Panthers to Draft Nick Fairley #1?

Updated: January 18, 2011

Note: If you have not already, check out my guest article on Black Sports Online, titled “Cam Netwon’s NFL Chances?”

A lot of draft hype is starting to crank up, as it usually does this time of the year. Currently Mel Kiper has been giving his opinion’s on ESPN’s Sportscenter and he seems to favor Nick Fairley as the #1 player on the board.

My thoughts are that while Fairley has played well, is it ever a great idea to grab a DT with the very first pick? I’m not so sure about that. Ndamukong Suh is the best defensive tackle to come along in a VERY long time, and he went #2 behind a quarterback.

If Bradford would have stayed in school, I actually believe the Rams would have took a long hard look at Russell Okung over Suh as their #1 selection and Suh still would have ended up going #2. But alas, we have no way of proving that.

Back on the Fairley at #1 theory. Carolina is a team with a solid defense already (Charles Johnson quietly racked up 11 sacks) and while they could always use a young defender, is DT a need you go out and spend the #1 pick on?

Wouldn’t Carolina’s best bet be to trade down and try to accumulate some of the draft picks they swindled away on horrible trades the past few years (Everette Brown, Armanti Edwards.)

It seems that the best move for Carolina is to let another team put all of their eggs in the Fairley basket, and stockpile talent to put on the defensive line and around Jimmy Clausen on offense.