The 1998 NFL Draft: A Look Back at the Epic Ryan Leaf Bust | Retro Report | The New York Times

Peyton Manning Brian Lea two can't miss rookie quarterbacks both have potential to be stars for a long long time two franchises Futures in limbo we have to get this pick right we have to go out and get a different quarterback both of them bring a lot of assets to this table 50% said Manning 50% said wa go every field has its own method of evaluating human Talent the Indianapolis Colts select but after the 1998 NFL draft produced one of the greatest busts in history what have we learned about the science of picking a winner the Ryan Leaf paintting Manning decision is something that's cast a long Shadow to 2014 and [Music] Beyond thank you for being here welcome to the National Football League's 1998 player draft the right quarterback can change a football team's fortune in the NFL college draft where the teams with the worst records get the highest picks the prospect of turning around a franchise with one top player is tantalizing we needed a quarterback and we had an opportunity to really pick someone special whether it was Ryan leafer or Payton Manning these are both very good athletes they're both very big young football players the scouts were split 50/50 those that supported Manning were intellectually convinced those that supported Leaf were emotionally convinced their argument was great athlete much better athlete than pton Manning wants to run it by 1998 picking NFL prospects had evolved from oldtime scouting to more Hands-On evaluations it's a far cry from the old NFL days when training was haphazard and college players typically didn't train it all before the draft both Manning and leaf went through a gamut of physical tests the league had developed over the years they also took a wonderlick aptitude test a 12-minute quiz used since the 1970s to gauge a player's intelligence Manning and Leaf's reported scores were nearly identical the selection process is about 40% science 55% investigation and then ultimately about 5% gut especially when it's between two very good players at the top of the draft Steve Champlain was tasked with digging into the backgrounds of the two leading candidates for the job to try to determine the more elusive part of the selection process you talk to the public safety officials on campus you talk to the Head trainers you talk to the position coaches from a character standpoint not a football standpoint pton who's your favorite football player then my D Payton was the son of Archie Manning a Pro Bowl quarterback who had a 13-year career in the NFL think about how many meetings that pton Manning has set in with his father he's listen to the best and the brightest in football Ryan Leaf meanwhile was a blue chip Prospect from Great Falls Montana who led Washington State University to its first Rose Bowl in 67 years you can stand flat footed and throw a ball 80 yards you know I mean 65 you know 235 lbs back then champ and the Colts drilled deeper into researching the two prospects including evaluations with a psychologist soon a clear favorite began to emerge with pton you knew what you had he was very forthright and he had convictions you know where Ryan was a little more of a Enigma still just days before the draft Champlain recalls a Scramble for more information Bill po came into my office and he said we need a touch tape on every past that Payton threw and Ryan threw in their college career I thought the number one pick was pretty much you know in the bag I'm thinking okay it's going to be a long couple days pton Manning will he go first to the Colts or will it be Ryan Leaf with the first pick in the draft the Indianapolis Colts select quarterback University of Tennessee Payton Manning bill goes Ryan's got a stronger arm than Payton but pton Manning is is the quarterback with the second choice in the draft with the first pick settled there was no question that the San Diego Chargers would take Leaf Ryan Le the struggling franchise had traded up just 5 weeks before draft day to ensure they would get one of the top rated quarterbacks we were excited about either one that was the beauty of it we didn't think we could lose it all started well for Ryan Leaf he had a good training camp and he won his first couple games there was certainly some aspects or holes in his game but we really saw that we had a special player in terms of physical skills the expectations for leaf were Skyhigh he may have been picked second but his contract included the then largest signing bonus for a rookie in NFL history only adding to the enormous pressure on head coach Kevin gilbride to turn the Chargers around that intense scrutiny came to a head after San Diego's thirdd game of the season against the Kansas City Chiefs Y Line fumble by Ryan Leaf we played a horrific game the one guy who played as poorly as you could play was Ryan Leaf don't talk to me all right knock it off he was caught on camera in the locker room yelling at a reporter I misdirected my anger after the Kansas City game I was extremely disappointed in my performance and I let it show he was a little bit overwhelmed by by all the attention by all the money uh by the expectations that we all had for him sorry that sounded kind of rehearsed in the rush before the draft the Chargers had dismissed some warning signs about Ryan Leaf including a test that classified players by personality type and found his was Ill suited to be an NFL quarterback he was arrogant and I think that rubb kids the wrong way this would be Ryan's junior year all gangly skinny neck kid I think he got one vote for a team captain as a quarterback he's probably the best quarterback I've ever played with as a person I think he struggled with just being himself at times we had heard all those things but nothing to the degree that you said that you couldn't control and overcome those things three games after the Kansas City debacle the Chargers fired gilbride and Leaf's play continued its downward spiral in his three seasons with San Diego Leaf won just four games before before being released and after short stints with three other teams he retired from football what would you describe as the low Point Ryan probably the fact that when the four years was up I was willing to walk away from it the story of Payton Manning and the Colts is just the opposite 15 Stellar Seasons as one of the top quarterbacks of all time five most valuable player Awards three Super Bowl appearances one championship and an impact on the the city of Indianapolis that includes a new football stadium built on his success and a children's hospital that bears his name I'm not going to sit here and tell you that we predicted that he would reach the heights that he did far from it as Manning's rise continued on the field Leaf struggled to adjust to life after the NFL in 2010 2 months after Manning made his second Super Bowl appearance Leaf pleaded guilty to eight felony drug charges after stealing prescription drugs from a player while coaching in Texas troubled former quarterback Ryan Leaf has been arrested and in 2012 he was sentenced to up to 7 years in prison after pleading guilty to felony burglary for breaking into a Montana home in search of pain medication I'm both humiliated and embarrassed with the situation not only for myself um especially for my family it's very sad to see someone who was extraordinarily physically gifted had achieved Financial Security was in an ideal location and due to Inner Demons it didn't work out right now there isn't any pictures up of Ryan definitely some things missing on the wall here without him up there but when he uh went to prison we decided just to take everything down what about that guy Ryan Leaf from Washington State he's got to be right up there that is an insane story The Extreme outcomes of the 1998 draft have made it a story that transcends Sports Rick Perry is the worst presidential campaign flash candidate in in American history Rick Perry is Ryan Lea in the movie Draft Day do I take Callahan Kevin cner stars as an NFL general manager wrestling with the pressure of the first pick I mean that's the word right he's won everywhere he's been they said the same thing about Ryan Leaf when he was a number two pick in '98 the Manning leaf draft was a huge part of our research what is certain and what is not is kind of the basis of why people love sports this is the draft analysis we've all been working on for the last two months I think that plays out every day you know a lawyer goes to the right schools gets high grades excels in every academic sort of sense but you put him in front of a a jury you don't know uh what is going to happen if they're going to excel you know when the bright lights are on cognitive skills the psychological attributes motivation got to capture what does it take to succeed Cyrus Mary has built a career trying to quantify those intangibles what makes someone good in front of a jury or effective managing salesman after years of advising corporations on how to identify and hire diverse Talent he recently turned to the NFL the best players are not necessarily the fastest players or the strongest players with input from NFL general managers and research psychologists Mary developed a 120 question test to assess the mental makeup of football prospects the goal is to find patterns that correlate with performance on the field we just think that we're beginning to crack the code about these un tangibles that all these Scouts have been trying so hard to get over the years now we have some more hard science that will is in the hands of the clubs when they make these selections adopted in 2013 the player assessment test is just the latest attempt to quantify The elusive key to Performance Cutting Edge technology will take us beyond the stats that quest for data driven certainty has become its own cottage industry got the quarterbacks in the draft lab today this is entire Sports shows and websites are now built around Advanced analytics he's so overwhelming a physical specimen even old school evaluations at the NFL combine measuring vertical leaps broad jumps and 40 yard dashes have been built into a media event perhaps a number one overall pick here with the NFL Network broadcasting 60 hours of programming in real time so 16 years after the Manning Leaf draft have teams gotten better at judging the latest College Talent while it's a subject of statistical debate a recent analysis by Economist David Barry found that there is some evidence that teams have gotten slightly better at predicting a quarterback's early success but he also found at least 88% of the time where in the draft a quarterback is picked didn't correlate with better performance per play in the NFL JaMarcus Russell is he now overtaken Leaf is the biggest draft bust in NFL history when you're spending millions and millions of dollars you know there really is so many components to it that make up their player and even then even then you might not know ch's the Wild Card of the first round I think Johnny Manzel's the wild card is it going to be a pton Manning or is it going to be a Ryan Leaf it's an art as much as is a science we're humans we make mistakes and sometimes we get it [Music] [Music] right

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Keywords: The New York Times, NY Times, NYT, Times Video, nytimes.com, news, newspaper, reporting, NFL, National Football League, football, quarterback, NFL draft, 1998 nfl draft, peyton manning, university of tennessee, ryan leaf, washington state university, greatest quarterback ever, indianapolis colts, rose bowl, san diego chargers, chargers, seattle seahawks, super bowl, johnny manziel, jemarcus russell, draft bust, draft busts, nfl draft bust, nfl draft busts, browns draft busts

Id: qT5ok_ztNiA

Length: 13min 1sec (781 seconds)

Published: Mon May 05 2014