Official NFL Draft Thread (General Discussion for Draft)

[jebrick]

The Browns have been winning the draft on paper for a lot of years.  Eventually, they will get enough talent to improve,

[Magnus-Viktor]

The only thing this team did right so far was trade Bryant for a 3. 

For the record, based on how far guys fell, this is how I would've drafted it knowing who would be available at the later picks (without doing any trades.....when Derwin James fell to 17 and they had that extra 3, they should've been trading up for him):

1.  Isaiah Oliver, CB, Colorado - Need to fix up the defense some more.  Depth at CB is non existent for the Steelers & while I'd prefer to go S here, Oliver wasn't going to last until our 2 (he went 2 picks before our 2), and there were multiple safeties that had a chance.  Jessie Bates almost made it to our 2nd, but not quite.  Mike Gesicki is extremely tempting here, but I want to upgrade the defense a lot more than I want to upgrade over Vance McDonald & Jesse James.  

2.  Justin Reid, S, Stanford - One of the 2 safeties I was looking at early on.  He's a solid all around prospect & a major steal at 3-4 & would've been a much better pick than Washington at 2-28.  I thought Bates had better coverage but less athleticism.....Bates being gone made the decision for me, but I would've slightly preferred him even though he isn't as athletic or heavy.  

3.  Sam Hubbard, OLB, Ohio State - Steal of the draft at this point.  I was hoping they jumped ahead of the Bungals for him, but they went with the QB instead.....Bungals did indeed take Hubbard though.  So in a consistent pattern, the Bungals continue to take the guys a lot of us wanted.  Jessie Bates III this year, William Jackson III 3 years ago, etc.  I think we can all agree that we'd rather have WJIII over Burns & I'm sure down the road we'd all prefer Jessie Bates III to Terrell Edmunds.  This time we had a chance but didn't take it.  Last year it was Carl Lawson over Sutton.  In '15 it was Josh Shaw over Sammie Freaking Coates (what a wasted pick, especially with Danielle Hunter right behind him).  

3.  Josey Jewell, ILB, Iowa - gotta upgrade ILB even if Jewell isn't quite as fast as I'd like.  I watch a lot of Iowa games, and he has looked good unless he's trying to stop Saquon Barkley.  I'm sure a lot of people wanted Ronnie Harrison at this point, but he's just a guy to me.  Name only.

5.  Zach Sieler, DE, Ferris State - depth at DE.  I really like the limited tape I've seen on him.  Looks like a prototype 34 DE.  

5.  Justin Watson, WR, Penn - this is where you replace your NUMBER THREE WR, not in 2!  

7.  Dylan Cantrell, WR, Texas Tech - double up on the potential steals to replace Bryant.  

 

Other guys I'm hoping for on day 3 (besides the 4 I have in my little mock above) are Greg Stroman, Avonte Maddox, Ade Aruna, Josh Sweat, Marquis Haynes, Brett Toth, Jordan Mailata, Luke Falk (if not for already taking Rudolph), Natrell Jamerson, Troy Apke (MUCH rather have him in 5-7 than Edmunds in 1!!!!!), Jordan Whitehead, & Nyheim Hines, Kalen Ballage, Akrum Wadley, Phillip Lindsay, Roc Thomas, Jordan Wilkins, Justin Jackson & Chris Warren III, for depth at RB.  

[Chieferific]

11 hours ago, 1BackInBlackFan said:

 

Can Munchak be both OL Coach, Head Coach and GM? He seems like the only one with some sense sometimes. 

[warfelg]

Tweets like this is why I think they panicked to take Edmunds. 

[VigilantZombie]

1 minute ago, warfelg said:

Tweets like this is why I think they panicked to take Edmunds. 

It pretty much confirms that they did. 

[Chieferific]

1 minute ago, warfelg said:

Tweets like this is why I think they panicked to take Edmunds. 

I'm not gonna say they panicked. They had to know it was a possibility he wasn't there. We didn't think he would be. I think they followed their Board it's just that their Board was out of whack. 

[Armsteeld2]

28 minutes ago, warfelg said:

I watched almost every VT game living in the heart of Virginia.  He's going to struggle.  His first step is always towards the LOS, so it's easy to get behind him.  Then he puts his head down to turn and run, watches the pass catcher rather than tracking the ball.  His angles thing might be a tad overblown, as some of it came from his need to protect that right shoulder.  What I get concerned with is he tries to play downhill first, to the sideline second.  That needs some work.  He needs to learn to break down and tackle off two feet rather than one foot tackles.

Depending on this new using the head rule the NFL is putting in place, I think he might be in for a few flags early in his career as his tackle motion is Shazier like.

Long wingspan.  Knows how to take away the inside moves and forces rushers to take the long road.  For his size, he move his feet extremely well.  One of the better pulling tackles I've seen in a while.  Uses his hands well and is extremely balanced.  Doesn't dip into blocks.

He needs work on taking a bigger base as he tended to stay narrow and get beat by power rushers.  Though he uses his hands well and has a big wingspan, he doesn't always use both to his advantage.  He can get his hands out there, and engage the rusher faster, and he becomes a lockdown blocker.  He's not consistent.  

Didn't start playing football until highschool, so he's still got a ways to grow.

Regarding Edmunds coming to the LOS, is part of the curbing aggression statement.  

Okorafor has a tendency to catch defenders which allows them to get their hands inside which gives the defenders control.  Thanks for the breakdown.

[Armsteeld2]

1 minute ago, Chieferific said:

I'm not gonna say they panicked. They had to know it was a possibility he wasn't there. We didn't think he would be. I think they followed their Board it's just that their Board was out of whack. 

I watched Evans’ Titans interview and the GM was asked did the Steelers try trading to get Evans and he said they had intel that someone was trying to get that spot.

[Chieferific]

1 minute ago, Armsteeld2 said:

I watched Evans’ Titans interview and the GM was asked did the Steelers try trading to get Evans and he said they had intel that someone was trying to get that spot.

Yeah, someone else posted that we tried to deal with Balt. but they wouldn't play. Like I said, I don't have a problem with Edmunds as a player. I have a problem with him being taken @28. But in the end, where he was taken doesn't change what he'll be. Hopefully it turns out for the best.

[95lloyd]

10 minutes ago, warfelg said:

Tweets like this is why I think they panicked to take Edmunds. 

I don't get how you can label it as "panicked"  Teams are always aware someone they covet might be taken ahead of them.  Heck it is why teams try to move up.  Just because you lose said target doesn't mean the guy you end up taking is crap.  Evans went at 22, there were another 5 picks before we drafted Edmunds are we suppose to believe Colbert sat there that whole time thinking OMG OMG what are we going to do now?

[Magnus-Viktor]

9 hours ago, 95lloyd said:

Exaggerate much? We won 6 games after Shazier was out last season.  One could argue we've improved since then.  Bostic should be an improvement over what Spence offered.  Mitchell is gone and Burnett/Edmunds could provide more in the secondary.  To come out and say we're going to have a losing record because you don't like their draft is pretty absurd lol

No, not exaggerating at all.  Bostic is a guy that has started 32 games out of what should have been 80 if he was any good.  Averaging 48 tackles a year, with a TOTAL of 3 sacks, 7 PDef and 1 INT.  He's short and not very quick.  He's a hitter though, which is baffling in today's NFL that the Steelers obviously prioritize it still.  They didn't win 6 games without Shazier last year either.  

 

Against the Bengals (game he got hurt in) they gave up 20.  Only allowed 14 in the 1st game.  

Gave up 38 points to a crappy Baltimore team that averaged 24.7 (with those 38 included).  They held them to 9 in Baltimore when Shazier was playing earlier in the year.  

Gave up 27 to the Cheatriots.  And lost.  

Held the lowly Texans to 6 (they'd lost their QB & were dead in the water).

Gave up 24 points to the Clowns.  Held them to 21 earlier in the year when they played like trash.  

Gave up 45 to the fricking Bungals with Blake Bortles.  A team that averaged 26, thanks in part to shredding the Steelers' Run D twice.  Gave up 30 earlier in the year with Shazier.  This is the same team that Buffalo held to 10 points in round 1 of the playoffs and the Cheatriots held to 20.  FORTY FIVE!  Disgusting.  

So by my count, that's 3-1 in the regular season without him and 0-1 in the post season without him, and gave up 45 points in the playoff loss when it mattered.  Sure not 6 wins without him.  

Points allowed each game:

1.  18
2.  9
3.  23 (loss)
4.  9
5.  30 (loss)
6.  13
7.  14
8.  15
10.  17
11.  17
12.  28
13.  20 (Shazier injured)
14.  38
15.  27 (loss)
16.  6
17.  24
playoffs.  45 (loss)

 

As far as I'm concerned, they did very little to upgrade the D.  Burnett is injury prone and has 9 career INTs in 8 years.  Missed 10 games in the last 3 years due to injury.  Bostic is nothing to write home about.  Edmunds is going to be a project.  Then they wasted the 2 other picks on depth on offense.  No linebackers at all.  

[95lloyd]

My mistake on the 6 games I took it from the wrong Bengals game.  However,  If you include the game he got injured in they beat the Bengals, Ravens, Texans and Browns.  Narrowly lost to the Patriots in the Jessie James catch game and then lost the playoff game to the Jags.  That's not exactly all doom and gloom like you're making it out to be.  Are we worse off without Shazier?  Most definitely but to suggest we're going to have a losing record because of the loss of Shazier is laughable.

[Alex]

So, here's my initial thoughts.

1). We all can agree that Evans was somebody who would have been a day 1 starter for us, they failed to trade up and get him. How we fail is, however, subjective as sometimes a team may be asking too much.

2). We signed Bostic and Burnett, knowing they'd start day 1 and we knew that, we weren't going to push the need for a player. We can afford a developmental prospect. 

3). I don't like where we got Edmunds, but I do love the idea of him being our moneybacker and if we only can put 11 best men on the field, then Edmunds may make sense in that aspect where he's our moneybacker over somebody like say, either Bostic or Vince Williams. 

4). James Washington was our best pick and I wanted to talk about one thing; I saw that he actually had experience playing as a running back. I wonder if the Steelers saw this as a way to kill the two birds with one stone? Getting Bryant's replacement and a 3rd down back? He definitely does have the size and agility. Question is, vision???

5). Mason Rudolph, well, well. We got the next best quarterback in the draft since we drafted Big Ben and we got him in 3rd. He's a system QB that would need time to learn our playbook and frankly, I like this really. While we want to ride Big Ben until he falters, it's good to have that freedom now if Mason ever develops into the player we want him to be we can afford to negotiate with Big Ben. We wouldn't be stuck with knowing we only got Landry. 

6). Chukwuma Okorafor. Still unsure about this. I know he has a lot of potentials and can play both positions, definitely Hubbard's replacement. I don't think this has anything to do with Hawkins or Feiler. The fact Finney is likely to replace Foster sooner than expected, who's going to back him up in future? We got Feiler. Hawkins could be the next guy. This feel like it has a lot to do with Gilbert and Hubbard than it does for our other players.

 

Overall the draft could have easily better- well, could it? We mentioned the players we wanted, would have they started? Are they substantially better than the players we have? Our defense is YOUNG. Justin Reid is essentially the same as Sean Davis. I do expect us to draft a free safety prospect later in rounds as there are many good developmental prospects remaining. 
 

Don't forget we still have the Bell situation that we may handle with during the summer. Gotta keep room for this too.

[VigilantZombie]

13 minutes ago, 95lloyd said:

I don't get how you can label it as "panicked"  Teams are always aware someone they covet might be taken ahead of them.  Heck it is why teams try to move up.  Just because you lose said target doesn't mean the guy you end up taking is crap.  Evans went at 22, there were another 5 picks before we drafted Edmunds are we suppose to believe Colbert sat there that whole time thinking OMG OMG what are we going to do now?

I don't get how you don't read panic in that.  Do I think they didn't figure out before #28 who they wanted? No.  Do I think that Edmunds was somewhat of a 'forced pick' because the people they actually wanted in the first round were gone? YES!  They went into their 2nd and 3rd round prospects and said to themselves "Who might not make it to us in the 2nd round that we really like", Edmunds was that guy.  Does that make him a good pick in terms of value? Hell no.

In terms of value, the Steelers have failed thus far in this draft imo.  Rudolph was a good pick as a 3rd rounder, Washington was a good pick as a late 2nd rounder, but Edmunds was a reach and we did not need an OT imo.

[August4th]

maybe the steelers plan B for ILB after missing out on evans will be through free agency or trade around TC like how we got haden/mcdonald last yr