It's 2012 NFL Draft Day

Good morning ladies and gents. It's draft day. For those NFL fans that just can't seem to get enough football out of 365 day year, this is the day that feels the most like Christmas. What toys will we be surprised with? Will we get that toy that we have been dreaming of or will we get a toy completely different only to find out that we like it better anyways. I don't deal in the negative too often so I wont go into the toy that makes us say, huh?.

So here is my opinion of how the draft will play out for our Buccaneers first round tonight. The first 2 picks are set. We all know that Luck will go 1 and RGIII will go 2. So Vikings are on the clock. The Vikings general manager Rick Spielman has made an admiral attempt at building a market for trading their number 3 pick. The more you can convince other teams that you may take the player they have targeted, the more value you gain in possibly trading down. So Spielman has pulled out every stop to get the word out that the Vikings may not be as interested in left tackle Matt Kalil and may look toward Morris Claiborne or Justin Blackmon. So lets take a moment to truly analyze this thought. First, the Vikings have a guard playing the LT position. Look no further than how many times Ponder was face down in the dirt to realize the NEED at LT. Second, the Vikings know that they can trade down no further than the Rams at 6 and still get their LT Kalil. If they trade past 6, the Rams would take Kalil and the Vikings are done. Third, the 3 players that are most coveted by the 5 team (Bucs) and 6 team (Rams) are Claiborne, Blackmon and Richardson. Now the Vikings can't really try to claim interest in Richardson when they have Adrian Peterson on their roster. So, Spielman has every pundit he can get rumors into broadcast the Vikings interest in Claiborne and Blackmon. Hoping that the Bucs or Rams will get trigger finger and give up some free picks to move up.  Bottom line is the Vikings will absolutely pick Kalil in this draft. They will pick him at 3 or they will pick him a few picks later, but they will pick Kalil. My prediction is that the other GMs are just as wise and force the Vikings to take Kalil at 3.

Now the Browns are on the clock. This is a tricky pick. The Browns let RB Peyton Hillis walk this off season and are in need of a running back. But what I think is a key issue to this pick is the fact that the Browns run a hybrid west coast offense. This offense requires a big athletic receiver that excels at yards after the catch. It doesn't take an expert to look at the Browns roster a realize that there is not one receiver that fits this mold. Then you look at the draft. The Browns could take the #1 RB in the draft and the 5th or 6th WR with their 2nd pick. Or they could take the #1 WR with their 1st pick and get the #2 RB with their 2nd. I am going on the limb to say the Browns will select WR Justin Blackmon with the 4th pick of the draft and get their RB later.

That brings us to the Buccaneers at 5. WOW! Look at that. The Bucs have their choice between the #1 RB in Richardson or the #1 CB in Claiborne. Now we have debated the choice between these two players endlessly so I won't go into that detail. I will only say what I truly believe about HC Schiano. He wants to run, run. run, run and then run a little more. If this scenario presents itself, and the Bucs have this choice, the Bucs will take RB Trent Richardson in tonight's round 1.