Are We Are Saying Is Give Culpepper A Chance

In retrospect, Dave Wannstedt’s decision to make Jay Fiedler, rather than Damon Huard, the Miami Dolphins’ starting quarterback in 2000 may have been a disaster. Personally, I’ll always believe it was but we’ll never really know. Huard never earned an NFL start during Fiedler’s “reign” so we can’t know for sure Huard would have outplayed Fiedler from 2000-2004. But there’s another more recent personnel decision we can all agree was a gigantic mistake with disastrous consequences. And surprise! Wannstedt didn’t make it. No, this was Nick Saban’s crowning botch job. In 2006 Saban had his choice of signing Drew Brees or trading for Daunte Culpepper to be the Dolphins’s new QB. Both quarterbacks were recovering from injuries—Bress a torn meniscus in his shoulder, Culpepper a completely-blown out knee. Saban passed on the guy with the busted wing and went with the guy with the busted leg and the rest is history. Brees received MVP-consideration and the everlasting thanks of a grateful city following a brilliant season resuscitating the New Orleans Saints in 2006, while Culpepper received nothing but paychecks “earned” while sitting his ass on the bench after putting up a few disastrous starts. Turns out he was nowhere near ready to return to action despite all his assurances to the contrary. Wannstedt passed on Brees in the 2001 draft and Saban compounded the error by making sure bad history repeated itself. Realizing his blunder set the team back for years and not willing to put the work in to atone, Saban classlessly quit after the season while making sure to blame everyone but himself for the giant eff-up.

Alright, why did I just rehash all that? Damn you Saban! The worst QB move in team history. But we knew that. What made me relive those painful memories was this June 13th, 2008 article.

CNNSI.com’s Bucky Brooks wonders why a big-name QB like Daunte Culpepper is “on the sideline with training camp only a month away?” After all, Culpepper “had one of the most productive years in NFL history with the Vikings in 2004” and though Daunte “has failed to reach that level of play in subsequent years, his career completion percentage (63.8) and passer rating (89.9) rivals those of perennial Pro Bowlers Donovan McNabb and Carson Palmer.” Uh, ok. McNabb? Palmer? Right. Now I’m sure Brooks isn’t being willfully clueless here. He surely knows like everyone else with eyes that Culpepper’s played like crap for years now even if Brooks prefers to deploy massive understatement to sugarcoat that truth (“failed to reach that level of play in subsequent years”?!?! No shit Sherlock). And I suppose it might a little unusual for a one-time star like Culpepper (or Byron Leftwich) to draw no interest whatsoever still being relatively young.

No the real insanity in that article is this:

“[Culpepper] was one of the best quarterbacks in the league at one point, but he can't get a job in this league?" said an AFC scout. "Sure, he's been injured, but his arm strength and ability to play the game hasn't changed."

Scan those words again Dolphin fans. Someone please tell that AFC scout isn’t working for the Miami Dolphins. ‘Cause if he is, and if the rest of our scouting department is that stupid, the future doesn’t look good for this team. Arm strength? Ability to play the game? At his peak, Culpepper’s game revolved around two things: Mobility and Moss. The knee injury robbed Culpepper of the first and the trade to Miami robbed him of the second. Culpepper proved not much of a traditional pocket passer when he could no longer avoid a rush nor could he longer just throw it up there knowing Randy Moss would come down with it. Experts and fans once debated who was the key player in the Culpepper to Moss connection but Culpepper’s poor play since 2004 combined with Moss producing his greatest season ever when paired with an even better QB emphatically ends that debate. So what exactly is that scout smoking? Hey, maybe I should take that back. You know what I’m really hoping? That the scout does work for Miami and that this is just one of Bill Parcells’ classic psy-ops strategies. Culpepper really helped screw up our team. What better way to get both revenge and a competitive advantage than by talking him up to everyone and letting some other sucker of a GM waste precious time and resources on the guy. Why not? At least he won’t be wearing aqua and orange again. So just repeat after me fans of the NFL’s other 31 teams, Culpepper “had one of the most productive years in NFL history with the Vikings in 2004” and though Daunte “has failed to reach that level of play in subsequent years, his career completion percentage (63.8) and passer rating (89.9) rivals those of perennial Pro Bowlers Donovan McNabb and Carson Palmer.” Pass up this opportunity at your peril. You have found him, now go and get him!!!