Raiders’ draft garners negative reviews

By Brad Wilbricht  |   Monday, April 27, 2009  |  Comments( 45 )

 Oakland Raiders
The 2009 NFL draft was falling right into place for the Oakland Raiders until Al Davis’ need for speed came to the forefront yet again. Although Texas Tech wideout Michael Crabtree and Missouri’s Jeremy Maclin were still on the board, the Raiders opted for the raw speed of Darrius Heyward-Bey from Maryland with the seventh overall pick. While...
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CommentsComments: 45
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 No.1
 04:24 AM
04/27/2009
(Realized there's a new topic)

4.2 and 4.3 are all Fine and Dandy. Let's just put it this way, I pray Khalif Barnes can protect for 4.something seconds to allow Heyward-Bey to get 40 yards down the field and enough time for JaMarcus to deliver the ball to him.

Listen, everyone on here loves the Raiders. Some like myself are season ticket holders, some aren't. Some are from the Bay Area, some aren't. Rightly or wrongly, some on here blindly accept what Al Davis does as genius, others don't and question his moves when they feel they don't make sense. Sure Al Davis owns the team, but that doesn't make anyone who questions questionable moves any less of a fan. Have you heard of the Yankees. They have an extremely loyal fanbase, and their diehards question George Steinbrenner all the time. Every fanbase has a love hate relationship with their owner and question their moves and motives (it's going on in Denver now and they've won Championships). It's that simple. But at the end of the day, we are all FANS OF OUR TEAM!!!! In our case: THE RAIDERS.

Do I think Heyward-Bey could have been had 10 picks later and garnered us more picks, and therefore addressed more needs? Yes!!! Do I dislike Heyward-Bey? Absolutely NOT!!! I love the guy and hope he has a Hall of Fame career. My thing the whole time has been, NOT A KNOCK ON THE PLAYER, but rather where the player was drafted. I liked Heyward-Bey a lot more than Maclin (not as much as Crabtree though), I just think it was a reach to draft him where we did (as does 99% of knowledgeable football fans).

As for Michael Mitchell. This was the biggest head scratcher I've ever had in all my years of following the Raiders (even more so than Janikowski at 17). The guy was not invited to the combine. The guy was not on any of the Football experts list. The NFL had NO INFORMATION to give on the guy at the draft site. Hall of Fame writers who are paid to follow the most obscure players didn't have the guy on their list. There was no way he was going round 2 like some are claiming here. My friend from Chicago said the Bears wanted Brian Robiskie with their second round pick, and once he was off the board they got on the phone to try and trade the pick, and was only a coincidence that they announced the trade after the Raiders picked Mitchell.

Anyway, did I watch the YouTube clip? Sure did. Looks good, but I also noticed how terrible the competition was too, so I take it with a grain of salt. I also know that every college player could put together a clip that can make them look great. How come the Raiders were the ONLY ones, and I mean ONLY ONES, who thought Mitchell was a second round talent. Is 99.999999999999% of the population stupid? I don't think so. We need a Safety in the worst way, but only an idiot would think that Michael Mitchell wouldn't have been available on Day 2. I really hope for the Oakland Raiders sake (and Al's legacy), Mitchell is the next Jack Tatum or Ronnie Lott, but common sense and too many other wrongful comparisons in the past tells me otherwise.

As a fan, I hope and pray these guys are all studs and starters from Day 1. I also hope that Cable is right about Khalif Barnes, Mario Henderson, Eric Pears being the answers at our Offensive Tackle positions, and that all Kelly, Sands, and Warren need are a couple of tweaks to the system to make them run stuffing Defensive Tackles.

Time will tell, but this seriously was the worst draft I've ever witnessed. Maybe in 4 years I'll be laughing and saying, BOY WAS I and EVERYONE ELSE WRONG!!!
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 No.2
The Shape		 05:38 AM
04/27/2009
This has to be one of the worst drafts I've ever seen on paper. I just hope and pray that half of these guys make the team. If we re-did the picks over I would have taken Crabtree and then Ron Brace from Boston college. That would have taken care of 2 of our biggest needs. I don't nation but I sure hope Cable knows what he's doing with these picks. The second day picks were also questionable. I'm still sick.
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 No.3
Raider Revenge		 06:30 AM
04/27/2009
On paper indeed. I still like the way we stach up against the AFC West.
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