It seems that just about every draft year, the watchwords heading into the draft are ‘expect the unexpected’ but then year and year out it seems that the picks actually come off the year in pretty much cookie cutter fashion. Not so much in last night’s opening round of the 2018 draft which was chock full of surprises… Read More »
It’s draft week!! … Depending on who is counting, just three days to go until the picks actually start coming off the board at the 2018 draft. And while there may be a lot of stuff going on just under the radar there really isn’t much buzz out there. Which is kind of surprising, because it is generally… Read More »
Steelers draft preview … Pittsburgh fan Mark Gregg has put together a pretty comprehensive preview of the Steelers draft options for later in this week which he has passed along. It looks like a potentially useful document for Steelers’ fans and its free.
One week to go!!! … Just a week to go until the 2018 draft. Hang in there guys. And the actual draft can’t come soon enough as what looked like was going to be something of a cookie cutter opening round appears to be getting muddier by the day. There is a growing chorus around the league, for… Read More »
To BPA or not to BPA … One of the intriguing elements of the 2018 draft is that while QBs are expected to go 1-2-3 – if not 1-2-3-4 – when the actual picking gets underway on the 26th, many analysts consider non-QB prospects like Penn State RB Saquon Barkley, NC State DE Bradley and Notre Dame OF… Read More »
Is USC QB Darnold slipping? … We won’t know for sure whether it simply represents a bunch of guys getting up on the wrong side of the bed, but there are a number of media analyses out there this day which are not kind to the draft fortunes of Southern Cal QB Sam Darnold. Darnold has long been… Read More »
There are just ten days to go until the 2018 draft gets underway and for the most part it remains very quiet out there, although some speculative rumors about a possible three-way deal between the Browns, Bills and Giants re-surfaced in the past 24 hours. What appears to have set off the latest round of rumors regarding that… Read More »
No Barkley, Chubb visits with Browns … Interesting story out of Cleveland where the Browns, who have the 1st and 4th picks in this month’s draft, reportedly will not have either Penn State RB Saquon Barkley nor NC State DE Bradley Chubb in among their 30 allotted pre-draft visits. Its odd because the two are widely considered to… Read More »
Two weeks to go until the draft; hang in there guys … Not a whole of breaking of breaking news about the draft this morning with now just two weeks to go until the picks start coming off the board, which is probably a good thing because we have really entered the silly season part of the draft… Read More »
There is a growing drumbeat around the league that Cleveland is seriously considering taking Wyoming QB Josh Allen with the #1 pick overall at this month’s draft instead of USC’s Sam Darnold, who has been the consensus favorite to be the pick pretty much since the draft process started. Is it smoke or is it real? Mark Kay… Read More »
The start of the 2018 draft is literally two weeks and normally at this time of the year the NFL community is awash in rumors about potential trades and who’s hot and who’s not on draft boards around the league. For whatever reason, though, it’s dead this year. At the same time, though, it is believed that both… Read More »
With Rams-Pats trade GBN projection updated … In the aftermath of last week’s trade in which the LA Rams acquired veteran WR Brandin Cooks from New England for the 23rd pick in the opening round of the 2018 draft, the GBN’s three-round projection has been updated. As usual, we also add a note that we generally aren’t big… Read More »
If its Wednesday it must be Cleveland … Nobody will excuse the top QB prospects in this year’s draft if they have to check the newspaper when they wake up in the morning to see what city they are in the these days as they are all building up their travel miles big time. Today, for example, USC… Read More »
• Interesting piece by SI’s Peter King in his MMQB column this morning for those that haven’t seen it; Kin g reports on a conversation with a friend of Cleveland GM John Dorsey who believes that the Browns will select Wyoming QB Josh Allen over USC’s Sam Darnold, the consensus favorite to be the first player selected this… Read More »
GBN Big Board extended; Pigskin posts top 50 … With just 24 days to go until the 2018 draft gets underway, as promised the GBN Big Board has been extended to now include the top 300-plus prospects for the upcoming draft. Meanwhile, GBN Associate Editor Pigskin Paul Guillemette has posted his personal picks for the top 50 overall… Read More »
GBN Big Board; positional rankings updated … With the pro days pretty much in the books, both the GBN positional rankings (see drop down menu above) and the GBN Big Board ranking the top overall prospects for the 2018 draft has been updated. Note the Big Board now includes the top 200 or so prospects for the upcoming… Read More »
All 32 teams had reps at the Arkansas workout where C Frank Ragnow reportedly had a strong workout. Ragnow was not able to participate in the on-field testing at the combine because he was still rehabbing from ankle surgery in October, made up for lost time as he measured in at 6-5, 310, had a vertical leap of… Read More »
All 32 NFL teams had reps at the Iowa pro day where star CB Josh Jackson was hoping to run a little better than at the combine where he had a somewhat disappointing 40 time of 4.56 seconds. And Jackson did reportedly run slightly faster at the Iowa workout but his unofficial time in the low 4.5 range… Read More »
Morning draft thots … With the draft now just over a month away, GBN Associate Editor Pigskin Paul Guillemette has some thoughts on exactly where we stand with the draft closing in in the the very first draft thots article.
Good day for Michigan DT Hurst … Just being back on the field today at the Michigan pro day made it a good day for DT Maurice Hurst. However, the fact that he was able to perform up to old level made it even better. Hurst, who is considered to be a potential mid-to-late first round prospect for… Read More »
There was what may have been the biggest crowd of the year on hand at the Ohio State pro day where there over 140 NFL coaches, scouts and assorted senior personnel execs including 6 G.M.s and 6 more head coaches. On the field, former Buckeyes’ DEs Sam Hubbard and Tyquan Lewis both ran for NFL teams after not… Read More »
Irish pro day update … Not surprisingly, all 32 teams were at the Notre Dame pro day, although the only senior exec (or head coach) that appears to have been in attendance was Indianapolis G.M. Chris Ballard. However, there were a bunch of position coaches in attendance including at least a half a dozen OL coaches who were… Read More »
No surprise with QB Sam Darnold, the consensus favorite to be the #1 pick at this year’s draft, set to workout for the first time for pro scouts after he sat out the positional drills at the combine, there was an almost who’s who of NFL personnel people in attendance. Cleveland, which has the #1 pick and are… Read More »
All NFL teams had reps at the FSU pro day where MLB Matt Thomas had an outstanding outing as posted a very athletic 41.5″ vertival, a 10-11 long jump, a 4.58 40 clocking and a three-cone drill test of 6.85 seconds, each of which would have been among the top numbers for LBs at the combine. The interviews… Read More »
As many as 20 NFL teams were at the Penn workout where record-setting WR Justin Watson made some noise. Watson, who is listed at 6-3, 225, ran the 40 in an unofficial 4.42 seconds, had a 40″ vertical as well as 20 reps in the BP, each of which would have been among the top 5-6 figures at… Read More »
