After a relatively dull first round last year, Thursday night’s affair in Chicago was a lot spicier, featured more trades and quite a bit of controversy and drama. Draft round-up All the news as Goff is picked at No 1 Laremy Tunsil had a rather embarrassing video of him leaked to the media 10 minutes before the start of the Draft, Myles Jack dropped like a stone due to concerns over his knee and Paxton Lynch soared all the way to the Super Bowl champion Denver Broncos. So here are six thoughts on six moves made in Chicago in round one.Tunsils nightmare evening Laremy Tunsil drops to No 13 pick It was one of the more bizarre draft nights. Minutes before the NFL Draft kicked off, a video emerged on Tunsils Twitter page appearing to show him smoking through a gas mask. As an unnamed team general manager said last night: He looked like Hannibal Lecter and were taking him off our board.One team after another passed on Tunsil, who was expected to go first overall a few weeks back. Baltimore had a major offensive tackle need, but preferred Ronnie Stanley. Tennessee traded back up to fill their tackle need but took Jack Conklin and the Giants - desperate for offensive line help - preferred cornerback Eli Apple.Tunsils first NFL contract will total around $13million, but it would have been in the $23-25m range had he gone in the top five.Jacks nightmare evening Myles Jacks evening didnt get better after his arrival There is a theme developing here and its what makes the NFL Draft such great drama. It is a soap opera and we get to witness it all as dreams are realised and childhood hopes are dashed.Myles Jack, of UCLA, is one of the best five players in this draft yet he will wake up in Chicago without an NFL home knowing 31 guys were chosen ahead of him. That is going to be a tough pill to swallow and it made for an embarrassing and frustrating few hours for this high-energy defender.The unconfirmed worry is that Jack has a degenerative knee issue and might not make it past his first NFL contract. Those are sentiments he backed up himself the day before the draft, admitting he might not last long in the NFL.Jack was trying to make a bad situation good and he made it worse. He can never erase what was a nightmare evening in Chicago.Jaguars win big Jalen Ramsey holds up a jersey with NFL commissioner Roger Goodell The way the dominoes fell at the top of the NFL Draft worked out very well indeed for the London-bound Jacksonville Jaguars. Jalen Ramsey is a special talent who can play cornerback, slot corner and safety in the NFL and he can play all three very well.The Jags are gearing up for a play-off run this season if they can keep their momentum going. I expect them to make several more defensive picks in the next two days as general manager Dave Caldwell wants to address and upgrade a unit that ranked 31st in scoring defence last year.Ramsey is as clean a prospect as they come on and off the field and I cannot wait to see him in action in London later this year. I think he could be a quality and versatile defensive back in todays pass-happy NFL.Late quarterback drama NFL Draft top pick Jared Goff tells Richard Graves hes ready for the pressure The top of the NFL Draft was already set to the point where were not really talking about Jared Goff and Carson Wentz all that much this morning. But there was a late talking point in round one as the Super Bowl champions Denver Broncos traded up to grab Paxton Lynch from Memphis.Lynch can eventually be a good fit for the Broncos because he can roll out and throw out of the pocket, which is what head coach Gary Kubiak likes but could never do with Peyton Manning at the helm.But Lynch is likely not ready for 2016 and even 2017 is a push. He has some developing to do and is a patient young man being well-guided by former super-agent Leigh Steinberg. That means the Broncos are likely to have Mark Sanchez babysit the role in 2016, unless they make a move for another veteran passer.But there is no doubt that Denver see Lynch as their quarterback of the future.Jerry gets his man! Ezekiel Elliott was chosen by the Cowboys Jerry Jones likes star power as the owner of the Dallas Cowboys and he certainly got that in abundance on Thursday evening as his team selected Ohio State running back Ezekiel Elliott.The position is a little rich for a running back, but not if you think youre getting a special one. Elliott has all the tools to be a generational player and somebody around whom the Cowboys can build their attack for years to come.Dallas didnt have to give up extra picks like some teams did to get players they coveted. They simply had to part with their fourth overall selection and Elliott, who can run, catch and block, is worth the effort.He will take some pressure off quarterback Tony Romo, who soon turns 37 and is coming off a nightmare season in which he twice broke the same collarbone.You like that! Kirk Cousins compares fellow QBs at a Fan Forum in London On the night of the NFL Draft, Sky Sports aired a Fan Forum with Washington Redskins quarterback Kirk Cousins. Kirk is a great guy and is growing to be quite a quarterback - and he could be even better in 2016 after his team selected wide receiver Josh Doctson, who I felt was the best wideout available.I didnt think Washington would target a receiver. I didnt think they needed another receiving target as their passing attack took off in the second half of 2015 with DeSean Jackson, Pierre Garcon and Jordan Reed playing big roles.Washington had bigger needs, including needing additional secondary help even following the Josh Norman signing, and could have upgraded their offensive line a little more.But Washington wanted to add more weapons around a developing quarterback and it certainly puts more pressure on Jackson and Garcon to maintain a high level of play this season. The Redskins are going to be fun to watch when they head to London later this year. Also See: Rams make Goff their No 1 pick WATCH: Tunsil admits mistake NFL Draft: Goff v Wentz Spences road to redemption Basketball Shoes Outlet Online . Halifax beat the Saint John Sea Dogs 7-5 on the strength of two goals apiece from Nikolaj Ehlers, Matt Murphy and Brent Andrews. Jonathan Drouin also scored and had three assists while Zachary Fucale made 17 saves for the Mooseheads (16-8-0), who led 6-1 after two periods. Wholesale Basketball Shoes Fast Shipping . -- On the field, it was business as usual for Jameis Winston and No. http://www.clearancebasketballshoes.com/ . Terms of the deal were not immediately available. The 26-year-old finished last season with Clevelands Triple-A affiliate in Columbus after signing with the Indians in August. Cheap Basketball Shoes Authentic .S. Open champion Justin Rose birdied the first hole with a blind shot he hit to a foot of the pin, and he stayed in front Tuesday until he completed a 4-under 67 for a two-shot lead over Jason Dufner in PGA Grand Slam of Golf. Wholesale Basketball Shoes Sale . The Brazilian goalkeeper signed a loan deal with the Major League Soccer club on Friday as he looks to get playing time ahead of this summers World Cup in his home country. Australias players havent the foggiest idea what sort of pitch they will be getting for the first Test of the summer. In some ways, that is how they like things to be. In others, it sums up a creep away from the sorts of conditions Australian cricketers have grown up to expect.Through tours of England in 2015 and Sri Lanka earlier this year, the men in Steven Smiths side have felt a certain sense of irritation at the pitches served up. Not so much because they have been difficult; more so because they have been prepared very much with the home side in mind. From the coach Darren Lehmann down to the possible debutant Joe Mennie, every member of this team knows that to make such requests in Australia is to expect a gob-full in response from the curator.In England there was actually a change in the sorts of pitches Alastair Cooks side wanted from match to match within the series itself. Initially the coach Trevor Bayliss and the head of cricket Andrew Strauss desired slow, dry pitches to reduce the influence of Mitchell Johnson. But when Australia dominated on a flat surface at Lords, the diktat moved to green seamers, resulting in tracks at Birmingham and Nottingham the visitors were utterly unable to cope with.Sri Lankas surfaces were a little more consistent: slow and spinning. They were of the kind made to order for the hosts, and exploited brilliantly once so prepared. In this context, Australias players yearned to get back to home, not for pitches weighted to favour them, but merely to play on surfaces not prepared with any one or two bowlers in mind.I think we prepare really good Test match pitches, theres something in there for everyone, said the spin bowler and sometime curator Nathan Lyon. We go and travel overseas and it does tend to favour one team more than the other. Our curators do a fantastic job and Im always going to stick up for them.Oddly for a team most recently defined by pace, Lyons offbreaks are actually the best measure of how much Australias players prefer playing at home. Down under, Lyon has 101 Test wickets in 26 matches at 31.97, a record superior to any spinner to visit from overseas this side of Mushtaq Ahmed. But away, in conditions ostensibly better suited to his art, Lyons 110 wickets in 31 Tests have cost 33.56 apiece.Im going back to the way Ive been bowling best in Australia for the last 18 to 24 months now, so Ill keep going down that game plan and my little blueprint I work off bowling here in Australia, Lyon said of this summer. But when we come to subcontinent conditions again Im going to have to re-evaluate and prepare for that. Im not going in the nets this afternoon and bowling in subcontinent conditions, thats for sure.Australian comfort at home does, in many ways, transcend the individual pitches themselves. As Usman Khawaja put it, the subtleties of each venue, the heat, the size of the outfields and their best scoring zones, are augmented by loud, supportive and at times merciless crowds. Australias healthy culture of Test match attendances helps too.I think its just experience, Khawaja said. Weve played at these grounds so often, thats what we lack when we go overseas a little bit, we dont have experience on these grounds while playing in the match scenario. But we play on these grounds so often, we know pretty much everything about the grounds there is to know and we can draw on those things. We know how the pitch is going to react and whats going to happen.The crowd makes a big difference too when you have the crowd behind you. When things are going well the crowd just comes over you. Im sure when were taking wickets and on a roll and the opposition batsmen are rolling in, the crowd is all over them, I think it makes a difference. They play a fair part in it too.However a world in which guaranteed days of play in Test matches are beloved of administrators and broadcasters has graduallly eaten away at the fundamental advantage available to Australia: extra pace and bounce.dddddddddddd. Early finishes, however dominant by the home side, have long been deemed troubling for state associations in particular. Similarly, the introduction of drop-in pitches in Melbourne, Adelaide and soon at Perths new stadium mean further homogenisation. When the WACA Test against New Zealand last summer creaked towards the bore draw that hastened Mitchell Johnsons retirement, the ABCs doyen commentator Jim Maxwell dubbed it a CEOs pitch designed to keep the game going five days. It was on a similarly long-lasting surface that South Africa chased their epochal 414 to win in Perth in 2008 and set Ricky Pontings team on the path to their first home series defeat in more than 15 years.Likewise the pitches in 2010-11 were flat enough to allow Cook, Strauss, Jonathan Trott, Kevin Pietersen and Ian Bell to dominate increasingly dispirited Australian bowlers. There is still a small advantage to be gained by Australia at home, but they must be at their very best to extract it.I think other countries around the world do that home advantage a lot better, Mitchell Starc said of the contrast he sees between home and away. The wickets in Australia have got a lot flatter in Shield cricket and Test cricket over the years. You just want to see that even contest. If you go back to the Adelaide [day/night] Test match, regardless of how many days it lasted, the whole Test was just an even contest between bat and ball for two and a half days, and it turned out to be the best Test match of the summer.I think thats what teams want to see and fans want to see, you dont want to see blokes just scoring runs for fun and nothing in it for the bowlers. At the same time I dont think people want to see teams bowled out for 100 in all four innings. We just want to see that even contest. And you still want to keep some characteristics of wickets around Australia.You want to see the fast, bouncy wickets of the WACA. You might want to see a turning wicket at the SCG. Its obviously not going to happen in Adelaide with the pink ball stuff - but you generally see a hard wicket at the start and it breaks up towards the end and you get a bit of reverse swing. The Gabba is obviously a fantastic wicket, where there is enough in it for both teams for five days. You dont want to lose those characteristics, but I guess the wickets have definitely got flatter over the years.If Australias home advantage is thinner than for other nations, against South Africa it narrows to the width of a sheet of paper. Australians love touring South Africa - having never lost there since reunification - and the reverse is also true.Not a single member of the South African side has experienced a Test series loss in Australia, and not a single Australian has won over the Proteas here. South Africa and Australian conditions are fairly related, Hashim Amla said, and I think thats why we have over the last two series weve had here, had some success.At Australias training session on Monday afternoon, Lehmann set the wicketkeeper and slips back to near enough a pitch-length away from the bat for a catching session. This is the traditional WACA distance, but bore no relation to what was served up last year. That rather summed up Australia at home - the national team are hopeful of conditions to suit them, but have no way of knowing for sure.We always talk about adapting to conditions, Starc said. I think [home] can help, but the way we approach our cricket is you have to change the way you play depending on what is in front of you. Regardless of what we get at the WACA, were going to be ready to go and hopefully theres enough in it for the bowlers. That would be lovely to see. ' ' '
