re: Zach Cunningham > Reuben Foster?

Yeah, I'm not sure where this guy is getting that idea from. I really can't recall Foster giving up any significant pass plays.

As far as Cunningham vs Foster, they are both great, albeit different, players. Probably couldn't go wrong with either.

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He took a long time to adjust to college football

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he sat behind an older CJ Mosley (1st round) and Reggie Ragland (2nd round)

In other words he played at Alabama, pretty common for 5 stars to start out on the bench. By his junior year he was one of the best linebackers in the country

yea saw that, curious how that escalated

Wtf? Wow. Maturity issues?

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Bama's Reuben Foster, a potential top-10 pick, is being sent home from combine for heated argument with a hospital worker, sources tell ESPN 

From Adam Schefter's twitter

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I didn't want Foster before this and I don't want him now either.

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And you're a Bama fan? Interesting.

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I didn't want Foster before this and I don't want him now either.

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I really respect your honesty. Every player will have pros & cons when it comes to being looked at as a prospect. Foster is extremely gifted but he has serious red flags surrounding him.

Despite what that clown says, my post about Foster has nothing to do with a disike of Alabama. No Saints fan should want to draft another player that has already shown to be injury prone & who continues to use poor tackling techniques that could lead to further injuries. Our defense has been injury riddled every season going back to 2012. We can ill afford drafting a player that high with this type of medical history.

No Foster didn't miss any games this season but his past injuries prevented him from becoming more involved in the Tide's defense much sooner. The staff also talked about Foster having difficulties learning his responsibilities which effected his playing time as well.

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Watching Foster play, it's quickly obvious he wears a different piece of equipment. Linebackers are known to wear extra neck support, but Foster's extends higher than most.

"That kind of collar can help prevent or reduce muscle strains, or what's called stingers," said Dr. Jody Ortega, who practices orthopedic medicine for the Andrews Sports Medicine & Orthopaedic Center in Birmingham . "But as far as preventing some kind of catastrophic thing, that's not going to prevent that."

These issues aren't new. Flip on any of Foster's high school highlight tapes and his style is unmistakable. As a senior at Auburn High School in 2012, he was simply dominant. Every recruiting service had him the No. 1 middle linebacker in the country and ranked as high as No. 2 overall.

The high school tapes show him destroying undersized running backs, quarterbacks or anyone else unfortunate enough to face Foster head on. He was a one-man wrecking ball out there, but more often than not his head was down.

Tackling technique has become a focus for coaches in recent years, though.

"I think it's rooted in the emphasis in concussions, but it's good because there's more emphasis on teaching people the correct way to hit and tackle," Dr. Ortega said. "So hopefully it will also prevent neck injuries also."

Arriving at Alabama in 2013, Foster had to learn more control and a much deeper playbook. The days of freelancing were over and it takes some adjustment.

"I think Rueben's first practice and how he picked it up he looked like a guy lost," Smart said last August. "He could run fast, play hard, didn't know what he was doing all the time."

Gradually that improved, as he entered competition at middle linebacker before last season. But with Foster battling stingers in 2014 spring practice, Reggie Ragland won the starting job vacated by C.J. Mosley. That left Foster in reserve duty, and through two seasons, he has 34 tackles and one sack.

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Coming into a complicated Saban/Smart defense like Alabama has, that rogue mentality just didn’t work. You had gap responsibilities, coverage responsibilities and more that he never had to bother with in high school where he saw himself as the one man wrecking crew. While he gained a headhunter mentality in high school, even his high school coach knew that he lacked the maturity in his head to go along with already matured body and muscle.

It wasn’t just getting the gap and coverage assignments down for Foster, there was also technique. Foster was prone to spearing himself into offensive players with a head first approach that was not only unsafe, but against the college rules. While he didn’t draw an excessive amount of penalties from his leading with the head style, he did receive a lot of unneeded punishment to his neck and head. Those injuries kept him from more playing time.

There’s an old football saying that goes, “The best player in the world isn’t worth a damn if he’s on the bench.” And for Foster, early on, that’s where he was most of the time. Though he made a name for himself on special teams, through his first two years, Foster was delegated to backup duty. Not because he didn’t have all the physical attributes he needed, but he just didn’t have the assignments and techniques down. That and he battled injuries, mainly “stingers” in his neck, from improper tackling technique of keeping his head lowered.

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Overreaction

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Yeah, I'm sure that's all it was. This happens all the time.

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But it is the kind of situation that Payton and crew like to avoid.

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You can pretty much forget about him as a Saints player. Payton values character & this will raise red flags with teams who place a high emphasis on character such as the Saints.

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This might cause Foster to fall to the 15-20 range

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Teams already had medical concerns they hoped would get the answers to at the medical evaluation portion of the Combine. If teams weren't able to get the answers they wanted & fail to get them before the draft, Foster could fall even further than that. Teams aren't going to make a blind investment on a player in the 1st round without a thorough medical evaluation. Foster did not help his situation one bit. It wasn't like he was performing due rotator cuff surgery. He was only there for the medical evaluations & team interviews yet he gets kicked out before he completed both. Not good.

But he does have poor tackling tech, just not the same tech problems as Foster