2009 NFL Draft two years out: Green Bay Packers
Considering the fact that just two years ago the Green Bay Packers had the 9th pick in the NFL draft, and this year they won the Super Bowl would seem to indicate that they did some very good things not only in the draft put elsewhere. However for today we are dealing with their 2009 draft class, and to be perfectly honesty it was one of the better classes from that year.
Before we go any farther a quick look at the picks made the Packers that year:
Round One (9)- BJ Raji DT
Round One (26)- Clay Matthews LB
Round Four (109)- TJ Lang OT
Round Five (145)- Quinn Johnson FB
Round Five (162)- Jamon Meredith OT
Round Six (182)- Jarius Wynn DE
Round Six (187)- Brandon Underwood CB
Round Seven (218)- Brad Jones OLB
Two years ago the Packers hired Dom Capers to be their defensive coordinator and he switched them to a 3-4 defense. Knowing that the 34 defense requires a dominant Nose Tackle to eat up a lot of two man blocks they made BJ Raji the 9th overall pick in 2009. He has been very good, even racking up 7 sacks in his second year. After that the Packers made a strong move jumped into the bottom of the first round and scooped up OLB Clay Matthews. Clay has been a force, and also racked up 14 sacks in 2010.
For the record they also landed a backup RG, and a backup DE in this draft. So they ended up with two key pieces of their defense that just won a title, and a couple of quality backups. Not so bad of work with eight picks with six of them coming past pick #100. We have to continue to rank this draft as a home run.
Related Links:
- Green Bay Packers news and notes
- NFL Draft Now
- Joshua Lobdell.com
