OM FIELD: NFL Draft - History of Pick No. 13

[-Om-]

NFL Draft: History of Pick No. 13
March 22, 2009

On April 25, the Washington Redskins will exercise their right to claim the 13th selection in the 2009 NFL Draft. Should they opt to use the pick on a player (as opposed to trading it away), what kind of player can they reasonably be expected to get?

Thirteen is an interesting spot after all. On the one hand, it doesn't carry with it the white-hot pressure of, say, a top five pick ... the kind of pick that, when missed badly, can set a franchise back for years.

On the other hand, it is hardly a throwaway either. Maybe at pick 28 you can write a bust off to bad luck, but at 13, you better hope the guy you tap isn't a whiff. No, there isn't a set formula for judging the merits of career after-the-fact–injuries, regime-changes and other X Factors can sometimes overtake the most promising of careers–but at the very least, you do want to be able to look back 5-10 years down the road and say, "Yeah, but he could play."

With pre-draft hype building to a crescendo (you can't swing a dead cat around the internet these days without hitting draft analysis and prediction), this week we're taking a look at the history of the 13th pick ...

CLICK HERE to read more[/QUOTE]