You assume there's only one level of "my guy".
There's the guy you find a way to make happen (Watson).
There's the guy you make a small hop up to get (Nix/Harris/Quessenberry/Tate)
There's the guy who you hope is still there when you trade back (Brown)
...Then there's the guy you settle on, after deciding that your 5th was too much to give up to get (Dillard vs. Howard)
Never forget that we "ended up with Watt" only after failing to move up. The difference is that Watt was still rated far higher, and Gaine wasn't in charge.
I want to trust Gaine, I really do. The fact remains that I've still yet to see a single reference anywhere that there was a team just waiting to grab Howard. Does he play differently if we get him in the 2nd? Does getting the BPA in the 1st become a worse decision somehow?
To turn your decision on its head, if we were so certain of Howard, why didn't we move up to grab HIM instead?
If we drafted a three-year-plan guy @#23, we need a new GM.