49ers Draft Grades

Originally posted by NCommand:

Originally posted by sfninerfanMax:
A+ great players drafted, Boldin, McCoy and a 3rd round pick in 2014!

Exactly! All these picks PLUS Boldin, McCoy and a 3rd rounder for 2014 is beyond epic IMHO! I'd give it an A.

Actual Picks:
1 (18) Eric Reid (6'2" 212 4.49 40, 40.5" VL 29 WS), FS, LSU
2 (40) Cornellius Carradine (6'4" 276), RDE, Florida State
2 (55) Vance McDonald (6'5" 267), TE, Rice
3 (88) Corey Lemonier (6'4" 255), OLB, Auburn
4 (128) Quinton Patton (6'0" 204), WR, Louisiana Tech
4 (131) Marcus Lattimore (6'0" 232), RB, South Carolina
5 (157) Quinton Dial (6'6" 318), LDE Alabama
6 (180) Nick Moody (6'1" 236), ILB Florida State
7 (237) B.J. Daniels (6'0" 217), QB South Florida
7 (246) Carter Bykowski (6'7" 306), OT Iowa State
7 (252) Marcus Cooper (6'2" 192), CB Rutgers

UDFA Signings:
DE Lawrence Okoye (6'6" 300+), Oxford
DE Michael Percell (6'3" 305), Wyoming
OT Luke Marquardt (6'8" 315), Asuza-Pacific
QB/WR/TE MarQuies Gray (6'4" 240), Minnesota
OG Patrick Omameh (6'4" 306), Michigan
LS Kevin McDermott (6'5" 238), UCLA

Boy, are you the homer!

Thanks for putting all the results up. Makes it so much easier to comment on.

B+

One cannot really judge a draft without more hindsight, but as we're just playing around, my reasons:

1. Gave up too much for Eric Reid. I didn't think that he was the best FS out there and, even if he was, there wasn't enough separation betwwen him and the next few to warrant giving up a thrid that could have been used to shore up an position which IMO now becomes the team's greatest area of need: Cornerback. The team has a lot of short-timers/questionables manning those spots. Competition is needed there. If Reid is not an immediate plug-and-play this pick, as made, would get a failing grade in my book. I'm curious how he'll compare this season againtst, say, Cyprien. However a pressing need was met. So I'm giving it a C+

2. Honestly, I felt that pass rush help, both from the DL and OLB spot, was a greater critical need for the Niners than the safety spot. A good pass rush can make an average backfield look great. I think that the Niners were an example of this. So the drafting of Carradine and Lemonier were tantamount to hitting it out of the park. I think that both of these guys will be excellent. We'll see. I'd give these two an A+ but for the fact of Carradine's ACL tear (which is the only reason that the Niners got him where they did IMO). But still: A

3. McDonald is a project. Right now, he's not a reliable pass catcher. How frustrating was Delanie in this respect? But Vance has been versatile. Would have preferred that the Niners go CB at this spot. But I cannot fault Niner's for going TE. Interesting prospect. Given the alternatives, grade : B.

4. The fourth round was great. Who wouldn't prefer to have more speed at the wideout, but we're hoping that Jenkins and Lockette show up this year, aren't we? Lattimore has the ACL tears, but its well worth rolling the dice. And Patton! Grade : A

5. I really like the Dial and Bykowski picks (maybe throw in Moody also) primarily because of these guys' versatility and where there were picked. But the alternative, maybe picking up a better corner prospect (some decent rated ones were still available), has to be factored in in the grading here. Grade: B

6. Forget grading the rest. Pure crap shoot. Really wish they could ahve picked up Matt Scott as a developmental QB. My personal favorite.

As an aside: Obviiously Baalke did not have Carradine targetted in this draft, Tank just fell to him. They gambled by trading down from #34 when he it would have been perfectly acceptable to have taken Carradine there. I say the wasn't a priority in Baalke's eyes because one cannot crow about moving agressively in going after a player that "we have targetted" i.e., Reid in this draft, and then rolling the dice with another. Right?

Anyway's hope Tank recovers nicely from the ACL. Love the pick. My favorite pick in this draft

Originally posted by ChaunceyGardner:

Niner's draft widely being reported as one of the best ... hard to argue with that!

CBS Sports Draft Scout summed up their grade with this:



http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/blog/eye-on-football/22153086/2013-nfl-draft-winners-and-losers-rookie-gms-do-well

Great read!

Originally posted by Rsrkshn:

Originally posted by NCommand:

Originally posted by sfninerfanMax:
A+ great players drafted, Boldin, McCoy and a 3rd round pick in 2014!

Exactly! All these picks PLUS Boldin, McCoy and a 3rd rounder for 2014 is beyond epic IMHO! I'd give it an A.

Actual Picks:
1 (18) Eric Reid (6'2" 212 4.49 40, 40.5" VL 29 WS), FS, LSU
2 (40) Cornellius Carradine (6'4" 276), RDE, Florida State
2 (55) Vance McDonald (6'5" 267), TE, Rice
3 (88) Corey Lemonier (6'4" 255), OLB, Auburn
4 (128) Quinton Patton (6'0" 204), WR, Louisiana Tech
4 (131) Marcus Lattimore (6'0" 232), RB, South Carolina
5 (157) Quinton Dial (6'6" 318), LDE Alabama
6 (180) Nick Moody (6'1" 236), ILB Florida State
7 (237) B.J. Daniels (6'0" 217), QB South Florida
7 (246) Carter Bykowski (6'7" 306), OT Iowa State
7 (252) Marcus Cooper (6'2" 192), CB Rutgers

UDFA Signings:
DE Lawrence Okoye (6'6" 300+), Oxford
DE Michael Percell (6'3" 305), Wyoming
OT Luke Marquardt (6'8" 315), Asuza-Pacific
QB/WR/TE MarQuies Gray (6'4" 240), Minnesota
OG Patrick Omameh (6'4" 306), Michigan
LS Kevin McDermott (6'5" 238), UCLA

Boy, are you the homer!

Thanks for putting all the results up. Makes it so much easier to comment on.

B+

One cannot really judge a draft without more hindsight, but as we're just playing around, my reasons:

1. Gave up too much for Eric Reid. I didn't think that he was the best FS out there and, even if he was, there wasn't enough separation betwwen him and the next few to warrant giving up a thrid that could have been used to shore up an position which IMO now becomes the team's greatest area of need: Cornerback. The team has a lot of short-timers/questionables manning those spots. Competition is needed there. If Reid is not an immediate plug-and-play this pick, as made, would get a failing grade in my book. I'm curious how he'll compare this season againtst, say, Cyprien. However a pressing need was met. So I'm giving it a C+

2. Honestly, I felt that pass rush help, both from the DL and OLB spot, was a greater critical need for the Niners than the safety spot. A good pass rush can make an average backfield look great. I think that the Niners were an example of this. So the drafting of Carradine and Lemonier were tantamount to hitting it out of the park. I think that both of these guys will be excellent. We'll see. I'd give these two an A+ but for the fact of Carradine's ACL tear (which is the only reason that the Niners got him where they did IMO). But still: A

3. McDonald is a project. Right now, he's not a reliable pass catcher. How frustrating was Delanie in this respect? But Vance has been versatile. Would have preferred that the Niners go CB at this spot. But I cannot fault Niner's for going TE. Interesting prospect. Given the alternatives, grade : B.

4. The fourth round was great. Who wouldn't prefer to have more speed at the wideout, but we're hoping that Jenkins and Lockette show up this year, aren't we? Lattimore has the ACL tears, but its well worth rolling the dice. And Patton! Grade : A

5. I really like the Dial and Bykowski picks (maybe throw in Moody also) primarily because of these guys' versatility and where there were picked. But the alternative, maybe picking up a better corner prospect (some decent rated ones were still available), has to be factored in in the grading here. Grade: B

6. Forget grading the rest. Pure crap shoot. Really wish they could ahve picked up Matt Scott as a developmental QB. My personal favorite.

As an aside: Obviiously Baalke did not have Carradine targetted in this draft, Tank just fell to him. They gambled by trading down from #34 when he it would have been perfectly acceptable to have taken Carradine there. I say the wasn't a priority in Baalke's eyes because one cannot crow about moving agressively in going after a player that "we have targetted" i.e., Reid in this draft, and then rolling the dice with another. Right?

Anyway's hope Tank recovers nicely from the ACL. Love the pick. My favorite pick in this draft

LOL. Well, I "am" a 9er fan. So....

On a serious note, love the breakdown. So a B+ plus Boldin, McCoy and a 3rd next year and 10 picks already that's gotta = an A right? Plus when you factor in some additional "project" players that were obviously, hand-picked by our own position coaches (e.g. Roman wanted McDonald and Tomsula got ALL of his guys including Okoye, etc.) it's got to be a solid A.

I filed the Reid pick under the category of "B/c we could..." category. The FO got THE FS/SS they wanted for our system. Period. Now, if the other S's you mention turn out great or Reid flops, yeah, I hear you. But let's be real, we have a lot of house money to play with and virtually, we didn't give up much for him to ensure we got our man (and the other interested teams didn't). Hell, we couldn't GIVE picks away. I imagine Baalke tried to give later picks away and he still ended up with 11. LOL.

Lowell Cohn gave us a C+...lol. He says the reason it is so low is because we didn't draft a DB... . Later in the article he goes on to say that yeah we improved the pass rush but it won't matter because receivers will be running wide open anyway. Can't stand that guy!

Originally posted by ChipDouglas510:
Lowell Cohn gave us a C+...lol. He says the reason it is so low is because we didn't draft a DB... . Later in the article he goes on to say that yeah we improved the pass rush but it won't matter because receivers will be running wide open anyway. Can't stand that guy!

That was done to give him more page hits because people will think its nuts and will want to check out why.

I'm fairly happy with this draft. I find it hard to find any particular fault in any of our picks. We seem to really like to move guys around. This draft was very similar to some of our past drafts in that we took guys we believed in where we believed in them and we were not afraid of injuries(or we were confident in our assessment of them) or in putting a guy in a different position based on their skill set. I do like that we tend to see what a player can do in our system.

Reid-This just seemed like a by the book pick. We needed a safety. He is a big physical guy. Vacarro came off the board. We use our draft capitol to come up and get the guy we needed before he was gone. Barring a time machine to validate it is hard to not like this pick.

Tank Carradine-I liked this pick. We need help on the Dline. We don't need that help now. He was a "good value" I think he will pay dividends. A bit of a risk but we don't seem to get our injury homework wrong as an organization. 6-4 276 is what I see. I bet we bring this guy in in spot duty and see if he can help the pass rush. But we will be happy if he can go try to keep up with J Smith in the weight room and put on 10-15 pounds by next year. This was another solid pick.

Vance MacDonald-The more I look at this the more I love this pick. If it weren't for my being a HUGE Marcus Lattimore fan this guy would be my favorite. I get why people argue that the guy from Cincinatti was a "better tight end" and part of me really wanted to get Eiffert or Ertz. However, my brain knows we didn't need the "best tight end". We have Vernon Davis. We have a guy in Garet Celek who is a decent #2/inline blocker. The more I read about this guy and see his skill set I start to see a reverse Delanie Walker. I mean that in the sense that Walker was a wideout who we converted to TE. This kid isn't as fast but he played more like a giant wideout than a TE in college and seeing him in the slot and motion etc I can imagine him being an upgrade over Walker in terms of his role in our offense. If this guy is a smart player who gets concepts and is willing to work his tail off he could be huge for us even if the stat line never shows, which it likely won't. He may not have great hands but neither did Delanie. He won't create the separation downfield like D Walker but he will likely be a HUGE target in the RZ.

Cory Lemonier-RIght now he's another in a long list of "depth" picks at OLB. I like it. I hope he pans out. Injuries seem to plague the developmental guys we keep taking every year at this position. Hopefully he will be the exception to the rule on our recent trend grabbing OLB prospects in the later rounds.

Patton-Future pick. Hopefully we finally hit on nice young threat to fill out our receiving corps. I'm tired of counting on old dudes to compliment Crabs.

Marcus Lattimore-LOVE THIS PICK. It's obviously a dice role. You can't fault us on this pick. Even if he ends up not panning out I don't want to here it from "I told you so people" the upside was TOO great for a 4th round pick.

Dial-This is one where I really liked Jesse Williams but I'm hoping we got the better value than the Hawks in this round.

The rest of the draft is just camp fodder and hope. Always is in these rounds. For every Tom Brady there's a bunch of coulda woulda shouldas.

Originally posted by Jcool:

Originally posted by ChipDouglas510:

Lowell Cohn gave us a C+...lol. He says the reason it is so low is because we didn't draft a DB... . Later in the article he goes on to say that yeah we improved the pass rush but it won't matter because receivers will be running wide open anyway. Can't stand that guy!

That was done to give him more page hits because people will think its nuts and will want to check out why.

Yep, that's why no link in my post, he gets no help from me!

Originally posted by ChipDouglas510:
Lowell Cohn gave us a C+...lol. He says the reason it is so low is because we didn't draft a DB... . Later in the article he goes on to say that yeah we improved the pass rush but it won't matter because receivers will be running wide open anyway. Can't stand that guy!

We didn't draft a DB???? Who did we take in Round 1?

Originally posted by VA49er:

Originally posted by ChipDouglas510:
Lowell Cohn gave us a C+...lol. He says the reason it is so low is because we didn't draft a DB... . Later in the article he goes on to say that yeah we improved the pass rush but it won't matter because receivers will be running wide open anyway. Can't stand that guy!

We didn't draft a DB???? Who did we take in Round 1?

lolz

Hey...be nice! Dementia is nothing to laugh about!

Originally posted by VA49er:

Originally posted by ChipDouglas510:
Lowell Cohn gave us a C+...lol. He says the reason it is so low is because we didn't draft a DB... . Later in the article he goes on to say that yeah we improved the pass rush but it won't matter because receivers will be running wide open anyway. Can't stand that guy!

We didn't draft a DB???? Who did we take in Round 1?

A safety?

Originally posted by ChipDouglas510:
Lowell Cohn gave us a C+...lol. He says the reason it is so low is because we didn't draft a DB... . Later in the article he goes on to say that yeah we improved the pass rush but it won't matter because receivers will be running wide open anyway. Can't stand that guy!

I really don't see one(Besides Milliner who we had no shot at) rookie CB from this class that Fangio would've put ahead of Rogers, Brown and Nnamdi on the depth chart. Now 2014 on the other hand we'll definitely have to draft a Corner in the top 3 rounds.

Originally posted by ChipDouglas510:
Lowell Cohn gave us a C+...lol. He says the reason it is so low is because we didn't draft a DB... . Later in the article he goes on to say that yeah we improved the pass rush but it won't matter because receivers will be running wide open anyway. Can't stand that guy!

Who is going to cover Harvin?

Originally posted by ChipDouglas510:
Lowell Cohn gave us a C+...lol. He says the reason it is so low is because we didn't draft a DB... . Later in the article he goes on to say that yeah we improved the pass rush but it won't matter because receivers will be running wide open anyway. Can't stand that guy!

Yeah, kept referencing how awful the secondary was last year. Uh, no. They were not great in the playoffs, but they had one of the better secondaries for most of the year.

Originally posted by bzborow1:

Originally posted by ChipDouglas510:

Lowell Cohn gave us a C+...lol. He says the reason it is so low is because we didn't draft a DB... . Later in the article he goes on to say that yeah we improved the pass rush but it won't matter because receivers will be running wide open anyway. Can't stand that guy!

Who is going to cover Harvin?

Not really sure but I would guess a combination of TB, Culliver and a lot of help from a linebacker or safety.