Giants Are in No Man's Land With Pick 12

The more I think about this draft -- and the NFL has given us an extra month to do so this year -- I think the Giants are in no man's land having the 12th pick in the first round.  I've written a lot about the various draft our teams take part in over the years, and this one is yet another that features a relatively small number of blue chip players (Watkins, Mack, Clowney, Robinson) and then we get into a vast area of red chip players.  Now the red chip players are valuable because some of them will turn into blue chip pro's but you're getting them with less valuable picks than it would take to get a Clowney or a Watkins.

The players that are being projected to the Giants at 12 are guys like Lewan, who I've posted about, Mike Evan, Aaron Donald and Eric Ebron.  Lewan, aside, the others all come with risk more risk than a #12 pick should come with.  Donald is the best player of the bunch, but he's undersized and may or may not be able to stop the run.  The Giants have whiffed on a lot of three techs, too.   That said, if they have a conviction on Donald, that could be a good pick.  Ebron is also talented, but then he didn't post the 4.4 they thought he was going to at the combine and just didn't blow the doors off it as expected.  He has a high ceiling, but a Shiancoe floor, and you probably shouldn't spend the #12 pick on a guy like that.  Evans may not be able to separate at the next level and he also almost makes more great plays than he actually makes.  Too risky.

Anyway, as I look at is now, I think the Giants should try to trade down into the 15-20 range, and pick up an extra day 2 pick.  That would give them 4 picks in the great big red area instead of just three.  They could then start their picks with Zach Martin, the versatile OL from ND, and then go with a Davante Adams or other physical WR in the second, then a Troy Niklas and maybe the Center from USC or one of the RB's (Shankey, Seastrunk, Hill) with the other pick.  

Thus, with the uncertainty around the likely prospects at 12, the Giants should try to trade down.