I invented mock drafts

Marv Blackstone
Editor-in-chief

The NFL Draft is this weekend, which means you've probably spent much of your week wading through the various mock drafts all over this Internet. Well, if you love them, you can thank me. If you hate them, you can go frost my ballsack.

See, back in 1973, when I worked at the Dallas Morning News -- before being fired for conducting a 14-person orgy in the newsroom -- I got the idea to try and predict how the picks would fall in the NFL Draft. This was before Mel Kiper made his pathetic living from forecasting draft picks. I paved the way.

It was just a flippant column, but I did a little research and ended up nailing 22 of the 26 picks that year, including the surprise pick of that Mormon, Burgess Owens, to the Jets. It was a big hit with people, and the concept caught on.

That was the last mock draft I wrote. But this year, my head filled with remembrances of orgies in newsrooms, I decided to forecast the top 10 picks. Here they are, hombres.

1. Dolphins: Glen Dorsey (DT, LSU). All this blithering talk about Jake Long, blah blah blah, contract details announced, blah blah blah. Bill Parcells is an enigma, so go ahead and put me in the camp of believing it when I see Long's name escape the thinly-parsed lips of Roger Goodell. I know the Dolphins like the Long brothers here, but I think they're going to go with the black guy because they'll value "talent" over "work ethic."

2. Rams: Jake Long (OT, Michigan). He's a big motherfucker, and I hear he trains by dragging tractors around by his johnson. He'll anchor that line for a decade. Only a 5.17 40 time though? Weak.

3. Atlanta: Matt Ryan (QB, Boston College). In 1983, while with the Tacoma Tribune, I wrote a feature story about a 6th grade boy with cerebral palsy who was allowed to play quarterback for one series for his Pee Wee football team. It was heartwarming and inspiring, and the boy was a better quarterback than Joey Harrington. Ryan is the pick here.

4. Raiders: Chris Long (DE, Virginia). Howie Long always seemed like one of those guys who, if I were a woman, I'd really enjoy getting to know. Great smile, big hands. He really seems like he'd know how to take care of you.

5. Chiefs: Ryan Clady (T, Boise State). Gotta be an offensive lineman here. Carl Peterson is a dummy, but he ain't dumb enough to not fix his offensive line.

Scratch that. They'll probably draft Darren McFadden to back up Larry Johnson. Please note that this is my second giggle-inspiring reference to "johnson" in this column.

6. Jets: Vernon Gholston (DE, Ohio State).



7. Patriots: Keith Rivers (LB, USC). Oh my God, what a steal, the Patriots are so much smarter than everyone else by absolutely snowing the rest of the goddamn NFL with their great pick of Keith Rivers! They could draft Maria Sharapova and people would splooge all over New England's outside-the-box thinking. There is so much to work with in that last sentence, especially when Bill Belichick's video camera is introduced into the equation.

8. Ravens: Darren McFadden (RB, Baltimore). Same thing that happened to the Vikings last year, with McFadden being too good to pass up despite already having a strong running back in-house. Except McFadden's no Adrian Peterson. He's like Reggie Bush, only not quite as fast, and with more attitude problems, and a less-powerful running style and some other bullshit. Not as sweet a ride.

9. Bengals: Sedrick Ellis (DT, USC). Jesus Christ, mock drafts are boring to write. I can't imagine having to read this shit. What are you people still doing here?

10. Saints: Mike Jenkins (CB, South Florida). Who the hell are you?

Oh my God, I can't take it anymore. You people who update mock drafts every week from November on need to be shot. You can't find anything better to do with your time?

I'm exhausted just from the 10 minutes it took to guess on these picks. I'm dehydrated (which might be because of the alcoholism) and I can't stop sweating (which is surely because of the mescaline). But damn you people for this journalistic trend. It was so innocent when I started it, so long ago.

Power rankings, mock drafts, various lists. What happened to journalism? What happened to searching out for stories? Penning prose? Spinning similes? Writing words? Is this what we've come to?!

God help us all.

I'm drunk.