[Patrick Barron]
So the Big Ten writers and coaches held a watered down version of Draftageddon called the “All Big Ten Awards” so we thought we’d chime in. The link has the official release.
Individual Awards:
Offense MVP: Barkley
Defense MVP: Peppers
Freshman: Mike Weber
Coach: Chryst (coaches), Franklin (media)
QB: Barrett, WR: Austin Carr, TE: Butt, OL: Elflein
DL: Tyquan Lewis, LB: Peppers, DB: Jourdan Lewis
K: Carpenter, P: Johnston, KR: Peppers
[Hit THE JUMP we have another think coming.]
Seth: I thought they got most of the named awards right except two: Tyquan Lewis was great this season but he wasn't the best DL in the conference. He might not even be the second-best defensive end on his team. Taco Charlton or Jaleel Johnson would have been more worthy winners, and Sam Hubbard should have been considered ahead of his opposite. Relatedly, Nick Bosa was far and away the freshman of the year, not Mike Weber.
Coach of the Year is a hard award to question but if they're going to target Penn State it should go to Matt Limegrover, their OL coach, who at times this year was having to stitch lines together out of guys who couldn't beat Paris Palmer for playing time.
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Ace: Like Seth, I thought for the most part they got things right this year, DL of the year aside. There were some notable differences between the media and coaches lists, though, that showed the coaches do more than just look at counting stats.
The selection that stands out the most is Illinois DE Carroll Phillips, who made the first team for the media and was only honorable mention to the coaches. Phillips had a sparkly 20 TFLs and nine sacks; he acquired those, however, by playing with zero gap/lane integrity. Related: Illinois is 124th in rushing S&P+. Point, coaches. Putting Phillips as a first-teamer over Johnson, Glasgow, Wormley, McDowell, Schwan, Sickels, or even his teammate Smoot was criminally bad.
My other complaints are mostly minor, though I’ll continue to bang the “Justin Jackson isn’t that good” drum. He made the media first team and coaches second team; in addition to Barkley, I’d have taken Weber, Scott, Smith, and Wadley over him without much thought, and if either of Maryland’s top two backs had more carries I’d probably go with one of them, too. There’s certainly value in having a running back who can tote the rock 20+ times per game, but that doesn’t mean that player is automatically great.
I do have to ding the coaches, however, for including Cole Croston as a third-teamer. Even in a down year for Big Ten offensive linemen, a guy who got benched, moved around, and was generally terrible in the time he was on the field shouldn’t make that list.
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Adam: The two things that I disagree with among named awards are Tyquan Lewis and Mike Weber being named DL and freshman of the year, respectively. This isn't my attempt to try and grind the gears of the OSU faithful, either; I'd be perfectly happy with Seth's suggestion that Nick Bosa should have been named freshman of the year.
With most of the big things covered, I've only got nitpicks left.
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| Corey Clement didn’t return to the breakaway threat he was before his injury, but the voters didn’t notice [Patrick Barron] |
I think the coaches ranked the TEs appropriately. Gesicki was named second team by the media, and I guess he's fine if you're looking for a TE who's a pure receiver. Still, I don't think he was the second best TE in the conference. The coaches got it right by naming Fumagali second team and naming Josiah Price third team. Price doesn't have the counting stats that Gesicki has, but he also played in an offense that was primarily quarterbacked by a guy who was as good at reading the field as a Jugs machine.
Ace: Price was also a better blocker than a wet paper bag. That seems important at that position.
Adam: Not only can a wet paper bag block better than Gesicki, it can also be recycled. Much greater overall utility, imo.
One thing the media got right was including LJ Scott, albeit as a third-teamer. He probably suffered from the same fate as Josiah Price. As the guy who has drafted Justin Jackson the last two Draftageddons, I'd take him or Rodney Smith over Jackson in a heartbeat.
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Seth: Third team is way too low for LJ Scott (and the coaches left him off altogether). I had Clement and Weber on my Draftageddon team and would have traded both for Scott, awful offensive line or no. I think just about everybody would be better off if the NFL let him enter the draft this year.
Speaking of that line, anyone who voted Brian Allen on the 3rd (coaches) let alone 2nd (media) team wasn't watching MSU this year. I ended up breaking down three of his games for FFFFs this season and somewhere in the second one I had to take a break because I was getting SO MAD U GUYS about how bad he was in comparison to his brother, whom I was always a secret fan of.
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| Don’t make the same mistake as Kalis: Pay attention to Jaleel Johnson [Barron] |
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Brian: I can't stand All Conference teams that would be bad at football, so the media's first-team DL is stabby stab times. It's solely populated by defensive ends, with Phillips an egregious shiny object pick. And it's not like there weren't some seriously deserving DTs, like, oh, say, anyone on the second team line.
As I mentioned on twitter, Tyquan Lewis as DL of the year is absurd given that Jaleel Johnson graded out better per PFF and had the same TFLs and sacks and twice the tackles... as a nose tackle. That guy is capital-L legit; Lewis was basically no different than any of OSU's other DEs. He's good. He's not close to the best DL in the league.
I have a more general complaint: we're still going with two running backs and two receivers like it's 1970, which results in guys like Malik Turner getting left off entirely while almost literally half the starting running backs in the conference are named.
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Ace: Turner should’ve made it straight-up over the likes of Yancey and Wolitarsky, too.
Brian: Injury and Jeff George Jr, I guess.
Brian: Compounding the WR/RB lack of balance: they put Samuel at WR.
Seth: Yancey was just this year's edition of Purdue target with <50% success rate we throw at a lot, but Wolitarky managed to be consistently productive despite twice as many targets as anybody else on Minnesota, and Leidner (non Michigan edition) doing the throwing.
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Ace: My general complaint: coach of the year always goes to a guy who did really well with less-than-powerhouse talent, as if part of a coach’s job isn’t to acquire said talent. While I don’t have too much issue with the Chryst/Franklin selections this year, it’s absurd that Harbaugh and Meyer probably weren’t even seriously considered. Meyer, the most successful Big Ten coach in a generation or more, still hasn’t won one.
Kirk Ferentz has won that damn thing four times.
Brian: Yeesh. TBH, James Franklin deserved it and deserved it by himself, though. Those guys were dead in the water.
Ace: Yes, Franklin, with a big nod in the direction of Joe Moorhead.
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Brian: I can't decide whether or not Michigan's OL is seriously overrated or there were no good linemen in the league. I think I'm leaning towards the latter. Sean Welsh definitely should have made it to at least the second team, though.
Ace: Yeah, I had the same reaction about the O-line until I looked at the other options.
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Adam: As long as we're getting things off our chest, I can't stand that they lump defensive backs together. it drives me crazy that there are three first-team corners and one first-team safety from both the coaches and media.
Ace: It’s especially galling since the CB/S and DE/DT distinctions are more important than OC/OG/OT distinctions, and yet they make the latter.
Seth: Before we go we should point out Jabrill Peppers was correctly named DPOY, despite what this did to some of our twitter mentions.
Ace: I assumed that went without saying.
Brian: I just want to express how incredibly pedestrian all of these RBs are. Corey Clement averaged 4.2 YPC. Justin Jackson is Justin Jackson. Weber gets so many of his yards because of the OSU offense. Wadley and LJ Scott were stiffed, man.
There. I am done. AWARDS CATHARSIS.
Ace: PIGGY TIME.