Alabama Cornerback Dre Kirkpatrick Has Visited Eight Teams (None Being The Cincinnati Bengals)

According to Aaron Wilson, Alabama cornerback Dre Kirkpatrick spent Thursday in Buffalo, making the Bills the eighth team that's hosted Kirkpatrick heading into the 2012 NFL Draft. The other teams include the Minnesota Vikings, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Jacksonville Jaguars, Dallas Cowboys, Baltimore Ravens, Detroit Lions and the Tennessee Titans. Notice the name not on the list?

No. This doesn't mean Cincinnati isn't heavily considering Kirkpatrick. And one fellow on Twitter pointed out to us that Kirpatrick himself said on ESPN's NFL 32 (March 26) that there was a planned visit with the Bengals at some point. Of the eight players that the Bengals drafted in 2011, the Bengals neither held a private workout or hosted five of them. It's a good bet that Cincinnati already has their players targeted, their big board formulated and these workouts and visits are simply to gather additional information on players they're not sure about.

If there's no need for information -- aka, confident in their judgments -- then they might not bring a player into Cincinnati or need a private workout. If that were the case then it would explain why players like Stephon Gilmore, Kirkpatrick, Janoris Jenkins, David DeCastro, Cordy Glenn, Michael Floyd, et al haven't visited yet.

And sometimes the Bengals don't even both with interviews. After he was selected by the Cincinnati Bengals, Geno Atkins admitted his surprised because the team neither approached him nor expressed interest.

But there's also three weeks remaining to get these visits and workouts in before the draft.