GREEN BAY, Wis. -- The way Brian Gutekunst operated on the first day of the NFL draft, expect the Packers' new general manager to come away with more than just one player on Day 2.
For now, he owns just one pick (a second-rounder, No. 45 overall) on the second day, when Rounds 2 and 3 are set to take place.
But with 10 picks on Day 3, including two in the fourth round and four more in the fifth, there’s a good chance for a repeat of Gutekunst’s trading ways from Thursday to carry into Friday.
“You never can predict it, but I think the way that our board looks now, I would assume we’d move around a little bit,” Gutekunst said after Thursday’s first round. “We have a lot of picks, and there’s areas of the board that we feel really good about, so I would assume that we would.”
Gutekunst made a pair of trades on Thursday. The full details can be found here. But essentially, he went from No. 14 overall and picked at No. 18 -- with a brief stop at No. 27 in between. His pick at 18 -- Louisville cornerback Jaire Alexander -- might have been the pick at his original spot.
When all the trading was done, Gutekunst looked like a veteran GM, rather than a first-time drafter. He essentially gave up a third-round pick to move back four spots and pick up a first-round pick in 2019 from the Saints. Sure, he swapped some Day 3 draft picks positioned between the fifth and seventh rounds, but he has plenty of picks to get back into the second or third rounds on Friday.
It might prove to be a mistake that he passed on linebacker Tremaine Edmunds, safety Derwin James and defensive end Marcus Davenport (the Saints pick at No. 14), but perhaps Gutekunst would have taken Alexander over anyone in that trio had he stayed put. The Packers used two of their 30 pre-draft visits on Edmunds and James, so Gutekunst must have liked them.
“We would have been happy with either one of those players, as well,” Gutekunst said. “But we just thought this was something we couldn’t pass up.”
Even for a cornerback whose height (5-foot-10¼) came in below the minimum requirement by which former Packers GM Ron Wolf abided?
“When you have a corner that lacks great height like that, sometimes you start to say, ‘Is he just a nickel? Can he play inside? Play outside?’” Gutekunst said of Alexander. “I think all of our staff, personnel staff and coaching staff, felt really good about him playing inside and outside. He’s a dynamic, explosive athlete ... and he was kind of right on the Mendoza line [for height] there.”
If Alexander turns out to be a capable starter, whether that’s right away this season or down the road, then Thursday will go down as solid start to Gutekunst’s tenure.
If Gutekunst picks up more selections on Friday and finds a pass-rusher or a right tackle, then solid could turn into stellar.
And then there’s 2019: The Packers now own two first-round picks for the first time since 2009, when they took B.J. Raji (at No. 9) and Clay Matthews (No. 26).
“The ability to get a first-round pick in next year’s draft wasn’t something that we started out thinking about trying to acquire,” Gutekunst said. “But it was just too good to pass up, quite frankly. Those first-round picks don’t come around very often. We just thought it was in our best interests to do that. We were going to get the same valued player, in my mind, once that [second] trade came up.”