2009 NFL Draft drAfterglow

Another NFL Draft has come and gone, and what have we learned? Obviously, nothing yet; none of these new playas have played a down in the NFL preseason yet, let alone contributed to your fantasy football team. And we already knew that the Lions were picking a quarterback and that Al Davis likes “athletes.”

But, much like a team with no picks on Day 1, we can and must conjecture. If you follow our madcap tweets on Twitter, you already know what we think of how every team did. (If you don’t, then please follow @fanchampdotnet … and you can check the sidebar on your left, too.) But here, we’ll post our biggest draft dayz winner and loser plus, since we’re fantasy football-minded, our favorite sleeper team:

BIGGEST HITTER: The New England Patriots

The National Football Post had them picking OLB Clay Matthews out of USC (a.k.a. Underachiever System College – at least in recent years: see WR Keary Colbert, DT Shaun Cody, WR Mike Williams, QB Matt Lienart, OT Winston Justice, WR Dwayne Jarrett, TE Fred Davis, et. al. ) with the no. 23 pick.  WalterFootball.com saw them picking ILB Rey Maualuga out of the same school. Bill Belichick had different ideas.

The Patriots recognized what I think was the most important quality of this year’s draft: it was not exactly deep, but very, very wide. There were a host of good players, guys that will help their teams, players that can do some things very well, but many of them were interchangeable for the first three rounds or so.

So, what did they do? What any smart organization that has built a system of winning would have done – they got out of the first round and picked up more picks. And kept picking them up. And swapped them around to get exactly the players they wanted. It was masterful.

They walk out of that draft with a secondary so fortified that the trade of a quality DB like Ellis Hobbs is completely harmless. They gained a lot of depth and have guys that can develop into starters on a team that knows how to coach players to their strengths. Of the 12, nine could be good backups or fill-ins for 2009. In three years, at least six of these guys will be starting. A draft with a long-snapper in it ain’t necessarily sexy, but it wins football games. The Patriots basically insured that they won’t miss the playoffs again until Brady retires.

BIGGEST MISSER: The San Francisco 49ers

The Niners show up here not because they picked WR Michael Crabtree at no. 10 – if he can get on the field, stay there, and concentrate on football, he could be a spectacular player for them. But how can anybody throw him the ball, if they’re running for their lives? How can the passing game open up if the running backs can’t run?

You’ve gotta have someone on the O-line, and the Niners philosophy lead them to do exactly what it took for that not to happen. It’s the flipside of what the Patriots did: San Fran traded their 2nd- and 4th-rounders this year for Carolina’s first next season. That second-round pick could have netted them Phil Loadholt, Max Unger or Will Beatty, which would have at least given them hope of having someone who could help. Now, they’ve gotta wait another year and hope for the best. Wouldn’t recommend it. At least they’ll have a shot at Colt McCoy.

SLEEPER TEAM: Miami Dolphins

It would have been easy to put the Eagles or the Giants here, because they both pretty much secured playoff berths with excellent picks, but Miami is the real home run threat of them all.

Everyone is already talking about how QB Pat White will perform in the wildcat, slashing it up and what not. That much is true, and of a fantasy note, depending on what his positional eligibility is, Ronnie Brown owners know that he may be a nice guy to pick up for some sweet rushing/receiving/passing action in the later rounds of your fantasy drafts. This is the guy people think Antwan Randle-El is going to be every year.

I’m more interested in the defensive backs, though. The impact of picking Vontae Davis and Sean Smith cannot be overstated. If both of those gentlemen pan out, what was a top 10 defense with potential for development becomes a dynamic, playmaking unit to rival or exceed what’s happening on the offensive side of the ball. Not only is this a playoff team, the Dolphins are a legit contender to get to the b(Super)ig g(Bowl!)ame.

Of course, WR Patrick Turner is no slouch, and their later round picks bring intriguing size and speed … Is it September yet? I wanna see this squad in action. Can we just make them play against the Washington Nationals or something? They aren’t doing anything …

What did you think about the draft? How did your team do? Where do you see the biggest fantasy impact?

Tags: nfl draft, pick, team

This entry was posted on Monday, April 27th, 2009 at 6:42 pm and is filed under Blog Posts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.