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National Football League
Draft King Analysis
November 22, 2007
Lou Pickney, DraftKing.com
Reader feedback is always welcomed here at DraftKing.com. Send your thoughts to me at LouPickney@gmail.com.
From: Mike Ladge
To: LouPickney@gmail.com
Date: Nov 22, 2007 2:45 AM
Subject: draft king site- D Jackson
Thought I would drop you a line and compliment the job you did on the draft picks. One guy you will be off on is Cal's DeSean Jackson at #23.
As a Pac-10 follower, every team either kicked every punt out of bounds or hit it so short that there were a lot of fair catches. From a receiver perspective, I am not sure he even dropped a pass. The reason for the lower numbers this year was due to poor play calling and horrible execution from the QB, Nate Longshore. When you have a coach who is more concerned with getting the ball to seniors or trying to make sure the team was bigger than it's star player instead of winning ball games, (Cal is 1-5 the last 6 games) you can literally see DJ wide open running his routes into the end zones, only to see incomplete passes and interceptions thrown. My sources have told me that he is running the 40 in the 4.2's (4.28 at Cal's pro day last year) and may actually break that at the combine. Best of luck
Lou: I've seen Cal play several times this year (with a notable exception for the Oregon/Cal game, which didn't air here -- thanks Disney *grumble*), and you're right that DeSean Jackson is a player with rare kick return skills. With special teams arguably being more important than ever in the parity-strong free agency era, where the difference between the middle 20-25 teams is often razor-thin, Jackson is a valuable commodity.
In some ways, Jackson may be a better prospect than Ted Ginn, Jr. was last year. They are nearly identical stat-wise (Jackson 6' to Ginn 5'11" and both 180 pounds), and Jackson is slightly faster than Ginn is, though both have world-class speed and the difference is a matter of hundredths of a second in the 40 yard dash.
Where Jackson is a better prospect than Ginn is that he has more experience than Ginn had at wide receiver. So does that mean Jackson will go higher than Ginn went in 2007 (#9 overall to Miami)? Not necessarily. Jackson lead Cal in receiving in 2005 and 2006, though Lavelle Hawkins has more yards in 2007. I found this article online that has an interesting take on the situation, in particular placing the blame regarding's Cal's recent slump on Jackson and Nate Longshore.
Jackson has a rather large window in which he could fit. Perhaps a team will view him as the top wide receiver in the draft and he'll end up as a top five pick. If the Raiders took him at #4 (if Darren McFadden and Jake Long are off the board), I wouldn't be surprised. However, the relative size of some of the other top-notch wideouts (6'5" Limas Sweed and 6'4" Adarius Bowman), along with the great all-around skills of a player like LSU wide receiver Early Doucet, might make him rank lower on some teams' lists than others.
Clearly, teams are taking measures to limit his touches on punt returns; ask Tennessee how kicking to him worked out for them (it wasn't good.) But Jackson is an amazing talent any way you slice it, and he should be a valuable player for whatever team drafts him. If Buffalo or Denver took him in the middle of the first round, it would seem entirely reasonable. But how high he goes in the draft will likely depend on a number of variables that still need to play out, not the least of which is how his speed will translate into ability to separate from corners in man coverage on the pro level.
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