As of today the NFL Draft is exactly three months away (April 25-26). As a Bucs fan the arrival of the Draft has always been bittersweet. The typical outcome would leave me scratching my head regarding who the Bucs drafted from Rounds three through seven. Last season I put an end to that by educating the community here on who the Bucs could look to draft and there wasn’t a pick I wasn’t familiar with, sure I disagreed with some, but at least I wasn’t in the dark as to who was taken. I vowed that 2007 would be the last Buccaneers draft in which I was miffed on who the Bucs selected.

Below you‘ll notice a Draft Chart powered by New Era Scouting, the rankings aren’t entirely correct and I plan to update them as soon as New Era Scouting updates their overall rankings with the underclassmen. Here’s the thing, we’re all Bucs Fans but a lot of us follow different College Teams, so if you feel a player is overrated/underrated or just flat out missing say so in the comments section. The goal is to educate ourselves on who the Bucs may or may not select in April’s NFL Draft.

Another goal of this post is to generate a select group of players we would like and approve of the Bucs drafting. To come up with a projected pick for each round of the Draft that we collectively feel the Bucs will select come Draft day. SBNation also does a Mock Draft amongst the NFL blogs through rounds 1 and 2 of the Draft and so we need a collective response to that request as well. In order to do that we have to agree on the Bucs Draft needs. Here‘s where I think they need immediate help:

DT, DE, WR, RB, QB, LB, CB

We had absolutely no answer for the run game those final four games of the season. Jovan Haye had six sacks last season and none this year. Chris Hovan has never been a sack man, but he was getting pushed off the ball with ease in the second half of last season. If we can‘t get an Albert Haynesworth, Julius Peppers, or a Tank Johnson in Free Agency then the d-line will certainly need help via the Draft. If we lose out on Antonio Bryant in free agency, then the Receiver position might become our biggest need to date. We still have Joey Galloway on the roster and Maurice Stovall will be back from injury. There‘s also that guy named Dexter Jackson, but that‘s all I‘ll say about that.

The Quarterback position is also unsettled with Garcia and McCown becoming free agents. Hopefully the Bucs elect to play Josh Johnson and forego drafting a QB in April. Derrick Brooks is still highly capable, but if a guy as talented as Brian Cushing is around the Bucs would have to at least contemplate looking at him. Cornerback and Runningback are positions we have filled, but may or may not need to be addressed via the draft if the right player falls to us. Alright, what do you think?