Raiders Draft

[Raiders Own You]

We all know Defense wins SB so why does everyone want Larry Fitzgerald I want the Raiders to Draft Sean Taylor I say trade down a bit pick up a high 2nd round pick draft Taylor in the 1st & with the high 2nd draft Greg Jones Running back Florida St we need a RB big time then with the 2nd from tampa draft the best DT on the board

[prober_69]

Easier said than done. But i'm all about it.

[Twisted]

Fitz is the human hype machine right now. After the combine, several others will be on people's lips, but I'm on the trade down for Taylor wagon myself. Problem is, Taylor will almost certainly be a top 5 pick, so trading down is damn risky.

[RabidRaider]

Historically safeties are not drafted this high. Roy Williams was I believe a #10 (Dallas) a couple years ago and that was considered very high. The safety position does not have as much valve as some other positions. Many safeties are older CB's who are slowing down. Taylor will be very good, but I believe you need an impact player at at impact position drafting #2. With that said Taylor will probably be the highest safety ever picked...and with Al, you never know...

[RaiderInNY]

Originally posted by RabidRaider
Historically safeties are not drafted this high. Roy Williams was I believe a #10 (Dallas) a couple years ago and that was considered very high. The safety position does have as much valve as some other positions. Many safeties are older CB's who are slowing down. Taylor will be very good, but I believe you need an impact player at at impact position drafting #2. With that said Taylor will probably be the highest safety ever picked...and with Al, you never know...

ET was the #2 pick overall, no secondary player may ever be drafted higher ever!

[Twisted]

to my man ET.


As for Taylor, there likely will not be a more immediate impact player in this entire draft. Underestimating the value of an all world safety is a critical mistake. A guy like Taylor could do wonders for our run D, if only cutting down the break away runs. His work near the line would also be a plus.

In coverage, he may be better than Ed Reed, and we've all seen how Reed turned out. #2 overall may be a little high, but if we can't trade down to 4 or 5, I say we pull the trigger on this guy. In 2 years, he could be our best DB and our best LB all in one player.

[TheHook]

Hey, I agree whole heartedly with the trade down theory. I saw an interesting scenario on another board that had us trading down one spot to AZ's #3 overall pick, giving up our third for their 1,2 and 4. This made a lot of sense to me, and I would have to agree with the person who came up with it, its a trade that is actually doable.

I would love to see us grab more picks in this draft, and really with so many areas we can work on, I don't see any reason not to trade down. Unless of course the team decides to take a QB; Then we are obviously "stuck" with our pick.

I see this board is about evenly split on the "draft QB / do not draft QB" issue. At this point, I think we put the ball in Tui's hands and let him show what he can do. If he is not the guy, we can address this position through free agency. I don't think the Raiders will spend 7 million to resign Gannon, and with the new focus on smash mouth running and down the field passing, I don't think they should.

I would like to see us pick up either an OT, DT, S, or CB with the first round pick. I would not however spend a #2 overall on any of the talent at these positions, except for maybe Gallery at OT.

The smart move is to trade down at least once, grab some extra second, third and fourth round picks and add a ton of depth to this team with young players from the top 100 of this year's class. I believe that adding depth through additional third and/or fourth round picks will shorten our rebuilding process by at least a year (i.e., we are champs of the AFC West, and competing for a super bowl in 2005 as opposed to 2006 or 2007.)

Those of you who are talking about safety as a draft priority have my attention as well. I have no problem drafting safety, so long as we can trade down through two moves, stay in the top ten to twelve and grab Taylor.

If for some reason, we can't find multiple trading partners and we have to trade down in one move, I would want that team's #1, #2 and #4 this year and their #3 and #4 next year.

The point is, our team needs quite a few players and we need to do our best to address this through the draft and through free agency. I can't wait to see how it all turns out.

The Hook

[Twisted]

Taylor won't fall out of the top 5 or 6 unless he gets busted for heroin possession, and even then he'll go top 10.

And I see the OT, DT, and safety need...but why a CB? You figuring Woodson is gone?

[TheHook]

Yeah, I agree, CB is probably a stretch for a first round pick, but I don't think Woodson is going to see the money he is looking for. On the off chance that we do sign him, then of course we don't really need to look for CB in the first or second round as we are pretty much set.

Assuming we don't sign him to his big contract though, we most certainly will franchise him. This gives us the use of his services for at least another year, or on the off chance someone will make a tender for him, additional first round picks, which we could then use as trade bait to get better and deeper on the defensive line and offensive line.

If we franchise Woodson, and no other team makes a tender for him, we get him for this season, but I'm not sure we can franchise him two years in a row. If that is the case, we will need to fill his CB spot through this year's draft or next year's draft.

The Hook