Cowboys To Draft 27th On Thursday

Drafting a great future football player is fairly easy in the first few rounds of the NFL Draft. But finding a great player worthy of being a first-round pick becomes a lot harder when a team drafts late in the round. That's Dallas' problem this year. The Cowboys have the 27th pick in the first round.

The Cowboys have a couple of immediate needs that could be addressed in the first round. They badly need a top-notch left offensive tackle and a safety, and many of the pundits predict they'll try to fill one of those needs in the first round. The two players mentioned most in the mock drafts are USC safety Taylor Mays and Maryland offensive tackle Bruce Campbell. It is likely that one or both of them will be available at the 27th pick, and both were impressive at the NFL workouts.

The question the Cowboys need to answer now is are they great future football players, or are they just "workout warriors" (players who do great in individual workouts but are unable to translate that talent to the football field). Workout statistics may be impressive, but they don't do a team much good unless the player can put his talent to good use on the field during a game.

Mays has impressive size and skills. He stands 6' 3" and weighs 230 pounds. During workouts he ran the 40 in 4.43 seconds, had a 41-inch vertical leap and could do 24 repetitions of a 225 pound weight. The talk is that he's a great tackler and could be switched to linebacker, but is deficient is pass coverage. That sounds to me like the second-coming of Roy Williams, and that's not good.

While another linebacker might be nice, the Cowboys need a safety a lot more. In the modern NFL, a safety needs to be great both in pass coverage and tackling. A deficiency in either one leaves a gaping hole in the defense. The Cowboys should know this, since they tried for several years without much success to cover for Roy Williams' lack of pass coverage skills. Hopefully, the Cowboys will pass on Mays.

That leaves Bruce Campbell (pictured) as the likely first-round choice. He also has impressive size and workout skills. He is 6' 61/2" tall and weighs 314 pounds -- adequate size for an offensive tackle. He also blew away other prospects his size in the workouts, running the 40 in 4.85 seconds, has a 32-inch vertical leap and lifted 225 pounds with 34 repetitions. That is very impressive size, speed and strength.

That only leaves one question. Is he a football player? Can he make that size, speed and strength work for him on the football field where it really counts? After all, he'll be counted on to protect Tony Romo's blind-side, where failure could be devastating.

Casting some doubt on his ability to be a player is the fact that he only started 17 games at Maryland, and didn't receive a single vote for first-team or second-team All Conference at his position. That's a bit worrying, but at #27 there's going to be doubts about nearly any player. There are no "sure things" at #27 or lower in the draft (although many good players have been found lower).

The rumor is that Jerry Jones is in love with Campbell's potential, and that gives him a great shot at being drafted if he falls to #27. If the choice comes down to Mays or Campbell, I hope the Cowboys pick Campbell. At least he doesn't have any known deficiencies -- like Mays poor pass coverage. And maybe he'll turn out to be a great player.

Anyway, we'll know Thursday night who the first-round pick is for the Cowboys. And being the Cowboys "homer" that I am, I'll be in front of the TV waiting to see who it is.