If you could redo one of the 49ers pick who would you take.

In hind sight, give up a 6th or 7th to jump one spot a head of seattle to grab John Moffit in the 3th round. See it's easy to do after the fact.Then we get a plug and play guard and don't have to go for two developmental types later on.

Instead of Alex Smith, Aaron Rodgers.

This team would be contending for a Superbowl if that was able to be reversed.

All I know is that I'm pretty sure I'd be a damn good GM. I wasn't fond of Patrick Willis but on the day of the draft my stance changed and that's the guy I wanted.

Other notable players of whom I was targeting for the 9ers:

Sidney Rice (so he instead of Joe "why the long face" Staley)
Pierre Garcon (so he instead of Larry Grant)
Tracy Porter (so he instead of Balmer or Rachal)

Originally posted by WINiner:

Originally posted by MadDog49er:
I'd re-do all of the Niners picks. These are the players I would have selected based on my board and team need (unfortunately excluding trades...I would have moved up to select Peterson..even if the cost was high). In having no trades, note the extra selection. I would have bypassed selecting a QB early.

Also, I strictly go by a no-cheating clause that does not look at how far a specific player mysteriously fell and selecting him in a later round before the real team selection.

1- JJ Watt, DE, Wisconsin
Simply the best player on the board at the time. Since Franklin appears to be leaving, moving Soap to NT would necessitate a new DE to take over right away.

2- Rodney Hudson, G/C, Florida State
I think Hudson is the best OL in the entire draft, and is a starter at guard or center.

3- Curtis Brown, CB, Texas
The team needs a cover corner, and Brown has size and speed.

4- Jordan Todman, RB, UConn
I graded Todman just slightly over Hunter, who I really like as well. Both are great value picks at this point.

4- Marcus Cannon, G, TCU
Since the Niners have a second fourth rounder, this can be a luxury pick. I'd burn it on a risk. Cannon is a starter at guard some time in the future if he can survive cancer and regain his strength. Worth the risk in the fourth round.

5- Tyrod Taylor, QB, Virginia Tech
The Niners need QB depth, and while no one expects Taylor to be a future starter, he can be a solid backup if the starter goes down for a short time.

6- Charles Clay, FB, Tulsa
A FB who can run and catch the ball. Sounds like a WCO fullback to me.

6- Justin Rogers, CB, Richmond
Team needs a second corner in this draft, and Rogers had a terrific career and offseason.

6- Jerrell Powe, NT, Mississippi
Simply a backup, toilet clogger. Every 3-4 team needs one.

7- Ugo Chinasa, OLB, Oklahoma St
Was not drafted, but a quick, strong guy who could develop into a nice role player.

7- Jeron Johnson, S, Boise St
Also not drafted, but a talented, fast guy who has a ton of experience.

7- Dane Sanzenbacher, WR, Ohio St
Competition for Williams in the slot. Sanzenbacher was a seriously clutch WR for the Buckeyes.

Cheers.

Glad you weren't in charge of things.

I second that. I liked our draft. I'm still not sure why everybody is so critical of the Culliver pick. It is a position of need, as our secondary is in shambles.

Originally posted by KknighthawkK_9er:

Originally posted by WINiner:

Originally posted by MadDog49er:
I'd re-do all of the Niners picks. These are the players I would have selected based on my board and team need (unfortunately excluding trades...I would have moved up to select Peterson..even if the cost was high). In having no trades, note the extra selection. I would have bypassed selecting a QB early.

Also, I strictly go by a no-cheating clause that does not look at how far a specific player mysteriously fell and selecting him in a later round before the real team selection.

1- JJ Watt, DE, Wisconsin
Simply the best player on the board at the time. Since Franklin appears to be leaving, moving Soap to NT would necessitate a new DE to take over right away.

2- Rodney Hudson, G/C, Florida State
I think Hudson is the best OL in the entire draft, and is a starter at guard or center.

3- Curtis Brown, CB, Texas
The team needs a cover corner, and Brown has size and speed.

4- Jordan Todman, RB, UConn
I graded Todman just slightly over Hunter, who I really like as well. Both are great value picks at this point.

4- Marcus Cannon, G, TCU
Since the Niners have a second fourth rounder, this can be a luxury pick. I'd burn it on a risk. Cannon is a starter at guard some time in the future if he can survive cancer and regain his strength. Worth the risk in the fourth round.

5- Tyrod Taylor, QB, Virginia Tech
The Niners need QB depth, and while no one expects Taylor to be a future starter, he can be a solid backup if the starter goes down for a short time.

6- Charles Clay, FB, Tulsa
A FB who can run and catch the ball. Sounds like a WCO fullback to me.

6- Justin Rogers, CB, Richmond
Team needs a second corner in this draft, and Rogers had a terrific career and offseason.

6- Jerrell Powe, NT, Mississippi
Simply a backup, toilet clogger. Every 3-4 team needs one.

7- Ugo Chinasa, OLB, Oklahoma St
Was not drafted, but a quick, strong guy who could develop into a nice role player.

7- Jeron Johnson, S, Boise St
Also not drafted, but a talented, fast guy who has a ton of experience.

7- Dane Sanzenbacher, WR, Ohio St
Competition for Williams in the slot. Sanzenbacher was a seriously clutch WR for the Buckeyes.

Cheers.

Glad you weren't in charge of things.

I second that. I liked our draft. I'm still not sure why everybody is so critical of the Culliver pick. It is a position of need, as our secondary is in shambles.

And he's got really good special teams value as a return guy.

If you look at Culliver at the combine, and compare him to Maddog's choice of Curtis Brown, you see a guy who's bigger, faster (4.4 vs 4.5), stronger, appears equal to or more fluid in the hips, and offers additional value as an excellent return guy. (Go to NFL.com, click on "draft" then go to "DB"s and watch their videos.)

Curtis Brown is no slouch, but I can see why the Niners took Culliver instead.

Originally posted by oldninerdude:

Originally posted by KknighthawkK_9er:

Originally posted by WINiner:

Originally posted by MadDog49er:
I'd re-do all of the Niners picks. These are the players I would have selected based on my board and team need (unfortunately excluding trades...I would have moved up to select Peterson..even if the cost was high). In having no trades, note the extra selection. I would have bypassed selecting a QB early.

Also, I strictly go by a no-cheating clause that does not look at how far a specific player mysteriously fell and selecting him in a later round before the real team selection.

1- JJ Watt, DE, Wisconsin
Simply the best player on the board at the time. Since Franklin appears to be leaving, moving Soap to NT would necessitate a new DE to take over right away.

2- Rodney Hudson, G/C, Florida State
I think Hudson is the best OL in the entire draft, and is a starter at guard or center.

3- Curtis Brown, CB, Texas
The team needs a cover corner, and Brown has size and speed.

4- Jordan Todman, RB, UConn
I graded Todman just slightly over Hunter, who I really like as well. Both are great value picks at this point.

4- Marcus Cannon, G, TCU
Since the Niners have a second fourth rounder, this can be a luxury pick. I'd burn it on a risk. Cannon is a starter at guard some time in the future if he can survive cancer and regain his strength. Worth the risk in the fourth round.

5- Tyrod Taylor, QB, Virginia Tech
The Niners need QB depth, and while no one expects Taylor to be a future starter, he can be a solid backup if the starter goes down for a short time.

6- Charles Clay, FB, Tulsa
A FB who can run and catch the ball. Sounds like a WCO fullback to me.

6- Justin Rogers, CB, Richmond
Team needs a second corner in this draft, and Rogers had a terrific career and offseason.

6- Jerrell Powe, NT, Mississippi
Simply a backup, toilet clogger. Every 3-4 team needs one.

7- Ugo Chinasa, OLB, Oklahoma St
Was not drafted, but a quick, strong guy who could develop into a nice role player.

7- Jeron Johnson, S, Boise St
Also not drafted, but a talented, fast guy who has a ton of experience.

7- Dane Sanzenbacher, WR, Ohio St
Competition for Williams in the slot. Sanzenbacher was a seriously clutch WR for the Buckeyes.

Cheers.

Glad you weren't in charge of things.

I second that. I liked our draft. I'm still not sure why everybody is so critical of the Culliver pick. It is a position of need, as our secondary is in shambles.

And he's got really good special teams value as a return guy.

If you look at Culliver at the combine, and compare him to Maddog's choice of Curtis Brown, you see a guy who's bigger, faster (4.4 vs 4.5), stronger, appears equal to or more fluid in the hips, and offers additional value as an excellent return guy. (Go to NFL.com, click on "draft" then go to "DB"s and watch their videos.)

Curtis Brown is no slouch, but I can see why the Niners took Culliver instead.

In my draft review, I had less of a beef with the Culliver pick than with the first two rounders. To me, he grades slightly lower than Brown, but not substantially. I know that many were horrified with the pick, but it was a good value selection.

I do see Brown as a better cover corner, and Culliver as the better FS prospect of the two. Since none of our safeties are starting material, I have no issue with Culliver sliding into one of these spots someday. He was more productive in that position than CB.

Originally posted by fortyninerglory:
All I know is that I'm pretty sure I'd be a damn good GM. I wasn't fond of Patrick Willis but on the day of the draft my stance changed and that's the guy I wanted.

Other notable players of whom I was targeting for the 9ers:

Sidney Rice (so he instead of Joe "why the long face" Staley)
Pierre Garcon (so he instead of Larry Grant)
Tracy Porter (so he instead of Balmer or Rachal)

I was a big proponent in selecting both Sidney Rice and Tracy Porter. Now we'll never know

Unless of course we sign Rice through FA

Originally posted by MadDog49er:

Originally posted by oldninerdude:

Originally posted by MadDog49er:

I don't think you fully read my post. As stated in my post, this re-do of the Niners draft is based on the idea that a) the Niners did not trade up or down at number 7 (although I would have been happy to move picks for Peterson); and b) they did not make the trade for Kaepernick, nor for Kilgore. So, the added pick in the fourth and sixth round exists (12 selections overall), and hence, Cannon would have been my second fourth round pick.

As for selecting guys who went after the Niners' selection, that is always the main premise. You can't select guys who went before.

To my knowledge, I have never used the word, "reach", for Smith at 7. Since I projected him to go at 11, he was in the area I suspected a team might select him. I avoid saying "reach" because it makes people angry, frustrated, irrational. I use the term, "value", instead. You are right that some may say that Smith may have more value than Watt, but team boards are varied. What some team may value in Watt, may not be what they value in Smith. On my board, Smith does not have 7th overall value, since I do not believe he is near the 7th overall best player. Many teams would probably agree with me. At the same time, some would disagree and say that Smith does has 7th overall value. In the end, it appeared the team was stuck with the 7th overall, and in this scenario, I think the better, wiser, safer selection was Watt, not Smith.

As for teams converting players to positions that they were not projected to be drafting for (in the case of Clay), that is the drafting team's perogative. It does not mean the player cannot play the position they played in college. They may run a scheme that could use the player in a different position (like Miller for the Niners).

You believe my draft is not better than the Niners, and that is your right. However, in comparing my drafts to the Niners over the years, I think you would easily trade the guys we selected for the ones I earmarked in the past. We wouldn't have seen the mountain of second and third round disasters that have plagued our teams.

It appeared the Niners did not come away with either of their intended goals for the 7th overall, selecting Patrick Peterson, nor trading with Atlanta for a boatload of picks. Whether it be bad luck, or poor planning, it sure appeared the Niners were stuck with the 7th overall, and simply picked the best player on their board, based on need, which was Smith. That set the wheels in motion for a series of days where they did not get the best picks in their slots.

Oh, I read your post. I'm just not into hypotheticals. "What would have happened if the Niners hadn't traded up or down, etc."

The Niners draft is done and on the record. If you want to come up with a better scenario, then you have to compare it directly to what they did, not to what might have occurred if they hadn't done what they did. Likewise, the actual draft has occurred, so we don't need to conjecture about player rankings.

A direct comparison is helpful, IMHO.

Further, I'm not sure you want to get into comparisions of past drafts, or your analyses of past drafts. For one, we no longer have McGloughan doing the drafting, or Nolan/Singletary looking over his shoulder on draft day.

Same goes for Baalke/Singletary. Not sure Baalke would have gone with two OL in the first round, or with Mays in the second, last year without Singletary's input.

So the focus is just on this year's draft. Truly, the biggest lack is no NT. Although that is of some concern, I am nevertheless intrigued by the Baalke/Harbaugh leadership and the amount of thought and planning they had to have put into this draft.

They could not have missed the NT issue, so they must have something else in mind.

As for the first round scenario you present, rumor has it that they were prepared to trade back with Atlanta, but it fell through. Maybe they tried to trade up to get Peterson, but I've never heard anyone confirm that.

Neither of those two possibilities means that Aldon Smith wasn't or isn't worth the #7 pick, or that the Niner's didn't get most, if not all the players they'd targeted.

So, rather than a grade--which is really meaningless--I prefer to consider the Niner's draft this year as intriguing and filled with potential. I consider your hypothetical draft to be interesting, but it does not contain overwhelming evidence that the Niners should have gone a different way. IMHO.

I don't understand how you can say that you are not interested in hypotheticals, since the nature of this thread is hypothetical: "If you could redo one of the 49ers picks..."

If I am re-doing the draft, I would go down a different path...period. No trade for CK, and the keeping of the 12 picks.

As for the idea that the previous regimes were far inferior in drafting players compared to this one, I'm not so sure that will turn out to be the case. Wasn't Singletary supposed to be superior to Nolan? Wasn't Scot supposed to be superior to Nolan having last calls on the draft? Just because they are newer does not automatically mean they are better.

I think you are jumping the gun to assume that the team will be much improved on draft days now that Baalke is in charge, especially since he was the head of scouting for years, and second to Scot as of last year. I tend to be skeptical that his opinion was bypassed, and that he was ignored by the top guys. Instead, I tend to believe a lot of these guys on the roster were strongly encouraged to be drafted by Trent.

As for my presumption that the guys in charge were blindsided by the two scenarios that did not play out: Peterson at 7, or the mega-trade with Atlanta, this falls into the lap of responsibility for Baalke. He is running the show, and he could have made an attractive enough offer to get something done if they found either move to be critically important. Obviously, they were willing to deal to get CK.

Plan C is usually far inferior to Plan A. Whether the team ends up paying a price in the end, or benefitting from the orginal plans going south, for the team to be stuck at 7 is problematic if they never planned to draft Aldon Smith at 7.

I suppose I should restate that as "I'm not into wild and unreasonable hypotheticals, with no basis in fact," since that's what I was trying to say.

The "let's pretend we traded all our picks for Cam Newton" kind of hypos are not of much interest, at least to me.

We know what the Niner draft looks like, and we know what every other team's draft looks like, and we know where every player that was drafted ended up. So we don't need to speculate about those things.

Singling out a single pick and arguing that there could have been a better choice, if based on solid data and the way things actually fell (not arguing that the Niners should have taken someone at #36 who was actually taken at #35, for example) seems like a reasonable basis for discussion.

I disagree with your argument that Baalke failed to take advantage of an opportunity to trade up for Peterson, or down for alot more picks, so had to "settle" for Aldon Smith. You say that Smith was "Plan C," or the third option, and therefore necessarily inferior.

I'd argue that Aldon Smith was Plan A, the guy they figured they'd get at #7 all along--or certainly one of a very few who'd be available to them there.

Would they have been disappointed that the two presumed trade scenarios didn't play out? Probably, but its unlikely that those two options were in their original plans; its much more likely that those were discussions held on day one of the draft which didn't bear fruit.

That fact shouldn't affect Aldon Smith's status or potential. He remains an excellent choice at #7.

Like Mayock said on NFLNetwork at the time of the draft, Aldon Smith is an explosive guy with a unique set of pass rushing skills. He's still got to prove himself on the field, but his abilities are not changed by any unexecuted trade, up or down, that might have been considered on draft day. Those things shouldn't be considered in deciding his draft value. IMHO.

Originally posted by MadDog49er:

Originally posted by oldninerdude:

Originally posted by MadDog49er:

I don't think you fully read my post. As stated in my post, this re-do of the Niners draft is based on the idea that a) the Niners did not trade up or down at number 7 (although I would have been happy to move picks for Peterson); and b) they did not make the trade for Kaepernick, nor for Kilgore. So, the added pick in the fourth and sixth round exists (12 selections overall), and hence, Cannon would have been my second fourth round pick.

As for selecting guys who went after the Niners' selection, that is always the main premise. You can't select guys who went before.

To my knowledge, I have never used the word, "reach", for Smith at 7. Since I projected him to go at 11, he was in the area I suspected a team might select him. I avoid saying "reach" because it makes people angry, frustrated, irrational. I use the term, "value", instead. You are right that some may say that Smith may have more value than Watt, but team boards are varied. What some team may value in Watt, may not be what they value in Smith. On my board, Smith does not have 7th overall value, since I do not believe he is near the 7th overall best player. Many teams would probably agree with me. At the same time, some would disagree and say that Smith does has 7th overall value. In the end, it appeared the team was stuck with the 7th overall, and in this scenario, I think the better, wiser, safer selection was Watt, not Smith.

As for teams converting players to positions that they were not projected to be drafting for (in the case of Clay), that is the drafting team's perogative. It does not mean the player cannot play the position they played in college. They may run a scheme that could use the player in a different position (like Miller for the Niners).

You believe my draft is not better than the Niners, and that is your right. However, in comparing my drafts to the Niners over the years, I think you would easily trade the guys we selected for the ones I earmarked in the past. We wouldn't have seen the mountain of second and third round disasters that have plagued our teams.

It appeared the Niners did not come away with either of their intended goals for the 7th overall, selecting Patrick Peterson, nor trading with Atlanta for a boatload of picks. Whether it be bad luck, or poor planning, it sure appeared the Niners were stuck with the 7th overall, and simply picked the best player on their board, based on need, which was Smith. That set the wheels in motion for a series of days where they did not get the best picks in their slots.

Oh, I read your post. I'm just not into hypotheticals. "What would have happened if the Niners hadn't traded up or down, etc."

The Niners draft is done and on the record. If you want to come up with a better scenario, then you have to compare it directly to what they did, not to what might have occurred if they hadn't done what they did. Likewise, the actual draft has occurred, so we don't need to conjecture about player rankings.

A direct comparison is helpful, IMHO.

Further, I'm not sure you want to get into comparisions of past drafts, or your analyses of past drafts. For one, we no longer have McGloughan doing the drafting, or Nolan/Singletary looking over his shoulder on draft day.

Same goes for Baalke/Singletary. Not sure Baalke would have gone with two OL in the first round, or with Mays in the second, last year without Singletary's input.

So the focus is just on this year's draft. Truly, the biggest lack is no NT. Although that is of some concern, I am nevertheless intrigued by the Baalke/Harbaugh leadership and the amount of thought and planning they had to have put into this draft.

They could not have missed the NT issue, so they must have something else in mind.

As for the first round scenario you present, rumor has it that they were prepared to trade back with Atlanta, but it fell through. Maybe they tried to trade up to get Peterson, but I've never heard anyone confirm that.

Neither of those two possibilities means that Aldon Smith wasn't or isn't worth the #7 pick, or that the Niner's didn't get most, if not all the players they'd targeted.

So, rather than a grade--which is really meaningless--I prefer to consider the Niner's draft this year as intriguing and filled with potential. I consider your hypothetical draft to be interesting, but it does not contain overwhelming evidence that the Niners should have gone a different way. IMHO.

I don't understand how you can say that you are not interested in hypotheticals, since the nature of this thread is hypothetical: "If you could redo one of the 49ers picks..."

If I am re-doing the draft, I would go down a different path...period. No trade for CK, and the keeping of the 12 picks.

As for the idea that the previous regimes were far inferior in drafting players compared to this one, I'm not so sure that will turn out to be the case. Wasn't Singletary supposed to be superior to Nolan? Wasn't Scot supposed to be superior to Nolan having last calls on the draft? Just because they are newer does not automatically mean they are better.

I think you are jumping the gun to assume that the team will be much improved on draft days now that Baalke is in charge, especially since he was the head of scouting for years, and second to Scot as of last year. I tend to be skeptical that his opinion was bypassed, and that he was ignored by the top guys. Instead, I tend to believe a lot of these guys on the roster were strongly encouraged to be drafted by Trent.

As for my presumption that the guys in charge were blindsided by the two scenarios that did not play out: Peterson at 7, or the mega-trade with Atlanta, this falls into the lap of responsibility for Baalke. He is running the show, and he could have made an attractive enough offer to get something done if they found either move to be critically important. Obviously, they were willing to deal to get CK.

Plan C is usually far inferior to Plan A. Whether the team ends up paying a price in the end, or benefitting from the orginal plans going south, for the team to be stuck at 7 is problematic if they never planned to draft Aldon Smith at 7.

You can not force a trade if your partner doesn't want to dance. Baalke has already said they were in discussions with Atlanta and Atlanta broke off talks. IMO it is pretty obvious that Cleavland talked to Atlanta and let them know that if Jones was going to be drafted, it would be at their spot and no other. Atlanta did what they felt they had to do to get their player.

You can make the deal as attractive as you like, but if Atlanta felt another team was going to get their guy at Cleavland's spot then it doesn't mater how attractive the deal Baalke offered was now does it?

Tom Brady

lulz at people wanting to redo the draft already.

Originally posted by Kalen49ers:
lulz at people wanting to redo the draft already.

Originally posted by jrg:

Originally posted by Kalen49ers:
lulz at people wanting to redo the draft already.

Originally posted by WINiner:

Originally posted by MadDog49er:

Originally posted by oldninerdude:

Originally posted by MadDog49er:

I don't think you fully read my post. As stated in my post, this re-do of the Niners draft is based on the idea that a) the Niners did not trade up or down at number 7 (although I would have been happy to move picks for Peterson); and b) they did not make the trade for Kaepernick, nor for Kilgore. So, the added pick in the fourth and sixth round exists (12 selections overall), and hence, Cannon would have been my second fourth round pick.

As for selecting guys who went after the Niners' selection, that is always the main premise. You can't select guys who went before.

To my knowledge, I have never used the word, "reach", for Smith at 7. Since I projected him to go at 11, he was in the area I suspected a team might select him. I avoid saying "reach" because it makes people angry, frustrated, irrational. I use the term, "value", instead. You are right that some may say that Smith may have more value than Watt, but team boards are varied. What some team may value in Watt, may not be what they value in Smith. On my board, Smith does not have 7th overall value, since I do not believe he is near the 7th overall best player. Many teams would probably agree with me. At the same time, some would disagree and say that Smith does has 7th overall value. In the end, it appeared the team was stuck with the 7th overall, and in this scenario, I think the better, wiser, safer selection was Watt, not Smith.

As for teams converting players to positions that they were not projected to be drafting for (in the case of Clay), that is the drafting team's perogative. It does not mean the player cannot play the position they played in college. They may run a scheme that could use the player in a different position (like Miller for the Niners).

You believe my draft is not better than the Niners, and that is your right. However, in comparing my drafts to the Niners over the years, I think you would easily trade the guys we selected for the ones I earmarked in the past. We wouldn't have seen the mountain of second and third round disasters that have plagued our teams.

It appeared the Niners did not come away with either of their intended goals for the 7th overall, selecting Patrick Peterson, nor trading with Atlanta for a boatload of picks. Whether it be bad luck, or poor planning, it sure appeared the Niners were stuck with the 7th overall, and simply picked the best player on their board, based on need, which was Smith. That set the wheels in motion for a series of days where they did not get the best picks in their slots.

Oh, I read your post. I'm just not into hypotheticals. "What would have happened if the Niners hadn't traded up or down, etc."

The Niners draft is done and on the record. If you want to come up with a better scenario, then you have to compare it directly to what they did, not to what might have occurred if they hadn't done what they did. Likewise, the actual draft has occurred, so we don't need to conjecture about player rankings.

A direct comparison is helpful, IMHO.

Further, I'm not sure you want to get into comparisions of past drafts, or your analyses of past drafts. For one, we no longer have McGloughan doing the drafting, or Nolan/Singletary looking over his shoulder on draft day.

Same goes for Baalke/Singletary. Not sure Baalke would have gone with two OL in the first round, or with Mays in the second, last year without Singletary's input.

So the focus is just on this year's draft. Truly, the biggest lack is no NT. Although that is of some concern, I am nevertheless intrigued by the Baalke/Harbaugh leadership and the amount of thought and planning they had to have put into this draft.

They could not have missed the NT issue, so they must have something else in mind.

As for the first round scenario you present, rumor has it that they were prepared to trade back with Atlanta, but it fell through. Maybe they tried to trade up to get Peterson, but I've never heard anyone confirm that.

Neither of those two possibilities means that Aldon Smith wasn't or isn't worth the #7 pick, or that the Niner's didn't get most, if not all the players they'd targeted.

So, rather than a grade--which is really meaningless--I prefer to consider the Niner's draft this year as intriguing and filled with potential. I consider your hypothetical draft to be interesting, but it does not contain overwhelming evidence that the Niners should have gone a different way. IMHO.

I don't understand how you can say that you are not interested in hypotheticals, since the nature of this thread is hypothetical: "If you could redo one of the 49ers picks..."

If I am re-doing the draft, I would go down a different path...period. No trade for CK, and the keeping of the 12 picks.

As for the idea that the previous regimes were far inferior in drafting players compared to this one, I'm not so sure that will turn out to be the case. Wasn't Singletary supposed to be superior to Nolan? Wasn't Scot supposed to be superior to Nolan having last calls on the draft? Just because they are newer does not automatically mean they are better.

I think you are jumping the gun to assume that the team will be much improved on draft days now that Baalke is in charge, especially since he was the head of scouting for years, and second to Scot as of last year. I tend to be skeptical that his opinion was bypassed, and that he was ignored by the top guys. Instead, I tend to believe a lot of these guys on the roster were strongly encouraged to be drafted by Trent.

As for my presumption that the guys in charge were blindsided by the two scenarios that did not play out: Peterson at 7, or the mega-trade with Atlanta, this falls into the lap of responsibility for Baalke. He is running the show, and he could have made an attractive enough offer to get something done if they found either move to be critically important. Obviously, they were willing to deal to get CK.

Plan C is usually far inferior to Plan A. Whether the team ends up paying a price in the end, or benefitting from the orginal plans going south, for the team to be stuck at 7 is problematic if they never planned to draft Aldon Smith at 7.

You can not force a trade if your partner doesn't want to dance. Baalke has already said they were in discussions with Atlanta and Atlanta broke off talks. IMO it is pretty obvious that Cleavland talked to Atlanta and let them know that if Jones was going to be drafted, it would be at their spot and no other. Atlanta did what they felt they had to do to get their player.

You can make the deal as attractive as you like, but if Atlanta felt another team was going to get their guy at Cleavland's spot then it doesn't mater how attractive the deal Baalke offered was now does it?

Who was the shady team that shafted Baltimore again in a proposed trade? Does the responsibility for that fall on Ozzie? That wasnt their plan A but they seem pretty happy about it. To much to ask for the niners fans to react the same way and just be happy we didnt reach for Gabbert or another player? According to reports our biggest reach in the first two rounds was 3 spots, I'll take that anyday over a reach of Balmer-like proportions...

Originally posted by WINiner:

Originally posted by MadDog49er:

Originally posted by oldninerdude:

Originally posted by MadDog49er:

I don't think you fully read my post. As stated in my post, this re-do of the Niners draft is based on the idea that a) the Niners did not trade up or down at number 7 (although I would have been happy to move picks for Peterson); and b) they did not make the trade for Kaepernick, nor for Kilgore. So, the added pick in the fourth and sixth round exists (12 selections overall), and hence, Cannon would have been my second fourth round pick.

As for selecting guys who went after the Niners' selection, that is always the main premise. You can't select guys who went before.

To my knowledge, I have never used the word, "reach", for Smith at 7. Since I projected him to go at 11, he was in the area I suspected a team might select him. I avoid saying "reach" because it makes people angry, frustrated, irrational. I use the term, "value", instead. You are right that some may say that Smith may have more value than Watt, but team boards are varied. What some team may value in Watt, may not be what they value in Smith. On my board, Smith does not have 7th overall value, since I do not believe he is near the 7th overall best player. Many teams would probably agree with me. At the same time, some would disagree and say that Smith does has 7th overall value. In the end, it appeared the team was stuck with the 7th overall, and in this scenario, I think the better, wiser, safer selection was Watt, not Smith.

As for teams converting players to positions that they were not projected to be drafting for (in the case of Clay), that is the drafting team's perogative. It does not mean the player cannot play the position they played in college. They may run a scheme that could use the player in a different position (like Miller for the Niners).

You believe my draft is not better than the Niners, and that is your right. However, in comparing my drafts to the Niners over the years, I think you would easily trade the guys we selected for the ones I earmarked in the past. We wouldn't have seen the mountain of second and third round disasters that have plagued our teams.

It appeared the Niners did not come away with either of their intended goals for the 7th overall, selecting Patrick Peterson, nor trading with Atlanta for a boatload of picks. Whether it be bad luck, or poor planning, it sure appeared the Niners were stuck with the 7th overall, and simply picked the best player on their board, based on need, which was Smith. That set the wheels in motion for a series of days where they did not get the best picks in their slots.

Oh, I read your post. I'm just not into hypotheticals. "What would have happened if the Niners hadn't traded up or down, etc."

The Niners draft is done and on the record. If you want to come up with a better scenario, then you have to compare it directly to what they did, not to what might have occurred if they hadn't done what they did. Likewise, the actual draft has occurred, so we don't need to conjecture about player rankings.

A direct comparison is helpful, IMHO.

Further, I'm not sure you want to get into comparisions of past drafts, or your analyses of past drafts. For one, we no longer have McGloughan doing the drafting, or Nolan/Singletary looking over his shoulder on draft day.

Same goes for Baalke/Singletary. Not sure Baalke would have gone with two OL in the first round, or with Mays in the second, last year without Singletary's input.

So the focus is just on this year's draft. Truly, the biggest lack is no NT. Although that is of some concern, I am nevertheless intrigued by the Baalke/Harbaugh leadership and the amount of thought and planning they had to have put into this draft.

They could not have missed the NT issue, so they must have something else in mind.

As for the first round scenario you present, rumor has it that they were prepared to trade back with Atlanta, but it fell through. Maybe they tried to trade up to get Peterson, but I've never heard anyone confirm that.

Neither of those two possibilities means that Aldon Smith wasn't or isn't worth the #7 pick, or that the Niner's didn't get most, if not all the players they'd targeted.

So, rather than a grade--which is really meaningless--I prefer to consider the Niner's draft this year as intriguing and filled with potential. I consider your hypothetical draft to be interesting, but it does not contain overwhelming evidence that the Niners should have gone a different way. IMHO.

I don't understand how you can say that you are not interested in hypotheticals, since the nature of this thread is hypothetical: "If you could redo one of the 49ers picks..."

If I am re-doing the draft, I would go down a different path...period. No trade for CK, and the keeping of the 12 picks.

As for the idea that the previous regimes were far inferior in drafting players compared to this one, I'm not so sure that will turn out to be the case. Wasn't Singletary supposed to be superior to Nolan? Wasn't Scot supposed to be superior to Nolan having last calls on the draft? Just because they are newer does not automatically mean they are better.

I think you are jumping the gun to assume that the team will be much improved on draft days now that Baalke is in charge, especially since he was the head of scouting for years, and second to Scot as of last year. I tend to be skeptical that his opinion was bypassed, and that he was ignored by the top guys. Instead, I tend to believe a lot of these guys on the roster were strongly encouraged to be drafted by Trent.

As for my presumption that the guys in charge were blindsided by the two scenarios that did not play out: Peterson at 7, or the mega-trade with Atlanta, this falls into the lap of responsibility for Baalke. He is running the show, and he could have made an attractive enough offer to get something done if they found either move to be critically important. Obviously, they were willing to deal to get CK.

Plan C is usually far inferior to Plan A. Whether the team ends up paying a price in the end, or benefitting from the orginal plans going south, for the team to be stuck at 7 is problematic if they never planned to draft Aldon Smith at 7.

You can not force a trade if your partner doesn't want to dance. Baalke has already said they were in discussions with Atlanta and Atlanta broke off talks. IMO it is pretty obvious that Cleavland talked to Atlanta and let them know that if Jones was going to be drafted, it would be at their spot and no other. Atlanta did what they felt they had to do to get their player.

You can make the deal as attractive as you like, but if Atlanta felt another team was going to get their guy at Cleavland's spot then it doesn't mater how attractive the deal Baalke offered was now does it?

What I am saying is that getting stuck at 7 with a player like Smith was not a good outcome for the team. It would have been better to be more proactive, and end up sending the 7th and 76th overall (and maybe a 5th or 6th rounder) to get Patrick Peterson at 4 or 5, or find a trade partner willing to move down. Or, if feeling that an outsider, like the Browns, might trump your deal, then you make a better deal (the Niners were in no danger of selecting Jones, and did not need the same package offered to the Browns).

In other words, the team was stuck with the number 7, and while this sometimes happens, I don't think it is a cause for celebration, or dismissal of a team optimizing their draft opportunity.

If you want something, get it done. The good teams of the NFL manipulate the draft to get the players they want, either moving up or down.