Originally posted by irief:
Originally posted by evil:
Nah he didn't. It's just that he's spent so much time in this thread bagging on Mitch that he's decided to double down instead of just admitting he turned out to be a solid pick for this franchise and he was proven wrong.
I've never said he's been a bad punter. He's been mediocre to pretty good. Is that the bar for punter picked in the 4th? Most would expect an all pro. My point is draft capital on a punter is like draft capital on a long snapper. Every year udfa punters are killing it.
That's a false equivalency. Typically, teams have waited until the late rounds or signed punters as UDFA's, so percentage wise, you'll find the largest pool of players acquired there, which means statistically speaking, the highest number of good kickers will come out of that pool as well. However, it's probably fair to say that those same kickers would have been just as good if they had been picked earlier in the draft, so it just becomes a question of PERCEIVED value as opposed to actual value. Team X signs a kicker who goes on to become someone who annually ends up among the top five in the league at his position. Does it matter whether they signed him as an UDFA or drafted him in the 4th round? The perceived value is, wow, we got this guy as an UDFA, what a steal. The real value is that he has become a player who consistently contributes to the team at a very high level, wouldn't that be worth a 4th round pick?
Under most circumstances, the 49ers might have waited until those more traditional spots to acquire one. It just so happened that they NEEDED a punter that year, the same way they NEEDED a kicker last year, so they did their due diligence and decided Wishnowsky was the guy they wanted and to prevent anyone else from getting him later on, they chose to invest a 4th round pick. A 4th rounder mind you, not a 1st a second or even a 3rd. Would Wishnowky still have been there in the later rounds, or available as an UDFA, maybe. But they had determined he was the guy they wanted, just as they did with Moody, and simply took the guesswork out of the equation.
Your argument that a 4th round punter should be held to some higher standard than a player at any other position, is just ludicrous. It's the 4th round for god's sake. I imagine a very high percentage of guys who are picked there become back-ups, practice squad players, or are out of the league after a few years. If you find a player in that round, regardless of their position, who can give you solid play for a period of 4-10 years than I think you have to consider that to be a pretty good pick. Occasionally, you might even find a really good player, which is even sweeter. As it turns out, Wishnowsky has turned into a pretty effective punter the last few seasons, which more than justifies their selection of him at that spot. He's on the roster and performing to the team's expectations, what difference does it make how he got there? Would his contributions be somehow more noteworthy if he had come in as a seventh rounder?
. Honestly, outside of the first round, I'm not sure there is anything as stupid as all the bellyaching that goes on about where someone was drafted, or who they COULD HAVE gotten instead. When it comes to the draft the goal is to get guys who will contribute, where you get them is immaterial. There's always a chance that another player who could have been chosen at a similar spot will go on to have an amazing career, but that's just the nature of the draft. Every team makes mistakes but, at some point, just about every team will also find a guy who ends up outplaying their draft position. Seems to me we have several on this team, with Brock probably heading the list.
