Well, how's that for a first day?
All told, I gotta say I'm pretty happy. I was at the Eagles draft party and as you could expect the initial reaction to the team trading out of the first round for a second straight year was not positive. I'll post some video up later.
I'll admit that I was pretty upset and disappointed when I saw the news come up, but then I saw what we got... Carolina's 1st next year, their second this year and their 4th this year. That's a pretty good haul. It looks like Carolina made the Eagles "an offer they couldn't refuse."
Then, the Eagles used one of their 3 4th round picks to acquire RB Lorenzo Booker from Miami . That was a shock to say the least, but on it's face it doesn't look like all that bad a deal. Booker was third round pick last year and didn't play a ton for Miami. So we're getting a very young player that I can only guess we coveted before we took Tony Hunt after him.
Then we get yet another trade down as the Eagles deal the second round pick they got from the Panthers to the Vikings. At this point, you had to be asking yourself if the Eagles wanted to make a pick at all! They end up getting what was their 4th 4th round pick in this draft in return, as well the Vikings 2nd round pick which was just 4 slots later. Of course, as we said, one of those 4ths we traded for the RB from Miami.
So finally, it was time for the Eagles to actually pick a player. It's DT Trevor Laws from Notre Dame. I'll get into a full analysis of the picks later tonight, but I like this pick a lot. We needed another DT and the pass rushing Laws will be a good fit to rotate in with Bunkley and Patterson. He's also a guy that should play early on.
Then comes pick #2 in the 2nd. It's WR Desean Jackson from Cal. I have to say I'm pretty amazed he was still on the board late in the 2nd, the Eagles probably were as well. Jackson has blazing speed, was a very good WR in college, and was arguably the best return man in all of college football. He's not a big guy and it'll be interesting to see how he develops as WR... but at the very least it appears our return situation was solved in a big way.
All in all, the Eagles added Trevor Laws, Desean Jackson, Lorenzo Booker, a first round pick next year, and an extra 4th rounder. That's a pretty good haul in my opinion. Lots more coming later, and I'll be live blogging day two.