Great article on Ozzie's success

[thundercleetz]

Although I am sure Papa will disagree vehemently and say that Ozzie doesn't trade away all our good players for first round picks after three years! Haha just giving you a hard time Papa

 

http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/8896482/bill-barnwell-baltimore-consistent-winning

 

 

Newsome did more with his undrafted free agents than Matt Millen did with actual draft picks during their shared time as general managers.

 

 

 

Noticeably, Newsome and the Ravens are very smart about how they value those players and treat the acquisition opportunities available to them. Battista's article talks about how the Ravens waited until the fifth round to draft safety Dawan Landry during a time when Baltimore had only one safety on the roster. When Bisciotti fretted with each safety coming off the board, Newsome calmed down the owner and promised they would end up with a safety when a safety was the best available player on the board. That was Landry, who immediately stepped in as a starter alongside Reed and played effectively during his four-year rookie contract. When that deal ran out, the Ravens didn't treat Landry like a precious object because they'd drafted him and gotten good value out of him; knowing that they had the best safety in football playing the other spot, they let Landry leave in free agency and trusted that they would be able to find another player on an undervalued deal to play alongside Reed. That was Bernard Pollard, who annually gets one-third of the guaranteed money Landry got on his new contract from the Jaguars. Likewise, the Ravens happily let inside linebackers like Ed Hartwell and Bart Scott hit free agency and replaced them with the next player they drafted in the late rounds or signed off the scrap heap. Bad organizations find even the tiniest diamond in the rough and treat that diamond like it's a testament to their brilliance; good organizations like Baltimore realize that there are probably more diamonds where that one came from and keep searching.

 

 

What makes it all work for Newsome and the Ravens is that he knows when to make the unconventional move and trusts that the scouting done by his front office is accurate. The Baltimore front office is full of people who graduated through what Newsome calls the 20-20 Club, the entry level in the Baltimore personnel department that pays twentysomethings little more than $20,000 per year. The guys who made it through the 20-20 Club, as Battista notes, have grown from being lowly interns designated to drive players to and from the airport into valuable personnel executives and scouts. One generation of scouts teaches the next, and by the time they grow up, they know exactly what the Ravens look for from a player in any given position. The Ravens also don't subscribe to either of the independent scouting services (BLESTO and National Football Scouting) that the vast majority of the league's teams use, so there's no influence from outside sources who don't take Baltimore's specific schematic concerns and player-evaluation credos into account.

[cravnravn]

Excellent find Mr Cleet.

 

We are truly blesses to have the Wizard as our GM..

[papasmurfbell]

I have always thought who Ozzie finds as UDFA's has been amazing.

[oldno82]

Justin Tucker is one of many who've become starters.

[vmax]

Don Banks posted a huge, 2 page article on Ozzie today...

 

 

....Newsome said. "I think this team will be able to continue to be a successful team because of some of the youth on the football team. The quarterback, the running back (Ray Rice), the offensive line, (defensive tackle) Haloti Ngata, and we've got some young corners. So I think we'll be able to contend for two or three years without having to blow the thing up like we did (after) 2001."

Read More: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/nfl/news/20130131/ozzie-newsome-baltimore-ravens/#ixzz2Jaxt1MY8

 

He's getting a ton of respect this week.

[OutsideRzAcE]

Good articles guys