Cincy Jungle's own Jason Garrison wrote up a mock draft for the SB Nation homepage, and then proceeded to tell me to do a write-up on his article. As a result, I will offer extremely harsh rebuttals to Jason's mock draft choices, and pick apart his faulty opinions, word by word (just kidding).
Anyway, in this pre-combine mock draft, Jason predicts that the Bengals will take Alabama runningback Trent Richardson with the 17th overall pick:
Richardson is probably too good to fall to No. 17, but good running backs fall in the first round all the time, especially those coming off knee surgery as Richardson is. The Bengals need a new running back badly, and Richardson is too talented to pass up. He's the kind of running back that could play all three downs and improve Cincinnati's young offense.
Jason brings up a good point that the chances of Richardson falling to the Bengals are even higher now that Richardson will not participate in the on-field events at the combine because of his minor knee surgery. Despite the many arguments against taking a runningback in the first round, I'm still in favor of taking Trent Richardson with the 17th pick. He's a very good runner, but the part the separates him from all the other backs is that he's also very good at pass protection and pass-catching.
At 21, Jason mocks up Georgia offensive guard Cordy Glenn:
This is tough. Janoris Jenkins is still on the board and the Bengals need a cornerback. But Jenkins has a lot of off-the-field issues, and they have a better chance at finding a good cornerback in free agency. The Bengals need to upgrade the guard position since Bobbie Williams, Nate Livings, and Mike McGlynn, are all free agents, so Glenn is the pick here.
If you are going to fix the running game, this is certainly the way to do it. Use both first round picks on the most crucial players to a good running game- offensive guard and runningback. I think almost everyone would rather have David DeCastro if he fell to this spot, but Glenn isn't exactly a pushover at 6'5", 345 pounds. Glenn presents a lot of potential and upside, and could become a dominant NFL lineman for years to come.