Anybody Else Loving Mueller's Stuff on ESPN

[Abe Sargent]

Since Randy Mueller started writing daily articles for Insider, I can't get enough. He talks about GM and talent evaluation and it's great. It's like nothing else on the sports sites, and I think it's worth the price of admission to Insider alone.

A lot of his stuff is really helpful for sports simmers as well. From his article going over the war room in minute detail to today's article on the importance of backup linemen, everything is just great quality.

Just wondered if anybody else was reading his stuff and enjoying it as much as I.

-Anxiety

[andy m]

sounds intriguing, but i don't have insider so i will just make a general comment which is making a few presumptions on the content it's about time more football writers came up with some intelligent analysis (when baseball is well catered for) because so much football writing is merely the reporting of fact and opinion (and an opinion which is rarely informative at that), which personally i find dull. so all power to football writers who use their brain rather than trawl out the cliches and go with the flow of general opinion.

if you haven't seen it:

http://www.footballproject.com/

is worth a read, and they produce a fantastic book each year too.

[Vince]

You think that the quality of reporting is directly related to games played? Statistical analysis in Football is so much more difficult, because with one or two bad games (1/8th of the season), an entire season can be 'shot.' In baseball, they play 162 games. Slumps and streaks tend to even themselves out over the course of so many games, and it's much easier to achieve statistics that are 'true' indicators of a player's talent.

[andy m]

absolutely. and there is stuff in the football prospectus book that makes me scratch my head and wonder why they even bothered 'analysing' it in the first place as it's pretty pointless. but they do try some new angles on football writing, and i am all for that, even if it does involve a few perplexing numbers squeezed out of a small sample

[Abe Sargent]

Here is my example. Here is Mueller's thoughts on cut day when they cut to 53 man rosters. Since it's a bit dated, I'll post an excerpt. He bulleted a bunch of points:


The Rams have 20 players on their roster with one or fewer years of experience, including 13 rookies. That's definitely a youth movement.

If Chris Fuamatu-Ma'afala is as good as everybody keeps saying he is, why won't somebody sign him this week and by doing so guarantee his base salary for the year? There are reportedly three or four teams willing to sign him next week. It sounds like the "cap" people don't trust the talent evaluators. Chicago, which signed Corbin Lacina on Tuesday, seems to be the only team willing to bite the bullet and sign a vested veteran to a guaranteed deal.

For a safety to be paid well in the NFL, he'd better be special every year. New England obviously didn't think Lawyer Milloy was special enough to keep earning top dollar. His four Pro Bowls and locker room leadership were not enough. The NFL is definitely a "What have you do for me lately league."

For the third year in a row in Cleveland, all of coach Butch Davis's draft picks have made the team. These results are to be commended. In this case, though, with Davis being the head coach and general manager, it is equivalent to a student being asked to grade his own test. We kinda know what the results will be ahead of time.

Philly has six undrafted college free agents who will start the year on its roster. That might be a record.

Detroit's decision to place James Stewart on RI after originally saying he'd be out 3-4 weeks should raise some eyebrows around the league. Not many shoulder separations are fixed by surgery in this day and age. Either there is more to the injury than we know or the Lions were looking for a reason to change the mix at running back.

Seattle had hoped to work out an injury settlement with Chad Eaton that would allow him to come back and play for the team later in the year. The five days allowed to accomplish this passed with nothing resolved so Eaton will not play in Seattle in 03'.


I love the detail and knowledge that he has. This was more of a factual one. He'll also attack people and stuff, and for a former GM who wants to be again, I really like that. Puts himself out there, you know?


-Anxiety