What Pac 12 player you thought was NFL star that ended up nothing.

Lots of "stars" that ended up doing nothing apart from making it to the NFL because of many reasons:

Empterman. legit #1 pick, well on his way to a really good career. Blew out his knee then his back iirc. Rest of the house that roids helped build couldn't keep up. Like a Ferrari that blew the suspension and then motor ... the greatness was there never to come back.

Williams evidently had major drug problems. When money meets 20-something year olds. Fame, drugs, women, fast cars, clothes and gold. Some people like PrimeTime can handle it and turn it into an advantage because they have that inner drive to be great. Some have greatness if kept in a bubble but when unleashed unto the world cannot handle it.

LaMichael? He was college material ...

Bryce Love? He was really good and would have been a good pro ... but during their major bowl game he injured himself badly, they shot him up bigtime, he returned to heroics ... but mortgaged his future for the present. He was never the same.

Colt Lyerla? He had Gronk-like ability. Meth and an addictive personality/poor life prep fucked it up bigly.

Vontaze Burfict was an awesome player, would have been all-pro many times over if he had the mind and attitude of a Sam Mills or Khalil Mack ... or any fucking body other than Burfict. He was just too fast strategy (lol). NFL minds bent over backwards for him more than many other characters because they saw something good in him and the talent was impossible to ignore. But he couldn't figure it out.

one guy I would add is: Lawrence Phillips
 
Burfict went undrafted after running a 5.1 40. I don’t think he was a freak athlete at all. He was just a crazy, high football IQ (look past the penalties) guy that loved to hit. He had microfracture surgery and played 3 more years after. The same guy that ran a 5.1.

He maybe got sent home a year early. He had a good career and doesn’t belong anywhere on this list.
 
Burfict went undrafted after running a 5.1 40. I don’t think he was a freak athlete at all. He was just a crazy, high football IQ (look past the penalties) guy that loved to hit. He had microfracture surgery and played 3 more years after. The same guy that ran a 5.1.

He maybe got sent home a year early. He had a good career and doesn’t belong anywhere on this list.
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He is a definition of not well adjusted, which is a good trait for a FB player
 
Lots of "stars" that ended up doing nothing apart from making it to the NFL because of many reasons:

Empterman. legit #1 pick, well on his way to a really good career. Blew out his knee then his back iirc. Rest of the house that roids helped build couldn't keep up. Like a Ferrari that blew the suspension and then motor ... the greatness was there never to come back.

Williams evidently had major drug problems.[/b] When money meets 20-something year olds. Fame, drugs, women, fast cars, clothes and gold. Some people like PrimeTime can handle it and turn it into an advantage because they have that inner drive to be great. Some have greatness if kept in a bubble but when unleashed unto the world cannot handle it.

LaMichael? He was college material ...

Bryce Love? He was really good and would have been a good pro ... but during their major bowl game he injured himself badly, they shot him up bigtime, he returned to heroics ... but mortgaged his future for the present. He was never the same.

Colt Lyerla? He had Gronk-like ability. Meth and an addictive personality/poor life prep fucked it up bigly.

Vontaze Burfict was an awesome player, would have been all-pro many times over if he had the mind and attitude of a Sam Mills or Khalil Mack ... or any fucking body other than Burfict. He was just too fast strategy (lol). NFL minds bent over backwards for him more than many other characters because they saw something good in him and the talent was impossible to ignore. But he couldn't figure it out.

one guy I would add is: Lawrence Phillips
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It is what I had recalled hearing/reading about Williams. And even before the drugs and lifestyle took their toll, there was chatter that as a pro he wasn't overwhelmingly special anymore talent-wise and had a hard time adjusting to the reality that he wasn't going to be the best athlete on the field week in and week out and wasn't willing to put the real work in. Lazy.
 
I'm kind of surprised David Shaw didn't get more flack for the way Love was allowed to be used. I remember in the 2017 painful loss to Stanford where Master Quitkowski managed to not win the division with Gainesy and Vita at DT, Love could barely walk in the first half and then came out in the second half and was unstoppable. I'm pretty sure all teams take advantage of pain killers more than we think but I had never seen anything like that. Then when Love came back for his senior year it was shocking. Both seemed like moves where obviously the kid wants to do it but a coach has to almost stop them and tell them to just move on or sit out for their own sake.

Lyerla could have been Oregon's and one of the Pac-12's GOAT TEs. Would have love to see what he would have been as an optimized player if he didn't play for Oregon. I blame it on Muskberger calling him "Big Colt Lyerla" every five seconds and him being one of many Oregon guys who the media was clearly told to outrageously pump up before he did anything.
 
As shitty Jon Wilner, love this stuff so I'll do each Pac-12 team.

Shocked people are saying LaMichael James. Always seemed like a pure college guy - really small and seemed like a lot of his success had to do with the hurry up and their system. Kenjon Barner always seemed just as good to me too.

Washington - Reggie Williams - Heard he didn't work hard enough to be an NFL impact guy.
Washington State - Rien Long (pre-combine) - Once he showed up like 100 pounds overweight at the combine it was clearly over.
Oregon - Jake Fisher
Oregon State - DeLawrence Grant
Cal - Jared Goff - thought he'd be better
Stanford - Bryce Love - thought he was too small to be a star and let himself get too beat up in college but surprised I don't think he ever played an NFL game.
UCLA - Dave Ball
USC - Marqise Lee
Arizona - Ka'Deem Carey
Arizona State - Vontaze Burfict
Utah - Star Lotulelei
Colorado - Chris Brown
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The subject of underwhelming football careers seems to be your wheelhouse
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Hey - I can do some that overwhelmed too...Budda, Littleton, McCaffrey, Richard Sherman, Justin Herbert (all time), Minshew, Bakhtiari, Keenan Allen, Gronk, Lawrence Guy.

Need to add Anthony Barr is some kind of underwhelmed category. He's been good in the NFL but he's up there with Terrell Suggs and Maurice Jones-Drew as best players I've ever seen play in the Pac-12 level and he came into the league seeming like he could still get even better.
 
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I'm kind of surprised David Shaw didn't get more flack for the way Love was allowed to be used. I remember in the 2017 painful loss to Stanford where Master Quitkowski managed to not win the division with Gainesy and Vita at DT, Love could barely walk in the first half and then came out in the second half and was unstoppable. I'm pretty sure all teams take advantage of pain killers more than we think but I had never seen anything like that. Then when Love came back for his senior year it was shocking. Both seemed like moves where obviously the kid wants to do it but a coach has to almost stop them and tell them to just move on or sit out for their own sake.

Lyerla could have been Oregon's and one of the Pac-12's GOAT TEs. Would have love to see what he would have been as an optimized player if he didn't play for Oregon. I blame it on Muskberger calling him "Big Colt Lyerla" every five seconds and him being one of many Oregon guys who the media was clearly told to outrageously pump up before he did anything.
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Shaw should be getting flack for being one of the highest paid coaches.
 
As shitty Jon Wilner, love this stuff so I'll do each Pac-12 team.

Shocked people are saying LaMichael James. Always seemed like a pure college guy - really small and seemed like a lot of his success had to do with the hurry up and their system. Kenjon Barner always seemed just as good to me too.

Washington - Reggie Williams - Heard he didn't work hard enough to be an NFL impact guy.
Washington State - Rien Long (pre-combine) - Once he showed up like 100 pounds overweight at the combine it was clearly over.
Oregon - Jake Fisher
Oregon State - DeLawrence Grant
Cal - Jared Goff - thought he'd be better
Stanford - Bryce Love - thought he was too small to be a star and let himself get too beat up in college but surprised I don't think he ever played an NFL game.
UCLA - Dave Ball
USC - Marqise Lee
Arizona - Ka'Deem Carey
Arizona State - Vontaze Burfict
Utah - Star Lotulelei
Colorado - Chris Brown
Click to expand...

The subject of underwhelming football careers seems to be your wheelhouse
Click to expand...

Hey - I can do some that overwhelmed too...Budda, Littleton, McCaffrey, Richard Sherman, Justin Herbert (all time), Minshew, Bakhtiari, Keenan Allen, Gronk, Lawrence Guy.
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I don’t see how a lot of those are overwhelming in the NFL, considering they were blue chips and/or had fantastic college careers. If you want guys who overwhelmed you need ones who didn’t look like they had the physical tools or were just average in college, not star players like those.

Keenan Allen is the highest rated recruit in Cal history, 5-star, top-10 nationally in the country as a safety or WR and set Cal career receiving records in just three seasons. Budda Baker was a top-60 recruit and first team All-American. McCaffrey was top-150, one of the fastest players I’ve seen live, almost won a Heisman and his dad had a 15 year NFL career. Gronk was a monster, I mean he had 3 TDs against Washington his sophomore year and just truck bedded Oregon that season when they almost blew a 48-17 lead, he was an obvious NFL player.
 
As shitty Jon Wilner, love this stuff so I'll do each Pac-12 team.

Shocked people are saying LaMichael James. Always seemed like a pure college guy - really small and seemed like a lot of his success had to do with the hurry up and their system. Kenjon Barner always seemed just as good to me too.

Washington - Reggie Williams - Heard he didn't work hard enough to be an NFL impact guy.
Washington State - Rien Long (pre-combine) - Once he showed up like 100 pounds overweight at the combine it was clearly over.
Oregon - Jake Fisher
Oregon State - DeLawrence Grant
Cal - Jared Goff - thought he'd be better
Stanford - Bryce Love - thought he was too small to be a star and let himself get too beat up in college but surprised I don't think he ever played an NFL game.
UCLA - Dave Ball
USC - Marqise Lee
Arizona - Ka'Deem Carey
Arizona State - Vontaze Burfict
Utah - Star Lotulelei
Colorado - Chris Brown
Click to expand...

The subject of underwhelming football careers seems to be your wheelhouse
Click to expand...

Hey - I can do some that overwhelmed too...Budda, Littleton, McCaffrey, Richard Sherman, Justin Herbert (all time), Minshew, Bakhtiari, Keenan Allen, Gronk, Lawrence Guy.
Click to expand...

I don’t see how a lot of those are overwhelming in the NFL, considering they were blue chips and/or had fantastic college careers. If you want guys who overwhelmed you need ones who didn’t look like they had the physical tools or were just average in college, not star players like those.

Keenan Allen is the highest rated recruit in Cal history, 5-star, top-10 nationally in the country as a safety or WR and set Cal career receiving records in just three seasons. Budda Baker was a top-60 recruit and first team All-American. McCaffrey was top-150, one of the fastest players I’ve seen live, almost won a Heisman and his dad had a 15 year NFL career. Gronk was a monster, I mean he had 3 TDs against Washington his sophomore year and just truck bedded Oregon that season when they almost blew a 48-17 lead, he was an obvious NFL player.
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You're right that Bakhtiari, Littleton, Sherman, Guy and Herbert are better examples than the other guys who are probably more like guys who overwhelmed just because they are so good and I thought they would just be kind of good but here goes.

I'll break this down:

Allen - He was really good at Cal, but a third round pick and not a guy who I thought showed that he'd be a like 10 year Pro Bowler. He may have been affected at Cal by shitty QB play from his brother or cousin or whatever he was.

Baker - I thought Budda's size would limit him in the NFL. Never thought he'd be in the conversation for best NFL DB immediately. Part of this may have been how vastly I underrated Budda while at UW.

McCaffrey - This was probably the biggest stretch on my end, but players like him had been so underwhelming going into the league I'm shocked he quickly became the best RB in the league.

Gronk - May have been a lot because of injury, but I didn't see him becoming the best TE in NFL history arguably. He was a second round pick.

 
Mike Williams - USC
JJ Stokes - UCLA
Russell White - Cal
Solomon Thomas - Stanford
Dion Jordan - Oregon
Markus Wheaton - Oregon State
Trung Canidate - Arizona
N'Keal Harry - Arizona State
Rashaan Salaam - Colorado
Devontae Booker - Utah
Steve Broussard - WSU
Kevin King, Dante Pettis, Austin Seferian-Jenkins, Daniel Te'o-Nesheim, Bob Sapp, Tommy Smith, Dana Hall - UW
 
Any big time high school RB is getting terrible advice if they want to be the bell cow their freshman year. Split carries with another good back in years 1-2, be the main guy junior year, and go to the NFL.
 
Any big time high school RB is getting terrible advice if they want to be the bell cow their freshman year. Split carries with another good back in years 1-2, be the main guy junior year, and go to the NFL.
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Like the najee Harris. Kid barely got any miles on him still went in the 1st round
 
Antoine Cason
Chad Ward
Hakim Allah Akbar
Lamont Thompson
Jahvid Best
Teyo Johnson
 
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