That could be but remember, the dirty birds are in cap hell and Matt Ryan is pushing 40. Now would be the more logical time to tap his replacement and get a WR in the second.skycruiser wrote: ↑Mon Apr 26, 2021 8:09 amSounds like the falcons are trying to trade Julio which could likely signal chase?
Nobody want a WR that old making that much money. They may redo his contract that makes him cheaper but wouldn't be surprised if they just release him.Jmble wrote: ↑Mon Apr 26, 2021 8:57 amThe Falcons are in salary cap Hell. They are currently over 6 mil over the Cap per overthecap.com. Julio's cap hit for 2021 is just over 23 mil. My prediction is that they eventually redo his contract and he will stay in Atlanta.skycruiser wrote: ↑Mon Apr 26, 2021 8:09 amSounds like the falcons are trying to trade Julio which could likely signal chase?
5. Cincinnati Bengals — Ja’Marr Chase, WR, LSU
For a long time, I’ve thought—even railed about it in this space—that the Bengals should just sit here and pick the best tackle in the draft, Penei Sewell. And if they do, good for them. But this exercise is trying to project what I think they will do, not should do. And I’m getting to the point where I am relying on history and this particularly board in projecting something like for the Bengals:
Round 1, pick 5: Ja’Marr Chase, WR, LSU
Round 2, pick 38: Liam Eichenberg, T, Notre Dame
Round 3, pick 69: Wyatt Davis, G, Ohio State
The point: In the scouting community, the quality of wideout, after the top three, has a steep dropoff. The dropoff at tackle is less, and you can find respectable starters, at tackle and guard, from 30 to 75.
One more point, and it involves Bengals history. You might say, They’re fine at wideout with Tyler Boyd and Tee Higgins. They are, but the Bengals have always prioritized receivers, and this is still Mike Brown’s team. 1981: David Verser and Cris Collinsworth, rounds one and two . . . 1985-’86: Eddie Brown and Tim McGee in back-to-back first rounds . . . 2000-’01: Peter Warrick and Chad Johnson in back-to-to drafts . . . 2016-’17: Tyler Boyd (second round), John Ross (first round). So they used a high two on Higgins last year. It’s not going to prevent them from putting another great receiver prospect in stripes again.
NFL Draft week has finally arrived. Only five months after our first roster projection that included draft picks for 2021, we can actually say this week we get the real answers.
But after months of talk and learning from league insiders and a 10-part deep dive into each positional strategy, I’ve come up with the final seven-round mock draft for what I think the Bengals will do this weekend.
This is not what I would do (I’m still sitting on #TeamSewell), but rather what direction I believe the Bengals go.
I’m using the Consensus Top 300 Big Board Arif Hasaan published last week to determine the universe of players available at each pick beyond the first round. This serves as the available player board if you want to follow along.
I think the team will be interested in trading back in both the first and second round, inevitably, but I’m sticking with the picks as given for this exercise as well.
Off we go, once more unto the breach, dear friends.
First round (5): Ja’Marr Chase, WR, LSU
This boils down to taking the team at their word. I’ve heard for a while the Bengals like the depth of the offensive line class and they are not alone. Dane Brugler discussed it as an “outlier” compared to normal years in finding starters in the second and even third rounds. When director of player personnel Duke Tobin spoke in this pre-draft news conference Wednesday, he mentioned how much more you can truly judge players on the outside compared with the interior players dealing with new levels of strength in the NFL. Evaluations in Bruce Feldman’s draft confidential piece from last week showed many coaches not as thrilled with the top of this offensive line class as Big Draft groupthink has suggested all along. If the evaluation on Penei Sewell is he’s a nice player at a position the Bengals truly need but Chase is a great player at a position the Bengals don’t need as much, do we go back to the best player available scenario for the team’s first pick? I believe the Bengals do just that and figure out the offensive line reinforcements in the middle rounds. Don’t forget, this is the team that set off a run of five straight playoff berths and two division titles by taking the receiver over the bigger need at the top of the draft. They return 10 years later to the same philosophy.
Meanwhile, for the next three years minimum, the Bengals can have Joe Burrow, Tyler Boyd, Tee Higgins, Chase and Joe Mixon grow together around a line they think will be much better and improved with health, Riley Reiff, offensive line coach Frank Pollack and a pick from the second round.
• Other considerations: Kyle Pitts, TE, Florida; Penei Sewell, OL, Oregon.
Second round (38): Alex Leatherwood, OL, Alabama
The consensus big board falls perfectly for the Bengals with Leatherwood right at No. 38. His presence at this spot takes a patented Bengals second-round trade back off the board. They dropped back in three consecutive drafts from 2017-19 and took a ton of calls before the second round started last year, but none that could trump the talent of Higgins being available. It’s a move they would love to make here and add a fourth-round pick, but Leatherwood hits their needs perfectly. He would arrive and immediately start at guard next to old teammate Jonah Williams. He may end up the long-term answer at tackle, also, when/if the club parts ways with Reiff. He’s played at the top of the SEC for three years and would bring instant credibility, depth and consistency to the interior. Leatherwood actually being available at this point might be the more important question. But, the consensus says he is, so that’s the pick.
• Other considerations: Liam Eichenberg, OT, Notre Dame; Carlos Basham Jr., Edge, Wake Forest; Levi Onwuzurike, DL3T, Washington
Third round (69): Payton Turner, edge, Houston
This feels like another ideal scenario for the Bengals. Turner comes with a reputation as one of the top effort players in this draft and an ideal rotational pass rusher as a rookie with potential to grow into more down the line. The team feels like Sam Hubbard and Trey Hendrickson both fit this similar mold in terms of playing style and Turner would also fit in on body type. At 6-foot-6, 268 pounds, he brings a ton of length and speed to make plays, but just needs an assist refining his rush moves. This could fall into a long line of successful Bengals mid-round defensive linemen.
• Other considerations: Alim McNeill, DL3T, NC State; Trey Smith, OG, Tennessee; Michael Carter, RB, North Carolina
Fourth round (111): Deonte Brown, OG, Alabama
Why not just start all Tide offensive linemen? That wouldn’t be so bad, would it? Well, it could be three out of five in this scenario. Brown dropped 20 pounds off his gargantuan frame to get under 350 during this past offseason and it will be fascinating to see if it helps him play a step faster at the next level. He’s obviously not going to win any 40-yard dashes, but he didn’t give up a sack in three years and brings power, anchor and explosiveness as well as anyone in this class. It would be a fun project to slot into the competition at guard immediately and a double-up at the position of need we often see the team employ.
• Other considerations: Marlon Tuipulotu, DL3T, USC; Stone Forsythe, OT, Florida; Khalil Herbert, RB, Virginia Tech.
Fifth round (149): Kylin Hill, RB, Mississippi State
The Bengals were tempted each of the previous two rounds to dive into the running back market. They could have pulled the trigger in searching for the next Giovani Bernard with the pass-catching ability to complement Mixon. They instead find it here with Hill, who brings nice hands and an aggressive, tackle-breaking running style they hope can mature into a more polished product in time.
• Other considerations: Shi Smith, SWR, South Carolina; Jermar Jefferson, RB, Oregon State; Janarius Robinson, Edge, Florida State
Sixth round (190): Tre’ McKitty, TE, Georgia
Filling out the back of the tight end group will be a priority in the late rounds. McKitty brings nice versatility as a solid blocker and decent skills in the passing game. He’ll need refinement, specifically as a receiver, but those can be taught and schemed open in this offense. For a sixth-round pick, those are the flaws you stick behind C.J. Uzomah and Drew Sample and hope to develop down the line.
• Other considerations: Joshua Kaindoh, Edge, Florida State; Drew Dalman, C, Stanford; Tony Fields II, LB, West Virginia
Sixth round (202): Justin Hilliard, LB, Ohio State
The Bengals would be taking a chance with the medicals on a local player. A product of St. Xavier High School, he left the Bombers as one of the top recruits in the state but injuries and lack of playing time never allowed his career to take off in Columbus. He still worked up to become a team captain and has some of the physical tools required to do the job if given a fresh start.
• Other considerations: Michal Menet, C, Penn State; Deommodore Lenoir, NCB, Oregon; Jose Borregales, K, Miami.
Seventh round (235): Blake Haubeil, K, Ohio State
A list of about three to five kickers would be deemed draftable and I think the Bengals will be willing to select one here. They think about the more high-profile Borregales in the prior round but eventually land on Haubeil with their last pick of the draft.
• Other considerations: Ta’Quon Graham, DL, Texas; Jimmy Morrissey, C, Pittsburgh; Zech McPhearson, CB, Texas Tech.
Alicia Colegrove
@nflftbltalk
I have been told by a source close to the #Faclons that they are doing homework on the top WR's in the draft. This could be writing on the wall for Julio Jones.
#NFLDraft #NFLTalk #NFL
I thought you had some of Stripes little blue pills for that....
32 NFL Mock Drafts combined: Biggest reaches, top risers and fallers, and most popular locks
As a final look ahead to this week’s NFL Draft, beat writers for all 32 teams were each tasked by The Athletic’s editors to post a seven-round mock draft for their teams on Monday, showing how they thought the board might fall this weekend.
Add them all together, and you’d think you might have a full 259-pick mock draft, but because all 32 are done independently and without consultation with the other writers, you actually get something more interesting. There’s quite a bit of overlap, as we discovered nearly a month ago when we did the same study of the last batch of seven-round mocks.
How much overlap? Out of those 259 picks, we mentioned only 163 players, with 64 showing up on more than one mock draft, some as many as five times. This makes sense; some players are inherently more well-known than others, or even more intriguing, and given the choice, a writer will want to float an exciting or unusual name as a better conversation piece.
This allows us to do a bit of mock-draft anthropology. If a writer is given the same assignment twice a month, how much will they change the selections from one version to the next? If there’s an entire story written about which players are most popular with a writing staff, will those players continue to show up frequently, or vanish entirely? You might be surprised by the results.
The most popular
This was curious: The six players who showed up in four or more mock drafts this week weren’t a big part of the last round of mocks. They were mentioned a combined 27 times this time, but last time, they were mentioned just seven times. Three of the players were not included at all.
Dayo Odeyingbo, DL, Vanderbilt: Somehow the player tied for the most mock-draft inclusions is a prospect who … tore his Achilles tendon during a workout in January. He’s a popular choice as a bargain pick who might not be immediately available. In last month’s mocks, he went at 80 and 90, but in this week’s, he fell to as low as 139 to the Patriots.
Jaelon Darden, WR, North Texas: Dane Brugler’s No. 29 receiver, speedy but short at 5-foot-7, showed up in five mocks, with three in the fourth round and two putting him in the sixth. He had video-game numbers last season, catching 19 touchdown passes in nine games after getting 12 the year before. “His foot quickness and home run gear will leave defenders in his dust,” Brugler wrote in his draft guide, listing him with a 4.44 in the 40-yard dash.
Zech McPhearson, CB, Texas Tech: A month ago, he wasn’t in any of our mocks, but this time, he made five, showing up all over the map. Our Rams writer liked him enough to take him in the third round at No. 88, but our Texans writer thought he still might be there in the seventh round at 233. He had four interceptions last year and scored touchdowns on a 56-yard fumble return and a 90-yard blocked field goal, so there’s big-play potential, wherever he’s drafted.
Greg Newsome II, CB, Northwestern: How about getting picked in the first round four times? Newsome was the most popular first-round choice, showing up more often than Jaycee Horn (twice), Patrick Surtain (once) combined. Again, that points to expectations of the others being gone and off the board earlier in the draft, as much as it is excitement for Newsome’s upside.
Brady Christensen, T, BYU: Christensen redshirted and took a two-year mission to New Zealand, so he’ll turn 25 in September, but Brugler has him as the No. 8 tackle and No. 62 prospect in this draft. Christensen shows up in a tight cluster in the mid-third, getting picked four times between No. 74 and 86.
Richie Grant, S, Central Florida: Grant was in three mocks last time around and was in four this time, including two different mocks that had him going No. 33, one to the Jaguars and one to the Raiders after a trade with Jacksonville.
First-round favorites
If those 32 mock drafts were to interlock nicely anywhere, you’d think it’s in the first round, where much of draft speculation is focused. And yet we still play favorites, with six prospects showing up as first-rounders with multiple teams.
Newsome, who wasn’t in anyone’s mock draft last month, showed up four times in the first round, going to the Bears (20), Titans (22), Browns (26) and Bills (30) in different mock drafts. This could be a response to him being a hot name; by comparison, Virginia Tech’s Caleb Farley (who underwent a microdiscectomy last month) wasn’t in any of our new mocks.
The same is true at quarterback, as North Dakota’s Trey Lance got picked three times in the top 10, with the 49ers taking him (over Alabama’s Mac Jones) at 3, the Patriots trading up to get him at 7 and the Broncos taking him at 9. Nobody picked Jones, though it could be that everyone presumed he was going to San Francisco at 3, that is, except the writer actually picking for the 49ers.
Want an offensive tackle in the second half of the first round? Three of our writers picked Oklahoma State’s Teven Jenkins, who went to the Colts at 21, the Raiders at 25 and the Ravens at 27. USC guard Alijah Vera-Tucker went to the Cardinals at 16 and the Jets at 19. By comparison, nobody picked Northwestern’s Rashawn Slater — again, that could point to an acceptance that he’s already gone rather than any suggestion he isn’t coveted by teams.
Biggest disparity for when a first-rounder will go? Miami edge Jaelan Phillips was matched with the Dolphins (20) and Saints (30) in trades, but also as low as 40 to the Broncos. Alabama center Landon Dickerson made it into the first round with the Vikings in a trade at 32 but also made it all the way to the Packers in the second round at 62.
How much do you change your mock draft?
Most of our team beat writers wrote three or four seven-round mocks this spring, so there’s a natural question as to how much you change up your picks from one mock to the next. Give us your best guess: What percentage of the players from the last wave of mocks were paired with the same team in this week’s final editions?
The correct answer? The repeats accounted for just 39 of 259 picks, which works out to 15 percent. And of course, sticking with a choice is more likely at the top of the draft, as we did with five of the top seven picks — the Jaguars and Clemson quarterback Trevor Lawrence at 1, the Jets and BYU quarterback Zach Wilson at 2, the 49ers and Lance at 3, the Bengals and LSU receiver Ja’Marr Chase at 5. Our Patriots writer Jeff Howe had New England trading up for Lance in both drafts, going to 6 a month ago and 7 this week.
But only two other first-round picks were repeated, eight second-round picks were the same, and from the third round on, the percent who went to the same team was just 12 percent. To have so much change is logical, as in the real world, when teams test themselves by playing out hypotheticals, the players available when they’re on the clock will change greatly based on the picks ahead of them. Buccaneers general manager Jason Licht, accustomed to picking much higher than No. 32, said last week that it seems like there are “8,000 scenarios” just at the end of the first round.
We pointed out the six most popular players in the last round of our mock drafts, and perhaps as a result of that, those six were much less popular this time around. Those six — listed a combined 25 times in the previous mocks — appeared on just six mock drafts this time around. Syracuse safety Andrew Cisco went from five mentions to one; Wisconsin-Whitewater center Quinn Meinerz went from four to one, and Iowa edge Chauncey Golston and Oklahoma center Creed Humphrey each went from four to none. Boston College linebacker Isaiah McDuffie and Oklahoma State running back Chuba Hubbard both went from four picks to two.
Prospects with the least/greatest disparity where chosen
McPhearson not only showed up in five different mock drafts, he did so in four different rounds: the third, fourth, sixth and seventh. His difference from highest to lowest was 145 picks, easily the most of any prospect. The next closest was Ole Miss tight end Kenny Yeboah, whose picks ranged by 100, from the early fifth to the third-to-last pick of the draft. Of the 41 prospects to show up twice, the largest disparity was Penn State edge Shaka Toney, who went 127th to the Vikings and 209th to the Rams, a difference of 82 picks.
On the other end of things, seven prospects showed up twice and within a span of just four picks or less. That’s not unusual with a first-round pick like Horn (11th and 15th) or Vera-Tucker (16th and 19th), but it’s stranger with Arkansas defensive lineman Jonathan Marshall, chosen three picks apart at the end of the fifth round.
What about comparing picks to our Consensus Big Board, looking for the biggest reaches and most optimistic guys still available? McPhearson pops out here as well, going 88th in one mock with a consensus ranking of 242 for a difference of 154 spots. Close behind is Texas A&M guard Jared Hocker, taken 148th in one mock with a consensus of 295 for a +147 score. Other bold picks include Michigan tight end Ben Mason and Boston College linebacker Isaiah McDuffie, both 107 above consensus, and Central Florida tight end/receiver Jacob Harris, 106 spots higher than the consensus.
On the opposite end, Miami’s Jaelan Phillips is 19th on the consensus and went 41st in one mock, and Alabama’s Dickerson went 29 spots later than his consensus ranking, with Kentucky corner Kelvin Joseph (41 after consensus), Syracuse’s Cisco (42) and Louisiana Tech defensive lineman Milton Williams (46) among the most hopeful selections.
