The Two 1st-Rounders in 2010

And how much another team is willing to give up to move to your pick.

very little in the way of movement is out of the question. I think we most strongly ought to consider packaging them together to move up. Not advocating, yet, and it sounds a bit myopic of me, partly because of the depth of the draft, but the difference a marquee QB makes is perhaps more dramatic than any other single aspect of a football team, personnel or otherwise.

We may have a top 10 pick and Bradford falls that far because Locker rises up past him, or we may not. Who knows. Clausen’s probably 1st overall. This draft figures to be deep, I recognize that, but I don’t want to end up with the JP Losman of this draft. I don’t want the best of the rest while a handful of other teams possibly including BOTH STL and SF take the Eli, Rivers and Roethlisberger of the draft. Myopic? Might just be necessary to see it that way.

So movement either way, we have to consider. Up to 7 positions are open for consideration for the first round. The other positions are out of the question, but that’s about it. Free agency comes before the draft, let’s not forget.

The Seahawks have a lot of needs but also lack true elite talent. They need a franchise QB. They need someone with Aaron Curry’s level of talent who plays 10 feet closer to the snap. Those players usually get taken in the first 7 picks or so. My WAG is that Seattle will end up with the 9th and 25th picks. If trading both of those got us Suh or Bradford, I’d make that deal. Ruskell hasn’t done much with mid/late 20’s picks anyway.

And I definitely wouldn’t trade down, at least not with the first pick. Suh, G. McCoy and Bradford may not last to the Seahawks pick, but what about Derrick Morgan, Jimmy Clausen, Eric Berry, or Carlos Dunlap? Its around pick 10 where you see the first big dropoff in talent. The Seahawks drafted Trufant and Hutch in a similar area of the draft.

I absolutely love the Simulation games…. always have.

This Seattle Seahawks team over the last few years reminds me of the “beginning of the end” of a custom built city in the game. You lay your grids, zone for industry, maybe employ a couple of cheats, and watch the city grow. Eventually you get to that point when you realize that the city you’ve built isn’t able to support itself…. and a problem occurs. Could be the first fire, or a riot, but “something” happens. At that moment you place another firehouse, or police station to bridge the “gap” in the coverage…. then, something else happens, followed by another budget deficit.

What ends up happening, is you end up chasing your tail. As you toggle between detailed and widescreen views you start to notice all the differences in your older zones that are looking very dilapidated, and the newer zones you threw stop gaps into. No matter what you do at this point, your population ALWAYS dwindles, and pulling out of it is nearly impossible.

I see the Seahawks in this situation right now. It appears like most of our “zones” are ALL getting to that critical mass simultaneously. If we were playing “Sim-Seahawks”, it would be that point of the game when the annoying little advisors begin popping up and warning you about all the impending dangers.

With this in mind, I wouldn’t at all mind seeing the Seahawks stockpile 2nd’s and 3rd’s and 4th’s all day long. It could be the fastest, safest way to plug all those holes that are emerging (DL/DE, RB, CB, QB, OL?) with quality players.

Trade down and get extra picks if he isn’t.

Don’t just sit with both 1st rounders.

Few rookies make a big impact on wins/losses. A few QB’s have recently been an exception, but I wouldn’t count on that. Many more have struggled to make a positive impact 2-3 years later. I look at the draft as the future backbone of the team, 2-3 years down the road. For that reason, I’m a big proponent of drafting best available player vs. reaching to fill current needs. If we need an elite DT now, let’s go sign Seymour, but NOT package 2 picks to trade up for anyone. The best “value” in the draft is late first and 2nd-3rd rounds, so if there is a group of say 6 players that are all on the board with about the same grade and we can trade down from 20-25 for a 3rd round pick, I’m all for it. If a stud linebacker drops to us at 20, we’d be crazy to pass him up even though we’re pretty stocked at that position.