This past weekend, hundreds of college football players realized a dream. Over the course of two days, the National Football League and its teams conducted their 65^th draft, choosing one by one the players they feel are the future of their respective teams. The Buffalo Bills, with their third pick, chose Virginia Tech All-American Corey Moore, a selection I feel very happy about.

Working at a regional sports network in Buffalo allows me to remain "in the know" when it comes to Buffalo Bills football. Our network covers the team on a daily basis, including numerous coach and player shows during the season. All biases aside (the Bills are after all my favorite team), it was nice to see the Bills select a high caliber football player with all the credentials Corey Moore has with their third round pick, 89^th overall, on the first day of the draft.

Being a graduate of Virginia Tech and diehard fan of the football team, it is easy to see how this selection makes me grin ear to ear. But this isn’t about me; this is about Corey Moore and the opportunity for him to step onto the biggest of football fields and prove he belongs.

Fans of Virginia Tech don’t need to be told what kind of player Corey Moore can be. They don’t need to be told what Corey says or why he says it. For two years now, fans of the orange and maroon have watched this undersized junior college transfer re-write the Tech record books. They have watched, listened and cheered as Corey and Company molded themselves into one the nation's stingiest defenses. His motor runs at full throttle from kick-off to the final horn, and his mouth runs a close second. But when you are Corey Moore, you can back up all that talk. Tech fans know this, Tech fans love this. And that is one reason why all Hokie football followers should be happy that an organization like the Buffalo Bills chose Corey to play on their football team.

John Butler, Vice President and General Manager of the Buffalo Bills, is a former scout for the organization. He knows talent when he sees it, and he knows what it takes to attain that talent. Dwight Adams, the chief scout for the Bills, is quite possibly the best in the business when it comes to evaluating college football players. He and his staff have one job, to find the best players and get them in a Bills uniform. So it isn’t hard to question the move to pick an undersized "tweener" on draft day; in their eyes, he’s a diamond in the rough.

When these gentlemen refer to Corey Moore as a football player, as an athlete, they don’t just mean it in a literal sense; they mean it in a figurative sense too. They look at players like Corey and know, some how, some way, he has to be on the field.

"Is he smaller than you’d like -- maybe."

"Is he going to have to learn a new position -- probably."

"But with his heart and his talent, can we afford to pass him up -- absolutely NOT!"

These are questions and answers I’ve heard for the past three weeks leading up to the draft. The goal is finding the best possible player when it’s time to pick. Corey Moore said he was kind of surprised the Bills picked him when they did; he was expecting a fourth or fifth round selection. Make no mistake; the Bills know what they are doing.

In a few months, in July, Buffalo Bills training camp will start. All the new draft picks, as well as free agents, will report to camp with the existing team. By then, there will already have been a rookie camp, a mini camp, and numerous other opportunities for the draft picks to become acclimated with the system. Some players will already know they are in a back up role, others will know they have a chance to play serious minutes, maybe even start. This is where Corey Moore comes in.

The Bills defense is in what most people would term as "disarray." They have lost Bruce Smith (we all know who he is) to free agency and the Washington Redskins. (Interestingly enough, don’t some of you think it’s ironic that a guy, who did the same things in college as Bruce, is now being given the opportunity to do them on the very team that Bruce Smith became famous? Seems too good to be true). Free agency and salary cap casualties also included numerous other defensive linemen, as well as linebackers and defensive backs. What does all this mean, you ask? It means, the sooner Corey Moore gets to Buffalo, the sooner he may be a starting outside linebacker for the Bills.

For those that follow the AFC East, many probably know the names of Cowart, Holecek, Rogers and Northern. This was last year’s linebacking crew for the Bills. Gabe Northern however, is a free agent and the Bills have decided to let him go and not re-sign him.

So who on the depth chart is thrown into the mix? Along with Corey Moore, you have guys named Jay Foreman, Keith Newman and Joe Cummings looking to step into a starting role.

Foreman is 6-1, 237 lbs. and had ZERO tackles last year, his first in the league. Newman, also in his first year, plays at 6-2, 243 pounds and had one tackle in three games last season. Cummings, at 6-2, 242 lbs., has the most experience, starting two games each of the past two seasons, but he’s only amassed a total of 22 tackles during that time.

Totaling up the experience, these three account for SEVEN years in the NFL, with Foreman and Newman being rookies. You don’t need to be a genius to figure out that isn’t a whole lot of game time. Add into the mix the fact that Gabe Northern was only a two-year starter with a total of 67 tackles and five and-a-half sacks in that stretch, and it’s easy to see why the Bills don’t have a solid front runner for one of the outside linebacker positions.

One guy to mention as the probable starter, at least at this point, is Marlo Perry. He has been with the team for five years and plays extensively on the special teams and in nickel and dime packages as an extra linebacker. Perry plays at 6-4, about 250 lbs., so he is by far the largest of the group and most polished.

So what does all this mean for Corey Moore? Corey has said he wants to come to Buffalo and be a demon on the special teams. With a guy like Steve Tasker in everyone’s memory, the fans of Buffalo know and love dedicated special teams guys. Again, coming from a program that is quite possibly the best in the nation on special teams at the collegiate level, is it hard to imagine any greater fit for Corey Moore? Not only does he understand his beginning role on special teams, but he embraces it and looks forward to the challenge of being the best guy out there. It’s a perfect situation if you ask me.

After the special teams play, it’s a matter of learning the position and adapting to that position, in this case, linebacker. With Corey’s intelligence and ability, I don’t think it’s a stretch to think he could be number two on the depth chart at either one of the outside linebacking positions. Joe Cummings is a guy who really is better suited for inside linebacker, so that leaves the two first-year guys, Foreman and Newman, for Corey to compete with.

If you look at the size of the existing linebackers on the Bills team, Corey Moore will be the smallest by a pretty good margin. He’ll give up about two or three inches and probably about 20 pounds, if you match them up right now. Will he put on weight and bulk up? I think it depends on what exactly the coaches want. With the type of talent he has, I think coaches are reluctant to change his physical attributes too much, for fear of losing the gifts that make him special. If he bulks up too much, he loses speed and a step, and that could prove costly.

The speed and quickness Corey possesses are his meal ticket. I’ve watched the other guys play in games and at training camp, and none are close to having the speed and quickness that the Lombardi winner from Virginia Tech has. The sooner he adapts to playing the position, including technique and team systems, the sooner he’ll be able to add his own moves into the mix, the explosive speed and quickness off the ball. If you can’t see or catch a guy like Corey Moore, how do you expect to stop him? There are coaches and players in college still asking that same question.

People are going to knock his size, but that happened when he was coming out of high school. I like to think that people such as Frank Beamer and John Butler know a good football player when they see one. Great things come in small packages sometimes. Ask Bills fans about a guy named Doug Flutie, they’ll tell you the same thing. Corey may not start this year or even next year, but I’d bet the ranch he plays. With the desire that this guy has and the passion he feels for the game, you never want to count him out.

The journey for Corey Moore started in Brownsville, Tennessee, with a stop at Holmes Junior College for one year, before moving on to Virginia Tech. It was as a Hokie that this small, "undersized" dynamo perfected and honed his skills. Now, after a season that has seen him win major award after major award, and help lead his team to its first ever national championship berth, Corey Moore will once again step on a new stage and attempt to prove the skeptics wrong. He’ll show everyone who cares to watch; you can measure my height, you can measure my speed, but you can’t measure the size of my heart.

Good luck Corey Moore; I’ll see you on Sunday afternoons!

Greg Kehr is a Marketing Coordinator for Empire Sports in New York.