May have been posted already, but apparently NYJ landed
three of their top 8 players on their board.
Why did Jermaine Johnson drop so far?
Per Breer at SI: "I'm told a big piece of his drop was how he came off in predraft meetings with teams- he turned a lot of people off through the process."
Other reasons for his drop could be just 1 year of production possibly scaring off some teams. Greg Cosell is a big fan of Jermaine Johnson. Two other guys he spoke highly of that are still available: Arnold Ebiketie and Logan Hall. Intrigued to see where they land tonight. Excited for R2 and R3.
SEA came away happy with their 9th overall pick. They had Cross ranked ahead of Neal in their OT rankings.
NYG had Ekonwu and Neal fairly close in their rankings. Per Jay Glazer, they were worried a team might trade up to 6 and grab KT. So NYG grabbed KT at 5 and took whichever T was left at 7. Neal slides right in at RT.
There was quite a bit of smoke regarding NYG and Cross in the pre-draft process. I'm speculating that they may have performed the amount of HW that they did on him in the event both Ekonwu and Neal were picked in the top 4. Given the uncertainty coming into the draft at the top, NYG planned for all scenarios. Ultimately, Cross is regarded as the most natural LT in the draft, but NYG didn't need a LT. Neal is more comfortable on the right. Great pick for NYG.