With the dust settling from the first round of the NFL Draft, a few big questions have already been answered: would the Rams take a proverbial “franchise” quarterback (yes), WHERE WOULD TEBOW GO (Denver), and which half-anonymous player would Belichick select, confounding Todd McShay, et. al. (Devin McCourty).
2010 NFL Draft Day 2: Where Will Jimmy Clausen Get Picked?
But with teams reshuffling their draft boards with Day 2 of the now three-day affair upon us, there are quite a few big names still available. And none are bigger than quarterback Jimmy Clausen, who had harbored hopes of going high in the draft’s first stanza. So where will he end up? SB Nation’s Vikings blogs, Daily Norseman, has a few ideas:
[T]he way the Vikings maneuvered out of the first round gives me a suspicion that Clausen is their target, or they're trying to get enough interest in him worked up to trade even farther down and acquire more picks (possibly including picks in next year's draft). They made a deal with a division rival in Detroit, who they knew had no interest in a quarterback with Matthew Stafford already established. The two remaining teams in the first round, Indianapolis and New Orleans, weren't going to take a quarterback, and the only team that selects ahead of the Vikings in Round Two, the St. Louis Rams, selected Sam Bradford with the #1 overall pick, so they aren't going quarterback, either.
This would be excellent if only because Brett Favre acted so magnanimously when the Packers did the same thing a few years ago, drafting their heir apparent Aaron Rodgers. But on a more serious note, Favre is pushing 41 years of age, and joking aside, will have to retire at some point in the near future (right?), making a quarterback of the future (sorry, Tarvaris, you don't qualify) a definite need.
Another potential darkhorse destination for Clausen could be Kansas City. Although the Chiefs paid a decently hefty ransom, in terms of picks and salary, for former Patriot Matt Cassel last offseason, SB Nation's Arrowhead Pride reports there are whispers that new offensive coordinator Charlie Weis is lobbying the front office to take his ex-Golden Domer with the team's second-round pick. It's difficult to imagine the Chiefs effectively using second-round picks on quarterbacks in consecutive years, and this could merely be a smokescreen to try to gin up interest for another team to trade up, but it's certainly plausible if the Chiefs do in fact have Clausen rated as top-ten prospect on their big board.
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