The NFL Network’s lead NFL Draft Analyst and Scouting Combine head honcho Mike Mayock took part in a conference call with national media members yesterday in the lead up to the 2012 NFL Scouting Combine.
Mayock does these calls every year prior to the Combine, but unlike last year, the NFL Network didn't provide a transcript of the call this time, so you'll have to make do with my hastily scribbled transcript below - or listen to a 45 minute part of the call here.
While members of the Dallas media may have been in attendance, no specific questions were asked about the Cowboys in the segment, so Mayock didn't address the Cowboys specifically, but he did talk about a couple of players and topics that are of interest to Cowboys fans.
The soundbite of the day (for me) may have come when he mentioned Sean Lee as a Pro Bowler when he talked about Boston College linebacker Luke Kuechly:
Think about Sean Lee. That’s the best comparison. Sean Lee went in the second round to Dallas but has become a Pro Bowl inside linebacker, and I think [Luke Kuechly] is very similar, has none of the knee issues Sean had and is a slightly better athlete.
After the break, find out what Mayock has to say about depth along the defensive line, offensive linemen and a selection of players that have been (at times) hotly debated on these boards.
Hot on the heels of yesterday's Mel Kiper mock draft comes Wes Bunting's latest offering, mock draft version 3.0.
Bunting, of course, knows how to deliver a mock draft that gets people talking, and in his third iteration of his mock draft, he offers the third prospect for the Cowboys after having the Cowboys select David DeCastro in v 1.0 and Peter Konz in v 2.0. But what makes this third version highly auspicious is what happened last year:
After mocking Robert Quinn to the Cowboys in his mock v 1.0 and Prince Amukamara in v 2.0, he hit the nail on the head in v 3.0, mocking Tyron Smith to the Cowboys. Will Bunting be able to repeat that feat this year?
With the 14th pick in the 2012 draft, the Bunting has the Cowboys taking Dre Kirkpatrick. Bunting writes:
The Cowboys have to be thrilled with both Kirkpatrick and Stanford OG David DeCastro still on the board. However, I see them opting for the big corner because of the overall priority of the position.
So this year's mock 3.0 is doubly auspicious, not only because of last year's pick, but also because both Kirkpatrick and DeCastro are available for the Cowboys - and if those two drop that far, other prospects must have taken their place in the top 13. After the break, we look at who those players are.
Yesterday, NFL Network draft analyst Mike Mayock released an updated version of his top five players per position heading into the Combine. You can find the full rankings here, but we'll focus only the positions of need for the Cowboys and any changes to the ranking since Mayock's initial version from January.
Defensive Ends/OLBs: An improved pass rush is an obvious position to focus on as a Cowboys fan. Anthony Spencer's future with the Cowboys is still up in the air, and with the amount of interest the Cowboys showed in J.J. Watt last year, an upgraded pass rush will certainly be one of the offseason objectives for the Cowboys. Whether this upgrade will happen at OLB or DE is the topic of much debate, but since Mayock conveniently lumps the two together, we'll talk about both in one go.
| Rank | Previous Ranking (1/24) |
Updated Rank (2/14) |
Change |
| 1 | Quinton Coples, North Carolina | Melvin Ingram, South Carolina |  |
| 2 | Melvin Ingram, South Carolina | Quinton Coples, North Carolina |  |
| 3 | Whitney Mercilus, Illinois | Andre Branch, Clemson | |
| 4 | Nick Perry, USC | Whitney Mercilus, Illinois | |
| 5 (tie) | Chandler Jones, Syracuse | Vinny Curry, Marshall |
|
| Andre Branch, Clemson | Nick Perry, USC | |
Most mocks and rankings have Coples as a top ten prospect and Ingram going somewhere in the second half of the first round, so it comes as a slight surprise to see Ingram move up ahead of Coples. Perhaps Mayock is already anticipating a better Combine performance by Ingram.
The same thing could probably be said of mock draft favorite Vince Curry, who is expected to put up some pretty impressive combine numbers, and rises accordingly. Overall, there's lots of movement in this positional ranking, and if you're wondering where Alabama's Courtney Upshaw is, Mayock put him at the top of the inside linebacker ranking. Upshaw did play OLB in Alabama's 3-4 defense, so from a Cowboys point of view he should be on this list, probably battling Ingram and Coples for the top spot.
After the break, we look at offensive linemen, corners and defensive tackles.
There's no secret that the Cowboys could use some help on the defensive side of the ball, especially in the secondary. This past season did see marked improvement over the 2010 campaign, but there is a large talent void that needs to be filled with some combination of free agency and the amateur draft.
Of course, player draft projections will change dynamically once the Scouting Combine gets underway later next week. For now, the only thing evaluators have to go off of is that pesky, irrelevant game performance stuff. It's so overrated. [/sarcasm]
ESPN's Mel Kiper has been doing this draft stuff for years. While, as Rabble pointed out in his 'Scouting the Scouts' piece he's never been employed by an NFL front office, he has probably played the largest role in why the draft process has become must-see TV. He's earned his reputation, for better or worse, to be discussed when he releases his mocks.
With his Version 2.0, he has Dallas taking Alabama S Mark Barron. The article is behind the Insider pay wall, so we can't link you to much, but Barron would be the first first-round safety for Dallas since the drafting of Roy Williams.
Dallas got shredded far too often with the passing game in 2011, and while Barron might be a very slight reach here in terms of his current grade, he's a perfect fit for the Cowboys. I have "defensive back" on my sheet as a big need in Big D, meaning they can't go wrong with either the top safety or the top cornerback here, and Barron offers the most value. Better in run support right now than he is in coverage, Barron could get better against the pass, but he's an upgrade for the Cowboys.
Barron is the 22nd ranked player overall according to Drafttek.com, 26th according to NFLDraftScout.com, but ranks high at 15th according to Wes Bunting at the National Football Post.
Follow the jump to see where other prospects that have been linked to Dallas have been slotted by Mel.
If and when you tune in to the NFL Combine this year, you'll probably be focusing on the better known names. Luck vs. RGIII, how fast is Dre Kirkpatrick, what is David DeCastro's bench press, how agile is Quinton Coples, etc. etc. But when some of the lesser known names take the stage, you'll be wondering who to root for.
Not anymore.
Every year, in addition to 30 usually high profile national draft-eligible players the Cowboys bring in for pre-draft visits, they also bring in some draft-eligible local prospects who are usually less well known.
These visits by local prospects usually happen in early to mid April and are known as "Dallas Days". Players qualify as a 'local prospect' if they attended one of the many high schools within the Dallas-Fort Worth metro area or played for SMU or TCU. These "Dallas Days" have delivered their share of Cowboys players in the past, with the likes of Patrick Crayton, Brandon Williams, Jacques Reeves, Stephen Hodge, Bryan McCann and Dez Bryant, as well as last year's rookies Phillip Tanner, Raymond Radway and Josh Thomas.
We don't yet know which local prospects the Cowboys will invite this year, but we do know which of the 318 players invited to the Combine would qualify as local prospects for the Cowboys.
After the break we list the 15 local players attending the Combine this year, many of whom you've probably never heard of.
Earlier this month, in another look at the Cowboys' offseason plan, I noted Jason Garrett's optimal talent acquisition strategy: use free agency to cover all the team's "must haves" so that they are freed from having to target (and reach for) a player at a specific position in the draft. In a perfect world, Garrett noted, the Cowboys would "draft without needs." Indeed, this is what the top organizations have been doing for some time now, since they began to figure out the salary cap universe's financial nuances.
More recently, as KD reported, Jerry Jones seems to be echoing Garrett's sentiment. Jones noted that if the team was to pinpoint a player it wouldn't happen during the draft - where they would pursue a "best player available" strategy - but in free agency. This strategy makes tremendous sense. The draft is a living, protean entity; trying to target a specific player beyond the first three or four picks is a suicidal endeavor. Free agency, on the other hand, allows you to target a guy--and to get him, if you're willing to spend the right amount of cash.
On a side note, Jones is influenced strongly by his coaches' philosophies--when they actually have a clear, global plan. For years after Jimmy Johnson's departure, he continued to parrot elements of Jimmy's coaching mantra, even as it became more corrupt. If you'll remember, one of the things he loved to say was that he's a "risk-taker." That's pure Johnson. After he hired Bill Parcells, Jones began to incorporate snippets of Billspeak into his interviews. Now, we have evidence of his taking on the RHG's mantra, which can only be a good thing. If Garrett's long-view thinking can begin to influence personnel decisions, the Cowboys will get draft more consistently - making fewer bad free agent reaches as a result - and will improve their personnel. Which is important, as there's a lot of overhauling to be done.
See what needs to be done after the jump...
Every mock draft out there agrees that Andrew Luck is going to be taken first in the NFL draft.
That is the only player that there is any consensus on. After the Stanford Golden Boy, the opinions vary, and the deeper you go, the greater the variation. Given the never-ending cycle of mocks coming out, I started wondering if there might be some way to come up with an overall ranking that considered a variety of sources to give a "most likely" draft order for the first round - at least through the 14th pick that fans of the Dallas Cowboys are so interested in.
So I put together a table using 12 different mock drafts. They are (in no particular order), Russ Lande from the Sporting News, Wes Bunting of the National Football Post, Rob Rang and Dave Brugler of CBS Sports, the separate CBS prospect ranking (which is different from Rang and Brugler's mocks), SBN's Mocking the Draft, Walter Football, Drafttek, DraftAce, Chad Reuter of the NFL Network, Draft King, and Football's Future.
If those look familiar, it is because I went with mocks that have already been used here for other articles. It means I am talking about some sites that you may be familiar with. And that I was able to go to OCC's various posts on mocks to get the links.
But then I had to decide what to do with this information.
The madness behind my method after the jump.
How would I attempt to fix the Dallas Cowboys?
Isn't that the question that we all pretty much have in our heads as we discuss the 2012 offseason? We all have varying levels of expertise and knowledge on certain subjects. Whether real or perceived, our hubris as people combined with our familiarity and passion for the team lead us all to believe we have some semblance of a fix for what ails this franchise. Mostly, this comes out in our comments in bit pieces and fragments, as certain subjects are discussed. I figured, with the onset of the new league year less than four weeks away, I might as well get a jump on sharing my views on the topic in their totality.
I'm no subject matter expert, and I realize that there will be some different opinions as equal, or more valid, than my own. This is simply my view; the moves that if the Cowboys front office made them, I'd sit back and say "that's exactly how I would've done it, let's get to September!"
The first order of business would be deciding which of our own in-house talent needs to stay, and which need to be shown the door. You have to handle your own business first, because you pretty much know what you have in those chess pieces. Especially how they fit into your specific strategy.
For now, here's how I'd handle our internal free agents. I'm waving goodbye to several players for various reasons. Terence Newman is obviously gone in my book. The other two main names here will be TE Martellus Bennett and OLB Anthony Spencer. Too much promise, not enough production for my tastes. I don't think there's any way I would pay Spencer what he can get on the open market, but if Bennett realizes his value as a blocking tight end only, there may be a two-year contract available for him at the end of this exercise.
Also gone would be QB Chris Griesen, P Mat McBriar (can't wait to find out your status), WR Kevin Ogletree, RB Sammy Morris, CB's Alan Ball and Frank Walker, and ILB's Keith Brooking and Bradie James. McB and Bradie are the most sentimental releases, but this is a business, folks.
Follow the jump for much more...
