The Times They Are a-Changin'

When the Saints draft Mark Ingram with the 28th pick in the 2011 NFL Draft, it was the lowest the first running back in the draft was taken in draft history (at least since 1970, which is when I quit looking and what wikipedia put as the "modern era" of football). The lowest a a RB has been picked besides Ingram was in 1984 when the Buffalo Bills selected Greg Bell with the 26th pick.  What's this say about the NFL?

                                                                                    via cdn.bleacherreport.net

Could it be that just no team needed a running back until we traded up for Ingram? There were a couple teams (in my opinion) that could have taken Ingram much earlier and didn't. The Dolphins were a favorite since they were pretty much running back-less going into the draft.  That was pretty much the only team in that kind of position where it was a full on need, but other teams selected a RB fairly early in the draft that passes on Ingram the first time around, such as: Arizona (Ryan Williams 2.38) Detoit (Mikel LeShoure 2.57) and New England (Shane Vereen 2.56 and Stevan Ridley 3.73), New England even gave up their (2nd) first round pick to us instead of taking Ingram. So obviously some teams had a need for a running back, yet still passed on the (consensus) number 1 back in the draft.

The Dolphins later on took Daniel Thomas, and I'm assuming that he will be their #1 back by the start of the season with Ricky Williams and Ronnie Brown skipping town. They also reached when they took Mike Pouncey with the 15th pick in the draft when they could have taken Ingram with that pick or even traded down a bit. But really, when it comes down to the draft, if you want a player, you need to take him...even if it reaching a bit sometimes you need to pull the trigger. 

The Patriots chose to give us their 28th pick in the first round in exchange for next years first round pick and this years 2nd rounder (which they selected Vereen with). I wonder if they knew who we were taking with that pick and just let us have Ingram or if like Coach Sean Payton put it, (I'm para-phrasing since I can not find the exact quote): "We told them the guy we wanted was still there and made they made a deal with us". So I wonder if we just didn't tell them that it was Mark Ingram and hope they just assumed that it would be someone else. But that's not good for business and it seems as if SP and Hoody have a pretty good relationship so why spoil that? So I'm pretty sure the Patriots knew we were taking Ingram with that pick and were ok with taking a RB later on (the 7th ranked RB according to CBS SPORTS with Vereen) that maybe fit their system and draft wants at that time.

So why the fall in the running back position this year? Is Ingram and this class really that bad? I mean Ingram is a former Hiesman trophy winner and would have been in contention again this past year if he wasn't injured and Trent Richardson didn't show up. So are the times changing? The NFL is maybe becoming more of a passing league year after year. And more and more RBBC's keep popping up all over the place, so maybe the RB position is just becoming less of a need when you can just have a stable of backs to do your bidding. What did we get when we drafted Mark Ingram? Hopefully someone who can stay healthy and produce solid numbers at the position that is almost fast becoming a multi-player position.