Would Maulauga have more of an impact than Chung and Vollmer have had? Doubtful is an understatement.
Definitely more of an impact than Chung. You're probably right on Vollmer, but that's talking apples and oranges (and I'm not going to annoint Vollmer as the best OL taken in the draft just yet). So far it looks like the draft class was solid, but I would argue that we could have done much better at the top and landed a high impact LB plus Butler Chung and Vollmer (or equivalent talent at their positions).
Hindsight is 20/20 and we'll never know exactly why they passed on LB early in the draft, but speaking as an armchair GM, the Pats ignoring Maulauga looks criminal, especially if back in April Bill was already looking at transitioning to more 4-3. Anyway, our window is closing and I don't care if it's worked out well for the Pats in the past--trading down and stockpiling future draft picks isn't always the smartest thing to do.