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Lou Pickney's 2024 NFL Mock Draft


National Football League
Draft King Analysis

December 26, 2007
Lou Pickney, DraftKing.com

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Jamaal Charles
Jamaal Charles makes great cuts out of the backfield. (Aaron M. Sprecher/Icon SMI)
Many of the lower-tiered bowl game matches are underway (or in the books), including two rematches of regular season games: BYU/UCLA and Purdue/Central Michigan. Short of the Florida/Florida State tie game (the infamous "Choak at Doak") in 1994 with the Sugar Bowl rematch in January 1995, or a BCS Title game, it seems silly to me for there to be bowl game rematches from the regular season.

As widely despised and panned as the bowl system is, it does allow for a national spotlight for some highly talented players. Tomorrow night I'll be keeping a close watch on Texas RB Jamaal Charles, who is probably going to return to Austin for his senior year, though we won't know that for sure until January 15, 2008, the final day for eligible players to declare for early entry into the draft.

What will be quite interesting is to see how things sort out among the cornerback prospects for the draft. Lockdown CBs rarely are allowed to escape, which makes Asante Samuel such a fascinating story. If Buffalo CB Nate Clements pulled 8 years and $80 million ($22 million guaranteed) from San Francisco this past off-season, what will Samuel land? You can argue that a shutdown corner is second only to a superstar QB, or maybe an elite OT, as far as value on the open market.

In many ways, I wonder how much that will impact the 2008 NFL Draft. There are a bevy of OLB prospects who have expiring contracts. Some may re-sign with the same team, and there is always the threat of a franchise tag being utilized, but even a conservative estimate indicates that there will be plenty of OLB talent on the open market this off-season.

I'm going to be attending the Liberty Bowl on Saturday, which should be fun. Mississippi State's defense is under-appreciated nationally, particularly their secondary. The real treat is going to be seeing UCF RB Kevin Smith in action. He has an outside chance at setting the single-season NCAA I-A rushing record, which would be impressive. Smith says that he's returning to Central Florida for his senior year, which puts him high on the list for the 2009 NFL Draft for college players to watch next fall.

It's one thing to say a player is 6'1", 210 pounds, and can run a sub 4.5 40, as is the case for Smith. But I'm excited about getting to see him play in person. There were two guys this year, Auburn DE Quentin Groves and Arkansas RB Darren McFadden, who impressed me with outstanding play that went above and beyond the stats and the hype and even what you can detect by watching a game on TV. While college football is readily available on television, there is no replicating the experience of seeing a player on the field in person.

Look for a loaded mailbag upon my return, and for sure look for the draft order by the end of Sunday. The networks will likely have the projected draft order available in broadcasts, but it will be on here with the exact percentage breakdowns, subject to change after Sunday only by the two teams that make the Super Bowl.

By the way, thanks to the NFL Network for opting to make the historic Patriots/Giants game on Saturday night available on over-the-air TV -- on both CBS *and* NBC, like it's Super Bowl I or something. While I'm one of the lucky Comcast customers who has the NFL Network at my home (in HD, no less), I highly doubt that my hotel in Memphis (or the bars on Beale Street) would have it readily available. Now? It should be no problem to watch history in the making.


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