Marc Ross is the New York Giants director of college scouting. Here is what he had to say about the selection of David Wilson in the first round of the 2012 NFL Draft on Thursday night.
Q: An easy pick?
A: Yeah, very. Very easy.
Q: Why?
A: In the draft there are certain players that you evaluate when you go through the process that despite differences on what you think his speed or toughness or this and that is, you come away at the end of your report saying this guy’s a good football player. There are only a handful of those guys in the draft every year and in our meeting this was one of those players where everybody, despite what you may have thought, came away at the end of the report and said this guy’s a good football player. That’s very intriguing.
Q: At what point did you say, ‘If he’s there, we need to pick him.’
A: When the reports come in in the fall about the guy and the grades are coming and then once we start meeting and then everything merges together and we start stacking the board, then it becomes more clear about the pecking order between all of the positions about who is going to go higher and how you like them.
Q: He’ll be an elite running back in the NFL?
A: I think so, yeah. I think so. He’s done it [at Virginia Tech]. Every game he’s [putting up] 100 yards. He is their offense and I think he can do the same thing here.
Q: In terms of off the field, what type of reports did you get?
A: Tremendous. Tremendous. ‘The best I’ve ever coached’ kind of reports. ‘Best worker in here.’ ‘Pound for pound strongest.’ ‘Loves the game.’ When you get those types of accolades from coaches, trainers, equipment people, whoever deals with the kid, and blend it together with a great football player you can’t go wrong.