With just five weeks left before the NFL Draft opens for business, I grabbed my two favorite “draft gurus” from the draft Twitter community and ran a quick, top-10 snapshot mock draft on eDraft’s podcast “The Draft Rap”. With elite football minds like Jeff Lloyd and Vincent Frank, emotions ran wild in the war rooms.
No shock early on as the consensus pick for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers was the hometown hero and hopeful franchise quarterback. Still too early in the draft process so trades were not allowed meaning no GM had the ability to go grab Marcus Mariota with the second pick. The Titans went with the best player on the board and landed a centerpiece to build around their front-seven. Luke then flipped a coin for the Jaguars edge rusher between Vic Beasley and Dante Fowler. Gus Bradley has earned the right to grab his favorite toy on the defensive side of the ball after spending the last two top-3 picks on offense (Blake Bortles, Luke Joeckel).
Jeff went with the en vogue selection of Kevin White, even though DeVante Parker is his top receiver in the class. No matter who you have ranked highest it's clear getting Derek Carr some help will allow him to further develop moving forward.
Things got weird though quickly when Vincent was torn handing in the Washington Redskins' card playing Dan Snyder. It was a pick he hated to make, but he felt was the most accurate route to go with rumors swirling around Washington selecting Marcus Mariota, if he is available.
Picking at six, Luke donated his selection to Jeff who knows the New York Jets' organization inside-and-out. After solidifying their secondary, grabbing a top-tier edge rusher just makes life easy for everyone. In this case that was Vic Beasley, although Amari Cooper was a hot discussion as Jeff took all 60 seconds to hand in his pick.
A rich and deep class of edge rushers continued to show its ugly mug as picks seven and eight saw Shane Ray and Randy Gregory walk up to the stage. After that Jeff made the selection of the day when the New York Giants took arguably the best and safest prospect I’ve seen in awhile with Amari Cooper. Cooper pairs up with last year's breakout star Odell Beckham Jr. to give Eli Manning the best young one-two punch on paper and a nightmare for opposing secondaries. To wrap up the top-10 Vincent agreed the St. Louis Rams needed secondary help and passed up on safety Landon Collins for cornerback Trae Waynes.
Best Pick: Amari Cooper, Wide Receiver, Giants (Jeff)
The thought of the Giants adding Odell Beckham and Amari Cooper in back-to-back years can only be constructed in a video game style setting. Cue the Eli Manning magical Super Bowl run?
Worst Pick: Randy Gregory, Defensive End, Falcons (Luke)
Just hours after announcing he failed a combine drug test for pot, the Falcons select the one-time, highly-touted defensive end to help fill their holes inside the front-seven. Gregory not only failed a test he knew he was scheduled to take, but also showed up this offseason weighing just 218 lbs., something scouts were very worried and confused about. With red flags being thrown up left and right, Gregory’s stock is falling fast and shouldn’t be touched inside the top-10.
Best Player Available: Devante Parker, Wide Receiver, Louisville
Jeff and I both have Parker as our top receiver in this year's class ahead of White and Cooper. Coincidence the Minnesota Vikings select next with pick number 11? Pairing up former Louisville teammates Teddy Bridgewater and Parker makes almost too much sense and could be just what the doctor ordered for Norv Turner and his offense.
Be sure to listen to last week's "Draft Rap" podcast. Where you can listen to the top-10 mock and hear great discussion about his year's edge rudgers with Vincent.