Those of us who crave hard-hitting, densely-packed, insightful, non-copy/pasted Saints commentary were thrilled Sunday morning to find that the venerable Pete Finney took some time out of his busy schedule to break down the first day of the Saints’ draft as only someone with six decades in the business can.

Pete’s conclusion? We’ll have to wait and see.

That right there is some good stuff.

But it gets even better. Pete knows that we love him here at our humble blog, and he has offered us his full-draft breakdown to publish as a moosedenied exclusive. (Sssssh… don’t tell anyone at the Times-Pic.) So without any further ado…

Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Peter Finney

It was quite an eventful weekend for the Saints.

How so, you ask?

Well, let me tell you.

It started Saturday morning, just like most other weekends. But this wasn’t just any weekend. No, this one was different. This one was like Christmas weekend. Christmas doesn’t always fall on a weekend, but when it does, this was a lot like that.

And let me tell you something else.

If Mickey Loomis’ goal was to land LSU’s Glenn Dorsey, he failed. But if his goal was to land the best player he possibly could without paying too much, he just might have succeeded.

But when will we know for sure?

I’ll tell you.

Just as soon as I finish this sandwich.

We’ll find out sometime down the road, once it becomes clear. But first, we have to see these guys put the pads on and play some games against NFL competition. Then we’ll know. Unless they end up kind of tied.

Until then, we wait.

That sandwich was pretty good. It had cheese on it. Sean Payton says not to eat the cheese. Carl Peterson must have overheard him, because the Chiefs refused the cheese that Payton and Loomis were offering. Which just proves that you have to be careful what you say.

Willie Roaf played for the Chiefs. He was a big fan of cheese. It seems like the Saints’ best drafts through the years were the ones where they took players like Willie Roaf. And Rickey Jackson. And Marques Colston. And the worst were the ones where they took players like Jonathan Sullivan and Shawn Knight and Ricky Williams.

What can we learn from that? Well, it’s simple, really. In order to draft well, you need to take good players and avoid the busts.

But it’s difficult, because you seldom know which ones are which. You only find out after it’s too late to make a different decision. That’s why these guys get paid the big bucks.

Later Saturday afternoon, the Saints took cornerback Tracy Porter.

Here’s the irony: Porter is from Port Allen, LA.

Even more ironic than that is that most people were expecting the Saints to trade that pick to the Giants for their version of Kyle Turley, tight end Jeremy Shockey. That’s extremely ironic. It’s ironic because Loomis could have sweetened the deal, but he didn’t. Not because he is lazy, or was not paying attention, but because Loomis is not a guy who is going to overpay.

So now the question becomes: Are the Saints better off with Tracy Porter instead of Jeremy Shockey?

I’ll tell you what I think.

I think that it’s hard to say. Porter is a cornerback and Shockey is a tight end. It’s apples and oranges. It would be like comparing a discount on dry cleaning to a really good ham & cheese sandwich.

But I will say this: If Tracy Porter turns out to be half the player that Willie Roaf was, then the Saints will take it and never look back.

Ironically, Sunday’s action started earlier in the day than Saturday’s.

It used to be that day two of the draft was all about finding diamonds in the rough. These days, it’s still like that. Only moreso.

The Saints stayed on the defensive side of the ball with their first of two picks in the fifth round, selecting another defensive tackle.

I once asked the late Jim Finks about whether it’s better to draft offense or defense in the later rounds.

Do you know what he told me?

No, you probably don’t.

So I’ll tell you.

He told me that you use late round picks on the best players left on the board.

That kind of philosophy was what made Jim Finks so great. That’s how the Saints ended up with Dalton Hilliard, Rueben Mayes, Barry Word and Gil Fenerty all in a single draft.

Barry Word ended up playing for the Chiefs. So did Willie Roaf and Kyle Turley. The same Chiefs team that, ironically, just welcomed Glenn Dorsey into the fold this weekend.

With their second pick of the fifth round, the Saints selected Nebraska offensive tackle Carl Nicks. Willie Roaf was also an offensive tackle. I wonder if Nicks will end up going to the Chiefs in a few years? If Nicks ends up being half the player that Willie Roaf was, the Saints better not let him go.

In the sixth round, the Saints drafted a kicker.

A kicker?

Yes. A kicker.

But here’s the irony: He’s left-footed.

You know who else was left-footed?

That’s right. Mike Ditka.

I once asked Iron Mike whether being left-footed helped him or hindered him during his playing days. He said it didn’t really make any difference at all.

But you have to wonder whether it was a significant factor for the Saints when they decided to select Wisconsin’s Taylor Mehlhaff. After all, Mark Brunell is left-handed, and so is Tyler Palko. One of those two guys could end up holding for field goal attempts if something were to happen to Steve Weatherford.

You can never be too careful.

In the seventh round, the Saints selected Michigan receiver Adrian Arrington. That’s ironic because the Redskins used one of the picks from the Ricky Williams trade to select LaVar Arrington.

But it remains to be seen whether Arrington will be more like the last receiver the Saints selected in the 7th round, or more like the last Saints player named Adrian. Watch out for those mascots.

Eventually we will have answers to all of these questions. But until then, all we can do is wait and see.

In the meantime, on a scale of 1 to 100, I’d grade this draft class a solid M.