Terrelle Pryor, four teammates suspended first five games of 2011

Raiders Scout or Coach Bryant on Forest Gump? "That kid may be the stupidest son of a bitch I've ever seen, but he sure is fast! "

 

So how much money did Pryor lose by not staying out of trouble and returning for his senior year?

 

At least cost himself a few tattoos.

 

That's the other interesting thing about this suspension by Goodell. Pryor originally agreed to it with Ohio State in exchange for playing in the bowl game. Would he have agreed to it knowing that he would end up losing five NFL game checks instead? He had a lot less to lose with the agreement with Tressel.

 

Raiders now doing their best Cleveland Cavs/Stepien imitation, 2012, no picks between 1st and 6th. Nice.

Pryor is a great athlete, but that's it.

 

Perfect comparison.

 

In fairness, Curry was never as good as Pryor in college.

 

There is a chance he might turn into an Antonio Gates or a Kordell Stewart (when he was playing receiver), but that is a pretty big "might."

For a third-round pick, it's far too big of a risk. For a sixth? Probably worth the flyer.

For what it's worth, Pryor is four inches taller, probably 10-15 pounds heavier and possibly faster than Curry (I would never trust a 40 time recorded in Columbus).

 

The record shows a third-round pick has around a 10 percent chance of becoming an NFL starter for multiple seasons. So if the Raiders think Pryor has a 10 percent or better chance of doing so, it's a good bet for them. They could be wrong, but it's hardly a major "risk." Like every quarterback discussed on this board, including Manning and Brady (!!!) there will be people who say Pryor's not that good. They could be right. Then again...

 

This got me thinking, so I looked up Pittsburgh's third-round picks from 1989-2009.

The Steelers draft just about as well as anyone, so I am guessing the results for the Bengals or Lions might look different, but here is what the Steelers turned 30 third-round draft picks into.

A handful turned into elite pros (6/30 20%)
Joey Porter
Hines Ward
Mike Wallace
Mike Vrabel
Joel Steed
Jason Gildon

Another group of good NFL starters (20%)(and people can argue that a few of the top group could fall into this group)
Bam Morris
Chris Hope
Brenden Stai
Ernie Mills
Max Starks
Neil O'Donnell

And then you have players who were spot starters, but still had good value. (16%)
Matt Spaeth
Hank Poteat
Trai Essex
Amos Zereoue
Andre Hastings

So over half of Pittsburgh's third round draft picks turned into pretty good pro players.

 

That's true, but let's be honest. It's not like Pryor was far and away better than Curry. Pryor played for a bigger franchise and won more games, yeah. But Pryor never set the world on fire in college. Neither of them did.

Curry was a decent receiver in the NFL. Pryor could be, too. Who knows.

 

The Ronald Curry comparison is a pretty stupid one... Curry was never even close to being as talented as Pryor was.