[skinsfan_nn]

In unrelated news to Shockey. Saints and Ravens to possibly make a deal?

RAVENS, SAINTS TO SWAP PICKS?
Posted by Michael David Smith on April 26, 2008, 12:02 p.m.

With just three hours to go before the start of the draft, trade talk is getting fast and furious, and John Clayton of ESPN reports that the Saints and Ravens could make a deal.

The Ravens want to draft a quarterback and they don’t think they’ll be able to nab their first choice, Matt Ryan of Boston College, with the eighth pick in the draft. That would then lead the Ravens to try to trade down and select their second-rated quarterback, Chad Henne of Michigan, and Clayton reports that they’d be willing to take Henne as high as 10th, the pick the Saints own.

That would be viewed as a major reach by just about every draft analyst, but according to Clayton, that doesn’t mean it won’t happen.

The Saints have made no secret this week that they’re willing to buck the recent trend of teams not wanting to trade up in the draft. New Orleans seems to think that it needs to bolster its defensive line and that the top four prospects — Virginia’s Chris Long, LSU’s Glenn Dorsey, Ohio State’s Vernon Gholston and USC’s Sedrick Ellis — will all be gone in the first nine picks.

One stumbling block in such a trade happening is that the standard draft trade chart would call for the Saints to throw in a fourth-round pick to make such a move, but the Saints have already traded their fourth-round pick to the Jets.