Now here's something about NFL worth mocking
So you thought you were done with mock drafts for another year.
The real NFL draft is over and you probably heard that the Bears took Virginia Tech cornerback Kyle Fuller at No. 14 overall.
There wasn't much coverage of the event … only about as much as if Americans were picking an entirely new Congress.
Nothing speaks to the irrational popularity of the NFL more than mock drafts, which in retrospect are so easy to mock because they're more like crock drafts.
Most of these uneducated guessers must have picked the Wild over the Blackhawks, too.
If mock drafts are compelling in May, it's no wonder that fans will find a Cardinals-Jaguars game on “Thursday Night Football” compelling in November.
Everyone in the world — from Bristol to Tehran and from Ayatollah Kiper Jr. to Ayatollah Khamenei Sr. — is bound by law to predict which college players go to which pro team.
The mock-draft epidemic is so widespread that USA Today's “The Big Lead” already has informed us that the Bears will select Michigan State cornerback Trae Waynes in 2015.
The Bears made this pick at No. 18 overall. Yes, “The Big Lead” not only predicted who would go where but where each team would be picking.
So don't worry about getting in line for Super Bowl tickets. Apparently the Bears aren't going to rise higher than the middle of the NFL pack this coming season.
Or maybe the Bears will. After all, there's a distinct probability that USA Today's mock-up will be as inaccurate about the league's order of picks as they are destined to be about the picks themselves.
The only people paid to be wrong more often than mock drafters are mock TV weathermen.
Maybe tonight Tom Skilling will forecast 18 inches of snow and, by the way, also that “the Bears will select Cockamamie State quarterback Joe Shmo with the 18th pick in the 2015 draft.”
Seriously, folks, of all the mock drafts published last Wednesday, did you see a single one that had the Bears taking Fuller?
There were ones that had them locked onto tackle Aaron Donald, others that had them taking one of the top safeties available, and others that had them taking just about every other able-bodied defensive player whose name they could spell.
But Kyle Fuller?
No, nobody that I saw had him going to the Bears except the mock draft that came up on Google by a sheepherder in New Zealand.
If you went to PetSmart and asked dogs in their playground to do a mock draft, there would be at least one cocker spaniel that would have connected Fuller's name to the Bears.
But none of the so-called experts populating newspapers, websites and cable sports networks had that pick.
At the moment the Bears took Fuller all the prognosticators slammed their palms against their heads and mumbled, “Why didn't I think of that?”
Since there doesn't seem to be any accountability, we might as well play along with the mock-draft game. I'm not smart enough to even guess whom the Bears will choose next year, but I do have some ideas about future No. 1 overall picks:
2020 — Little Jimmy Runnynose to the expansion London Bridges; 2021 — The first woman draftee to the Oakland Raiders; 2022 — The first gay woman draftee to the Rosemont Rose Thorns; 2023 — The first Martian draftee to the expansion Pluto Plutocrats; 2024: The first kumquat draftee to the relocated Los Angeles Bills.
As for next year, all I am sure of is the pope will designate Vladimir Putin a saint, bacon will be reclassified a vegetable and, of course, the Cubs will win the World Series.
These have as much chance to be correct as the Bears winding up with Trae Waynes.
For all anyone knows about him right now, he's a fictitious Spartan action hero starring in a fictitious mock draft.