JACKSONVILLE – It's ba-a-a-a-a-a-a-ack.
As hard as it may be to believe, the annual give-and-take that is the jaguars.com reader mock draft is not only very much ba-a-a-a-a-a-ck, it's back for the fifth time.
That's right … Season Five.
What began during the 2011 lockout now is an honest-to-goodness tradition. Once again, we'll poll jaguars.com readers in an effort to get something close to a consensus on how they see Round 1 of the NFL Draft. If that doesn't happen, we'll at least have some fun.
The catch with the "consensus" part is obvious. When it comes to the draft, there's really no such thing. And in a very real sense, that's the fun of the reader mock.
The other fun part – for some, anyway – is the disdain most readers show the senior writer during the process. That disdain sometimes stems from his poor initial offerings for the identity of the selection. At other times, it stems from his tendency to exercise veto power over the reader's selections.
Other times? Well, other times the readers seem to dislike the senior writer out of habit, principle or just, plain fun.
As a reminder, the format:
The senior writer each day will offer up a possibility at the day's selection, beginning with – wait for it! – No. 1. The readers can then "vote" in the comments section below the story, leaving their choice for the selection and a comment if so desired.
The writer will then "tally" the selections and reveal the day's selection the following day. If the writer thinks the readers have whiffed wildly, he may exercise veto power. This last part often draws the ire of readers, but he's the one doing the tallying and the writing; if he wants to draw ire, ire he shall draw.
And as always …
No trades.
As was the case the past two offseasons, we're striving to keep the process as tight as possible. Instead of running it each weekday for a little more than six weeks, we're shooting once again to get this done in about three weeks, meaning it should wrap early draft week.
This intro story is running Monday. We'll run the No. 1 selection Wednesday, which will give everyone time to get geared up for the process. We'll select the next nine selections of Round 1 over the next nine "business" days. After that, we'll go more quickly, selecting picks 11-15 one day, 16-20 the next, 21-26 the day after that and 27-32 the following day.
We'll then pick the first four selections of Round 2, closing with the Jaguars' scheduled second-round selection, No. 36 overall. It was an ambitious affair going seven selections deep last season to get to the Jaguars' second selection. Perhaps this year won't seem quite so ambitious. We'll see. Whatever.
Once again, this reader mock will be similar to other mocks in one critical sense. It will get more right than wrong – quite probably a lot more. Its point, again like all other mock drafts, is to have fun and pass the days until draft day.
OK, enough explanation. It's time to get going. We'll offer Florida State quarterback Jameis Winston to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at No. 1 overall, and the guess here is this is the most consensus selection of the 2015 jaguars.com reader mock. Few analysts seem to believe the No. 1 selection will go any other way.
Will jaguars.com readers agree? They rarely do. We'll see.
Have at it.
