Gathering Speed

Oher Number One September 15, 2009

Okay, he didn’t say exactly that, but Charley Casserly insinuated that Michael Oher is the best offensive lineman in this year’s draft class. I’ll listen to anything Casserly says, since he’s the guy with the cojones big enough to pass on Vince Young, Reggie Bush, and Matt Leinart to take the best player in the 2006 draft. And Mike Preston, who is harder to impress than Neil Armstrong (“Really? Two weeks on the French Riveria. Whoo, that’s nice. Hey, listen, look up for me for a second…”), lauded Oher as having, “some of the quickest feet I’ve ever seen from an offensive lineman.” This coming from a guy who watched Jonathan Ogden wear the same uniform for eleven years.

Oher had two big things against him leading up to the draft: one was that the hype from The Blind Side made him seem overrated because his story was so compelling. The other was that he was dumb. A lot of people said it. They said he was a mental work in progress. But watching him fight off stunts and, frankly, erase the right side of the KC defensive line (which has a couple first rounders on it, mind you) leads you to believe that the guy doesn’t have to do advanced calculus to be a smart football player. And reading this Q&A with the Sun, he sounds a whole lot more eloquent than the average 21 year old NFLer. Really, the only questionable thing he says is that even though he’s in one of the top seafood cities in America, he likes Red Lobster.

When is the rest of the league going to start cheating off Ozzie’s draft board?