Wasn't a fan. With draft grades!

[3wt]

(05-01-2017, 10:21 AM)bengals67 Wrote: I have been fuming about management for not firing Marvin, failing to franchise Whit, and keeping Bodine as the starting center. I still disagree on these decisions.

With this background, I think this was a great draft that addresses most of problems during a draft year with weak o lineman available.

Ross will completely unbalance opposing Ds and open things up for AJ and Eifert and other WRs and Gio. Picking Ross does more to protect Dalton than picking a below round/pick level o lineman.

If Pats or Steelers had picked Mixon, ESPN would have said it was brilliant. He may be the best player in the draft. He made a really stupid mistake as an 18 year old. He appears genuinely remorseful . Give the kid a chance.

Mixon runs like Bell. When everyone sings the praises of Big Ben, they ignore how his passing opportunities are enhanced by having a back like Bell to keep the D unbalanced.

Third and fourth round picks were off the charts excellent.

Simmons picked the kicker he wanted. Simmons is one of our best coaches.

The Houston safety could be a huge steal.

The Oklahoma linebacker is great on coverage. All reports say he was one of the best cover LBs in the draft. How many years have we gotten killed by tight ends and backs catching passes?

 The Utah center would have gone in fourth round if he had not been injured. I think he is a better player than many on this board are thinking.

I see a much stronger and nastier defense and a lot of weapons on offense making us far less reliant on AJ.

The ball is n Alexander's court o coach up our two tackles, both of whom were first round level choices.

I am with Bonnie Bengal and much more excited about the coming season

Agree with you and Bonnie.  We really did not have the opportunity to upgrade the OL at the top of the draft  -  not with quality people, and not that would have impacted this year.

I would like to have gotten Asiata at the end of the draft and maybe toy with some other OLinemen.

But I think we significantly upgraded the team.   I'm a big fan of the Ross pick.  He's not just a speed guy, he's a student of the game with apparent football intelligence, a guy who loves the game and obvious toughness.  Anyone who could play out a season on a bum shoulder and play well has my confidence as a mentally tough competitor.

We significantly strengthened the pass rush potential with Willis and Lawson, and I think Glasgow may be one of the more undervalued picks in the draft.  I looked at film on him.  He's a stud in the run game.  Stud.  Destroyed Elflein.  Rarely if ever goes backwards.  Our D-line coach raved about his technique.  And on film I thought he did a good job of shedding and penetrating.  That's huge from my perspective.  Stuffs the run, collapses the pocket and penetrates.  That's a pretty complete defensive tackle and will help us to compete in the AFC North.

We got faster in all three phases of the game and, I think we'll find, raised the floor of our backups (LB and WR in particular)  And we did a lot to significantly upgrade our special teams in terms of speed and consistency.

The only area we did not upgrade was the offensive line.  But for the most part the quality just was not there in this draft.

The only huge offseason gaff in my mind was letting Whit get out of here.  We keep him I think we're looking at the playoffs.

And while I'm dreading how Og plays at LT, I'm hoping that with a full offseason and the work he's put in on his own, Og makes it up to at least average this year.

But Ross and Mixon are going to have a powerful impact against defenses.   

There is now a reason to tune in this year.