ALAMEDA, Calif. – Miles Burris was watching the NFL draft with family at home in Granite Bay when he received the call telling him he’d be an Oakland Raider.
By the time he was patched into a conference call with the media, Burris said, he had needed to make his way to another room.
“It’s getting a little loud,” said Burris, an outside linebacker out of Granite Bay High School and San Diego State.
After taking an offensive guard with their only pick in the first three rounds, the Raiders went heavy on defense on the last day of the draft, using four of their five selections to bolster that side of the ball.
They used their fourth-round pick on Burris, a potential pass rusher who had eight sacks and 78 tackles in his final college season.
“We said, ‘Hey, we’ve got a quality football player that’s got a chance to come in and compete for a position on this team,'” Raiders coach Dennis Allen said of Burris. “And we wanted to try to bring him in here.”
The Raiders also selected two basketball players-turned-defensive linemen in Penn State’s Jack Crawford and Georgia State’s Christo Bilukidi in the fifth and sixth rounds, respectively. Neither began playing football until their later high school years.
McKenzie said both linemen are “a little raw” but athletic. Crawford, a 6-foot-5, 273-pound defensive end born in England, recorded 6{ sacks in his final college season. Bilukidi, a 6-foot-5, 290-pound tackle born in Angola, had 10 sacks in two seasons for Georgia State.
“It’s so unlikely,” an emotional Crawford said on a conference call. “I told myself coming into this situation that I wasn’t going to get upset if I didn’t get drafted. I have come so far already. I am just so happy.”
The Raiders also drafted wide receiver Juron Criner of Arizona in the fifth round and linebacker Nathan Stupar of Penn State in the seventh round.
Oakland had selected offensive guard Tony Bergstrom of Utah with its first pick in the draft, a compensatory choice at the end of the third round.
At Saturday’s end, the Raiders’ draft class seemed to reflect the changes atop the organization, as even the receiver Criner, who was clocked at 4.68 seconds in the 40-yard dash at the NFL combine, does not promise track-team speed.
“We set out to try to upgrade the team,” McKenzie said. “By the end of the day, we felt like we did that. It remains to be seen just how good they will be, but we anxiously will await their presence here in Oakland and also into camp.”
McKenzie said the wave of defensive picks Saturday was a result of how the draft unfolded. But, he said, “I think we went into the draft from Day One to address the defense. You’ve got to understand we have a defensive head coach and a defensive-minded general manager. So let’s win on defense.”
Burris said he was somewhat surprised when it was the Raiders who called him on draft day. He, like several of Oakland’s picks, said they had had contact with the Raiders before the draft, but only Bilukidi said he was brought in for a predraft visit.
Meanwhile, McKenzie confirmed the Raiders will bring in free-agent quarterback Matt Leinart for a workout. ESPN had reported the visit early Saturday.
If the Raiders sign Leinart, the former Heisman Trophy winner ostensibly will compete with Terrelle Pryor and Rhett Bomar to back up Carson Palmer.
