April 23, 1989 - This was a big day for the League with the start of the 1989 NFL Draft. The Dallas Cowboys had the opening pick and chose future Pro Football Hall of Fame player UCLA quarterback Troy Aikman. The players taken in this Draft class had many of them get their bronze busts in Canton Ohio including the third pick by the Detroit Lions, running back extraordinaire Barry Sanders, the fourth selection of linebacker Derrick Thomas by the Kansas City Chiefs and the Atlanta Falcons pick of shutdown corner Deion Sanders with the fifth overall selection. That is 4 HOF’s in the first five picks! But wait there was one more Gold Jacket bearer forthcoming so far! Safety Steve Atwater was chosen by Denver at number 20 according to the Pro Football Reference website.
April 23, 2005 - The 2005 NFL Draft had the University of Utah quarterback Alex Smith as first overall pick by San Francisco 49ers per the Pro Football Reference. This Draft still has some significant players either still playing or too recently retired to have any Pro Football Hall of Fame enshrinees but a future slam dunk player that will surely be in Canton some day is Aaron Rodgers. Who can forget that young QB out of Cal painfully waiting in the green room for a team to call his name. It was not until the 24th overall pick that the Green Bay Packers chose Rodgers but still people were all over them for doing so as they had Brett Favre under center still at that time.
Our Newspapers.com Football Headline of the day comes from the Desert Sun out of Palm Springs, California that posted “ Auburn shows its depth at draft” The article written by Associated Press writer John Zenor describes on on day one of the 2005 NFL Draft that the entire starting backfield of the Auburn Tigers wentin the first round of the League's Draft. Tailback Ronnie Brown was the second overall pick by the Miami Dolphins, Carnell Williams went to another Florida team the Tampa Bay Bucs three picks later while Quarterback Jason Campbell was the 25th overall choice by Washington. It should be noted that Washington also selected another Auburn player with the ninth pick, cornerback Carlos Rogers.
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April 23, 2020 The 2020 NFL Draft started off in a pandemic virtual session and LSU quarterback Joe Burrows first pick by Cincinnati Bengals per Pro-Football-Refeence.com. The rest of the top ten went like this according to the Pro Football Reference:
2 WAS Chase Young DE Ohio St.
3 DET Jeff Okudah CB Ohio St.
4 NYG Andrew Thomas T Georgia
5 MIA Tua Tagovailoa QB Alabama
6 LAC Justin Herbert QB Oregon
7 CAR Derrick Brown DT Auburn
8 ARI Isaiah Simmons LB Clemson
9 JAX C.J. Henderson CB Florida
10 CLE Jedrick Wills Jr. T Alabama
