Haye, What?

It’s an annual egg hunt amongst all sports fans, the enchantment of a ‘sleeper’ player. Front offices across the spread had better damn well get their first round picks correct, that’s a requirement, not an expectation, it’s what personnel directors do in the second day and after the draft and free agency is in the process of roster fillers when they earn their praise and paycheck.

Since taking over as Buccaneers’ general manager Bruce Allen has made a name of himself for finding sleeper players, most notably the ever underrated Chris Hovan. It’s a given that every off-season Bucs’ fans will make a comment that equates a current project, Ryan Sims for example, as a ‘Hovan’ like signing. Frankly these signings are overrated, Sims, like Hovan, like Phillip Buchanon, was a first round pick. Players chosen in the first round have tools that stick out, whether the coaching staff can groom those tools, and if the players can mentally adapt to modern day gladiator like abuse is the difference between a bust and a boom.

Shelton Quarles is the textbook example of what great personnel groupings do; find a player who fits your system and fits it well. Quarles was signed after being cut by the Miami Dolphins and spending some time up north in the Canadian Football League, he’d hang around on the Buccaneers until Nate Webster bolted in free agency and the team retooled with Q at mike. He played the spot well alongside Derrick Brooks and numerous strong side linebackers that would come into the system.

In 2005 the Bucs would take a young middle linebacker from Nebraska, Barrett Ruud, NFL genealogy in tact. Quarles would hold the youngster off until 2006 when he’d go down with an assortment of injuries, the rest we know, Quarles has been relieved of his playing duties, and Ruud is the starter at MLB, but that’s not the point here: the Bucs took a chance on a kid from Vanderbilt and he worked out magnificently for nearly a decade.

The pre-season is less than 14 days from starting, reading the training camp reports and coming across the first time under tackle gave me great enthusiasm: Jovan Haye. An undrafted kid from Vanderbilt previously released by the Carolina Panthers Haye took in nine games for the Bucs last season, 11 tackles and six assists later he became a blip on the radar for some Bucs fans looking towards next season.

Born in Jamiaca Haye’s family moved to the United States when he was six, he didn’t play football until his junior year in high school and even then he was an offensive guard for his two years, as well as a shot putter and a basketball player. Haye isn’t your run of the mill ‘jock’, unlike some Buccaneer players who I won’t name, getting into Vanderbilt is quite an accomplishment, as is a 4.5 GPA in high school.

He’d head to Vanderbilt, switch to defensive end, and after redshirting a season would start 11 of 12 games the next year. What he did in college statistically isn’t important in the least, he showed the ability to play against better competition, and he brought his best every week. Scouting reports noted he was a ‘relentless pass rusher’ with a ‘great burst’ but was ‘moody’ and ‘handled adversity differently’, seemingly not a good mix for the world of drill commander defensive coordinators and defensive line coaches.

Jethro Franklin was hardly that, and perhaps that’s one of the reasons Haye excelled, but I’m willing to bet it had more to do with Haye’s determination and drive, and I’m also willing to bet Larry Coyer is a better coach. People warn that small sample size will be the downfall of Haye, but I’d point to Dewayne White’s half season sample last season, and notably when he gave all-ever left tackle Walter Jones fits for 60 minutes, and then took his ball and headed to Detroit for more money than his performance demanded.

Haye has the body of an end, the speed to boot (4.7 in the 40, faster in-game) he’s also got the body of work that shows he’s no enemy of changing for his team’s own good, that shows maturity, he’s coachable and has talent, otherwise an offensive guard turned defensive end wouldn’t have succeed so quickly, now he’s back to step one, only on the opposite side.

He knows exactly how to block a defensive tackle from getting to his quarterback; Haye is a smart man, don’t be surprised when he uses that knowledge to make opposing passers’ days hell come the season, and don’t be surprised when he becomes the next ‘from nowhere’ story, collectively placing a stamp on Bruce Allen’s résumé, filed under ‘sleeper finder’.