Title

Is JaMarcus Russell the #1 Draft Bust of All Time?

By ArtieFufkin

Has Jamarcus Russell failed badly enough to make him the biggest flop in league history? (Original photoshop/hack job by ArtieFufkin)

When news broke that the Raiders released former #1 draft pick JaMarcus Russell yesterday, the sports blogosphere collectively wondered weather Russell had claimed the throne as the biggest draft bust in the history of the NFL. And while it would be easy to place the Rotund Raider at the top of the list, we’re not going to hand him the crown just yet.

Until now, the general consensus has been that Ryan Leaf – the #2 overall pick of the San Diego Chargers in 1998 - is the biggest draft bust of all-time.  For our money, it’s Tony Mandarich, who the Packers selected with the #2 overall pick in 1989 (you can read our previous pieces on Mandarich here and here). But most people seem to think it’s Leaf, and since both he and Russell are QB’s, it makes things much easier for the purpose of this conversation.

The guys at Shutdown Corner put together a nice statistical comparison between the two quarterbacks, and while both players were godawful, the numbers paint Russell in a more favorable light:

So based on these figures alone, Leaf has the edge (for being worse, that is … 14 TDs vs 36 INTs?!?  Ouch.) And when you take into account Leaf’s locker-room outbursts and the fact that he was universally hated by his teammates, Russell doesn’t really even come close to eclipsing the train wreck that was Ryan Leaf.

For us, the question of how big a draft bust someone is always comes down to one main thing: expectations.  Sports Illustrated took a look back at the pre-draft hype on JaMarcus Russell from 2007, which includes some incredible gems from some of the draft’s top prognosticators, including Mel Kiper:

JaMarcus Russell is going to immediately energize that fanbase, that football team — on the practice field, in that locker room. Three years from now you could be looking at a guy that’s certainly one of the elite top five quarterbacks in this league. …You’re talking about a 2-3 year period once he’s under center. Look out because the skill level that he has is certainly John Elway-like.”

Way to go Mel. Good call. But he wasn’t alone … at the time, Todd  McShay, Terry Bradshaw, and a slew of other “experts” were all drooling over Russell’s physical skill set.

Let's face it, we all saw this one coming

But while everyone seemed to agree that Russell’s physical skills warranted a roll of the dice, there were plenty of questions about his mental state of mind from the beginning.  In the linked SI article, Peter King and Gil Brandt were among those who expressed serious doubts as to whether or not JaMarcus had the desire & work ethic to be a top-level NFL quarterback.

When Russell – who was the best QB in a weak draft class for the position – went to the Raiders, it seemed like a bust made in heaven.  After all, Al Davis has made a living out of spending draft picks on physical specimens with questionable heads.  And with Lane Kiffin taking over at the helm (if temporarily) for Art Shell, the Oakland organization was entering a dysfunctional heyday in 2007.  We all knew how this story was going to play out, didn’t we?

It wasn’t quite as obvious with Leaf, who was thought by some to be a better prospect than Peyton Manning heading into that year’s draft.  But Leaf had questions of his own maturity & intelligence coming out of college, with the Colts making the best choice in franchise history in passing on him in favor of Manning.

Mandarich, whose dominance at the collegiate level would later be found to have been fueled by steroids, was viewed as an absolute lock pro-bowler for the next decade by just about everyone around the league at the time. But upon entering the league, Mandarich stopped using steroids and became addicted to painkillers, getting cut by the Packers 3 years later without ever really ever making an impact with the team.

This piece on Mandarich from ESPN gives a pretty good picture of the quintessential draft bust in my mind:

So JaMarcus, if you’re gunning for the title, you’ve still got a little bit of work to do.  I suggest getting yourself back into shape and tricking another team into giving you a shot, before ballooning to 350lbs and having a heart attack on the field.  That should make you a shoe-in.