At #7 overall with Eugene Monroe, Michael Crabtree and Brian Orakpo still on the board, they take.... Darius Heyward Bey.
How bad was this pick? Here are Bey's college stats:
Stats Overview | Receiving | Rushing | Fumbles | |||||||||
YEAR | REC | YDS | AVG | LNG | TD | ATT | YDS | AVG | LNG | TD | FUM | LST |
2006 | 45 | 694 | 15.4 | 96 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 1.0 | 9 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
2007 | 51 | 786 | 15.4 | 63 | 3 | 5 | 107 | 21.4 | 54 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
2008 | 42 | 609 | 14.5 | 80 | 5 | 15 | 202 | 13.5 | 76 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Never more than 51 catches in a season, never more than 786 yds in a season. There was talk of the New York Giants maybe taking him at #29 overall, but if not he was expected to fall into the 2nd round. But Al decides to take him 7th overall.
That was laughable enough, but then the 2nd round happened.
With projected 1st round picks like Rey Maualuga, Max Unger and Everette Brown still on the board, the Raiders traded down 7 spots and took....
Safety Michael Mitchell.
Who?
The ESPN guys had to look him up in the draft book issued by the NFL because they had no clue who he was. They asked Kiper about him and Kiper replied that that he likely would have still been there in the FIFTH ROUND and that at least a couple of NFL teams had him pegged as an UNDRAFTED free agent!
This was one Raiders fans reaction to the trade:
FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVCCCCCCCCCCCCKKKKKKKK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Here's another:
Maybe DHB and Mitchell were the only two guys who can give Al a hard-on at this age.
My own theory is that in his dementia, Al Davis believes he is a prisoner in Leavenworth and is trying to be the "craziest motha in here" so he doesn't get gang raped in the shower.