The Eagles used their second pick of the night, the 53d, overall to get help for Brian Westbrook. They selected Pittsburgh running back LeSean McCoy, another early-entrant candidate.
Maclin, who turns 21 next month, said he saw a lot of mock drafts that had him going to Oakland as the seventh overall pick, but the Raiders opted for a bigger and faster wide receiver in Maryland's Darrius Heyward-Bey.
"You all see the mock drafts and a lot of them had me projected there," Maclin said during a conference call. "Al Davis is the guy who makes all the decisions there [in Oakland], and everybody knows that he loves speed. Credit to Heyward-Bey. He ran the fastest 40 at the combine."
As for Edwards and Arizona's Anquan Boldin, the other veteran receiver on the trade block, Eagles coach Andy Reid said the Eagles didn't think they could make a deal for them.
"We looked into them," Reid said. "It didn't look like it was going to work. But that's not why we took Maclin. He was just the best player on the board there."
Maclin, listed at 6-foot and 197 pounds, was the third of six wide receivers taken in the first round and just the second wide receiver taken in the first round by the Eagles during Reid's 11 drafts. The other was Freddie Mitchell, the 25th overall selection in 2001. Mitchell spent four disappointing seasons in Philadelphia before his career was over.
The Eagles believe they got a much better value in Maclin.
"Actually, we thought he was going to go quite a bit higher than what he did," Reid said. "This was not who we had targeted. He just happened to be one of those guys who fell a little bit and kind of fell into our laps."
Maclin, a native of Kirkwood, Mo., didn't seem the least bit disappointed about landing with the Eagles.
