SB Nation - Cornelius Ingram

What's Wrong With Florida?

Year2 — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 16:15:18 -0000

More photos » by Phil Sandlin - ASSOCIATED PRESS

It's been a frustrating season in Gainesville.

Poor red zone play.

UF came into the game against Mississippi State at eighth in the SEC with just an 80% red zone conversion rate, and they blew two more chances with a missed field goal and Tim Tebow's 100-yard pick six. A year ago, Florida was deadly inside their opponents' 20 yard line, more often than not getting touchdowns. Predictable play calling has turned many of those touchdowns into field goal attempts, and poor execution has turned some of both into...

Turnovers.

Florida was +22 in turnover margin last season, and it was +24 in its wins. This season, Florida is -1 and turnovers have played a huge role in the Gators' close scrapes over the past two weekends. They lost three fumbles in Arkansas territory (two in the red zone), and 13 of Mississippi State's 19 points came on interception returns for touchdowns. It's extremely difficult to win games by the big margins that Florida did last year when you turn the ball over multiple times per game.

A depleted receiving corps.

Last season, Florida lost Cornelius Ingram for the season in August and lost Percy Harvin for a game and a half. That's it for the front line players, and the receivers were a strength for the team. This season, Florida lost Carl Moore and Andre Debose for the season in August, and each was projected to be a starter. Deonte Thompson missed some games. Riley Cooper has been slowed sometimes by various injuries.

For Florida's offense to operate at its highest level, it needs to have at least five legitimate receivers. UF only has four this year thanks to losing Moore and Debose, and even they've got even fewer when guys miss time or are slowed. That means that running backs have had to moonlight out wide quite a bit. Whenever that happens, it means defenses can rush Tebow with abandon because they only have to seriously cover three of the five guys on the perimeter.

Tebow has not been great.

Tim Tebow is getting a lot of Heisman poll votes because he's the quarterback of the No. 1 team and because they are doing it out of habit, I suppose. He hasn't been playing like one of the most outstanding players in the country though, as he's been one of the primary sources of turnovers and red zone struggles. He doesn't go through his progressions enough, and he doesn't throw it away when no one is open enough.

To be fair, he hasn't been helped out by the deficiencies of the receiving position. Playing quarterback is harder when you don't have a lot of great options. He also hasn't been helped out by...

A crisis of offensive strategy.

Things looked great in the first two games against the cupcakes. They went downhill against Tennessee's great defense, where the offense went overly conservative in response to it. With Thompson out and Cooper slowed, the offense went extremely run heavy against Kentucky, and that ended up the most coherent offensive game of the conference season. They went back conservative against LSU thanks to Tebow's concussion and being on the road, and now against Arkansas and Mississippi State it had problems finding balance and a good mix.

Part of it is undoubtedly growing pains under first year offensive coordinator Steve Addazio. During the Kentucky telecast, Bob Davie (who employed Addazio on his Notre Dame staff) mentioned that the Gator OC's background has a lot of wishbone in it. That fact would explains why the option-based bonanza against the Wildcats was the most fluid the offense has been all conference season. Addazio has struggled re-integrating the passing game post-LSU, though things would look a lot better without the turnovers.

Spotty offensive line play.

Florida's offensive line didn't play all that well at the beginning of 2008, and it showed. It didn't gel until late in the '08 Arkansas game, which uncoincidentally was the point at which the offense as a whole took off. It has yet to gel this season, and until it does, we're not going to see a lot of fireworks from the Gator O.

Addazio is not just the offensive coordinator; he's also the offensive line coach. It's probably now time to ask whether his expanded role as coordinator has taken away from his ability to coach up the line. He's not done it many favors either since two of the five positions have been revolving doors for reasons other than injury, and he keeps begging for it to be overwhelmed with blitzes with his play calling (i.e. going five wide with two running backs at receiver). Addazio also used to have an associate offensive line coach to help him out in John Hevesy, but he left to follow Dan Mullen last off season.

They're feeling the pressure.

The team just looks tense on the sidelines. Meyer looks the most tense of anyone. He keeps calling each win a "good win" (no matter how ludicrous it may sound in situations like after the Arkansas game) to try to help take some pressure off, but the burden of trying to repeat appears to be getting to them. They better find some other way to deal with it because it's only going to grow with every passing week.

A regression to the mean.

I already mentioned the Gators' outrageously good fortune in the turnover department last year. They also aren't blocking nearly as many kicks; they had three blocks in the '08 Kentucky game alone, but they've gotten to just two this year.

Even when they weren't necessarily taking the ball away from their opponents or blocking kicks, someone in 2008 always came up with big plays when it counted (except against Ole Miss, of course). Percy Harvin broke off big runs. Louis Murphy would catch long passes. Ahmad Black would come up with improbable interceptions. Brandon Spikes would flatten somebody. When a game could break in favor of either team, someone always made a play to break it in Florida's favor. Good luck and good timing are fickle, and you don't get them in spades two years in a row.

Definitely not the defense.

It has allowed four touchdowns all season, and one was on a 31 yard drive after a fumble by the offense. Only two teams have cracked 240 total yards on it, and one was Charleston Southern in a game where the coaches emptied the bench in the second quarter. It has allowed 20+ points once—and it was exactly 20 points—and that was the game with the 31 yard TD drive. It has been doing all of that despite a plague of injuries on the defensive line and Brandon Spikes out or limited in most games.

Say what you want about the offense (and most of it is true), but you can't fault the defense. The Gators could easily have two or three losses if not for the play of the Charlie Strong's men.

SEC 2009 // Meet the New Gators, Same as the Old Gators

Year2 — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 14:30:09 -0000

More photos » by Phil Sandlin - AP

Florida safety Dee Finlley pulls in a pass in the rain as the Gator freshman football team opened their season practice. (AP Photo/Phil Sandlin)

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Had I written a roster post for Florida last year, it would have made this one heck of a lot easier. I could just copy and paste it, delete the sections on Percy Harvin and Louis Murphy, and then be done, right?

Well, yes and no.

Of course Florida has a lot of guys back from last year. That's where the whole "consensus preseason No. 1" stuff comes from. Seven offensive starters return, and the top 22 from the defense come back. Some will say top 21 and point to the transfer of DT Torrey Davis as the missing one, but I'd ask you when you were taking the depth chart snapshot. He registered all of five tackles before the bowl and spent much of the year in the coaches' doghouse.

The quarterbacks are set. We know that. Tim Tebow is starting with John Brantley backing him up. About the only thing worth mentioning here is that Urban Meyer says Brantley has a package of plays and will get spot work in meaningful situations. I doubt he'll do as much as Tebow did in 2006, but he's going to get non-garbage time minutes.

Speaking of 2006, that leads to the receivers.

They are the biggest question mark on the offense, what with Harvin and Murphy gone. The unit is probably going to approximate the one that Meyer had in his first championship year down to the man. David Nelson will be Dallas Baker, the tall guy. Deonte Thompson will be Andre Caldwell, the speedy guy. Carl Moore will be Jemalle Cornelius, the possession guy. Freshman Andre Debose will be Percy Harvin, the slash guy. Aaron Hernandez will be Cornelius Ingram, the receiving tight end. Riley Cooper will be, well, Riley Cooper.

The biggest difference is that Hernandez is a known quantity from the beginning, a playmaker waiting to break out. Ingram was still adjusting to being a tight end, having come in as a quarterback, but Hernandez will be ready from Day 1.

The running backs are in much better shape this time around compared to '06 though. Jeff Demps, when he's not moonlighting in the Percy Position, will probably be the primary back. He's fast and hits holes with authority despite his size. Chris Rainey is exciting with his ability to make people miss, but he dances around too much to be the top guy. Emmanuel Moody will be the biggest beneficiary from the new I-formation sets, but he's not guaranteed to get many carries. It'd be a big boost if he could be the big back playmaker that Florida has lacked since the time of Ciatrick Fason, but he hasn't put it all together yet.

Moody and Rainey also tend to get hurt, which further solidifies Demps in the top spot. Return man extraordinaire Brandon James and freshman Mike Gillislee are in the mix as well, but I don't know how many balls there will be to go around.

The offensive line will be the key to everything. The Gator offense didn't take off last year until it gelled around the fourth quarter of last year's game with Arkansas. Three fifths of it are rock solid with Maurkice Pouncey, Mike Pouncey, and Carl Johnson back from starting in 2008.

After that, some combination of redshirt sophomore James Wilson, sophomore Matt Patchan (who played defense last year, like Mike Pouncey did in '07 before moving back to offense in '08), and redshirt junior Marcus Gilbert will fill the other roles. Redshirt freshman Sam Robey made some noise in the spring, and true freshman Xavier Nixon has impressed in fall practice. All of those guys except Robey were four or five star recruits according to Rivals, so it's likely that no matter which five take the field, it will be a good group. It better be, if UF is to repeat as champs.

The defensive line is in flux a bit, as it has been every year since most of the excellent 2006 line graduated. All the starters are back, but only Jermaine Cunningham looks set in his job. Tackles Terron Sanders and Lawrence Marsh are getting pushed hard by Jaye Howard, and this may be the year that Carlos Dunlap gets the starting role over Justin Trattou. Dunlap led the SEC with 9.5 sacks last year, but uneven effort kept him behind Trattou on the depth chart.

The linebackers are two thirds set. Brandon Spikes and Ryan Stamper are every bit the senior leaders and performers that any team would want. The final spot is currently a revolving door of A.J. Jones, Brandon Hicks, and, when he gets back from suspension, Dustin Doe. All three of those guys have started games, so whoever ends up there for good (if anyone) will be quality. Young bucks Jon Bostic and Brendan Beal are pushing for playing time as well.

The secondary is perhaps the strength of the entire team, something that would seem impossible during 2007's burnfest. The corners are right now Joe Haden and freshman All American Janoris Jenkins, a formidable duo. Wondy Pierre-Louis, Markihe Anderson, and Moses Jenkins are good enough as backups. The one to watch though is redshirt freshman Jeremy Brown, who missed last season to injury. Meyer has lamented that at the time of his injury, Brown was actually ahead of Janoris Jenkins on the depth chart.

The safeties are loaded. The two starters are back, the big hitting Major Wright and the ball hawking Ahmad Black. Wright struggles in coverage though, and Black can't lay the wood. As a result, sophomore all-everything recruit Will Hill has been impossible to keep off the field since the spring. Also in the mix are senior Dorian Munroe, who missed last season due to injury but has played well in the past, and newcomer Dee Finley.

The special teams will look exactly the same. Dangerous return man Brandon James is back (his last year I promise, Tennessee fans), and so are P Chas Henry and K Jonathan Phillips. Phillips missed just one field goal and one extra point (the fateful blocked one against Ole Miss) in all of 2008, but his longest made FG was only from 40 yards. The big-legged Caleb Sturgis might get a chance to kick the longer ones. The tradition of key players contributing on special teams will continue as in past years, most notably with the addition of Demps as the gunner on punt coverage.

The depth across the board is much to Florida's advantage, and the coaches are delighting in the ability to replace underperformers in practice with another quality guy. If you want to nit pick about the receivers, two O-linemen, and the third linebacker go ahead, but just about any coach in the nation would trade his roster for this one.

MONDAY: Florida's Song Remains the Same, Florida's Heisman winners

TUESDAY: The Underdogs Florida Will Face, Don't Miss Tebow's Last Year

LATER TODAY: Coaching Changes

THURSDAY: Predictions

FRIDAY: Conclusions

Quotable: Eagles at minicamp

JasonB — Sat, 02 May 2009 15:42:11 -0000

More photos » by Bradley C Bower - AP

Philadelphia Eagles rookie running back LeSean McCoy, left, confers with teammate Brian Westbrook, right, at the team's the first mini-camp. (AP Photo/Bradley C Bower)

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Rookie RB Lesean McCoy found himself a little starstruck standing in the huddle with Brian Westbrook & Donovan McNabb.

"Playing next to Westbrook, that's all weird, man," McCoy told reporters. "Watching him on TV, seeing him on the games. Then you're at camp with him. And being in the huddle with McNabb, it's crazy, man," he said.

Speaking of being a little starstruck, Cornelius Ingram felt it when he walked by Donovan McNabb's locker.

"I walked by it pretty slow and then I turned around and walked past it again,” said tight end Cornelius Ingram, the fifth-round pick out of Florida. "I think one day he will be in the Hall of Fame.”

Donovan McNabb has chosen not to address the media at minicamp. Andy Reid seemed to think eventually McNabb would hold a press conference.

"He’s done a great job, at least he did today and he has over the last ten years of leading this football team. That to me is very important, that he continues to do that and obviously somewhere he’ll talk to you along the line here. I haven’t really talked to him about that, but somewhere he will talk to the media.”

Shawn Andrews was asked whether his brother was upset that he was moved from RT to RG to make room for Shawn.

"(Stacy) has no hard feelings about it," Shawn Andrews said. "He's excelled at guard. The team didn't say if he was going to play guard or tackle when he first came here, so this is where he is and he's excited to get on the field when he does."

Shawn also said that he's been looking forward to playing tackle the whole offseason.

"I was definitely looking forward to playing left tackle,” said Shawn Andrews, sporting a Mohawk. "This whole offseason, I was taking left tackle sets and it felt very natural. It was a very natural feeling that I got just putting my hand down on the left side. I don’t know if that had anything to do with me being left-handed or not but it definitely felt natural.”

Injured Eagles a "go" and are draft picks prepped for Philly fans?

JasonB — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 21:00:13 -0000

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There have been some questions about whether several guys are healthy enough to participate in this weekend's first mandatory minicamp. In a radio interview yesterday Tom Heckert said that tight shirted Jack Ikegwuonu, who spent all of last year on IR, is cleared to practice 100% in this minicamp and will be participating in the full practices.

There has been some rumors that Cornelius Ingram may be still be suffering effects from his knee injury last year. Some rumors even suggested that he may need a second surgery. However, Ingram himself said yesterday that he feels fine and will be participating in the full practice.

Another thing Ingram said which I found very interesting was when he was asked by the hosts in a radio interview if he'd heard how passionate Philly fans could be? He said that during his private visit the coaches said people will cheer you one minute, but if you drop a pass they'll get you quick. Ingram laughed about it, but i can't help but think whether it was a test?

I wonder if they said it to see how he'd react? An important part of the evaluation process has to be finding out whether a guy has thick enough skin to play in this town.

McNabb speaks on newest additions

JasonB — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 16:16:55 -0000

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There's probably no person whose thoughts I've been more interested to hear about the draft and the offseason than Donovan McNabb's. Finally Mcnabb has broke his silence on his Yardbarker blog. He talked for a while about what he's been up to personally, but then got down to football talk.

You'll notice that I am ready to move forward. I'm the first to admit that you must learn from your failures, I also believe that you cannot change the past. It's time to focus on the future.

As with every minicamp since I've been in the league, I'm excited about meeting my new teammates, getting to know them and working together on the field. We now have a lot of new, young skill position players and it will be exciting and interesting to see how they become acclimated to what we do here. If they can come in here and take their game to the next level, they will be productive pros and we can achieve great successes together. I want to welcome the new rookies and am excited to get to work with them.

I haven't taken the time yet to welcome some of the veteran free agents to the team. I'm looking forward to working with a new set of bookends on the o-line. Stacey Andrews and Jason Peters are young, athletic and physical. They will help in both the passing and running game. The same can be said for fullback Leonard Weaver. As for the additions on defense - Ellis Hobbs, Rashad Baker, and Sean Jones - I can't wait to see how Jim Johnson uses all the talent he has at his disposal.

I want to congratulate all the newcomers and let them know that I am excited to be working with them and taking the first step towards moving forward and getting something accomplished.

I love this guy and I love that probaby has more weapons now than at any point in his career. I just hope he stick around long enough for the likes of Jeremy Maclin, Shady McCoy, & Cornelius Ingram to really mature into reliable every down threats. Maybe that will be this year... who knows?

Sprints // 04.28.09

cocknfire — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 05:19:40 -0000

More photos » by Carlos Gonzalez - AP

Comes with the Cornelius Ingram Seal of Approval. Sort of.

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Day after the Draft. A little bit here and there on the players who went high. Year 2 has your free-agent signings here.

Matthew Stafford rolls out his Top 10 draft-day thoughts for David Letterman. One of the unlisted ones better have been "Can I get another makeover from Maria Sharapova?"

Cornelius Ingram comes to Percy Harvin's defense -- after Harvin is already drafted. Which seems a bit late. In any case, he says the criticisms of Harvin are unfair "to a certain extent." Hooray equivocal endorsements!

Yes, the SEC had the most picks in the NFL Draft -- but the ACC had the second-most. So read into that what you will.

For some, it's already time to look ahead to 2010. Swamp Things has Tim Tebow going in the first round.

You mean to tell me Matthew Stafford and Mark Sanchez will be that much better at the next level than Tebow? I know the throwing motion scares people, but Stafford threw 30 collegiate picks and Sanchez had a decent -- nothing more, nothing less -- one season as a USC starter.

Okay, let's go through this again. You know it makes no sense for Tebow to fall below the first round. I know it makes no sense for Tebow to fall below the first round. This is exactly why Tebow will fall below the first round. These are NFL GMs; nothing they do is rational or sane. Remember: Al Davis will have a pick, and he's just as likely to pick a 1994 Toyota Tercel (great 40 time!) as Tim Tebow.

What did he do, drink after Lane Kiffin? Urban Meyer had some fascinating insights in his latest visit to the Central Florida Gator Club. To wit:

"We want former Gators to come back, but loyalty's a two-way street. If you want to be critical of a player on our team or a coach on our team you can buy a ticket for seat 37F, you're not welcome back in the football office.
"You're either a Gator or you're not a Gator. It's real simple. For those who are not Gators keep buying tickets, critique, but if you're a real Gator, get to know our players. Let's enjoy the greatest era not just football of Gator athletics."

Urban, a bit of friendly advice: Stop using "greatest" and "era" in the same sentence. It just doesn't work for you.

But wait. There's more.

"We're evaluating Gator clubs, everybody wants to evaluate me. I'm going to evaluate you. We've cut our Gator clubs down because it's very important I'm a father. We want to go to the best.

"For example, I've been to some horrible Gator clubs with a couple hundred people. They hand me a mic like I'm Johnny Carson. We're not going to do that. This is the way it's supposed to look. We're not going to places that aren't very good anymore."

Johnny Carson's got nothing on Urban Meyer. How many national championships did he win? And did Carson look as good in a leather jacket as Meyer does? I thought not.

That's, um, special. Auburn's brilliant new idea -- send all their assistant coaches to the same recruiting stop at once! In a tricked-out limo!

Wow. Just wow. I've seen classier Clemson fans.

Now, I'm no mathematician. But it seems to me that you would have more of a strategic advantage by send each of the seven coaches to different places, no?

I still can't believe that Gene Chizik didn't manage to win a national championship at Iowa State.

What do the Vols and the Tide now have in common? The wrath of Brian Cook. Observe:

Lane Kiffin caused defections at Tennessee are up to a spectacular nine now, which is a lot more folk a lot faster than Rodriguez "ran off," to use the parlance of people who don't know what they're talking about. ...

Relevance to Michigan? Slight. I guess he's taking a lot of heat that might otherwise be directed at Rodriguez.

For those of you who don't remember mgoblog's classic war with Roll Bama Roll, you're far better off than the rest of us. But it started sort of along a similar track -- Rich Rodriguez was taking heat, but Saban wasn't taking heat for this trangression, etc. In any case, Vols fans, I'm sure Todd has plenty of ideas for how to strike back at Brian, if you're so inclined. Granted, I'm not quite as sure that Tennessee fans are as -- what's the word I'm looking for? -- ~~rabid~~ passionate as Alabama fans, so we'll see what happens.

Nick Saban's old programs still fall under his sway. Exhibit A: Phelon Jones. Exhibit B: Michigan State .

Just confirming what you already knew. Larry Munson is headed to the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association Hall of Fame. Well, duh.

Cornelius Ingram To Philadelphia

mlmintampa — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 19:04:31 -0000

One of my favorite Gators of all time is heading for a team I hate. TE Cornelius Ingram was drafted by the Philadelphia Eagles with the 153rd pick in the draft. Ingram would be a perfect fit for the Eagles, where Ingram could blossom in the West Coast offense used by Donovan McNabb and coach Andy Reid. Not just that, Ingram will be part of a group of targets that includes Mizzou's Jeremy Maclin (Philly's first pick), and speedster DeSean Jackson. Ingram could be used in the same manner as at Florida, where elite outside guys allowed CI space to work inside and find mismatches. Going to an established team may hurt in that he won't get to play much, but remember CI is still a raw guy. A year with minimal action could pay off later.

With the 153rd overall pick the Eagles select TE Cornelius Ingram

JasonB — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 18:54:22 -0000

With the 17th pick in the fifth round Eagles select TE Cornelius Ingram from Florida.

The 6'4, 245lb TE missed the entire 2008 season after tearing his ACL last August. He was seen as a major prospect before his injury last year. Ingram has great size, runs a 4.6 40, can leap. and can play a physical game. He was pretty much never asked to block. One of my draft guides here had him ranked as the 59th best player in the draft.

This pick reminds me a lot of the Jack Ikegwonou selection from last year. A highly touted player who suffered a pretty bad injury that dropped his stock. Even with his injury, some draftniks had Ingram projected as a 2nd or 3rd round pick.

Scouting report

Strengths:
Outstanding athleticism...Very good speed and quickness...Excellent ball skills and body control...Soft hands...Terrific leaper...Good focus and is able to make the difficult catch...Adequate height with the frame to add more weight...Runs well after the catch...Can get up the seam and stretch the field vertically...Competitive...Still has a ton of upside.

Weaknesses:
Doesn't have the ideal bulk that you look for...Not a polished route runner...Isn't very tough or physical...Needs to get stronger...Has a long (long) way to go as a blocker, especially in-line...Doesn't like contact...Durability is a concern...Awfully inexperienced...A 'tweener?

Great scouting report on Ingram from Mile High Report.

Draft Day Devil's Advocate: Ingram Will Be A Better Pro Than Harvin

mlmintampa — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 15:21:17 -0000

Welcome back to the Devil's Advocate, where I take a position opposite most of our readership. Previously, I made the case that Lane Kiffin is bad for UF and that there will never be a college football playoff. Today, we look at two Gators in the NFL Draft.

The greatest athletes in the world are not football players or boxers. They don't compete in the decathlon or triathlons. They are thoroughbred horses, the only athletes that are expected to be in peak physical condition at age 3. While you and I are just learning how to not crap in our big boy pants, thoroughbred horses are running in the Kentucky Derby and in Dubai for Middle East royalty. At a racetrack, there are usually two schools of thought; do you like the sprinter, who might break down but could win the Triple Crown like Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner Big Brown? Or do you value the endurance horse, who wins on guts and strength like two-time Horse of The Year, Curlin?

Florida's thoroughbreds, Percy Harvin and Cornelius Ingram fit both descriptions. Harvin got to where he is on God-given talent, but has enough nagging injuries and personality issues to scare people off. Ingram has God-given talent too, but where Harvin is loved for his highlight reel, Ingram will out work you. Look at this picture of Ingram, via the Orlando Sentinel and Muscle & Fitness. Have you ever seen someone so jacked? My God, it looks like a GI Joe man wearing armor plating!

via blogs.orlandosentinel.com

Ingram's history speaks of a man who has blown up every barrier put in front of him. Signed out of Hawthorne for basketball and football by Ron Zook, CI dropped basketball to focus on football full time. When Urban Meyer came on, Ingram was a typical Zook recruit; freakish athlete who wasn't trying in school. Then Ingram started looking at transferring, realizing he would never be Gators' QB like he was in Hawthorne. But, CI stayed on, became a student and tight end. He stayed in Gainesville for a senior season to graduate and win another championship. HIs knee injury in training camp may scare teams off at some point, but his growth as a player and a man is more significant. CI had to do a lot of things the hard way, and it will pay off with a spot in the NFL.

I'm not knocking Harvin and I believe his 171 total yards and touchdown against Oklahoma is the greatest individual performance in Gator history (Tebow vs. Alabama is #2). But, Harvin's package includes the personality issues like not taking practice seriously and testing positive for weed before the draft. Harvin believes his talent overrides his flaws, which is true. In the NFL however, those flaws are magnified. Not working in practice might be tolerated by Meyer, who knows what buttons to push and when. It won't be tolerated by a career assistant who wants to breakdown a rookie receiver. Plus, Harvin's body type (5-11, 192) makes him about average and he's got the problem of not being a typical WR or RB, and NFL teams are not creative enough to use a tweener-guy (see Bush, Reggie). CI is a monster at 6-4, 245 and can run well enough to be a tight end. CI can also destroy a corner, and with some quickness, could be split wide.

In 7-10 years, Harvin may have more highlight plays, but it will be Ingram who will have had the longer and more productive career.

Poll

Who will be the better pro?

Percy Harvin

81 votes

Cornelius Ingram

686 votes

767 votes | Poll has closed

ROTB Community Mock Draft: With the 55th Overall Pick, the Atlanta Falcons Select...

Hawkwind — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 15:57:11 -0000

Cornelius Ingram, TE Florida

6'4", 245

The Falcons used to have a great tight end in Alge Crumpler but last year their tight ends combined for just 19 receptions. As we all know, a good tight end greatly helps a young quarterback and the Falcons has a great young signal caller in Matt Ryan. The Falcons have some needs on defense but putting some more weapons around Ryan is also a big need. Ingram may be a work in progress but he's got a unique blend of size and athleticism and has the potential to be the best tight end in the draft in a couple of seasons. Here's the scouting report we put together as a potential draft pick:

Positives: Ingram is a big tight end that has the ideal frame and muscle mass for the NFL. He's still has plenty to gain and it wouldn't affect his speed either. Ingram was formally a quarterback in college and made the transition to tight end early. He was able to bulk up, learn the position, and develop into one of the top tight ends in the nation. Due to his previous position, Ingram has good peripheral vision and has soft hands. He's a strong athlete and is an animal in the weight-room. He has above average speed and can out-run most linebackers. He uses his natural ability to gain extra yardage after the catch. He's a decent route-runner and gets off of jams fairly quickly. He will often extend to make a play and he has enough of a vertical to go up for the big catch.

Negatives: Ingram is a project player and still needs more experience to help a team in the NFL right away. He's your classic under-achiever and needs something to motivate him. He needs to polish more parts of his game and struggles to learn quickly. He can often make bonehead mistakes or line up incorrectly. He's more fit as a slot receiver and could make the transition in the NFL. He doesn't play with a passion and needs to develop a stronger work ethic. He tried quitting 2 times at Florida and most believe that he doesn't strive to win. He's not an NFL-ready blocker, and only is a productive blocker in the secondary. He goes with the motion when running routes and he won't sacrifice his body to make a catch.

First Round Pick: Larry English

Many thanks to Cardsfan08 for submitting this pick. The Dolphins and CardsIrish are now on the clock (email pick to revengeofthebirds@gmail.com) with the Ravens and Red Reign on deck. If anyone needs to refresh their memory on the second round draft order, check here.

Also guys, we're in draft 'crunch time' right now with nine picks to cover in the next two days so we're going to be hitting these fast and furious. Please, send a list of three players who you'd like to draft as your pick approaches so that we can stay ahead of the action and knock these picks out quickly.