Caught Off Guard: Packers Work Out Duke PG Paulus

I'm sitting at work eating my Easter snack cakes and reading the papers and web sites when I stumble upon onto the Eastern Sports Propaganda Network (ESPN) for this little nugget. Maybe you've seen it, but the Packers had a workout for former Duke PG Greg Paulus. ESPN must've went crazy that it hasn't mentioned Duke anything in a couple weeks, but yes, this is the same Greg Paulus that was benched during the Duke basketball season for a freshman and was hailed as being a great mentor for the younger Dukies. Apparently, it's also the same Greg Paulus who started at quarterback in the U.S. Army All-American game, turned down scholarship offers from Notre Dame and the U (Miami), and was a Gatorade Player of the Year.

Sounds impressive from that aspect, but my guess is that Coach K discouraged his point guard from tossing around the pigskin during his time at Duke. However, maybe Paulus picked up a football and started fooling around to try and capture his glory days. After all, the article states he was the only one of his siblings to go the D1 basketball route, with his other siblings playing D1 football.

 Personally speaking, our backups played football throughout their college years and don't exactly leave much to smile about. I can't even imagine Paulus being able to shake off enough rust in terms of footwork, hitting patterns, and so on and so forth to make a serious attempt of being drafted. After all, he's been tossing bounce and chest passes for four years and apparently wasn't good enough to do that for big minutes his senior year. Maybe he'll get invited to a camp, probably Carolina where there would be a little intrigue because of the Duke connection. I'm a little shocked we wasted the money to travel to Durham for the tryout, but who knows. There's a reason why I'm in a cube eating Easter snack cakes instead of scouting NFL talent.

In related news, ESPN has not reported whether or not Dick Vitale creamed his shorts over the possibility of being able to talk Duke basketball during NFL programming.