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player ready...Bob Sapp was around the Bears only long enough to confirm what ails them. As the highest-picked player (69th) in the NFL cut before the season starts, he becomes the biggest mistake of the 1997 draft so far.
The Minnesota Vikings don’t think so. They had Sapp rated as a second-rounder and promptly claimed him. The Bears took him in the third round over the apparent objections of offensive line coach Tony Wise.
Former personnel chief Rod Graves was conducting the draft as his final duty before Mike McCaskey replaced him with Mark Hatley. Graves is now with the Arizona Cardinals. Informed of Sapp’s release Wednesday night, Graves expressed surprise but did not want to comment.
One account is Wise lost a draft-day argument to Graves.
“I don’t want to get into that,” Wise said Thursday.
Of Sapp, Wise said: “No instincts.”
Coach Dave Wannstedt denied the existence of a rift between scouts and coaches.
“No, we wanted him,” Wannstedt said. “He just never improved.”
The Bears cross-check their grades among their scouts and come up with a “Bear grade.” Sapp graded about where he was picked. Bears coaches have input in draft selections, as many coaches do. It was not that way under former general manager Jim Finks, who drew a not-so-fine line between duties with a cleaver. But there is more than one way to win. Packers General Manager Ron Wolf, for example, vows never to give coach Mike Holmgren a player he doesn’t want, a sensible approach.
Usually, scouts and coaches get close to the same page before selecting a player. If personnel shoves a player down a coach’s throat, personnel always ends up losing in the long run.
What makes the Sapp situation so telling is it’s the second huge mistake the Bears have made on the offensive line in the Wannstedt-Graves drafts. Marcus Spears, their 1994 No. 2 choice, sat on the bench for three years. At least the Bears didn’t live unhappily with Sapp for that long. Progress is where you find it.
“Sapp is the kind of lineman we like,” Vikings personnel chief Frank Gilliam said. “He needs some work, but we thought he was a good prospect. Maybe he doesn’t fit into their system.”
Since the Vikings have one of the best offensive lines in the league, Gilliam’s opinion is worth noting. It is also worth noting that Sapp and Vikings coach Dennis Green share the same agent. The Bears said no one was interested in trading for Sapp, and most teams passed on him on the waiver wire before the Vikings claimed him.
Regardless of Sapp’s future, it’s astonishing the Bears’ braintrust could not agree on Spears or Sapp, two linemen of opposite styles. Spears was more of a finesse player, Sapp a power player. And neither fit?
The Packers picked up Spears and cut him last week, although they still like him. They think he would fit into their system. Sapp is described as stiff, but his size (303 pounds) makes him a candidate to block huge Packers nose tackle Gil Brown, the target of the moment.
Since McCaskey is boss, the buck stops there. If he didn’t have any inkling of a chasm in philosophy and communication between coaches and scouts, he should have. If he did, why did he allow Graves to conduct the draft in April after announcing in January that there would be changes in the personnel structure?
Teams that waste their 69th, 39th (Spears) and 52nd (defensive tackle Pat Riley in 1995) picks are in trouble for years to come. Hatley starts his race three laps behind.
Meanwhile, the Bears line up Monday night against the world champion Packers, who are starting a 48th pick (LeRoy Butler), a 62nd pick (Robert Brooks), a 66th pick (William Henderson), a 73rd pick (Brian Williams), a 79th pick (Brown by the Vikings), an 81st pick (Earl Dotson), a 90th pick (Antonio Freeman), a 126th pick (Gabe Wilkins), a 132nd pick (Santana Dotson by Tampa Bay), a 141st pick (Doug Evans), a 149th pick (Dorsey Levens), a 157th pick (Mark Chmura), a 230th pick (Adam Timmerman) and a 276th pick (Frank Winters by Cleveland). All but Butler were acquired during the Wolf-Holmgren era.
To be sure, the Packers have made mistakes too–Terrell Buckley (5th), George Teague (29th) and LeShon Johnson (84th). But they got at least some use out of Buckley and Teague, and all three are still in the league.
As for this year’s rookie class, the Cowboys are starting linebacker Dexter Coakley (65th), the Dolphins are starting defensive end Jason Taylor (73rd) and linebacker Derrick Rodgers (92nd), the Redskins are starting linebacker Derek Smith (80th), the 49ers love tight end Greg Clark (77th), the Eagles are playing running back Duce Staley (71st), the Patriots are playing running back Sedrick Shaw (61st) and defensive back Chris Carter (89th), the Saints are counting on running back Troy Davis (62nd), the Colts are playing linebacker Bert Berry (86th), the Ravens are playing running back Jay Graham (64th), the Falcons expect tight end O.J. Santiago (70th) to start soon and the Cardinals are playing cornerback Ty Howard (84th).
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All were third-round picks, like Sapp.