NEW YORK-- --After working the phones feverishly and ultimately missing out on their first option, the Ravens selected a quarterback to finally fill that black hole in the pocket, a young arm and sharp mind charged with leading the team to new heights and into a new era of success.
"If you look across the board at every measurement you have, he's the complete package," the Ravens' head coach said. "He's got size, intelligence, huge arm strength and great charisma. Yet he's just scratching the surface at where he can go."
Strongest arm in the draft, great college numbers, intelligent, personable, hungry. The Ravens got their man, their quarterback of the future.
I'm referring, of course, to Kyle Boller, the first-round pick in the 2003 draft. We bring up his name because despite the optimism and complimentary words showered on yesterday's selection of Delaware quarterback Joe Flacco, the circumstances seem somewhat familiar. The Ravens have to ensure that the results will be different.
The Ravens' draft plans changed early yesterday, when they were unable to obtain their top choice, Boston College quarterback Matt Ryan. Their initial response - a trade that reaped four picks - was a beautiful orchestration; it was vintage Ozzie Newsome. Their second response - another trade, this one resulting in the Flacco selection - was as much a head-scratcher as it was a fist pump.
It's not clear why the Ravens felt they had to move up. (Either someone panicked or someone in the war room had early dinner reservations.) Nor is it clear what kind of impact a small-school quarterback who was a virtual unknown a year ago can be expected to make - in the near future and in the distant.
Clearly, the Ravens knew at the outset that they would likely walk out of the first round with a quarterback. They made an admirable chase after Ryan, but the St. Louis Rams wanted too much to part with their No. 2 pick and the Atlanta Falcons had their hearts set on him at the No. 3 spot.
Because the top remaining quarterbacks were projected as late-first round choices, there was no sense in hanging on to the No. 8 pick. Newsome somehow persuaded the Jacksonville Jaguars to part with a first-round pick, two in the third round and one in the fourth. A Times Square pickpocket artist couldn't have got more out of the Jaguars.
Using some of that stockpiled ammo they stockpiled from Jacksonville, the Ravens eventually moved up from the No. 26 spot to get Flacco at No. 18 - one spot higher than Boller was taken in 2003.
