Wednesday, January 21, 2009

Draft Breakdown by Position - Offensive Line

I will do this for each position, with the lesser needs being grouped together in one post and the greater needs having their own posts.

Today we'll start with the trenches, the offensive and defensive lines.

The following are the average rankings by position, along with the estimated draft pick they are projected at in parentheses.

Tackle:

1. Eugene Monroe (2)
2. Andre Smith (5)
3. Jason Smith (7)
4. Michael Oher (9)
5. William Beatty (25)
6. Eben Britton (32)

Guard:

1. Duke Robinson (42)
2. Herman Johnson (51)
3. Kraig Urbik (69)
4. Andy Levitre (82)
5. Trevor Canfield (98)

Center:

1. Max Unger (33)
2. Alex Mack (52)
3. Johnathan Luigs (61)
4. Eric Wood (81)
5. Antoine Caldwell (96)

So which of these guys do you think is the best value, the highest need, the biggest bust potential, the biggest upside, etc?

Or is there someone else on your radar?

Sometimes the small school guys come out of nowhere, especially at these types of positions. Will one of my targets, Center Cecil Newton of Tennessee State overtake Caldwell who hasn't looked too sharp at Senior Bowl practices? And will Michael Oher's performance be enough to elevate him to the top of the Tackle hierarchy? Notice the 3 guys ahead of him chose not to play in the Senior Bowl.

[UPDATE: I watched the one on one 'pit' drills today and have to say that I thought Mack looked awful at Center, but pretty good at Guard. Same with Unger. The only one who stood out at Center today was Eric Woods. BJ Raji made everyone else look pathetic.]

5 comments:

  1. I like those guards the best. We can nab all of them in the second round (except maybe Robinson) where we have 2 picks. Unless we let go of Carey we don't really need a 1st round tackle. I wouldn't draft a 1st day center especially with Satele on our bench... plus I've heard center is the most um-imoportant spot on the line and very easy to play

    ReplyDelete
  2. "plus I've heard center is the most um-imoportant spot on the line and very easy to play"

    It's true. I've heard it all over the web.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Tin,

    You're a moron. Stop spreading that horrible rumor about centers being superfluous. You were just a punt returner on an intramural team. the only center you know about is the center of a meat sub.*L*

    ReplyDelete
  4. Duke Robinson will be gone by the beginning of the second round. If we like his size and mean streak, we'll need to take him at 25.

    I think Eric Wood will go before 81 as well, but I think his value as a 3rd round selection would be tremendous.

    ReplyDelete
  5. It's tough to judge Robinson since he's not at the Senior Bowl, but I thought Urbik looked sharp at that position. But a lot of the OL looked weak in one-on-one drills but looked sharp in team drills, so who knows. None of the Senior Bowl OL prospects have looked anywhere near as good as 7 or 8 OL I watched during the east west shrine practices/game. Those guys were absolute beasts. That's why I have conceded to not drafting OL on the first day.

    ReplyDelete