NFL Draft 2014

Last night was a blast.  The NFL's decision to move the first round from Saturday morning where each team had 15 minutes to make a selection to Thursday night where each team has 10 minutes to make a selection is brilliant.

I recall many days where it was 5 in the afternoon and the first round was still going strong!  It flew by just about right last night.

The Bengals sat toward the end of the first round at pick 24.  I was disappointed that the player I hoped they would get, Ryan Shazier, OLB from Ohio State, was off the board (worse yet, he was off the board to our rivals, the Steelers), but the CB that the Bengals landed, Darqueze Dennard, is an excellent choice.

That will mean the Bengals will have five, yes five, first round draft picks at the CB position come fall: Terence Newman (#1 choice of the Cowboys in 2003), Adam Jones (#1 choice of the Titans in 2005), Leon Hall (#1 choice of the Bengals in 2007), Dre Kirkpatrick (#1 choice of the Bengals in 2012), and now Dennard in 2014.  In fact, I see Dennard as a clone of Hall.  And that's a great thing for the Bengals.

Realistically, the Bengals had Dennard as the 10th best player on their entire board. So to get him 14 picks later, that's a no-brainer for them.  And there is no pressure on him to start in 2014 with Hall coming back from injury and Newman and Jones able to hold down the other starting position.  In a best case scenario, Dennard progresses nicely and steps in as the slot corner, allowing Jones to take some downs off and allow the Bengals to use his great return skills on special teams.

Now, though, this brings us to my favorite round of the NFL draft: the second round.  This is where the Bengals have mostly relied on taking the most talented player available rather than drafting for need.  And for the most part this round has brought the Bengals some of their best players.  Here's a list of second round gems for Cincy: QBs Boomer Esiason and Andy Dalton (love him or hate him - and I do both, sometimes in the same series - Dalton holds the record team record for most yards and TD passes in a season); RBs Ickey Woods, Harold Green, Corey Dillon, and last year's rookie phenom, Giovanni Bernard; WRs Chris Collinsworth, Carl Pickens, Darnay Scott, and Chad Johnson.  So the second round has been gold for the Bengals.

Here is a look at some of the players I'd like to see slide until the Bengals pick at #55 in the second round -

RB Carlos Hyde (note how often they have hit the ball out of the park on RBs in the second round)
WR Jordan Matthews (again, when the pick a WR in the second round, they are a Pro Bowler)
OT Cyrus Kouandjio, Morgan Moses, Joel Bitonio (who could move inside nicely to guard), Antonio Richardson.

On defense, there are some good defensive ends and linemen available too - Kony Ealy, Timmy Jernigan, Louis Nix, Demarcus Lawrence, and Scott Crichton.

There are a few quarterbacks that could be appealing too, but I'd like to see the Bengals pick up a kid to start right away here in a pinch.

If all things go well, the Bengals could again take the first running back selected in the draft (as they did last year with Gio) and tap his polar opposite (big and rumbling) in Carlos Hyde. He'd be a great partner in the backfield with the speedy but diminutive Bernard.

If Hyde is gone, then I'd go with an OT.  Matthews is tempting just in terms of value.  But considering we have offensive weapons galore (AJ Green, Marvin Jones, Tyler Eifert, Jermaine Gresham, Mohammud Sanu, and Gio), this wouldn't be a need pick.  But Matthews just has so much talent.  They might not be able to pass that one up.

A darkhorse I'd like to see us tap is Vontaze Burfict's old teammate from ASU, Carl Bradford.  He could come in and compete for a starting position, if not playing time, immediately.