[OC] Draft Scratchers- Part II: Tyson Alualu (DL, Jacksonville Jaguars, 2010)

The Jaguars have picked inside the top 10 of the draft every year since the 2008 NFL Draft. They’ve picked inside the top 5 of the draft every year since 2012 (one of just 2 teams to say they’ve done that, the other being the 1936-43 Chicago Cardinals, when there were 10 teams in the league). For some perspective, I was in the fourth grade the last time the Jaguars did not have a pick inside the top 10. I am about to enter my junior year of college.

Why do I bring this up? Because the Jags have had quite a bit of experience early in the draft. And with that comes picking players that, normally, you have heard of. Sure, they might not be the flashiest players of the bunch, but you pretty much have a good idea of who the Jags are going to pick every year. And sure, there have been times where I disagreed with who the Jags should have picked; to this day, I think Leonard Williams should’ve been the pick over Dante Fowler (though I wasn’t upset that we got Fowler; it really was a no-lose situation at the time between the two of them and Amari Cooper). But most of the time, the pick doesn’t catch you by surprise. When you’re picking for so long in the top 10, that’s what happens. You know the draft board. You know the players. It goes pretty much according to plan.

However, there was one exception, that will forever go down as one of the strangest draft picks of all-time.

And that’s what today’s edition of Draft Scratchers is all about. This is the series where we look at the picks that make you go hmmm, and the picks that genuinely made no sense. Last week, we took a look at Roger Vick being taken by the Jets, which led to the greatest moment in the history of the draft. Today, it’s about the man that had every Jags fan on the planet scratching their heads.

Because no matter your thoughts on who they should’ve taken that year, nobody in their right mind thought they would take Tyson Alualu.

Part I: The 2009 Season

The 2008 season was a bit of a shocking disappointment for the Jaguars. Entering that season, the Jaguars were one of the favorites to make the Super Bowl. I kid you not, I distinctly remember a New York Daily News preview that had Jaguars/Cowboys as their Super Bowl XLIII prediction. They were expected to do great things; the team was coming off of an 11-5 season, and made it to the divisional round before they lost to the undefeated Patriots (but not without putting up a pretty good fight).

But things in 2008 went south pretty quickly for the Jaguars. They lost their defensive coordinator, Mike Smith, who took the head coaching job with the Atlanta Falcons and immediately led them to the postseason. One of their tackles, Richard Collier, was shot a few days before the season start and had to have his left leg amputated. The team had an awful draft that could be considered one of the worst of all-time; they drafted 5 players, and only one of them was on the team by 2010 (and none were on by 2011). They whiffed on every free agent signing and trade, from Troy Williamson to Jerry Porter to Drayton Florence. Marcus Stroud, arguably the anchor of that defense, was traded to Buffalo and the Jags were never able to replace him that year.

Basically, it was bad. So expectations were a bit more reasonable heading into 2009.

The 2009 Jaguars were a pretty bad team that exceeded expectations. There was no real talent on that offense besides Maurice Jones-Drew and Mike Sims-Walker. The defense was atrocious, and registered just 14 sacks for the entire season (the lowest total in the league by 8 sacks; for comparison, the Dallas Cowboys, who finished 7th in the league in sacks that year, had triple the number of sacks that the Jaguars did that year). They allowed 67.6% of the opposition’s passes to be completed, which was second worst in the league, only ahead of the Detroit Lions, who went winless the year before. They allowed the second most passing touchdowns in the AFC (only ahead of the Titans), and 38.1% of opposition drives that year ended in scores, which was the second worst percentage in the AFC (only ahead of the Dolphins).

It was so bad that the leading sacker on the team was John Henderson, who had 3. Derrick Harvey was second with 2. There were 2 players on the Jaguars that year that recorded multiple sacks, and that was it. They had no defense, and barely had anything resembling an offense.

And yet, after 12 games, they were sitting pretty at 7-5, and actually had a pretty good chance at making the playoffs. The problem is that they ran into Murderer’s Row at the end of the season and had to play the Colts and Patriots in back-to-back weeks. The game against the Colts was a pretty good game, with two problems. Number one, Reggie Nelson forgot how to play safety and forgot how to tackle. He wanted to play patty-cake with Reggie Wayne. Number two, David Garrard had a brain fart on the final drive. That game dropped the Jags to 7-7, and from that point, it was pretty much over. They ended the season 7-9 having lost their final four games.

Again, this team was not a good team. Don’t let that 7-9 record fool you- the 2009 Jaguars were really bad. The 2010 team was pretty good, even though they finished with a similar record (8-8). But the 2009 team was hard to watch at times (and yet, was hands down the second best team of the past decade for the Jaguars).

Their on-field issues were concerning, mainly, their poor defense and questionable quarterback play. But their off-field issues were even more concerning.

Part II: Blackout Issues

In 2017, if you make a serious statement about the Jaguars moving to London or anywhere else, you’re a fool. I know people that do that, and that’s their only go-to joke for the Jags, even though it’s completely outdated. It’s not happening. Shad Khan has invested millions and millions of dollars into this city, and even though the results on the field have not come, off the field, he’s a perfect owner. An amphitheater/indoor practice field is opening up later this month adjacent to the stadium, and it should look pretty cool. He replaced this scoreboard with this scoreboard, and to show you the difference, here’s what the old scoreboard looks like on the new one. And he’s done so much more for this city that he’s pretty much saved the Jaguars.

So I want to get that out of the way right now. The Jaguars are not moving. They don’t have attendance issues. They are staying in Jacksonville. Let’s get that clear.

Having said that, in 2009? The Jaguars moving out of Jacksonville was a real and legitimate possibility, so much so that there were times where I thought that the 2009 season was going to be the last one in Jacksonville.

On the field, 2009 wasn’t great. But off the field, 2009 might have been the biggest disaster of a season you could have. There were 10 games that season, including preseason. Nine of them got blacked out. The only one that wasn’t was a Thursday night game against the Colts. Besides that, every game was blacked out and didn’t even come close to selling out. For perspective, 9 games in 2008 were blacked out across the entire league, and in 2009, the Jags blacked out 9 all by themselves.

This was the home opener against the Cardinals. I could legitimately hear conversations going on in other sections during this game; it was that quiet.

That wasn’t even their worst attended game of the season. They had a game that drew just 42,000 fans against the Rams a month later. Their final preseason game sold less than 40,000 tickets, and the number at the game was significantly lower. Owner Wayne Weaver flat out said that he couldn’t keep doing this if they only drew 46,000 per game. There were about 17,000 season ticket holders who didn’t renew their tickets from 2008 to 2009; the Recession killed Jacksonville, and by 2009, not only were people not filling up the seats, but stores in the Landing downtown were closing left and right, and to this day, have not been filled.

Los Angeles was really trying to close a deal to get a team. The stadium didn’t have a sponsor, so they were getting no naming rights money whatsoever (it was called Jacksonville Municipal Stadium). Here’s an article about it from the New York Times, and then, here’s a more-detailed article from ESPN. Basically, it was a major problem for the Jaguars. Today, this is not the case, but again, back in 2009? The Jags needed to do anything and everything in their power to get attendance back up.

The problem was attendance. The solution may have been in the upcoming draft.

Part III: Tebowmania

In 2009, the Jaguars had a lackluster offense, and all of the hype surrounding David Garrard after his fantastic 2007 season was gone. Garrard was way too inconsistent to be a franchise quarterback, and he had peaked. He was serviceable, but in order for the Jags to get to the next level, they couldn’t do it under him.

This was especially true during this season, when he threw just 15 touchdowns and threw less than 240 yards in each of the final 5 games of the season when his team needed him most. On the road, he threw 3 touchdowns and 5 interceptions. This was in 8 road games. He threw less than half a touchdown in each road game. He had 122 yards in the opener against the Colts (on the road), got shut out 41-0 to the Seahawks, lost 20-3 to the 49ers, and had 1 road touchdown pass in the first 7 games. It took until week 9 for Garrard to throw a road touchdown pass, and on the road, his passer rating was an abysmal 75.1.

Again, not the makings of a franchise quarterback. Oddly enough, he made the Pro Bowl that year, but don’t let that fool you- he was the eighth choice. Peyton Manning was in the Super Bowl, so he couldn’t play, and three other QBs dropped out, meaning that your Pro Bowl quarterbacks that year for the AFC were Matt Schaub, Vince Young, and David Garrard. It makes up for him not being on there in 2007 when he actually deserved it (how Derek Anderson made it over Garrard that year, when Garrard didn’t throw an interception until December, I’m not sure), but still, he had no business making it that year. It was his worst season, and a lot of fans, while they didn’t hate Garrard, wanted a change. He wasn’t terrible or even bad; he was just wildly inconsistent and middle-of-the-road.

Anytime you can kill two birds with one stone, you should do it. The Jags needed a quarterback. The Jags needed a way to boost ticket sales. Enter Tim Tebow.

During halftime of a 2007 game between the Jaguars and the Raiders, they honored Tim Tebow on the field for winning the Heisman. What followed was a five-minute standing ovation. Tebow might be the greatest college football player of all-time; he was in the Heisman race three times, was the first underclassman to ever win the award, and won two national championships and made it to three BCS games. By the time his career ended, he had the third most passing touchdowns in the SEC in his career, and had the most rushing touchdowns (57), a record that he still holds to this day.

Tebowmania was in full effect in Jacksonville. Owner Wayne Weaver loved the guy. There were fans that made custom Tebow jerseys. The divide between those that wanted Tebow and those that didn’t was strong, to the point where every day, there was an argument with whether or not to get him. I can’t understate not only how many Jags fans thought we would get Tebow, but how many people wanted him. It was a civil war in the fanbase, and a strong one at that.

The novelty of Tim Tebow would’ve guaranteed sellouts for the 2010 season. Remember that the University of Florida and Jacksonville are only separated by about an hour, barring any traffic. There are lots of Jaguar fans that are also Gator fans (not that I could ever imagine associating with both of those teams), and there were lots of fans that would only go where Tebow goes. If the Jags had middle of the road attendance, then this divide probably wouldn’t have been as strong, but remember, they had 9 blackouts in 2009 and the future of football in Jacksonville was dire. The city could not afford to lose the Jaguars, and drafting Tebow to ensure ticket sales not only might’ve fixed a need, but would’ve guaranteed strong ticket sales.

Here’s a mock draft from Walter Football from 2010 hammering this point home:

The bottom line is, and I can’t stress this enough, the Jaguars NEED to walk away from this draft with Tebow. If they don’t, Weaver will continue to lose millions upon millions of dollars, and the Jaguars will eventually move to Los Angeles. The NFL is a business-first model, and Tebow would be an extremely valuable commodity for Jacksonville’s troubled owner.

And then, here’s Bill Simmons on his thoughts with the Jaguars and Tebow:

I’ve never been a big “gotta take the local hero” guy. You know what sells tickets? Winning. But Tim Tebow isn’t just a local hero. He’s a local demigod. He’s the most popular person in Florida. He would immediately transform the Jaguars from “The team that’s probably moving” to “Florida’s official pro football team.” This has to be the move for them. It’s just smart business. I mean… have you been to Jacksonville? Not a lot going on. To say the least. If the Tebow thing worked out, that saves the franchise and legitimizes the city of Jacksonville.

What did they do? Well…

Part IV: The Pick

I’ve set the scene. Half of the fans want a defensive player like Derrick Morgan or Jason Pierre-Paul to establish a pass rush that had 14 sacks in 2009. The other half wanted the Jaguars to take Tim Tebow.

In the end, the Jaguars chose Tyson Alualu, a guy that nobody had heard of.

This was the Jags official draft party. Notice how after the pick was made, they only showed the interviews for players. My guess is that the fans had no idea who he was, and at the time, neither did I. This was one of the biggest reaches in the history of the NFL Draft.

I can’t stress enough how nobody saw this pick coming. In 1987, when the Jets took Roger Vick, while that pick was shocking, unexpected, and a massive reach, we didn’t have mock drafts. However, in 2010, people had mock drafts. I made a post a few years ago about mock drafts in 2010 with Alualu. I looked at the first 5 pages on Google from 1/1/10 to 5/1/10 and saw if Alualu popped up.

Turns out, he didn’t pop up in any first round. I looked at 18 mock drafts, and not one person had Alualu going in the first round. The highest pick someone had him at was 48th. I saw as low as 81st, which would’ve been the second half of the third round. Nobody had him in the first round; the debate was whether or not he’d go late second or sometime in the third. And he went top 10. Imagine taking a projected third round pick in the top 10. Imagine if the Cincinnati Bengals took ArDarius Stewart with the 9th pick in the draft, or imagine if the Carolina Panthers took Kareem Hunt with the 8th pick. That’s the modern-day equivalent of the Jaguars taking Alualu tenth overall.

Jack Harver of Bleacher Report called the pick, “demonstrating utter disregard for popular opinion.” And this was the draft video from NFL Network when he got chosen. They passed on Tim Tebow, and passed on other defensive linemen like Jason Pierre-Paul and Derrick Morgan (the two favorites besides Tebow) to take a guy that would’ve been a surprising pick inside the top 50 of the draft. Nobody, and I mean nobody, saw this pick coming.

Part V: The Career

So now that Tyson was on the Jaguars, how would he play? Unsurprisingly, he did not play like a top ten pick in the draft. However, he played like most people expected him to play- as a second or third round talent. Make no mistake- Tyson Alualu was not a bad player by any means. That doesn’t change the fact that he should not have been the tenth pick in the draft.

Alualu would actually go onto play 7 seasons with the Jaguars, playing 110 games with the team and starting 88 of them, including every game in his first four seasons. He’s actually the seventh longest tenured defensive player in Jags history by games played, and became a fan favorite as a solid depth player who was good at everything but not great at anything. Additionally, he stayed healthy, and played 96 straight games for the Jaguars from 2010-15. He was a decent player.

But did he solve the Jags issue at pass rush? Nope. The following season, the Jags finished second to last in sacks with 26, only ahead of the Denver Broncos, and to this day, the Jaguars are still looking for that pass rusher. He never finished with more than 3.5 sacks in a season (though he mainly played defensive tackle), and only had more than 2.5 sacks in a season twice (2010 and 2012).

The sad part is that he was the only Jags player drafted by Gene Smith who received a second contract with the Jaguars. Gene Smith might be the worst GM in the history of professional football, because the only player he had in four drafts that got a second contract with the team was a guy that shouldn’t have been taken in the first two rounds. After seven seasons, he signed in free agency with the Pittsburgh Steelers, where he should provide solid depth on that defensive line.

Alualu was a role player. He played like the experts projected him to play- as a second or third round pick. But as the tenth overall pick? Only Gene Smith thought he was worthy of a top 10 spot. It was the pick that literally nobody saw coming. It was the ultimate Jags draft head-scratcher… until 2012 came around. But that’s not for another few weeks.

Lost Leagues (Sundays)	Record Watch- Offense (Mondays)	Draft Scratchers (Tuesdays)	Record Watch- Defense (Wednesdays)	One Hit Wonders (Thursdays)	Weird Stat Threads (Fridays)
Part I: United Football League	Part I: Passing Yards	Part I: Roger Vick (NY Jets, 1987)	Part II: Sacks	Part I: Derek Loville (San Francisco, 1995)	Part I: NFL vs. Eurovision
Part II: Spring Football League	Part III: Receptions	Part II: Tyson Alualu
Part III: Fall Experimental Football League