2008-01-16

I'm Like a Dog w/ a Bone

The Draft isn't until March and the Bucs don't pick until the 20th hole but yet here I am devoting my third straight post to the damn thing. The Draft is like Vegas, everyone goes in thinking they're going to win but you know the House is going to win. The odds are stacked against you, but everyone still get excited about it.

Scouts Inc and current ESPN Product Todd McShay (check your contract Todd, the WWL now owns your soul) has released his mock draft which has our Bucs drafting OT Sam Baker out of USC. While this isn't the only mock I've seen with the Bucs drafting Baker it does strike me as odd for the following reasons...

1) The Bucs already have two left tackles, Luke Petitgout and Donald Penn
2) The Bucs have bigger needs, notably receiver and undertackle

I'm not completely ruling out Gruden and Company drafting an offensive tackle with the first pick, based on the last two drafts it's obvious Gruden has a hard on for offensive lineman. But drafting an offensive tackle makes little sense after spending as much as the Bucs did on Petitgout unless Gruden has serious doubts about both Petitgout's ability to return next season and Penn's ability to start at left tackle. Even is the former is a likely possibility the latter is highly unlikely. While Penn is not about to make it to any Pro Bowls he was reliable at left tackle.

Which leads us right back to drafting a receiver. McShay has four receivers drafted around the Bucs pick, and most draft talk at this point has six possible receivers being drafted in the first round. The receiver crop this year appears to shake out much like it did in 2004. That was the year we saw 6 receivers drafted in the first round, including Michael Clayton. This year's potential 1st rounders include

DeSean Jackson - Cal

Malcolm Kelly - Okla

Limas Sweed - Texas

Mario Manningham - Mich

Early Doucet - LSU

James Hardy - Indiana

I've already stated my support for Manningham (the solid if somewhat overwhelming choice) but I'm starting to come around to Sweed. He was widely considered the top receiver before the season started and if not for a wrist injury could have gone in the top ten. He's one of those guys who you get the feeling that looking back in ten years could have been the steal of the draft.

Anyway, like I mentioned at the beginning, we're a long ways away from the Draft so I'm sure I will waste a few more words on the subject between now and April.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Not to post-jack here, but Ski, what's your take on the Monte Kiffin situation? What about Allen, who's still dreaming dreams of Jake Plummer's past?

Ski said...

i've refrained from commenting on monte kiffin mostly because i assume he will be resigned. it's safe to assume at this point that kiffin is content to stay in tampa, and as long as he is paid a fair market value kiffin will remain with the bucs.

it will be interesting to see how the jason garrett signing affects kiffin's contract. i doubt the glazers are willing to pay kiffin $3 M a year, but kiffin's market value has gone up considerably since he signed his last contract.

and i get the feeling allen is simply keeping the door open to the possibility of the snake returning to football.

T.K. said...

SI's latest mock came out today and has us taking Manningham, which I would consider a fine choice. I'm itching to run with what we have on the OL for a year and see if they can jell even more, since it's amazing to me we did as well as we did with them given that all of them were so young.

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