass might be coming.

Marco Garcia

Those offensive shortcomings were exposed last season in losses to the defending national champion, Bishop Gorman (from Las Vegas), and then to Saint Louis in the state title game, which Maiava started as a ninth-grader. “We played four other [nationally] ranked teams,” recalls Gorman tackle Jacob Isaia, “and Kahuku was as good as any of them. But those guys gotta change their game up. Everybody knows all they do is run.”

To ease Maiava’s transition, Freitas brought in a quarterbacks coach, ex–Winnipeg Blue Bomber Brian Ah Yet. When Freitas met with Sol-Jay and his father, Luaao Peters, it didn’t take long for the latter to bring up the Elephant package in the room. Casual mention was made of feelers Sol-Jay was receiving from various coaches, on and off the island.

After much discussion and prayer, a decision was made: Maiava would stay put. “We have a saying down here,” Peters told me. “Red Raider for life.” (And in a flash, all the RR4L bumper stickers on the North Shore made sense.) The upshot? Kahuku’s running game is flat-out firing this season. Enoch Nawahine (NOW-uh-HEEN-ay), whose modesty is belied by his leopard-print cleats, is a hard-nosed inside runner who can be balletic when needed. And while erratic earlier in the season—Kahuku likely led the nation in NPBORH (Number of Passes Bounced Off Receivers’ Helmets)—the team’s fledgling aerial attack was vastly improved by the end of September.

There is one aspect of Maiava’s game that could use some fine-tuning. Dude needs to learn how to slide. At the end of a weaving 30-yard run against Aiea High on Sept. 1, he was piledriven into the turf, separating his left shoulder and sealing Kahuku’s fate the following Saturday. With their QB out, the Red Raiders bowed 17–0 to the 16th-ranked team in the country, Utah’s Bingham High, in Las Vegas.

Even without its starting QB, Kahuku stood a fair chance in that game, fielding a superb defense coordinated by one of the program’s more intriguing characters.

The defensive meeting started at 4 p.m. in a cruelly un-air-conditioned classroom. The first guys to get there congregated near a large fan in a front corner. This was back in August, and the Red Raiders were two days away from their opener against Leilehua, whose offense they’d gathered to dissect. “What are your pre-snap reads on the offensive line?” asked Sola Soliai, all business.

Twenty voices answered: “The left tackle.”

“If he’s leaning forward?”

“It’s a run.”

“How can you tell if it’s a pass?”

“He’s leaning back.”

“Like he’s taking a dump.” The coach went on, toggling between Leilehua-specific instructions and more general counsel. Like: “If you’re struggling, that’s part of the path. Embrace it! Go through the bumps, the cuts, the pain. That’s gonna make you a man.” Then he copped to a struggle of his own.

Soliai returned to the sideline this season after two years away. “And to be honest,” he confided in his players, “I’m still trying to find my groove. It’s pissing me off, but I gotta keep going.” He was an all-state cornerback on Kahuku’s 2001 state championship team, and he used that success as a springboard to . . . where, exactly? “Nowhere, man,” he says with a rueful smile. “I’m not gonna lie—school wasn’t my ting. By the time I graduated from Kahuku, I had two kids already. So I went to junior college, came back here and just started working, taking care of my kids. And that was it, man. I didn’t go anywhere.”

Today Soliai is a gifted coordinator with a knack for making life miserable for opposing QBs by summoning stunts and blitzes—“darkening the gloomy and aggravating the dreadful,” to recycle a compliment paid by Samuel Johnson to John Milton.

As coaches often put it, the guys they’re talking to and shouting at “don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.” And this guy cares a lot. When his playing days came to an end, Soliai couldn’t bear to tear himself from the game. So, with a boom box, a rope ladder, plastic hoops and coconut husks painted orange like cones, all pulled in a gardening wagon to a distressed patch of grass outside Laie Elementary, he started organizing a regular workout—agility drills and wind sprints interspersed with kernels of wisdom. Turnout for the first session was nine youngsters. Now he’ll typically get around 100, including athletes from rival high schools and college stars home during their offseasons. Afterward, members of the Rebel Squad, as he calls it, are welcome to join the Soliai family for dinner, usually a big pot of spaghetti.

Watching Sola pour his time and energy into this, I suspected I was witnessing a man making amends for mistakes in his prodigal youth. “What’s in it for you?” I asked.

“I do it for our people,” he said, talking about the North Shore youth. “For as many guys as we have who make it big, there are still too many who fall through the cracks. I wanna catch those guys before it’s too late. I want them to go further than me.”

Kickoff against Leilehua was two hours away, but a couple thousand Red Raiders fans had already staked out their seats, happy to talk story and take in the JV game. For families with young children, the most coveted real estate is the set of bleachers curved around the makai (“ocean-facing”) end zone, where on a half moon of trampled grass a score of laughing kids played overlapping games of pickup football, all of them tackle. The games were briefly interrupted on this evening when half the children peeled off to greet and hug a shambling 68-year-old who’d arrived with his wife. Junior Ah You (whose serene, smiling spouse is Almira—friends call them Beauty and the Beast) set up his folding chair behind the makai end zone, facing the field on which he’d once been a holy terror.

A gathering of Red Raider Nation might easily be mistaken for a convention of bouncers and bodyguards: legions of thickset men with oaken calves and powerful upper bodies, exuding a stolid, low-grade menace. Compared to many of those hulks, the 6' 3" Ah You, who looks to be around his playing weight of 233, is on the svelte side. There’s not much about him to suggest that he is, arguably, the best player ever to come off this island. But Ah You was Von Miller before Von Miller, an edge rusher and sackmeister before the NFL fully appreciated such specialists. So he took his game north of the border, to the pass-happy Canadian Football League, and got paid. Which is how a native of American Samoa, whose parents moved to Laie when he was a boy, is now beloved in Montreal and a member of the CFL Hall of Fame. (The Ah You line is not exactly petering out. While BYU whiffed spectacularly in passing on Junior, sending him into the arms of then-WAC rival Arizona State, his younger brother, Sale, did play for LaVell Edwards in Provo. The brothers later sent two sons apiece to BYU; a fifth, Sale’s oldest, Jasen, is the Cougars’ director of football athletic relations. Jasen’s son Chaz, a four-star safety, is a freshman there this season too.)

Marco Garcia

Despite the presence of Maiava and his 6' 5", 270-pound left tackle–bodyguard, Enokk Vimahi (whose suitors include Nebraska, Ole Miss and USC), the unquestioned alpha of Kahuku’s 2017 team is Miki Ah You, a sculpted, speedy, unfairly handsome junior linebacker. (BYU offered him when he was a ninth-grader; Oregon followed suit in June.) And there was Miki in the third quarter against Leilehua, knifing off the edge to blindside the QB for a 12-yard sack. Forty or so yards away, his grandfather grinned broadly.

When I asked Miki what motivated him, whom he played for, he paused and chose these words carefully: “For the foundation that previous generations laid down for us, and for the guys coming after us.”

He’s not always this reflective, such as when he addressed the defense a few days before the team left for Vegas. “Last year we went up there and got f—– up,” he snarled, recalling that loss to Gorman. “Some of you guys are playin’ around too much. If you’re not gonna be physical, don’t come. We’re gonna go up there and punch ’em in the mouth.”

The serial maulings meted out by the Red Raiders are but one manifestation of a broader trend. From Utah to Oahu, Pago Pago to Melbourne, Polynesian players are flocking to this cousin of rugby in ever-increasing numbers. And their chances of being good at football are probably much better than yours.

In the last U.S. census, in 2010, 1.2 million Americans identified as Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander (NHPI)—roughly one-third of a percent of the 309 million people in this country. And yet: Of the 1,696 players in the NFL last season, 70 of them—4.1 %—were Polynesian.

Part of that is genetics. Many islanders are large, bulky men with low centers of gravity. Part of it is culture. Jesse Sapolu, a native Samoan who won four Super Bowls with the 49ers, explains it this way: “The thing about Poly kids, they grow up in a household where there’s”—here he’s thoughtful in choosing his words—“a chiefly protocol. There’s a huge emphasis on humility, on respect for elders, family and community.”

Who says graveyards are just for grieving? On Sept. 3, with the Red Raiders sitting pretty at 4–0 and having outscored opponents by a collective 152–13, the extended Fonoimoana clan gathered in a cemetery just behind the 7-Eleven in Hau’ula, six miles south of the high school and across the Kam Highway from the Pacific. The mood was cheerful, festive. As on the first Sunday of every month, they were observing Family Home Evening, an occasion to catch up, say a prayer or two, and sing some songs. When this afternoon’s speaker asked if anyone had anything else they wanted to share, Kana and Mana Fonoimoana—sophomore rising stars in the Kahuku secondary—remained silent . . . until their mother, Kaui, glared at them.

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This was three days before the Red Raiders flew to Las Vegas, a trip made possible by financial donations and plate-lunch purchases from many of the 50-odd Fonoimoanas assembled at Family Home Evening. Now the boys rose to thank them personally. Intense and predatory on the field, they are perpetually grinning and happy-go-lucky off it—so it was surprising to hear Kana’s voice crack as he assured his people he would be playing for them in Vegas, and for all their ancestors who’d donned Kahuku red. As he spoke he stood beside the gravestone of his great-grandfather, Kosena, a Red Raiders quarterback who passed away 10 weeks earlier, leaving behind, according to his obituary, 55 grandchildren and 64 great-grandchildren.

Not all of those descendants made the trip to Vegas. It only seemed that way, to see the army of Kahuku faithful sporting customized FONOIMOANA T-shirts, sharing the stands at UNLV’s Sam Boyd Stadium with legions of Reeds and Ah Yous, Kanihos and Alapas, Nawahines and Loos, and thousands of other red-clad pilgrims. A good portion of that horde stuck around after the game, in no rush to leave the grassy area they’d staked out for tailgating. And while you couldn’t find a beer to save your life (#MormonTailgate), there was plenty of music and laughter. Red Raider Nation knew it would get Maiava back (he looked sharp in his return three weeks later, passing for 202 yards in a 45–6 rout of Campbell) and that its team remained the favorite to win Hawaii’s OIA title.

So it came to pass that Kahuku lost the game but won the party. And how often can you say that about a bunch of Latter-day Saints?

On a recent flight from San Francisco to Honolulu my plane swung west over the southern tip of the Big Island before vectoring north toward Oahu. For five-or-so minutes we were following the path sailed by HMS Resolution in 1779, shortly after its renowned captain, one James Cook, came to grief. Upon killing the great explorer, the natives baked him in an underground oven—not to eat him, mind you, but to expedite the removal of flesh. The bones of such a powerful man were, to them, a source of immense mana.

Native Hawaiians believed—many still do—that their world was guided and influenced by mana, a kind of mystical energy, a force “present in the atmosphere of life” and “manifested by results which can only be ascribed to its operation,” wrote British missionary and anthropologist Robert Codrington in 1891.

When Vai Sikahema describes the North Shore as a place that “reeks of power, spiritual and physical,” he is referring, knowingly or not, to mana. Sikahema, an All-Pro kick returner with the Cardinals in 1987, is a native Tongan who lived in Laie as a boy. He pinpoints another characteristic that, he believes, may predispose Polynesians to football success: “For a lot of people who live in the States, their connection to their warrior heritage”—here he’s talking about close quarters, pre-firearm, hand-to-hand combat—“may go back to the days of Richard the Lionheart or William Wallace in the 1200s. But for some of us Polynesians, our warrior heritage goes back just two or three generations. My great-grandfather in Tonga killed people with a club.”

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A 2003 archaeological survey of Waimea Valley, on the North Shore, identified 78 “surface sites of interest”—burial caves, shrines and temples. It is a sacred place, steeped in history and mana. No less sacred to countless Latter-day Saints is another place of worship, 10 miles due east, over the spine of the Ko’olau Mountains. There, rising from an Elysian arrangement of terraces and reflecting pools, is a vest-pocket Taj Mahal, the century-old Laie Hawaii Temple. Mormons believe in “celestial” marriages, which can be sealed only in an LDS temple. And as the first Mormon temple constructed outside the contiguous U.S., the gathering place at Laie served as a beacon and magnet to Saints from across the Pacific.

Migration to Laie quickened midway through the 20th century when, determined to open a Mormon-affiliated college (now BYU-Hawaii), church elders sent out a new call for missionaries to help with construction. Still more Saints were summoned for the building of the Polynesian Cultural Center, which opened in 1963. And so it came to pass that the hallways of Kahuku High, three miles up the road from the temple, were chockablock with burly first- and second-generation Pacific Islanders: Maori, Tongans and Samoans on whose good side one wanted to stay.

“Take a walk around this place when class gets out,” says Tommy Heffernan, who quarterbacked Kahuku in the 1960s. “You’ll be tinkin’, What da hell dese kids eat over here?”

A 40-foot wave is breaking on the north end of the Kahuku campus. It’s not the actual ocean but a mural painted by local artist Hilton Alves, whose work, in this case, draws the eye away from the corroded exteriors of 40-year-old classrooms.

“The salt air deteriorates a lot of tings around here,” says Heffernan. Known across the island as Uncle Tommy, he is a plainspoken Vietnam War vet and retired maximum-security prison guard who apologizes in advance for any profanity that might escape during his guided tour. A former Kahuku High coach and administrator, he now serves as a caretaker of both the school’s athletic facilities and its traditions. He’s the person most responsible for transforming the locker room from the “dump” (his word) it was a few years ago into what it is now: a multi-purpose changing area, shrine and museum celebrating the team’s glory-drenched past. State championship trophies and banners; Parade All-America plaques; framed Honolulu Star-Advertiser stories announcing all-star rosters lopsided with Red Raiders.

It is remarkable, notes former Kahuku coach Reggie Torres, how many former players have gone on to the college and pro ranks, “but it’s sad we don’t have more.” Torres, who won three state championships during his tenure, from 2006 through ’13, laments the number of Red Raiders prevented from playing at the next level by subpar grades or test scores. He wishes some Kahuku parents would spend fewer dollars sending their boys to the mainland for football camps “to get recognized” by college coaches, and more on tutoring them for the ACT and SAT.

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In Friday Night Lights, Bissinger limns a dark, downbeat universe. Odessa is in the slough of an oil bust. Unemployment runs high; racism is baked into the landscape. One of the team’s stars is nagged by the sense that America is on the wane, that he is coming of age “in this place that didn’t seem like a land of opportunity at all, but a land of failed dreams.”

There’s plenty of hardship and disappointment on the North Shore. But despite its distance from the mainland, the American Dream—the chance to improve one’s lot by earning a college scholarship—remains vital and alive here. It could be a by-product of strong faith or the jaw-dropping natural beauty all around, but the vibe one gets from the Red Raiders and their coaches and parents is upbeat, buoyant, optimistic.

And, when necessary, aggressive. Among the vows cried out by the players during their haka: “We will fight with courage like hammerhead sharks, like the Raiders of the past!”

While shouting that line, players pantomime hoisting a heavy rock. What’s up with that?

When pulling that jersey on over your shoulder pads, Fitzgerald reminds the players in his periodic haka tutorials, “you’re holding the legacy of the Raiders who’ve come before you. It’s a blessing, but also a burden. So I want you to reach down and grab it like it’s a 150-pound boulder, and lift it over your head.”

That boulder is the bedrock of this community, this ohana, this extended family whose members are bound together by a violent game that comes to them as much as they have come to it.

#churns #florida #island #kahuku #schools #studs #texas

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