John Clayton reports that the Texans' brass was joined by the Vikings and the Browns in attendance at Brady Quinn's on-campus workout. I'm becoming slightly more convinced that Houston may not pass on Quinn if he's there at #8. I refuse to believe that there is any chance that Carr will be back in 2008, and the Texans need to have another "face of the franchise", a guy that fans can hitch their dreams to, and I think Quinn could possibly wind up being that guy.
My gut feeling, at this point, is that Russell will go #1 to Oakland, Thomas #2 to Detroit and Peterson #3 to Cleveland, who will hope to use its 2nd round pick on Troy Smith to compete with Charlie Frye for the QB job. That leaves Tampa Bay (Calvin Johnson would be a coup for them at #4), Arizona (already has Leinart), Washington (Jason Campbell) and Minnesota ahead of the Texans in Round One. Clayton mentions that Quinn would be a perfect fit for Brad Childress' offense in Minnesota; I hope Brad agrees because I'd really prefer to see the Texans go for Landry or a D-lineman at #8 than Quinn.
Looking beyond the Texans at #8, the next teams (in order) are Miami, Atlanta, San Fran, Buffalo and St. Louis, none of which would seem to be a logical destination for Quinn. #14 is Carolina, which could make some sense, then Pittsburgh, Green Bay, Jacksonville, Cincinnati, Tennesse, the Giants and Denver. Of all of those teams, only Jacksonville or Green Bay make any sense at all, and even those teams seem to be a bit of a stretch. In other words, it seems that a team who covets Quinn will most likely not have to trade into the top five to get him, or, conversely, if the Vikings pass on Quinn for some reason, the Texans or any other potential suitor for Brady could theoretically still reasonably hope to get him in the mid-teens. Quinn's draft day stands to possibly be the most interesting of any high level prospect; it seems he could go anywhere from #2 or #2 to #22 or #23, depending on the way that the dominos fall.