The SG 50 is a beautiful thing. Unlike silly fantasy football leagues, where running backs who are merely average, or even way below average (I’m looking at you, Frank Gore and Shaun Alexander), are drafted ahead of elite quarterbacks (which, last I checked, is only the most important position on the freaking field), SG 50 is a measure of pure individual talent. There’s no team chemistry to worry about, no silly external intangibles to consider — you’re getting the 50 best players in the NFL, plain and simple. It’s a refreshing change of pace, and a nice reality check with all the fantasy talk starting to heat up again. With that said, let’s recap the first round, shall we?

#1. Bryan Alsworth - Tom Brady, QB, New England Patriots
#2. Adam Adkins - Peyton Manning, QB, Indianapolis Colts
#3. Justin Zeth - Ben Roethlisberger, QB, Pittsburgh Steelers

Honestly, any draft that doesn’t have those three guys, in some order, as the first three picks is either run by meatheads or filled with die-hard hometowners who think somebody like Eli Manning is Jesus reincarnated. You have three very legit quarterbacks, all with exceptional strengths and not many significant weaknesses, and it’s really up to you which way you want to go if you hold the #1 pick. You can go the safe route with Brady — after all, it’s hard to argue with 50 touchdowns in a single season. Oh, and he won a few Super Bowls, too. You can just as easily make a case for Manning — it’s not a matter of if he’s going to break the vast majority of Brett Favre’s records, just a matter of when. Finally, you can make a strong case for Big Ben as well — he has the highest career yards per attempt (a VERY important statistic for passers) of any NFL quarterback since 1960. (I’m assuming there’s a minimum number of career attempts involved there, probably 1000 or so.) You can’t really lose in the first three picks if you take any of them. But I’m just rambling now, so let’s get down to business.

With the fourth pick in the SG 50, I select…

Tony Romo, QB, Dallas Cowboys

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again — Romo is a little bit of Brett Favre and a little bit of Steve Young in a nifty package. He’s a gunslinger at heart, but he usually avoids the crazy throws that most gunslingers tend to make. He doesn’t possess great speed, but his quickness is very deceptive. I believe I went on the record saying that his 40 time was something like 5.02 seconds. Folks, here’s a quick football lesson for you: DON’T BUY INTO 40 TIMES. Jerry Rice ran a 4.6 40, which is quite slow for a wide receiver, but if you can name one defensive back who could consistently stay with him on the field, you’re lying. Track speed is very, very different from game speed. In pads, Rice was unstoppable. But I digress. My point is Romo’s lack of pure speed is a very minor weakness, if you even want to call it one. He’s right up there with Roethlisberger, maybe a notch below, in terms of avoiding the rush because he’s exceptionally agile. In a game last year against the Rams, while in shotgun formation on 3rd and 3, a snap went way over Romo’s head and rolled a good 30 yards or so before he managed to chase it down. This play should have been a huge loss that resulted in a 4th and 36, but Romo eluded his pursuers and turned that 33-yard loss into a four-yard gain. Folks, I don’t care what level of defense you’re playing against, elusiveness of that caliber cannot be ignored. And let us not forget that he himself is a yards-per-attempt monster, with a career mark of 8.3 over 857 passes. To give you an idea of how awesome that is, the average starting NFL quarterback is usually in the 7.1-7.3 range in any given season, and Tom Brady led the NFL last season with an 8.3 mark. And, as you may have heard, 2007 was a pretty good year for Brady. Age is not really a factor with Romo, as he seems younger than 28, and you can thank Bill Parcells‘ blind loyalty to his Veteran Quarterbacks™ for that. Tony carried clipboards for such luminaries as Drew Bledsoe and Vinny Testaverde (NOTE: We here at Sporting Gurus love Vinny, always have, always will, but he had no business being a starting quarterback in the NFL in 2004) for the first 3½ years of his career. That leaves a little bit of uncertainty regarding his potential, since he doesn’t even have two full seasons’ worth of starts under his belt. However, in my experience, quarterbacks who are merely riding a hot streak last far, far less than a year and a half before they hit the Game Film Wall. For those of you unfamiliar with what the Game Film Wall is, it’s when opposing coordinators get a significant amount of film on an unfamiliar player who’s taken the league by surprise. They then use that film to formulate a game plan against that player, effectively neutralizing him and returning him to his normal level of play. Thus far, Romo has survived everything that defensive coordinators have thrown at him and continued to produce outstanding numbers. His lack of playoff success and occasional struggles in games that should be easy wins (e.g. week 5 last season at Buffalo) are cause for a little bit of concern, but I believe he’ll drastically reduce those mistakes as he continues to develop and mature over the next five years. I’m more than happy to take him with my second pick.