There have been many conversations about how the Miami Hurricanes will finish this year, and the lines are fairly well divided.  Hurricane fans are very optimistic about the potential this upcoming season will bring, but of course all the other naysayers seem to doubt what the has been assembled down in Coral Gables.

The Atlantic Coast Conference preseason picks were voted on by media members, and they picked the Hurricanes to finish second in the Coastal division.  The Media members of course picked Virginia Tech to win it’s fourth ACC title in only it’s seventh year as a member of the ACC.  I think these media members felt that they can’t go wrong by picking Virginia Tech, they always have a solid team and have a very good team returning led by Tyrod Taylor.  The Hokies have never been able to win the big game when it counted, the Hurricanes on the other hand have slowly been returning to form and media members are not ready to jump on the bandwagon yet.

When you break it down the Coastal is really a two horse race this year.  Miami and Virginia Tech are the only two teams with a “Viable” chance to win the Coastal Division.  Duke and Virginia we can go ahead and toss out of the race those teams are still behind the curve in talent and ability to make any ripples in the conference.  North Carolina was not that good last year, going 4 – 4 in the ACC, and 8 –   5 overall the Hurricanes had no business losing to the Tar Heels last year.  I think Miami gets it right this year, plus with all the shady business hanging over North Carolina’s football program right now they may be in for a long season.

Georgia Tech lost Demaryius Thomas and Jonathan Dwyer, so the only returning player from their big three is Josh Nesbitt.  He won’t have an explosive receiver like Thomas on the outside to make enough big plays to keep teams honest against the options.  Couple that with   losing the speed and power of a Jonathan Dwyer and  giving ACC defenses a third year to look at this offense, and they will have a hard time threatening for the Coastal Division title.

It has been well chronicled why Miami is going to have a good season, so we will talk about why the Hokies will finish in second place.  People will look at Miami’s loss to Virginia Tech last year and say there is no way they beat the Hokies this year.  You can’t blame it on the weather or anything like that, Miami just failed to show up for that game.

Pride will win out this year, and comparing the two quarterbacks Harris is a much better passer than Tyrod Taylor which will help provided the Hurricanes stick to the running game.  The Hokies defensive line won’t have the same success they had last year, they will still be able to pressure Harris somewhat.  Miami will play smarter this time, and have a game plan to account the pass rush.  Looking at the stats Taylor only threw for 98 yards on four completions, Virginia Tech ran the ball well, but that was really it.

Most of their points came off of Miami mistakes, if the Hurricanes limit the turnovers and run the ball with authority.  The defense will be more than sufficient to shut down Taylor, they just need to worry about stopping the running game.  Looking at it closely if Miami takes care of the ball I do not see where the Hokies are going to get enough points to beat them.

Miami should win the Coastal Division without much of a fight, if they get past Virginia Tech none of the other teams are really built to win right now.  Unless Paul Johnson comes up with replacements who are Dwyer and Thomas’ caliber they won’t’ have enough to win it either.  Miami should have been the team voted to win the Coastal, but let the Hurricanes play the underdog role where they have always been successful.

But the odd picks started to come later in the draft.  We will focus on the Denver Broncos even though the Eagles moved up to get a defensive end, when the best player available was a need at Safety that they passed up on.  Before we get to the Broncos I also have to mention that San Diego moved up almost ten spots to take a running back, they could have re-signed LaDanian Tomlinson cheaply or even grabbed a Thomas Jones.

The Chargers instead elect to go into the season with undersized Darren Sproles and a Rookie Running Back out of Fresno State?  We will see how all of that pans out for them, pass protection is one of the most important jobs of a running back and entrusting that to a rookie seems like a mistake.

Now on to the Broncos, they selected Georgia Tech Wide Receiver Demaryius Thomas with the 22^nd pick.  Now he was expected to fall to the Jets about 29^th and be taken after Dez Bryant, instead he is the first Wide Receiver selected in the draft.  I was personally hoping he would fall to the Jets as I think he is a sleeper pickup, and will turn out to be dominant.

I think he would have still been available later in the draft, but they came up to get him.  The part that is odd was Broncos coach Josh McDaniel saying he picked him because he reminded him of Brandon Marshall.  Wait, did he just say that the receiver he just drafted reminded him of the receiver he just traded to the Miami Dolphins?

I do not see the logic here; Brandon Marshall has been the best receiver in the NFL the past three seasons.  He has three consecutive 100 reception seasons under his belt, and you draft a receiver because he reminds you of the guy you just traded?  I am sure things could have been worked out with Marshall, you do not trade a pro bowl receiver with talent like that and hope to get a guy in the draft that will be like him.  Lighting rarely strikes in the same place twice.

The 25^th pick of the Broncos was Tim Tebow, how they decided that Tebow was worthy of a first round pick is beyond me.  They have Kyle Orton in house who is not old, and had a decent season last year 21 touchdowns to only 12 interceptions.  You do not draft a wildcat quarterback with your first round pick; Tebow is not a polished passer and even though he has a “new” throwing motion it will take time for that to be natural for him.

They said the same thing about David Carr when he was drafted, they were going to get him to hold the ball up near his chest instead of near his waist when he dropped back to pass.  Well that did not work out well, and now Carr is a journeyman backup who has played for several teams.

I know that McDaniels is attempting to make some kind of statement about character over everything else, but he is taking a big leap in putting his coaching future on the shoulders of Tebow.  I have talked about this to friends many times there are a lot of cases where talent needs to be taken over character, if you can find a guy who has both great.

If Tim Tebow is starting in a few years and he turns out to be a bust, do you think Denver fans will really care if he is a great guy?  Fans want to see wins, that is why they spend their money to come to the games, if a guy has good character and turns out to be a great player that is the best scenario.  But if he is unable to hit receivers, and does not consistently win games he will not be able to lead effectively.

The pick does not make much sense to me, but I have to assume that Josh McDaniels is an NFL coach for a reason while I am running a website.  Maybe he knows what he is doing, and has a master plan for Mr. Tebow.  Only time will tell how this works out.