First Round of the NFL Draft Draws Out the Drama

Published on 9-May-2014 by Stacey Mickles

Football - NFL    NFL Daily Update

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First Round of the NFL Draft Draws Out the Drama

If you were looking for extended tension at the NFL Draft last night, you got it.

We all knew that Johnny Manziel would be drafted in the first round, but the question was where.

The suspense of who'd be the No 1 overall pick was lifted when the Houston Texans took Jadeveon Clowney. That moved the hype-fest flashpoint to Slot No 4, where the Jacksonville Jaguars were thought to be considering a quarterback.

Can't fault their pick: Blake Bortles of Central Florida. Prototypical build. Homeboy. Smokin' hot girlfriend. Bringing some buzz to a team that has none.

Seasoned Johnny Manziel watchers knew he'd already blown off the thought of going to the Jags. They were waiting for Cleveland's pick at Slot No 9. That's where he was surely headed.

Long story short, that's what happened. But it was a circuitous route. The Browns traded up one slot to get CB Justin Gilbert of Oklahoma State and later traded up from Slot 26 to Slot 22 so they could pick before Kansas City did. Then this happened:

Whoa! Did this dude undego the perfect PR makeover or what! He got every necessary cliché worked into his responses with Suzy Kolber.

Nuke LaLoosh couldn't have done it better!

Some observers thought Jerry Jones would pull the trigger at No 16, but he actually showed an ounce of football sense for once and filled a more pressing need -- and do the Cowboys have a pocketful of them! -- along the offensive line. There may be hope down in Big D yet!

Frankly, the Browns played their first-round cards like they really knew what they were doing. That may have been the biggest shock of all for their fans last night.

And ESPN's Sal Paolantonio capped it with the old 'selfless heartstrings/save our city' angle, tossing in this little parable:

Yep. A WWE scriptwriter couldn't have done it any better. As to no one in Tennessee knowing Haslam, that's not quite accurate. They just don't want to go near him.

Ironically, it all made the Hollywood take on parables look even more realistic. Then again, those writers live closer to Donald Sterling:

So, as numerologists pointed out to the extent of inducing nausea, Johnny Football is the Brownies' third shot at taking a quarterback with the 22nd pick. Since the other two were Brady Quinn in 2007 and Brandon Weeden in 2012, their fans had best hope that slot isn't cursed.

All in all, the NFL and its fans got what they wanted last night, a soap opera. And with Johnny Football's squeaky clean performance, it definitely had more than enough soap.

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