I mentioned on Friday that I thought the Jaguars would take a quarterback in the first round of the draft. That scenario would likely mean the Jaguars would want to move up or down in the draft order. I also mentioned that, if that's the case, the Jaguars would likely draft either Christian Ponder or Jake Locker. Let's take a closer look at my claim, and find out if I'm a genius or woefully misinformed.
In case you missed it, my claim is something like this. The Jaguars are in a prime position to take Jake Locker. New England has shown some interest in him, and they pick right behind the Jaguars. My thinking is that the Jaguars may not have a shot at a solid quarterback in the second round if there's a run on quarterbacks by every team that needs one. Simply put this mock draft is the scenario I'm talking about.
That particular mock draft has Andy Dalton going to the Seahawks at pick #25. Let me emphasize the point that I don't expect a run on quarterbacks to the extent that this mock does, but If there are a lot of teams that take quarterbacks in the first half of the second round, the Jaguars wouldn't get a shot a "franchise" quarterback.
As with all of the Jaguars picks, they have to find value by picking a quarterback. Gene Smith showed last year that he won't cave in to external pressure to take a particular player (Tim Tebow last year; Christian Ponder this year), but he will take that player if he's the best player that's still available.
Like all draft theories, this should be taken with a grain of salt. The draft is just 10 days away. Who would have predicted that the Jaguars would take Tyson Alualu last year? If I'm right, expect a big write-up about how I saw this coming months ago, and I'll even talk about the way I expertly dissected the facts. If I'm wrong, expect me to completely ignore the draft, and change the subject of conversation as quickly as possible.
As a final note, I do think the Jaguars will take Jake Locker at number 16. Here's a video of all of his plays against Oregon State last season for you to take a look at.