<span style="">Opening Statement:
"We are real excited and I feel like we got a little short changed because there were only two rounds today. It feels different than most years, but we are real excited to have Sedrick Ellis and Tracy Porter on our team and we are looking forward to seeing what happens tomorrow. With that said I will take any questions."
Q: Would you be seeking to acquire a third or fourth round pick tomorrow?
A: Obviously there will be some guys tomorrow that we would like to have that you don't think will be available when we pick in the fifth round, but I don't know that we have enough stuff to move up significantly in our pocket without having to trading away something real valuable next year. We'll try but I don't know that will happen. Truthfully, I think we were on the phone today talking about deals more than the past three or four years combined, and we made some deals in the past three of four years but there was a lot of conversation today and obviously we were able to make one trade and move up a few spots and I think we needed to do that. As for tomorrow, maybe, like I said, we'll try but I don't know that we have enough stuff to do that.
Q: Were you pretty decisive from the start that you wanted to acquire Glenn Dorsey or Sedrick Ellis?
A: I don't know how much misdirection we had available to us. We were pretty clear that defense was the direction we needed to go and fortunately for us there were a lot of good defensive players at the top of this draft and we were able to get one of the ones we coveted. It worked out well for us. I felt like today, all the teams that we talked with were really straight forward and it was pretty clear relatively early where everything was headed. I think teams were just positioning themselves to get the guys that they wanted and I think there are a lot of satisfied teams today.
Q: Was it a key for you today that neither defensive tackles went in the top three?
A: I think that was a real key for us that Atlanta was able to take the quarterback that they wanted and not take a defensive tackle. It was probably important for us in the scheme of things.
Q: Was the price too high to move up further to get Glenn Dorsey?
A: There are so many variables, and I don't want to talk about any specific, but I mean just in trading up period. You have to value what is the size of the contract and the size of that contract is going to prevent us in doing what going forward. For example, the difference between the contract that picked 10 and the contract that picked two is $40 million plus over the course of that deal. There is a lot of things we can do with $40 million in terms of free agency and our own players so that is a big variable. Also the variable of how much compensation, what picks are you giving up, what players do you have to give u, all of that becomes an issue. It is not a clear cut this for that type of decision. It is a lot of variables that you have to weigh and decide what is best for your team and for each team it is different. There is no question about that.
Q: What type of impact in the draft does the relationship between one of your coaches or scouts and a college coach impact a decision?
A: I think it is important because, particularly in the last three or four years, teams, us included, have put a lot of focus and energy on background, on character and on intelligence. That is hard to measure on film. What you have to do is a lot of research and who better to give you an idea of those characteristic for each guy than the people that have worked with them closely and seen them grow over a period of time. It is important to us if a young player has some incidents that happened two or three years ago, it's important to us to hear from his coach that this kid has grown and matured. That he has gone from a guy that was difficult early to a guy that is team captain as a senior and here is why, here is how he grew. Those relationships are important, and obviously, assistant coaches can have those, our head coach has a number of those and even our scouts have a lot of those relationships with people at different schools. When you have those you have to take advantage of it. In Sedrick's case, we happen to have an assistant coach here who recruited him and coached him and there is no better information than that right there for us.
Q: How much did Sedrick Ellis help his stock when he lost some weight between the combine and USC's pro day?
A: I think he was considered in the top group of players from the very beginning. He certainly didn't hurt himself, but I think he has always been considered one of the top defensive players in this draft and I know we certainly had him graded that high and he didn't hurt himself in the time period after the season. That is probably the best way to describe it.
Q: How close do you rate the defensive tackles, Glenn Dorsey and Sedrick Ellis?
A: I don't know that I want to get into that. Obviously we had them graded very highly. They are both great players in our view, elite players, and we are just happy to have Sedrick Ellis.
Q: Were you able to combine the best player available and position needs today?
A: I think would describe it as we came into this draft with the idea that we were going to help ourselves on defense early and as I said before, there were a number of good defensive players, fortunately at really every defensive position. We needed help at the back end and we needed help on the front seven so we were able to get a guy that could fill that role. If we hadn't been able to make that trade and we would have stayed at our position and we had to pick a player at a different position, I know we would have gotten a good player because we saw how it unfolded.
Q: By potentially improving your pass rush today, how does that improve your secondary?
A: I think at the end of the day if you help the pass rush you are getting better at corner by creating the pass rush. We saw the Giants and everybody has talked about that and that impacted their pass rush in the post season. I think teams have always had that philosophy, but we definitely went into this draft with that philosophy.
Q: Bill Belichick said that the groundwork for the trade was laid out yesterday, is that accurate?
A: I think every team that was interested in moving either up or down spent a lot more time on the phone in the days before this draft. We all recognize that with a shorter window, 10 minutes isn't enough to negotiate a deal, so you want to have a good idea of what it is going to take to trade up or what you are going to get to move down before that phone call is ever made. That was especially true. There is always a little bit of tinkering at the end. Everybody is always asking for that one extra thing or trying to shorten it up a little bit in that last phone call, but you don't have time to start from ground zero. As I said the other day, I made a lot of phone calls to every team that was in front of us during the course of the last week or two so I had a real good idea of what the cost to move was going to be.
Q: Up until the last minute, were you in talks to acquire veteran players?
A: I'd rather not talk about that at this time.
Q: What will be your philosophy tomorrow position-wise?
A: We are going to regroup tonight and look at the board as it ends up and make some decisions. We will get an idea of where we think players are going to be available when we pick in round five. Obviously quite a few players are going to get taken between the beginning of the draft tomorrow and when we pick, but also if there is a guy or two that look particularly attractive to us then will we see if we can make a move. I don't know that we will be able to do that, but we will make those decisions tonight.
Q: In earlier years, running backs have been found on day two and been successful. Given Deuce McAllister's injury, would you shy away from taking a running back tomorrow?
A: I think it is an area that we wouldn't shy away from drafting a guy if we think he can help us, but we are in that point in the draft where it is real questionable if a guy can make your team. Is he better than the players that you have, Deuce included certainly. There are some questions about Deuce's knee, but we feel good about his progress so far. It's hard for me to say without recognizing and looking at who is available to us when we pick. It would be a little different if we had our third round pick because then we would have a good idea of who is going to be available, but when you pick in the fifth round at this point I just don't know if there is going to be a guy that we feel can really make our team.
