National Football League

Texans GM Rick Smith knows who he wants with No. 1 pick in draft

Published May. 1, 2014 11:33 a.m. ET

foxsports

The Houston Texans may be keeping quiet about who will get their No. 1 pick in the 2014 NFL Draft, but general manager Rick Smith says that the team knows who it will be.

“I absolutely know who I want,” Smith said in an interview with “Texans Huddle” on Fox Sports Southwest. “I know the guys we like. The fortunate thing about having the first pick is I’ve got the pick of the litter, so I will know exactly who I want at that point.”

The Texans have been linked to Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel, South Carolina defensive end Jadeveon Clowney and Buffalo outside linebacker Khalil Mack, to name a few. Sports Illustrated reported that the choice would most likely be between Manziel and Clowney. The Texans aren’t ruling out a trade either, if they’re approached with a lucrative one.

“Now where the game is played is if there’s an opportunity to move and, in this case, obviously to move back if somebody else wants to come up to that first pick,” Smith said. “Then you weigh what the opportunities are versus who the individual is that you want to take and what that value is relative to the value that somebody might be offering you. But as you move through the draft, obviously you don’t know who’s going to be picked when.”

Smith also said that the team has an idea of other players they’ll pick throughout the draft.

“As we go and that board starts to fall, we’ve already earmarked the guys that we like, that we think will fit in our systems and we’d like to see in our locker room and the guys that we think would be good guys in our community,” Smith said. “We’ve got a pretty good idea of who those men are.”

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