And on the flip side, the bottom:
26. Pittsburgh Steelers
Pittsburgh has spent heavily over the past few drafts in an attempt to fix its offensive line. Between C
Maurkice Pouncey, G
David DeCastro, T
Marcus Gilbert and T
Mike Adams, the Steelers might do the unthinkable: give
Ben Roethlisberger enough time to throw a ball unmolested. Beyond that, though, much of the Steelers' value on this list is in running pieces such as
Rashard Mendenhall and
David Johnson. We think very highly of CB
Cortez Allen and DE
Ziggy Hood, but if they are the top two young players on your defense, that's a bit troubling.
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27. San Diego Chargers
The Chargers have a lot of their value tied up in one player: RB
Ryan Mathews, who looks poised to become a perennial top-5 fantasy football pick, as long as he can stay healthy. Wideout
Vincent Brown is promising and should see more action this year. They've also got a pair of decent young starters in LB
Donald Butler and G
Louis Vasquez but need leaps from highly drafted players such as DT
Corey Liuget and CB
Marcus Gilchrist to really start ascending the list. LB
Jonas Mouton, a 2011 second-rounder, could join the fray quickly after missing last year to injury, and if the Chargers got as big of a steal as some experts are predicting by finding DE
Melvin Ingram with the 18th overall pick, it wouldn't be a major surprise to see them 10 slots higher next season.
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28. Atlanta Falcons
Trading massive piles of draft picks for WR
Julio Jones might yet be proven to be a terrific idea, but doing so has left this team with only a few eggs to place in their young-player basket. Jones, obviously, has a chance to be one of the best receivers in the NFL as soon as this year.
Sean Weatherspoon, likewise,
had a fantastic season for Atlanta in 2011 and should be a mainstay at linebacker.
After those two, it gets murky. LB
Akeem Dent was a very good special teams player last year, but we have no real statistical track record to say that he'll be an adequate replacement for
Curtis Lofton. G
Joe Hawley, RB
Jacquizz Rodgers and DT
Corey Peters comprise the best of the rest. Then again, at least the Falcons have a team that can win now, which somewhat excuses their lack of young depth.
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29. Buffalo Bills
Marcell Dareus was an enormous addition as a rookie, notching 5.5 sacks despite playing some 3-4 nose tackle last season. Beyond him, the Bills had more questions than answers. CB
Aaron Williams is going to be a contributor in their secondary, but RB
C.J. Spiller is blocked by
Fred Jackson, and the addition of
Cordy Glenn in the draft could place LT
Chris Hairston on the bench or at a different position. WR
Donald Jones has been rather inconsistent, and the rest of the Bills' youth movement focuses an awful lot on quantity over quality -- or at least that's how it has gone so far.
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30. New York Jets
Remember what we just said about free-agent signings affecting the U-25 list? Well, at least DE
Aaron Maybin actually started games and was productive at times -- he's still really a supporting edge rusher on a good team, but New York hasn't found that premium pass-rusher yet. WR
Jeremy Kerley made our top 25 prospects list (coming Tuesday), and DT
Muhammad Wilkerson and CB
Kyle Wilson are a pair of decent, young building blocks for the defense. But nobody knows quite what to make of DE
Quinton Coples, so forgive us for taking the same wait-and-see approach that he took toward going after quarterbacks in his senior season at North Carolina.
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31. Chicago Bears
With the graduation of RB
Matt Forte and WR
Johnny Knox, the Bears have very little youth on offense to fall back on.
J'Marcus Webb still qualifies at tackle, but even if you are Mike Tice, sole believer in Webb's potential, Webb has yet to post a season worth crowing about.
Gabe Carimi had to deal with injuries in his rookie season, and outside of Chicago's young safety tandem of
Chris Conte and
Major Wright, none of their young defenders managed to start multiple games in 2011.
Wide receivers
Alshon Jeffery (age 22) and
Brandon Marshall should help rejuvenate this team's passing game, but at the cost of two third-round picks, the Bears will again be at a disadvantage when draft day rolls around next season.
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32. New Orleans Saints
Obviously they didn't know this at the time, but given the fact that the Saints were forced to forfeit multiple high picks in light of the bounty scandal, the trade up for
Mark Ingram looks even sillier in retrospect. New Orleans now employs four solid running backs in Ingram,
Chris Ivory,
Pierre Thomas and
Darren Sproles. To make matters worse, Ingram was dinged up last year and made even less of an impact than you would expect given the other solid players at his position.
Malcolm Jenkins is a fine safety, but
Patrick Robinson continued to struggle at corner, and
Cameron Jordan notched just one sack in 15 starts. Perhaps
Martez Wilson's conversion to defensive end will help raise the tide, but there isn't much help coming in future drafts due to the aforementioned punishment.
In short, this is a team that very much needs to win now. Which is why it's a good thing
Drew Brees is now signed.