would you reach for a QB?

would ya say go for Boeller with our 1st pick. i don't think he'll last to our second pick and it seems it will cost too much to jump ahead of CHI for Palmer or Leftwich. i don't have much hope in Simms and Ragone even if they are there at our 2nd or 3rd pick. i can't stand the thought of going into next season with Peete. i think this may be panic setting in but damn ...

 

no... I take the best available athlete if we don't have anything else there

 

well make me feel better about taking a OT. my stomach is churning.

 

didn't say OT was best available athlete... I'd probably go corner at that point... if there was NO way to trade down and everything else was reaching

 

even if there was a corner in the draft that'd be worth a pick that high, it would help our team marginally. our corners weren't that bad last year and wesley showed lots of promise. i could see OT over CB as our line is pretty sad. and i could reach a little at WR. but i want a QB, badly. i think if we wait till the second round we will be unhappy with what is left at that point. i think there's a good possibility that there will be a small run on QBs in the lower half of the first round. as bad as we need one we might should bite the bullet and take whoever we like with our first pick. if we could trade down a few spots that'd be a wet dream but it also seems like a fantasy -- which i guess my wet dreams usually are -- not that i have those nasty things.

 

I'll give it a shot.
We need help on the OL. No one would dispute that. I think we need a free agent but with Donnaly and Steussie on that unit, I think it's important to get some young blood on that unit and the best talent appears to be tackle - Gross, Harris, Williams and Foster. It makes a lot of sense to me that, rather than reaching for a quarterback (precipitous drop after Palmer and Leftwich), running back (weak draft even before the injury to McGahee), or wide reciever (could definately help ourselves here but no more than we could on OL), that we take a Jordan Gross or a Kwame Harris who could help immediately on the right side and be groomed to eventually replace Steussie on the left. By improving the offensive line you automaticly improve your quarterbacks by protecting them better, your wide recievers by giving them time to get open and your running backs by giving them better running lanes. I think that's well worth the #9 pick.

 

what you say makes sense, except that in our case i don't think anything improves our QBs and WRs other than new bodies.

 

I agree but I don't see taking a qb in the first if you can do just as well in the second. There looks to be a greater difference in quality between the second and third best quarterbacks available than between the third and fifth or sixth best quarterbacks. And while I understand that wide recievers are more entertaining than tackles, I think that the offensive line is every bit as big a concern as wide reciever. And there looks to be some pretty good wide outs available in free agency. I don't think you can say the same for young talented tackles.

 

>>I agree but I don't see taking a qb in the first if you can do just as well in the second. There looks to be a greater difference in quality between the second and third best quarterbacks available than between the third and fifth or sixth best quarterbacks.

but will the 3-5 be there?

>> And while I understand that wide recievers are more entertaining than tackles

yep our wr's kept me pretty entertained last year

>> I think that the offensive line is every bit as big a concern as wide reciever

i may not agree. thought our OL did a decent job and our wr's were horrid. but i'd be just as happy (and i use the term loosely) with a OT as a WR with the first pick as long as we pick a wr or two by the 5th round. and i hate to reach but damn we need a QB.

 

I respect your opinion. I just think our wide outs might have looked better if our quarterbacks had more time to let patterns develop rather than rushing throws. And I think that there's no question that the running game that was to be the foundation of our offence would have benifited from better blocking.
Hey, I don't think I'm gonna sell you on this and that's ok. That's what makes the board interesting. But I said I'd give it a shot.