Hey Gang! I know it's been a while since my last article, but, I have been waiting to see what was going to happen in the Draft. And a very defensive draft it was. 6 out of the 9 players drafted were picked to fill the holes left by this last free agency period. I must admit that I was surprised by the pick of LB Nick Barnett out of Oregon State at #1especially with players like Maryland's E.J.Henderson and Ohio State's Boss Bailey available at the time.But Mike Sherman seems to know what he's doing. Sherman said that Barnett, although a bit undersized, Has the speed and strength to be a starter almost immediately at either outside or middle Linebacker.The fact that Henderson and Bailey are coming off of serious injuries had a significant role in that choice.This will make for some interesting battles in training camp for the remainming starting job between recently acquired Hannibal Navies from Jacksonville and last year's holdover back-ups Paris Lenon and Torrence Marshall. Lenon had a pretty good run while filling in for the recently departed Nate Wayne when he was injured.This camp could very well be a chance for Lenon to make his case as the rightful starter.As for Marshall it looks like this will be his LAST chance to show the coaching staff that he really CAN be a productive Pro. I had predicted 2 seasons ago that Marshall could be the steal of the draft IF he could adapt to the NFL quickly. Right now that doesn't appear to be the case.Add to the fact that the Pack drafted 2 other linebackers(Hunter HIllenmeyer of Vanderbilt in the 5th and Steve Jouse of Carson -Newman in the 7th) amd picked up Shantee Orr of Michigan as an undrafted free agent and you can see where most of the competition will be in camp.Coming in the 3rd round was defensive lineman Kenny Peterson from Ohio State. The take on Kenny is that he has the speed to play outside and the strength to play over the ball.With Joe Johnson coming back from his season ending injury it would appear that Peterson is headed to the inside of the line next to Cletidus Hunt. If Gilbert Brown Re-signs it could be an interesting rotation in the pits.Another 5th round pick is Barnett's teammate James Lee a 6'4" defensive tackle.The knock on Lee is that all through college he was lazy.Didn't want to workout, just wanted lay around and play video games.But in his tv interview he said all the right things especially that in order to make the team he would have to re-dedicate himself to football and the Green Bay Packers since he had no idea he would even get drafted.CB Chris Johnson from Louisville rounds out the defensive picks . The book on Johnson is that he is lightning quick with excellent cover skills but isjust a bit short (5'11"). As for off season and free agent pick-ups the aforementioned Navies and former Eagle DB Al Harris shows how dedicated Sherman is to rebuilding the defense. Harris is a tough, physical player who will jam you hard at the line then cover you like a blanket.My biggest problem with the now Atlanta Falcon Tyrone Williams is that he would be playing an excellent game then all of a sudden he would just seem to forget what he was doing out there. If Minnesota knew what it was doing on offense last year they could have run Randy Moss at Williams all game long and probably have taken at least 1 of the 2 games against Green Bay if not both!

Now onto the offense.The drafting of Notre Dame tackle Brennan Curtain in the 6th was probably a steal.Why? Because he was having a pretty decent career at ND when he got kicked off the team for conduct problems.If Curtain's game continues to progress the team will not have to worry about signing free agent Earl Dotson.Curtain just has to grow up a bit and he could have a decent career in the NFL.Rounding out the draft were WR Carl Ford,6'0,179 lbs out of Toledo and WR/KR DeAndrew Rubin from South Florida. The most interesting signing to me during the off-season was that of former Heisman Trophy winning QB Eric Crouch. Crouch was claimed off waivers from the Rams and has been told he will get a legitimate shot at a job.The former Nebraska star "retired" from the NFL when Mike Martz tried to make a wide receiver out of him. With all the excellent reports coming out of NFL Europe about Craig Nall plus the signing of former Northwestern QB Zak Kustock, Doug Pederson could have a tough time making the roster.

Well that's all for now except for a "Where Are They Now?" update. Former #1 Pick Tony Mandarich is alive and well running a country club he owns up in Canada. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel ran a nice story about Tony a week or so back. He is down from his 362 lb. playing weight to a very svelte 275.He says that he is very happy with what he's doing and also said how much he enjoyed playing for the Packers. He went on to say that the reason he wasn't as good as expected is that he didn't expect the level of competition to be as high as it was in the NFL. Coming out of the Big Ten where there wasn't that kind of Proquality playing against him he just assumed he would be just as good in the NFL as he was in school. All I can say is "GOOD LUCK TONY"!! Hope you do great! As for the rest of you, I'll be seeing you "From The Cheap Seats"!