Should Darren McFadden go #1 in the 2008 NFL Draft?

Should Darren McFadden go #1 in the 2008 NFL Draft?

With Darren Mcfadden finishing runner up in the Heisman voting, not many people seem to be talking about Darren McFadden going number one overall. This talented Arkansas running back finished second in Heisman voting for the past two consecutive years. Arkansas Coach Houston Nutt, incorporated the Single Wing into his offense. This Arkansas "Wildcat" offense formation was used to confuse opposing defense and putting the versatile Mcfadden at the Quarterback position.

Arkansas Uses Darren Mcfadden in their Single Wing Jet Series formation

Below you see the Offensive Coordinator for Arkansas discussing the base formation and how it works. These football plays sure look like a lot of the stuff we and other Single Wing teams have been running for decades. This formation helped Darren Mcfadden take advantage of his overall speed to beet defenders in the open. This one on one match up creates a huge advantage for any speed runner. Arkansas ran their "Quarterback", Darren McFadden very heavily out of this series, whereas most Single Wing teams typically spread the ball around quite a bit more. Arkansas realized that having Mcfadden in this formation would force defense to react and change their blitz formations.

The downside of drafting Darren Mcfadden over Jake Long

Darren Mcfadden has definitely had some off the field problems. He has 3 different children with three different women. You might ask the question how does this relate in anyway to football? Well the answer is pretty simple when you look at a teams franchise from a money point of view. When drafting a player in the first 5 pick of the NFL Draft a team must make sure that the player will hopefully be around for a while. With the salary cap playing such a major roll in a teams success, the team must take everything into consideration. Michael Vicks off the field debacle not only cost him two years in prison but helped cause the complete rebuilding of the Atlanta Falcons Franchise. A team does not want and nor can they afford a franchise player that has these type of off the field problems. Bill Belichick has stated over and over that chemistry is the most important part of a teams success and he has the super Bowl rings to prove it. Chris Long has been clean on and off the field and even though he might not have the sudden impact that Darren Mcfadden might have he will surly help whichever team drafts him. He might be classified as the safe pick but many people were questioning the Texans of drafting Mario Williams over Reggie Bush. It looks like Texans might have made the right decision. Mario Williams was an amazing force and an important element to the success of the Houston Texans. Reggie Bush is still trying to find his place in the Saints offensive scheme.

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