Update: The Texans selected Ohio State wide receiver DeVier Posey with their traded-down pick (No. 68 overall) and Miami of Ohio guard Brandon Brooks with their original third round pick (76th overall). Posey, who was suspended for 10 games during his senior year, is one of those draft talent gambles the Texans are not known for making.
What's even more intriguing is adding Posey has general manager Rick Smith working to try and trade Jacoby Jones by the end of the NFL Draft Saturday. Jones has been vilified by Houston fans ever since he touched a punt he should have let go in the Texans' second round playoff game in Baltimore, gift wrapping a touchdown to the Ravens, who ended up winning by a touchdown.
What's more alarming to the Texans is how he only made 31 catches last season even when huge opportunity opened up with Andre Johnson hurt for much of the year.
But as happy as it'd make the fans, moving Jones would make the Posey pick even more of risk because the Texans would need him to contribute immediately.
Posey was suspended five games for taking part in Ohio State's memorabilia scandal, and five games after the NCAA ruled that he was paid too much at a job. Posey is a 6-foot-2, 210-pounder who professed his admiration for Texans all-pro wide receiver Andre Johnson.
Brooks is hulking specimen (6-5, 353 pounds) who has shown good speed for a lineman (4.99 seconds in the 40-yard dash), but he wasn't thought highly enough of by the NFL's decision makers to be invited to the Combine in Indianapolis. Both these picks are departures from the Texans' safe ways of drafts past. Smith's spent this draft rolling the dice.
"We thought he was a talent that was comparable to a lot of guys taken a lot earlier," Texans offensive coordinator Rick Dennison said of Posey.
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If anyone knows the value of a second round draft pick, it's Houston Texans general manager Rick Smith.
In the last three drafts, he's nabbed Connor Barwin at No. 46, Ben Tate at No. 58 and Brooks Reed at No. 42. That's two starters and a running back who would start for a number of teams.
But Smith passed on the chance to continue his second-round magic Friday night, trading the 58th overall pick and the Texans' seventh-round pick for third (68th overall) and fourth round (126th overall) selections. The trade came with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
By the time it rolled close to No. 58, play-making wide receivers Brian Quick (33rd to St. Louis Rams), Stephen Hill (43rd to New York Jets), Alshon Jeffery (45th to Chicago Bears) and big target tight end Coby Fleener (34th to Indianapolis Colts) were all long off the board. LSU wideout Rueben Randle was available (he was later plucked by the defending Super Bowl champion New York Giants with the 63rd overall pick).
Smith went for additional depth instead, ending up with two high third round picks rather than a late second round selection.
The Texans will now have five picks in the third and fourth rounds. For Smith, that's six trades in the last three drafts.Â
For rounds two and three of the NFL Draft there are no elaborate stadium parties. Instead Reliant Stadium was a scene of men at work on Friday night. The floor of the arena was bare, only concrete showing, waiting to be assembled for the next event. Back in the Texans' war room, Â a different type of construction job was going on.
In the days before the draft, Smith talked of staying true to the Texans' carefully-researched and vetted draft board.
The Texans haven't given Andre Johnson any new receiver help yet. While teams like the Jets and Bears traded up to get the wideout they wanted, Houston moved back. Jacoby Jones is still being depended on for more than his history says he can deliver.
Smith has decided the Texans' time will come in the third round though.
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