NFL draft weekend starts tonight

Once upon a time, the NFL Draft was an all-day Saturday and all-day Sunday event that commanded the attention of an entire weekend. Growing up, my brother and I referred to it as The Holiest of All Holidays, and for good reason. Any day where you roll out of bed, pop on the couch for some football (of sorts) all day, eat munchies, bean dip and drink soda while getting a glimpse at your team's future was as good as it got for a Saturday in late-April.

Then Roger Goodell, as he so often does, shat on everything. We get this primetime draft garbage that just ruined that most holy of days. As if him trying to take contact out of the NFL wasn't enough... freakin dick.

BUT... On the brighter side of things, when was the last time we were all pretty sure we'd see three Utah State Aggies drafted in a single draft?? (Seriously, any of you older guys who could help with this answer, it would be appreciated)

Bobby Wagner and Robert Turbin are locks to get their names called this weekend, while Michael Smith is looking awfully close to being a lock after his workouts and pre-draft buzz.

SO WHERE WILL THEY END UP?
There's just no way to accurately pick that. The rumors about what teams are interested in which player fly around like crazy in the months leading up to the draft, but all of it is so subject to change. One report about strong interest in a particular player by a certain team could all just be because that was the tidbit of info a certain reporter caught wind of. There could be any number of other players drawing just as much interest that nobody heard about to spread it all over teh intranetz.

Not only that, but as much as I hate to say it, a lot of teams will try to find a reason why a guy from a non-BCS conference is flawed in comparison to player coming from one of the power conferences. Still, USU's got some seriously talented guys in this year's draft, so here's my predictions on at least where I think they'll get picked.


BOBBY WAGNER
With his performance in the Senior Bowl, along with his stellar pro day workouts, Wagner should be a lock for the first round. He's still a tiny bit undersized, but makes up for all of that with his intangibles. Not to mention there are countless guys who have had great success despite entering the league with "undersized" as an alleged knock on their ability.

Prediction: Early 2nd round.


ROBERT TURBIN
Turbin is the guy who I feel will be most affected by the BCS vs. non-BCS conference thing. Turbin's strength and really overall athleticism are among the best of this draft's running backs. Still, a handful of guys are routinely mentioned as being ahead of Turbin in the pre-draft rankings. Personally though, I see Turbin as the most well-rounded running back in this draft , outside of Trent Richardson. The combine numbers make that difficult to dispute too. Still, there's the non-BCS bias, as well as Turbin's knee injury that will drop him down a bit further than he should be going.

Prediction: Mid 3rd round


MICHAEL SMITH
This is another case of the BCS vs. non-BCS bias. In Smith's case, it also doesn't help that he was the No. 2 running back on his team. Regardless, if a guy from a BCS conference school were to put up the kind of numbers he did on his pro day, and if he were previously projected as at least a fringe draft pick, he would rise all the way to the second round of the draft. Smith doesn't have that luxury though, which means some team could potentially hit a home run on him in the later rounds. 

Prediction: Early 6th round