FanHouse Darius Butler

FOXBOROUGH, Mass. -- Plenty of Ravens and Patriots players wore pink on Sunday -- matching shoes and gloves -- in honor of breast cancer awareness. Myra Kraft, wife of Patriots owner Bob Kraft, noticed.

She stood on the Patriots sideline only minutes before kickoff as both teams stretched and styled nearby. It takes a real football player to pull off pink, we agreed.

"And I am so glad they are manly enough to help with this cause,'' she said. "I wasn't so sure they would actually do it.''

The Patriots then set out to ensure that their social conscious should never be confused with their football tenacity.

They did just that -- even in pink, the Patriots still pack a punch.

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Who moved to the head of the NFL class during the draft? Find out with FanHouse's team-by-team 2009 Draft Grades.

No team enjoys wheeling and dealing on draft weekend quite like the New England Patriots. The 2009 draft was no exception, as they made a series of moves resulting in 12 picks, and the stockpiling of even more selections in 2010.

As a result, the moves left the Patriots with no first-round selection for the first time since 2000, which is also the same year they selected some guy named Tom Brady.

Along with the 256 college players drafted last weekend, cornerback Ellis Hobbs also got a new home: the Patriots sent him to the Eagles for a pair of fifth-rounders. It was a surprising move, even for the trade-for-picks-happy Pats. Not only because cornerback was a liability last season in New England, but also because Hobbs is one of the best kick returners in the league.

The Patriots signed Shawn Springs and Leigh Bodden this spring, and '08 second-rounder Terrence Wheatley will compete for playing time with his '09 counterpart, Darius Butler. Which made it easier to jettison Hobbs, despite the fact that he started every game the last two seasons.

NEW YORK -- The New England Patriots drafted UConn's Darius Butler thinking he could replace cornerback Ellis Hobbs at cornerback and in the kick-return game. Today, they accelerated that process, trading Hobbs to the Philadelphia Eagles for a pair of fifth-round picks. The wheeling-dealing Pats immediately flipped both picks, trading up in the fourth round to take Penn State offensive lineman Richard Ohrnberger.

The Eagles, who actually had five fifth-round picks before this deal, sent New England the No. 137 and 141 overall picks in exchange for Hobbs. New England immediately traded both of those picks to Baltimore for the 123rd and 198th picks, and selected Ohrnberger at 123.

It's amazing how a player can rise and fall in the final weeks of the draft. Tyson Jackson hasn't played a game since early January. All through January, February and March, he was looked at as a defensive end who could go somewhere between No. 10 and No. 20.

But now in the final days before the draft, all of a sudden multiple mock drafts are predicting Jackson to go No. 3 overall. We'll find out soon whether it's a true rise or some subterfuge.

With the draft just hours away, here is a final look at who the mock drafts are picking to go where. This is a roundup of 17 different mock drafts, all of the mock drafts are from this week and most are from the last day as experts try to refine their final predictions. Everyone will get No. 1 right, as everyone predicts the Lions will take Matt Stafford.

To get ready for this weekend's draft, we're looking position-by-position at who could go in the first round. Click here for the rest of the breakdowns.


CB/S Malcolm Jenkins (mid first round), CB Vontae Davis (mid-to-late first round).
This isn't a good year if you're looking for a shutdown corner. The top cornerback in this draft, Jenkins, is thought by some experts to be a free safety in the NFL because of his questionable man-to-man coverage skills. Davis is the best athlete among the corners, but he's shown lackadasical effort during his college career, which leads one to wonder, what will he do when he has millions in the bank? Neither are slam dunk picks, but with the constant need for cornerbacks, both are first-round picks this year.

With the draft approaching, we ignore projections and identify the dream scenario for each team in a series we call The Perfect Draft.

The Steelers are never big players in free agency, so the draft is of vital importance to the Steelers ability to contend year in and year out. With two Lombardi trophies and another AFC Championship appearance in the past five years, it's clear that Kevin Colbert and the Steelers' scouting department have done their job well.

The Steelers rarely draft players to start right away. Even 2003 first-round pick Troy Polamalu played only sporadically as a rookie and last year's top two picks, Rashard Mendenhall and Limas Sweed, will be asked to play much bigger roles in 2009 than they did in 2008.

With the draft approaching, we ignore projections and identify the dream scenario for each team in a series we call The Perfect Draft.

When you put together the league's best record and bring back most everyone from that team, you don't have many pressing needs. Even after losing Albert Haynesworth to a massive deal in free agency, the Titans still have a very solid defensive line, an above-average secondary and a solid group of linebackers.

With the draft approaching, we ignore projections and identify the dream scenario for each team in a series we call The Perfect Draft.

A year ago, the Dolphins were coming off a 1-15 record and had locked up Jake Long with the first-overall pick a week before the 2008 draft. Now, one year into Bill Parcells' Reclamation Project, Miami is 11-5, defending AFC East champs, and hold the 25th selection in Saturday's draft.