BCC Community Mock: Jaguars Select - DE/LB Brooks Reed

With the 16th pick in the 2011 NFL Draft the Jacksonville Jaguars select Brooks Reed, DE/OLB Arizona.

While Christian Ponder is an attractive pick, and seems to be the people's pick, assuming that the Jaguars stand pat at 16 (for the purposes of this draft there is no movement) I feel Gene Smith will stick to his convictions and build his team the way he feels it should be built and he will not deviate from his value board. Bottom line, you're not going to have a sunk cost on the bench and drafting a quarterback in the first round all but guarantees he will start at some point in time in his rookie season. Would you expect Garrard to take a pay cut for the good of the team? I wouldn't.
Not to mention with the labor strife, how much face time with new quarterbacks coach Mike Sheppard is Ponder going to get? Contrary to popular belief, 16 is too high for Ponder or any quarterback not named Gabbert or Newton.
Let's face it, with the exception of the tackles our defense is full of holes. The NFL is a copycat league, and this guy has Clay Matthews and Brian Cushing (minus the ‘roids) written all over him. 6'3" 263 and a huge burst. I'm typically not a big combine guy, but his 10 yard burst was an eye-opener 1.54 seconds Clay Matthews ran a 1.49 at the Combine a few years ago. He was a 5th year senior at Arizona and that is one of those (ugh) "Gene's guy" measurables. I believe he was captain of his debate team as well (made that part up). One of the things I notice that frequently came up in interviews with Gene Smith was the lamenting that Sean Lee was off the board for them when they picked in the Third Round last year. Gene knew that he had a patchwork linebacking corps with the obvious exception of Daryl Smith. In Reed, he gets Lee and then some! Some may say he's a 3-4 linebacker at best, but you know what? A wise old man once said you find football players where you find football players. Brooks Reed is a football player who I feel will be very successful at the next level.

With the linebacker corps in a state of flux, all indications are that Kirk Morrison will not return and that Justin Durant may not return and quite frankly, how dependable is he with his history of injuries, this is a pick that I feel will be similar to Tyson Alualu where there was nothing but silence. We then went to Youtube and watched some action and realized the kid is going to be a good one. Watch Reed's performance against Iowa back in September. People talk about Alualu's game against Minnesota as an eye opener, Reed was all over the place and thoroughly abused a traditionally stout Iowa offensive line. Ricky Stanzi was running for his life and the last Iowa drive he got sacked 3 times.

As said earlier, this is a pick that fans will not care for at first but like the line goes, "In Gene We Trust."

Pick made by: Joe Fisher

The New England Patriots are on the clock.

16. Brooks Reed
15. Mike Pouncey
14. Corey Liuget
13. Cameron Jordan
12. Julio Jones
11. Robert Quinn
10. A.J. Green
9. Tyron Smith
8. Blaine Gabbert
7. Prince Amukamara
6. Da'Quan Bowers
5. Von Miller
4. Nick Fairley
3. Patrick Peterson
2. Marcell Dareus
1. Cam Newton