Fan-Valuation #2 Linebacker

[BURROWorBUST]

(05-04-2020, 11:39 AM)BURROWorBUST Wrote: From this article in The Athletic.

‘This is crazy’: Inside how Bengals plotted, executed a massive roster overhaul
Paul Dehner Jr.

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Quote:The Bengals liked all three linebackers that went off the board in the first round (Texas Tech’s Jordyn Brooks, LSU’s Patrick Queen and Oklahoma’s Kenneth Murray) and could have selected Georgia tackle Isaiah Wilson, but with their obvious need at linebacker unfulfilled, they had an eye on the top of the third.

It ended up being Wyoming’s Logan Wilson thanks to one of the tensest rounds in recent memory.
“You’ve got your 10 guys mapped out as you come through the second round,” Taylor said. “But you aren’t even counting Logan at that point. We shouldn’t even be discussing him. He’s going to be gone.”
Yet, as their No. 65 pick got closer and he was there, discussions kicked up about how to secure a target they had graded so much higher at a position of need.
“We thought Logan had a really, really strong chance of going somewhere in the second round,” Potts said. “Maybe even early to mid-second round. So we were, just being honest, I can’t speak for everyone else — I was nervous the whole second round as picks started to go off the board and he was still there.”
They knew a grouping of teams were in the linebacker market, most notably Kansas City. When the Chiefs selected Mississippi State’s Willie Gay, the staff thought it might make it with only Seattle left to pick. The Seahawks already snagged Brooks in the first, so it seemed the Bengals might be in the clear.
Then, a trade was announced. Carolina came up. The Panthers had just lost Luke Kuechly to retirement.
“Everybody was pretty bummed out,” Potts said.
The Panthers ended up taking Southern Illinois safety Jeremy Chinn.
“There was a loud combination of exhale and cheers on the Zoom conference call,” Potts said.
When Akeem Davis-Gaither of Appalachian State and seventh-rounder Markus Bailey of Purdue ended up falling below the Bengals’ grades, it seemed the strategy of favoring free agency versus the draft in overhauling the defense played out to perfection.
“With (the) free agency thing, we were talking about Schobert, we were talking about Martinez — not to put Wilson in that category — but in my opinion, he’s faster than those guys, a better athlete, cover player than those guys and those guys all got 10-plus (million),” Radicevic said of their lucrative deals with the Jaguars and Giants. “So, everybody is all pissed off because we didn’t sign a linebacker in free agency but, in my opinion, we ended up drafting one that’s going to be better.”
As opposed to spending that much money on a linebacker, they drafted Wilson using the money on Alexander and Bell in the secondary.