The NFL’s Hidden Gem: The 12th Overall Draft Pick Unveiled

Is the 12th overall pick, the NFL's best kept secret for finding hall of Fame power.

From the sheer dominance of Warren Sapp and Herb Adderley to the modern day game changers like Micah Parsons and Marshawn lynch, this slot has a history of producing pure beast mode talent.

Welcome to the Pig Pen.

It's Pigskin Dispatches Countdown with Ed Cleese, our guest.

We are just 12 days before the NFL draft in Pittsburgh and we are getting ready by counting down the picks and Ed Cleese joins me once again.

Ed, welcome back to the Pig pen.

Hey Darren.

We're down to the dirty dozen.

It sure is.

These are the big boys coming up here.

Now we're people to talk about here the next almost two weeks right for this draft, so a lot of fun to go on the show here.

So what do you have to say about the, the overall view of pick number 12?

Well, I think, I think we're getting there because you know, when we talked Yesterday about the 13th pick, I think I said, I've said all along that I'm waiting for their where's the, what's the number?

Like at what point can I write a line and say, okay, this is where the draft history really improves.

And I'm telling you from pick 14 through 32, I, there's very little difference to me to discern.

I did not find any patterns.

So for the teams that are drafting, you know, I don't see a whole lot of difference right now between like that middle teens pick and like an early 30s pick.

At least historically there's not been a lot of difference with like hits or misses or hall of Fame and just kind of all over the place.

Maybe we see that change at 13 because yesterday we talked about 13.

13 Was super strong, like definitely our best group so far.

So it's, you know, this is a pretty good, pretty good list here.

And when I was going through I was like, okay, a little bit of a cut above.

Now maybe the top, Maybe this top five isn't quite as strong as 13, but it's still pretty darn good.

And historically so far there's not a lot of hall of Famers from this number, pick 12.

I was kind of surprised by that.

I think we only have three that are on the list here.

And I got some maybes.

I think we got some maybe.

Yeah, we might have more in the modern era than we have already have been in the hall of Fame.

Right, right.

And I think we've also got some, like we talk a lot about in the past.

We go like, oh, this guy's pretty good.

We got a lot of guys in this list that were really good.

Maybe not quite Canton, but better than average by far.

Yeah, definitely.

All right, well, why don't we get into who you're giving some honorable mentions to and get into your list.

Yeah, sure.

So we always.

I like to start with like the recent and I'd say recently, really, this potentially very promising.

You've got Bo Nix, Jameer Gibbs, Jameson Williams, and then a little farther back, but you know, Vita Vea.

So these are really strong, strong players.

And then you kind of have these kind of.

In that same like last dozen years, two of the opposite.

Both Henry Ruggs and DeSean Watson were taken 12th overall.

Who have had significant off field stuff that has stunted their career.

And then the one that I've got to mention for sure is we got to keep an eye on Michael Parsons.

I decided that this pick was strong enough that I don't quite have him in the top five.

But I think there's a big yet with that because he is clearly trending towards probably the hall of Fame, if we're being honest.

He's got a long way to go in terms of volume, but in terms of his production so far in his career, he's kind of having a Hall of Fame career so far.

But.

But that seems, almost seems like the health issues, you know, end of last season or some big question marks going into this season.

You know, Green Bay might be.

Maybe he's even getting some, you know, plan B as an edge rusher to take his place.

They're not.

I don't think they're too keen on if he's going to be playing a lot this year.

And yeah, and we've seen that a lot when we've gone through the history of some of these players, like, wow, this guy was shot out of a cannon.

And then like, what happened?

And a lot of times it's like, oh, he got hurt, you know, he couldn't get.

Now I think these days we see guys rehab and come back way faster and better than they used to, but you don't know.

So so Parsons, for me, he's, he's neither honorable.

He's just on the island by himself when it comes to 12 picks right now just in this will see spot because he's obviously a dominant player when he's playing and then we'll just have to see where his career goes from here.

Yeah, I think that's, that's probably a good safe choice there.

And you got some names that are very deserving to be on your top five.

If I'm not sure who you're picking, but just looking at these names, there's a lot of good choices.

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We do need to talk about quarterbacks first though, because it has not been pretty.

You know, we mentioned Deshaun Watson who was having a very good career, and it has, you know, come flying off the tracks.

I'm gonna ask you, let's see, of those three quarterbacks, Ponder, McNown, McCown, McNown, if I can say it, McNown, Cade McNown, and Chuck Long, who had the most wins as a starter?

Oh, God.

I know.

Staying along around the longest was probably McNown and.

But I don't know how many he started.

I'm gonna go with him, though, because I think he had the longest career.

Nope.

It was Christian Ponder.

He had.

He went 10 and six.

I wasn't expecting 14.

I was expecting like four.

The rest of his career, he had four wins, McNown had four.

Three wins, and Chuck Long had four wins.

So between.

Between the three of them, they barely got to 20.

So these were definitely three quarterback busts and sort of one random year where Ponder was okay and then just gone.

So that was.

That was rough.

It was a.

It's been rough on quarterbacks, for sure.

Yeah.

Maybe Mr. Nix will change your opinion.

Maybe.

Yeah.

It does make you wonder a little bit if, like, once you get to 12, I wonder if teams are more apt to reach there.

You know, like the teams at the top of the draft didn't.

Didn't take a quarterback because they weren't sold on them.

And then you get a team that's kind of desperate at 12 and maybe reaches.

I don't know, but those.

But it hasn't worked out very well.

Well, I, I will tell you that it's.

Okay, I'll be interested to hear that.

Okay, so.

But there is a pretty long list of honorable mentions.

And we've gotten to the point now, Darren, where I'm not going to name all of the players that were good, you know, because it would just be here for a long time.

Yeah.

But he was.

He made some big splash plays.

He had the very big long touchdown reception in the 92 NFC championship game in San Francisco that put Dallas on their first super bowl in that.

Of that era.

So he was a big player for the Cowboys in terms of making big plays.

And that's kind of shocking because, you know, that's the Michael Irvin era.

You'd think, you know, all the coverage would roll to Irvin and Harper would be a great target for Aikman to throw to.

Yeah, Harper was, like, good for like, two catches a game for like 75 yards, something like that.

You know, that was kind of his.

That was kind of his role.

Keith Brooking was a very good linebacker for quite a while.

Drafted by the Falcons in 98.

And he is one of those guys that just suffered from being on miserable teams.

He was on a really bad Cardinals team.

He was a free agent, signed with the Redskins during their very rough era of the.

Of the like, 94 to 97.

He was very good, a very good on the edge, a very good outside linebacker.

Really nice career.

Never played in one playoff game as his team's just never, never got there.

And then let's just see if there's.

We.

We've had Jim Harbaugh on this list in the past.

Who's our one current head coach that was taken 12th overall.

Do you know?

Not right offhand.

Without.

Okay, I'll give.

I'll give you one hint.

I'm not sure he'll be a head coach for too much longer, but he is.

Right now.

I'm not sure.

I'm not.

I'm on the list.

94, Aaron Glenn.

Oh, God.

Yeah.

I didn't even look at him.

Yeah, you're right.

He did have a pretty nice career.

He did have a. Yeah, he did.

He was corner.

Yeah.

And then.

So my.

And then my very last guy I'm going to talk about was a dead tie with my number five.

Like, dead tie.

They played the same position.

Was an absolute dead tie.

But I'm from an older generation.

We don't have ties, Darren.

There's no trophies, so he.

I had to cut somebody a tie to.

You is kissing your sisters.

Exactly.

Okay, so I caught.

Hello.

Dinata from the Ravens, and he's not in my top five.

Wow.

Yes.

Okay.

Yep.

Yeah.

I mean, I was shocked at Aaron Glenn, but hello to Nada not making a top five.

All right.

Yep.

So.

But who.

Who, who, who beat him out?

He had all 12 years with Philly.

He made four all pro teams and one first team all pro.

Again, we talk about that all the time in the middle part.

He was very good player on the team that won the Eagles first Super Bowl.

So he's a, he's a classic Eagle.

And like I said, if you line him up next to Nada, they're like almost identical.

But what put me over the edge was Cox had 70.

I'm sorry, he had 40 more sacks than Nada.

Now I realize, hello, he probably played a little bit more nose and Fletcher was a little bit more traditional defensive tackle.

But I had to break the tie somehow and I went with the guy that got a little bit more pressure on the quarterback.

I think they're both very good players.

But I agree with you.

I think Fletcher Cox is a little.

But better player.

You know, he's a little bit more of a two gap.

He's.

Hello.

Not as a run stuffer and a, you know, a block eater.

You know, opened up for his, his backers to make some tackles.

But yeah, I'm, I'm actually kind of surprised you didn't have Cox higher, but I'm interested.

Yeah, it was.

Like I said, it's a pretty good list.

So we'll.

We'll see.

But number four, I've got a guy that was only 59 and 180 pounds.

He was the offensive rookie of the year.

I don't know if this is.

I don't.

It kind of surprised me when I looked at it.

He only played five years in Tampa and then seven with the Falcons.

I definitely remember him.

Yeah, I don't remember him with the Falcons.

Yeah, yeah.

Seven years there.

And what was interesting to me was he sort of flip flopped his workload, meaning when he was with the Bucks, he was catching more passes and not rushing as much.

And then he flip flopped it with the Falcons.

But out of 11 of the 12 years he played Darren, he had a thousand or more yards from scrimmage.

And the one year he didn't was he had 958.

And he did have five years of rushing for over a thousand yards too, as a really tiny guy.

And then in the playoff game he had 100.

And I think Warwick Dunn was just a weapon and.

And just something that.

Somebody that kind of like a difference maker in a game.

And that's kind of what really sets him apart for me is he can make those one or two extra plays, get those extra first downs out of the backfield, lining up somebody that the defense had to account for all the time.

And I think some.

A lot of people know this about him.

It just kind of elevates him a little bit more.

He was the Walter Payton man of the year once.

Lots of off the field accolades.

His mother was an off.

Was a police officer and she was killed two days after his 18th birthday when she was doing some security off duty.

And he sort of became the, you know, the mother and father of his brothers and sisters at 18.

And so he's just a really good story.

He was like a great dude and just a hell of a player.

National champion at Florida State and yeah, some great teams.

Yeah, he was almost like Derek Sprouls before.

Derek Sprouls.

Yeah, yeah, that.

He's in that.

He's in that vein.

Yes.

Perimeter.

Yeah.

Yeah.

All right.

He's solid.

Yeah.

Right.

All right, so who do you have at three?

Three would be somebody that I really.

I'm gonna.

There's a couple hills I want to die on, and I'm going to die on this hill forever.

I'm going to say some things about Lachey here in a minute.

Very, very weird trade.

A series of trades.

He played three years with the Chargers, was very good.

Got traded to the Raiders for a.

For a pretty hefty package.

Then after he played one game with the Raiders, the Raiders traded him to the Redskins for Jay Schrader, the quarterback.

And I'm just going to tell you this, Darren.

Ever.

That he was dominant.

Dominant.

Incredible.

I think he was equal probably to Anthony Munoz.

That which is some people consider the best offensive tackle in the history of football.

For good reason.

In the annals of the league, you cannot put Jim Lachey with Anthony Munoz because he did not do it for nearly as long.

But when he was at his peak, I personally never watched anybody that was any better.

Nobody touched.

And.

And he went.

He was going against Reggie White and Lawrence Taylor twice a year.

Nobody ever sniffed the quarterbacks from the left side for like four years in Washington, he had a really bad knee Injury, I think it was knee in 92.

That kind of ended it.

He never, he just.

It was done.

He was done.

Since then.

He has been on every broadcast for Ohio State University in the radio Booth since like 97.

So he's still in football back at his alma mater.

But he was, he was one amazing player.

Yeah, great, great story.

Yeah, great, great player.

Yes.

Disagree with that.

When you're playing 25% of your games against, you know, Reggie White and Lawrence Taylor, probably two of the best pass rushers ever.

Yeah, that's.

That's pretty good things.

Yeah.

Yes, for sure.

All right, so who do you have at number two?

We're gonna go beast mode.

Another weird trade.

He had a really good start with the bills.

He had two really strong seasons.

Are productive.

There were some off the field stuff going on and I think the Bills were a little bit unhappy with him so they traded him to Seattle for a very modest return.

I like this about him a lot, Darren.

He played in 13 career playoff games and he scored 12 touchdowns.

So he was good for almost a touchdown per game.

We all remember the one touchdown he didn't get, of course would have been.

When the one carry he didn't get right.

When the Seahawks didn't call his name, when they should have on the goal line, which probably cost them a Super Bowl.

He has an interesting hall of Fame case.

To me it really depends on what you value and how you look at things.

You know, if you just look at the all time rushing leaders and all those numbers, he's probably going to come up short because he doesn't pop on the page.

But if you want to talk about like oh my gosh, on a Super bowl winning level team, we can't stop that guy.

That was Marshawn Lynch.

He was, he was a guy that took games over.

Let me put it this way.

I'll rank a lot of running backs higher than him, but if we do the who would you want for one game rankings, he's going to be way Higher for me.

You mean, like, who would you want from the one yard line and at the end of a Super Bowl.

Yeah.

Oh, boy.

Yeah, that was.

Yikes.

I mean, yes, yes.

Give the Beast the ball from the one yard line.

Yeah.

I don't care if.

If all 11 are expecting it on defense.

Yeah.

I would give the ball.

I would give the ball to the beat.

He was an interesting guy.

You know, he was kind of weird and people had a hard time kind of reading him.

Like, is he.

Is he in on the joke?

Is he.

Is he.

Is he trolling people?

Like, you know, it's like he was a little bit of a loose cannon, maybe.

Hard to read, but also kind of makes things fun.

Yeah.

And he's.

He does some fun things like that now since he's been retired, he's been on a lot of shows, having some pranks and movies.

Yeah, I think.

Yeah, he's having a good time.

He's living a good life.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And really fun guy to watch.

Yeah.

Most definitely.

The old beast mode.

Yep.

All right, so who do you have in your number one spot?

It's pretty easy.

And that is one guy that does have the gold jacket, and that is going to be Warren Sapp, defensive tackle, taken in 95 by the Bucs.

In 13 years, he didn't miss very many games.

It's interesting, on draft night, I don't remember this right before the draft, like the night before the draft, there were these rumors that he tested positive for marijuana and cocaine.

And not only did he deny it, but the league came out and said this is like a fabricated story.

Somebody's out to get him.

We have no evidence of this, but it hurt him.

Apparently in the draft, he probably would have gone higher than 12 because he was a big time, big time college player.

So I think that hurt him a little bit.

He dropped a little bit.

It might have been the Buccaneers that were saying that.

So.

Yeah.

Really?

Yeah.

Perhaps, perhaps.

Yeah.

Sly as a fox there.

So he made seven straight Pro Bowl, Pro Bowls between 97 and 03.

But then, this is incredible.

Four straight first team all pros during that same stretch.

So basically, hey, best defensive tackle in the league, top one or two, whatever, defensive player of the year in 99 when they had an absolutely dominant, dominant defense.

Very prominent figure just on the bucks in general.

I'd say 96 and a half career sacks.

He was okay for the Raiders, too.

Not bad.

One thing that really sticks out to me, for Warren Sapp, that's a little different than we talked about.

Like Aaron Donald is.

Warren Sapp was not like a Greek God.

You know, he was.

He kind of had that roly, poly body.

He.

He did have some weight issues throughout his career where the.

I know the teams wanted him to drop some.

He was kind of like round, you know, and.

And you probably wouldn't think that this guy is so insanely athletic and can get to the quarterback the way he did.

So he kind of looked a little different and, you know, kind of squatty out there.

And he did this in his post career.

He's had all kinds of like, I don't know if they're major or minor, all kinds of like legal issues and stuff, but.

And also thought of this, Darren, because another guy we talked about.

I didn't.

I don't know why I never put this together.

So the, the Bucks took SAP in 95 in the first round.

They had a second first round pick that year, a guy we talked about who was also number one in our list for that pick.

The number or number two, I'm sorry, on the number 20, that's Derek Brooks.

They took two hall of Famers, two easy first ballot hall of Famers in the middle of the field on defense in the same round of the same draft.

That is incredible.

And then if you think they already had John lynch on the team.

Okay, so we always talk about how important it is to.

In the middle of the field, interior, D line, middle linebacker and safety.

They went, hall of Fame, hall of Fame, hall of Fame.

Draw a straight line right up the middle, right.

And.

And they hired Dungey in 96.

So all of those guys arrived at the same time.

So my message for the jets and the Browns and the Raiders this year is just do that, just draft future hall of Famers and you'll be fine.

Well, you.

You've talked.

We just talked about their coach just a second ago.

So maybe he wants to save his job.

He'll do that.

So.

Yes, sir.

Yeah.

All right.

Well, so that SAP is one of our hall of Famers we talked about earlier.

There are two other ones.

And one of the greatest defensive backs of all time, Herb Adderly of the Green Bay packers, who still has many of the packers records for defending passes and interceptions and everything.

Hall of Famer, and this is a little known because he didn't play in the NFL at first.

1965 For the St. Louis Cardinals took Joe Namath, Joe Willie Namath.

Is our quarterback that's in the hall of Fame, but never played for the team that drafted him in the NFL draft.

So.

Right.

That's when the AFL still had their own draft.

And you know that's.

We could do an entire pod someday on Namath and sort of the polarizing nature of his career in a lot of ways because you get on paper it's not pretty actually.

Way more interceptions than touchdowns in his career.

But that's probably a debate or a topic for another time.

And most importantly, he's a Western Pennsylvania, so.

Oh boy, here we go.

You know, he played at Bama.

He's from Western Pennsylvania.

We have a lot of that coming up the next few days.

Not in the hall of Fame, but Marshall Goldberg, who is another Western Pennsylvania pit Panther.

Marshall Goldberg had his number retired by the Cardinals organization.

And if you remember when J.J. watt got traded or I don't know if he free maybe a free agent with the car to get his number 99, they had to go ask Marshall Goldberg's family and if they could get that.

And Goldberg has been a lot on lately on the senior list, so he might get in the encant here eventually.

He's a popular name that pops up on the senior circuit after that.

Goldberg.

Okay.

Yeah, yeah.

So great.

Great player.

He was too.

All right, we have.

So we have our three hall of Famers.

Our most popular position picked at number 12 has been defensive tackle.

We've seen some good ones.

We just talked about a whole bunch of them between, you know, Fletcher Cox and Warren Sapp and you know, some of the other ones we talked about.

And our draft stat of the day is about this 12th spot.

So it's kind of an interesting one.

So you.

Almost everybody we talked about was a defensive player in your top five, except for what Warren done in beast mode.

But all your honorable mentions, most of them were defensive.

So that holds pretty true.

So very interesting stat there.

So I think that sort of wraps up our dirty dozen, the top number 12 pick here of your top five that you've had.

And we'll be coming back tomorrow to talk about the 11 selection.

So I thank you for joining us, Ed.

Can't wait.

See you tomorrow.

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