The Miami Hurricanes Are Hoping Lamar Miller Starts Another String of 1st Round Picks

Oh, how the mighty have fallen. Not too long ago the Miami Hurricanes had an un-godly streak where they had a player picked in the first round. in fact, The Miami Hurricanes have been one of the most successful colleges in the history of the draft.

The Hurricanes hold the record for most players selected in the first round in a single draft (6, in 2004), most first-round draft picks in a two-year period (11, from 2003 to 2004), most first-round draft picks in a three-year period (15, from 2002 through 2004), and most first-round picks in a four-year period (19, from 2001 through 2004). For a 14-year period, from 1994 through 2008, Miami had at least one player selected in the first round of the NFL Draft. The Hurricanes once had a streak of 149 consecutive regular season weeks where a former Hurricane scored a touchdown in an NFL game; the streak started in Week 15 of the 2002 NFL regular season and ended in Week 11 of the 2011 season. During the streak, 33 different former Hurricanes scored touchdowns and a total of 661 touchdowns were scored. The Miami Hurricanes are also 10th overall on the NFL’s all-time number of draft picks with 307.^[1]

Since 1999, Miami Hurricanes has had 67 players selected, 2nd-most in the nation, behind only The Ohio State University (77). In the same time-span, Hurricanes players were picked 33 times in the first-round, the most of any Division I university.^[2] From the 2001 Miami Hurricanes football team alone, 17 players went on to compete in the NFL.

However, lately the Hurricanes have struggled getting players drafted early. Last year their best player on our board, CB Brandon Harris had a chance to go in the first round but fell to the Houston Texans in the second round. The first player drafted for the Hurricanes was OL Orlando Franklin by the Denver Broncos at 46th overall.

In 2010, they didn’t have a player drafted until the third round when some relatively unknown Tight End named Jimmy Graham was selected by the New Orleans Saints. Little did we know that he should have been a first rounder.

In 2009 their first pick was in the sixth round when Spencer Adkins was drafted by the Atlanta Falcons.

This year though Miami could get back in the game with speedy running back Lamar Miller who proved to be one of the fastest players in College football with his official 4.40 forty yard dash. Miller combines speed with good size and power. Miller has terrific potential as a receiver as well.

There are a few teams that make sense for Miller in the first round. The first would be the New York Jets who are looking to improve their run game, but that seems like a long shot. The first place where he seems likely to be drafted is the Cincinnati Bengals at either 17 or 21st overall. They have a pretty good OL and a good passing game, but need to improve their stable of running backs. After the Bengals the next likely landing spot for this dynamic running back would be the Denver Broncos at 25. The Broncos are moving forward with Tim Tebow and their coach is John Fox which means the running game will be a focus of their offense for the foreseeable future. A player with Miller’s talents could be very valuable in Denver. The last likely landing spot for Lamar Miller is the New York Giants. The Defending Superbowl Champs. The Giants had the worst running game in the league last year and are asking Brandon Jacobs to take a huge pay cut to stay with the team, which he seems unlikely to do. If (when) Jacobs is cut they may wishd to reinforce their group of running backs.

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