(01-28-2022, 11:05 PM)JAGFAN88 Wrote: James Harris The GM before Gene smith is #1 and its not even close and if your not old enough to remember him and his thoughts about who he wanted on the team and who he passed up in the draft look it up

I am old enough to remember Shack Harris, and your analysis of his tenure is way off.

First off, under Harris, the Jaguars rebounded from the aftermath of TCs first collapse and had 4 seasons of .500 or better between 2004 and 2007, including three (3) winning seasons and two playoff seasons.  The record reflects this is only the second period of any sustained success in team history.   Gene Smith did not come close to matching this and failed to notch even one winning and/or playoff season by the end of his tenure.

Shack Harris missed on numerous first round picks in his tenure including Reggie Williams, Matt Jones and the disastrous 2008 draft that featured a trade up for Derrick Harvey.  However, from the second round on, his drafts far eclipsed Gene Smith's.  Shack drafted Pro Bowlers like Rashean Mathis, Greg Jones, and Maurice Jones Drew, and other solid contributions like Daryl Smith and Vince Manuwai.  Gene Smith never drafted any Pro Bowl caliber players.  In fact, throughout Smith's tenure (2009-2012)the best players on the roster remained players drafted by Shack Harris.

Shack Harris was wrongly accused of advancisome sort of racist agenda because he had 3 black QBs on the roster under his watch.  Never mind the fact two of those QBs (David Garrard and Quinn Gray) were brought to the team by his white GM predecessor Tom Coughlin.  There was also consternation about Shack Harris' decision to bypass Brady Quinn in the 2007 draft, with many citing that action as proof of some sort of racist agenda at the QB position.

Having the benefit of more than a decade of hindsight and the entirety of the relevant players at our disposal, it's easy to see Harris' decision to pass on Brady Quinn was unquestionably the right thing to do.  Brady Quinn was drafted 22nd overall by the Cleveland Browns after the Jaguars passed him twice after trading back from around 17th overall.  Quinn played a total of four seasons, had 20 starts and compiled a 4-16 record.  He never threw more than 8 TDs in a season and threw all of 12 in his entire career, five (5) less than the number of INTs he threw.   

At the time, the Jaguars had 3 QBs on the roster: Byron Leftwich, David Garrard, and Quinn Gray.  Leftwich had 44 starts for the Jaguars and compiled a 24-20 record.  He finished his Jaguars playing career 51-36 TD-INT ratio.  By every objective measure, Leftwich was the superior player to Brady Quinn.  If Leftwich's performance clearly exceeded Quinn's, and Garrard is widely viewed as being better than BL, then it stands to reason Garrard was better than Quinn based on objective QB measures.  But what of the team's 3rd string QB, Quinn Gray? Having only a fraction of the career starts as Brady Quinn (4 vs. 20 for BQ), Gray threw or more TDs, had a vastly superior TD -INT ratio, won half as many games.  

But putting aside positional need for the moment, from  a BAP analysis, was passing on Brady Quinn justified? The Jaguars wound up drafting S Reggie Nelson in the first round that year.  Nelson had a good rookie year and notched 5 INTs.  He went on to make two pro bowls in what wound up a 12 year career.  Quinn made zero pro bowls, had a 4 year career.

Statistical data available on profootballreference.com.

With this in mind, isn't it possible that Shack Harris could have done an objective analysis wholly independent of race and rightfully  concluded any or all of the following 

1.  From a purely needs basis, there was zero justification for taking Brady Quinn at any point during the 2007 draft?

2.  From a purely talent evaluation basis,  there was zero justification in taking Brady Quinn over any of the QBS on the Jaguars roster at the time?

3.  From a purely talent evaluation basis, there was zero justification in taking Brady Quinn over Reggie Nelson?

4.  Based upon the comparative lengths and production of all of the players involved, isn't it possible Shack Harris' decision to pass on Brady Quinn the absolute right thing to do?

Too many people, both in the local sports media and the message board, entertained this false notion of Harris having a racist agenda to unjustly pass on Brady Quinn.  Unsurprisingly, many of these same people never bothered to revisit the facts once it became apparent Shack made the right decision in passing Brady Quinn.  They lacked the intellectual honesty8, factual mastery and testicular fortitude to admit they were wrong. None of these people ever argued that Gene Smith or Dave Caldwell were advancing some racial agenda by purging the roster of all black QBs to go with less qualified white QBs, even though from a performance and W-L basis, Leftwich and Garrard proved to be better than Gabbert, Henne and Bortles.

Shack Harris was far from a perfect GM.  He squandered BLs development, Garrard's and the team's overall development by blowing way too many first round picks on both sides of the ball.  He was unable to find a viable WR, LT, or edge rusher for this team to win the division,  reach the Super Bowl and sustain success.  But in comparison to Smith, he comes off looking like a genius, and the charges of racial agendas were completely warrantless.

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