FanHouse DaunteCulpepper

Retired NFL quarterback Trent Green is the first-ever guest columnist of MMQB, filling in while Peter King is on vacation. Green provided an interesting read on subjects relating to the league's personal conduct policy, concussions and the expanded season. And of course it wouldn't be a MMQB without a healthy dose of Favre thrown in for good measure.

What jumps out of Green's article is his prediction that 10 quarterbacks will have over 4,000 yards passing this season. He says six are a lock to do it (Drew Brees, Peyton Manning, Tom Brady, Kurt Warner, Phillip Rivers and Aaron Rodgers), and seven have the potential to do it (Jay Cutler, Matt Cassel, Carson Palmer, Matt Schaub, Donovan McNabb, Tony Romo, Matt Hasselbeck).

Let's put this prediction in context:

The Detroit Lions, who haven't won a football game since 2007, just wrapped up their final minicamp of the offseason. There's a lot that's new about them, including offensive coordinator Scott Linehan, who was good enough to return FanHouse's phone call on Thursday afternoon and answer some questions about the way the team looks to him so far.

Linehan, the former head coach of the St. Louis Rams, addressed the quarterback competition between top draft pick Matthew Stafford and veteran Daunte Culpepper, had very high praise for rookie tight end Brandon Pettigrew and called himself a longtime admirer of new Lions head coach Jim Schwartz. He also spoke of the challenge of coming in as part of a new coaching staff on a team that only has to win one game to call 2009 an improvement over 2008.

FanHouse's crack squad of savvy fantasy football personnel put our five heads together and amassed consensus rankings for non-keeper, standard scoring leagues. We'll update as the season gets closer, but this is our "incredibly early yet still fun" version.

Was last season the year of the quarterback or what? You still had the old reliables like Drew Brees, Peyton Manning, Kurt Warner and Donovan McNabb doing their thing, but a whole new crop of passers have elevated themselves. Aaron Rodgers, Philip Rivers and Jay Cutler led the way for the youth movement. You could have even waited toward the end of your draft and landed stud QBs in Matt Ryan and Tyler Thigpen (who would have been waiver-wire fodder). Team all that with Tom Brady's Week 1 injury, and we had a really interesting season. Let's see how they fall out presently for 2009.

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Sure, it may be a little early for most normal people to start thinking fantasy football draft, but for us derelict diehards, keeping abreast on the developments of the offseason can provide peace of mind and an advantage in watching things progress as we head into the summer. While the news coming out of the NFL these days is far overshadowed by two wildly entertaining playoff series, there are some pretty critical players to keep an eye on.

A small handful of elite fantasy stars are in the midst of a serious value conundrum. On one hand, they provide an opportunity to nab otherwise surefire first-rounders on the cheap, but not without taking on big-time risk. It is question of "how far do we let them drop before it is critical to pull the trigger?"

Who moved to the head of the NFL class during the draft? Find out with FanHouse's team-by-team 2009 Draft Grades.

For the fourth straight year, the Miami Dolphins used a second-round pick on a quarterback, selecting West Virginia's Pat White with the 44th overall pick. White, a record-setting player in college, joined John Beck (recently released) and Chad Henne as recent selections, to go along with the trade that brought Daunte Culpepper to Miami prior to the 2006 season.

While there is still some debate as to what type of future White will have in the NFL, the Dolphins view him as a quarterback, while one scout recently told Omar Kelly of the Sun Sentinel that Miami is trying to "revolutionize pro football by bringing the spread to the NFL."

Heading into the 2009 season, we know this much about the Miami Dolphins quarterback situation: Chad Pennington is going to be the starter, and for good reason. After 2009? Well, that's anybody's guess. Miami seems to be quite high on 2008 second-round pick Chad Henne, which played a role in the front office's decision to not offer Pennington a long-term contract extension after he helped guide the Dolphins to an AFC East title.

On Saturday, the Dolphins raised a few eyebrows when they used the 44th overall pick on West Virginia quarterback Pat White ... the third straight year they've selected a quarterback in the second round.

There used to be a time when teams would use a first-round pick on a quarterback with the understanding that he would sit on the bench for two or three years, learn the offense, and then assume the full-time gig. Recently, with the proliferation of the pro-style offense in college, and the out-of-control salaries top-of-the-draft quarterbacks now command, more is expected sooner.

Since 2002, 20 QBs have been drafted in Round 1, and 10, for different reasons, played in at least nine games as a rookie. Results were mixed (Matt Ryan, Joe Flacco, Byron Leftwich and Ben Roethlisberger were all stellar; David Carr and Joey Harrington were not), but much of that had to do with the situation these young signal callers were thrust into.

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With the first pick of the 2009 NFL Draft, the Detroit Lions surprised nobody by inking a deal with the former Georgia Bulldog quarterback, Matthew Stafford. Long before the draft began at 4 pm this afternoon, Detroit and Stafford agreed on Friday night to a six-year deal worth $78 million with $41.7 million guaranteed.

While most young quarterbacks might be tempted to pull the Elway and start singing, "I gotta get out of this place, if it's the last thing I ever do," Stafford, on the contrary, seems genuinely excited to be a Lion and up to the challenge of turning this team around under his leadership. This, combined with a pretty savvy contract by the Lions that puts a lot of that $78 million in incentives based on playing time, looks like a recipe for success. So, the question remains, does Matt Stafford have fantasy value for the upcoming season in Detroit as a rookie?

For most of the offseason, people who pontificate about such things had the Lions taking an offensive player with the first-overall pick. Quarterback Matthew Stafford was the popular choice, with offensive tackles Jason Smith and Eugene Monroe also in the mix. But maybe the organization should focus on fixing the defense, which, surprisingly, was the weakest unit on an 0-16 outfit last season.

Linebacker Aaron Curry has been described as the "safest pick of the draft," and has even been mentioned as a potential pre-draft Lions target. And today, after watching the team's final mincamp practice, MLive.com's Tom Kowalski has a suggestion: Detroit should use its first three draft picks to shore up the defense.

I give Daunte Culpepper credit. Last fall, he went from his couch to Lions starting quarterback with predictably disastrous results. He weighed close to three bills at the time, and looked nothing like the Pro Bowl quarterback drafted by the Vikings in 1999. A career-threatening knee injury will do that.

Now, nearly four months after the Lions put the finishing touches on an 0-16 season, Culpepper has dropped 30 pounds, regained his confidence, and looks like a completely different player -- both physically and mentally. During the team's first minicamp practice of the offseason, the Detroit Free Press' Nicholas Cotsonika had only laudatory things to say about Culpepper: