At this year's NFL Combine in Indianapolis, NFL Network analyst Bucky Brooks discussed what he thinks the Redskins should do in the NFL Draft. While Brooks acknowledged that there are needs on both offense and defense for the Redskins, he believes their primary concern should be adding more playmakers to the offense. If the Redskins want to be able to compete, he said, they need to add a quarterback, or a wide receiver on the outside to take the offense up a level.
Brooks' main reason for believing the Redskins should potentially grab a wide receiver is due to Jamison Crowder's pending free agency, and Paul Richardson's injury problems. Whether the Redskins use their first-round pick on a wide receiver or not, Brooks believes that they can add talent to the receiver position anywhere in the draft.
"There's not many wide receivers who are tier one that I would say are slam-dunk, blue-chip players that play wide receiver," Brooks said. "But there are a number of what I would call playmakers, in the second or third round."
When addressing the Redskins' quarterback problems, Brooks was complimentary of all four of the players who are most commonly mocked as first-round selections.
"Dwayne Haskins and Kyler Murray are the two ones that I say slam-dunks when it comes to quarterback," Brooks said. "After that Drew Lock and Daniel Jones, the conversation is split and mixed on them. With Drew Lock, you're talking about a talented player a guy who has that Matt Stafford like talent, but he's not as polished and he hasn't been as productive throughout his career. Daniel Jones was an unheralded prospect coming in to college, kind of still flies under the radar. Dual-threat, tons of production, doesn't have a big arm but is very similar to what Alex Smith was."
While Brooks thinks that adding offensive weapons is a need for the Redskins, he does not think they need to add a running back. Brooks had words of praise for the Redskins' 2017 second-round selection, Derrius Guice, who missed all of his rookie season with a torn ACL suffered in his first preseason game. Brooks sees Guice as a perfect replacement for last year's starter, Adrian Peterson, as they have comparable styles of play.
"He's [Guice] an old school back who kind of gives you that Frank Gore dimension," Brooks said. "I think he'll be terrific and I think you'll see their offense kind of grind it out. They did it with Adrian Peterson when you talk about an older back, but a younger back with fresher legs, maybe that grind-it-out offense produces better results."
Brooks was still unsure of what the Redskins were going to do with the 15th pick, as the middle portion of the draft is a bit harder to predict. He thinks that the Redskins could just target the best player available for any of their positions of need, but ultimately, he thinks, the Redskins should select a quarterback.
"I can see them taking safety, I can see them take a legitimate playmaker at wide receiver," Brooks said. "But I think for the money, where they're at, it's time for them to take a quarterback."
