Southern Cali Sports

Well, I’m not happy about the Raiders drafting Jamarcus Russell but it is what it is…

I hope Russell doesn’t have the poor work ethic that most critics claim he has and I hope the Raiders one day have the offensive line they’ll need to allow Russell to heave the ball the 80 yards he’s capable of doing.

Other then drafting Russell, the Raiders also screwed up by trading Randy Moss to the Patriots for a measly 4th round draft pick. However, this appears to be a “addition by subtraction” move so let’s hope that getting rid of Moss creates a better clubhouse.

Other then those 2 moves, I think the Raiders had a decent draft. I think they had a lot of holes going into the draft and I think they addressed a lot of them. Whether or not the players they drafted to fill these holes work out remains to be seen.

They may have picked up the steal of the draft by drafting RB Michael Bush out of Lousville in the 4th round. Prior to breaking his leg, Bush was regarded by many as the best RB in the country (even over Reggie Bush of USC!) so that should tell you what kind of potential this guy has.

He should have plenty of time to fully recover since the Raiders picked up RB Dominic Rhodes out of Indy this off-season to complement Raider RB Lamont Jordan. The only thing that concerns me is that Bush and Rhodes play the same type of game and I’m concerned about these guys getting enough touches. The bottom line is  that the Raiders couldn’t and shouldn’t have passed up on Bush this late in the draft.

The Raiders  also picked up QB Josh McCown from Detroit as well as former 1st round pick WR Mike Williams formerly of USC.
Josh McCown is nothing special at QB but he should give Jamarcus Russell some time to learn the NFL. The over/under right now is 8 games I say.  You heard it here first, Russell will be starting by the 8th week of the season.

Mike Williams couldn’t cut it in Detroit and the hope is that a change of scenery will help. The rap on him is that he doesn’t have the break-away speed a WR in the NFL needs to create some space between he and the DB.

Whatever… I say send him down the middle (you don’t need speed to go down the middle do you?) and hope he doesn’t get killed.

The Raiders also picked up Zach Miller (TE) out of Arizona State with the 38th pick in the 2nd round. In the 3rd round, they went after DE Quentin Moses of Georgia and OT Mario Henderson out of Florida State. I feel these are all good picks since these are all positions the Raiders needed more depth at.

I still think the Raiders have some offensive and defensive line issues that need to be addressed and their linebacking corps could also use some upgrading.

Let’s face it, going into this draft the Raiders were a mess!

Coming out of the draft I feel the Raiders as a whole got better as a team.

Let’s hope it translates to a few more wins.