Goldfish's Way Too Early Draft Rankings 2021 (All up)

[candyman93]

I agree with your rankings so far.

[Hunter2_1]

12 hours ago, FrantikRam said:

 

Wish I could give you two footballs for the funniest comment I've ever read on here 😂

Soap box time:

If we are just a top 6 team something went horribly wrong. This team has no weaknesses and it's one of the best rosters in the league. So many Rams fans blamed the OL last year for Goff's struggles that this fallacy became internet fact (that we have a bad OL) - truth is we had a top 10 OL by most metrics and "lost" our only below average starting offensive lineman.

I hesitate to comment on the Rams draft here after stl getting crap for being so positive, but I think its similar to the people who always criticize us for not having first round picks - a lot of people can't fathom our team building strategy and end up with a bias. A few years from now this will be the 16th-ish best draft class, and will rank ahead of many teams who did have a first round pick.

I do get the disappointment with the Atwell pick though.

Not sure why I chose now to vent, and I know this is only about the draft, but I've seen power rankings that have had Seattle ahead of us this off-season after we beat the **** out of them in the playoffs and it melts my brain.

Yeah I definitely think either NFCG or SB for LAR, but thought I'd temper it a bit for those lurking...:D 

[goldfishwars]

26.  Las Vegas Raiders

This Class In One Sentence:

Old dudes making picks and having fun

Pre-Draft Needs

IDL, LB, S, OL, CB

Selections

1. 17. Alex Leatherwood - Alabama | OT |

2. 43. Trevon Moehrig - TCU | S |

3. 79. Malcolm Koonce - Buffalo | DE |

3. 80. Divine Deablo - Virginia Tech | S/LB |

4. 143. Tyree Gillespie - Missouri | S |

5. 167. Nate Hobbs - Illinois | CB |

7. 230. Jimmy Morrissey - Pittsburgh | C |

 

Picks Heading In

17.

48.

79.

80.

121.

162.

167.

200.

 

What I Liked

If you swap the first two selections, there probably is very little noise about what the Raiders achieved in the first two rounds. I love Trevon Moehrig in the 2nd round, I think he’s excellent value at 43. He might be more of a split safety, than someone who fits Bradley’s traditional high/low preference. But at TCU, he was someone who consistently made plays on the football and was a threat to take it away when in his area of the field. He also Called the plays at the back end of a dominant pairing for TCU too.

Divine Deablo in the 3rd went around where expected but gives the team a run and hitter within the box (if they even need another guy like that). He’s also got some ball skills as a former receiver, but he's still raw and will need some seasoning. Tyree Gillespie, I quite liked too – with the caveat that he’s not a particularly good fit for Bradley’s defense and yet another safety to figure out.

What I Didn’t Like

I felt kind of sad listening to Mike Mayock justifying the Alex Leatherwood selection on NFLN. He was describing a by-gone era, talking about how important it was to run the football and how Leatherwood’s size ability to finish got Tom Cable excited. That's stuff which doesn’t move the needle in the win column, not when you’ve got Pat Mahomes in your own division. The fact he was Cable’s number one tackle in the class probably isn’t something you should be proud of saying out loud when that dude clearly has a loud voice in the room.

As for Leatherwood himself, he’s a good player who can play for a long-time in the NFL. He has some physical limitations and wasn’t worth the 17th overall pick – that’s taking a single when you have to come out of the first round with at least a double. Outside of that, Koonce has stuff to like but he’s sub-package sized and that’s probably an overdraft. Right now Jonathan Hankins and Quinton Jefferson are the starting defensive tackles on the depth chart, you’d like to have seen more competition there. The defensive roster is difficult to work out, just so many maybes everywhere you look. There seems to be an obsession with safety and hybrid linebackers, possibly to the detriment of other spots on the roster.

Edited May 4, 2021 by goldfishwars

[MWil23]

9 minutes ago, goldfishwars said:

What I Liked

If you swap the first two selections, there probably is very little noise about what the Raiders achieved in the first two rounds.

This is firmly where I am/was with Oakland. I had Moehrig graded pretty high in a safety class that as a whole I feel was/is pretty underwhelming. 

[Daniel]

26 minutes ago, MWil23 said:

This is firmly where I am/was with Oakland. I had Moehrig graded pretty high in a safety class that as a whole I feel was/is pretty underwhelming. 

Same.  I had Moehrig as S1.  Was pretty surprised he fell that far, and even more surprised that he wasn't the first or second safety off the board.

[MWil23]

3 minutes ago, Daniel said:

Same.  I had Moehrig as S1.  Was pretty surprised he fell that far, and even more surprised that he wasn't the first or second safety off the board.

I also like(d) Holland as a guy who has some versatility in the nickel and S spots, but I thought Moehrig was going to go somewhere between 20-35. That's good value for them after a bit of a head scratcher.

More than anything, I didn't feel like Vegas really did anything to improve in a position/positions where they had obvious holes, especially at premier positions.

[BayRaider]

Can’t disagree with your Raider analysis. 

[Daniel]

3 minutes ago, MWil23 said:

I also like(d) Holland as a guy who has some versatility in the nickel and S spots, but I thought Moehrig was going to go somewhere between 20-35. That's good value for them after a bit of a head scratcher.

More than anything, I didn't feel like Vegas really did anything to improve in a position/positions where they had obvious holes, especially at premier positions.

Oh yeah, I don't disagree with their ranking at all.  Leatherwood was a guy I thought would be worth it for the Titans to take...at 53.

Holland was good too.  He was next on my list after Moehrig, so that's not so bad.  But taking Grant over him was a bit of a headscratcher to me.

Only ranking I disagree with so far is the Cowboys.  I don't think they were great, but Parsons, Joseph, and Odighizuwa were guys I liked, and I liked where they go them.  And Cox I like as a hybrid LB/S.

[MWil23]

Just now, Daniel said:

Holland was good too.  He was next on my list after Moehrig

That's 100% how I felt.

1 minute ago, Daniel said:

Only ranking I disagree with so far is the Cowboys.  I don't think they were great, but Parsons, Joseph, and Odighizuwa were guys I liked, and I liked where they go them.  And Cox I like as a hybrid LB/S.

Parsons and Joseph are the most Cowboys picks ever. They have equal chances of doing really stupid things and never playing in the NFL as they do of becoming great players (IMO), and Dallas being Dallas and rolling the dice on those guys plus another off ball linebacker is a bit of a head scratcher, even with them declining LVE's 5th year option, as they still have Smith. Just my opinion.

[MrOaktown_56]

Good analysis @goldfishwars, this class is really contingent on how our "safeties" (Gillespie, Moehrig, Deablo) do. Deablo will play more of a hybrid type of role like Chinn, Gillespie will back up both FS and SS, and Moehrig will obviously play more of a centerfield role. So while I dont' think they are redundant players, we will see how it goes.

Don't sleep on Koonce. That dude has some moves 😅

[Turnobili]

honestly surprised the raiders made it this far before being mentioned.

[onejayhawk]

I'm going back through the last few drafts. GFW correctly pegged the Chiefs 2018 draft as mediocre and the 2019 draft as being decent, but not outstanding. In 2020, like most of the NFL, he whiffed on L'Jarius Sneed, but the rest of the review was spot on. While only ranked #17 at the time, he correctly viewed Lucas Niang as the key to the long term key to the draft. With Niang a major piece of the OL rebuild, that's still true.

This year, the Chiefs will again be out of contention for top honors, though division rivals LAC and Denver upped their game and will be in contention. The main reason is that the Chiefs traded their #1 pick for Orlando Brown before the draft, so it cannot be considered under the rules set down. Still I expect the Chiefs to get a solid middle ranking based on two excellent OL picks, a much needed LB and excellent value for a possession WR.

J

[onejayhawk]

I'll quibble with the Dallas ranking. It is completely legit to raise character issues, but they did a good job of acquiring overhaul parts for the defense. Parsons is the best defensive player in the whole draft pool. if the character issues don't dog him, he will be an exceptional value, with Golston thrown in as a freebie.. This is not a good draft, but neither is it one of the bottom dwellers. 

J

[goldfishwars]

25. Pittsburgh Steelers

This Class In One Sentence:
The draft of a front office frozen in their own tendencies 

Pre-Draft Needs 
CB, OT, IOL, QB, LB

Selections
1. 24. Najee Harris - Alabama | RB |
2. 55. Pat Freiermuth - Penn State | TE |
3. 87. Kendrick Green - Illinois | OG |
4. 128. Dan Moore - Texas A&M | OT |
4. 140. Buddy Johnson - Texas A&M | LB |
5. 156. Isaiahh Loudermilk - Wisconsin | DT |
6. 216. Quincy Roche - Miami (FL) | OLB |
7. 245. Tre Norwood - Oklahoma | CB |
7. 254. Pressley Harvin III - Georgia Tech | P |

Picks Heading In
24.
55.
87. 
128.
140.
216.
245.
254.

What I Liked
You’ve got to admire, at some level, a team willing to sit and make eight picks without once trying to move up or down. I know that’s been the MO in Pittsburgh forever, but it’s a remarkable commitment to the bit. I also love the unit of a punter in round 7, watching those highlights have been a complete joy. Outside of that, Pat Freiermuth feels like a very Steelers-esque selection in the second round. He’s someone with a very solid all-round game as a blocker and receiver, it's hard not to see him doing well in Pittsburgh.

The Kendrick Green selection too, gives them an interior blocker who is absolutely rapid out of his stance and gets after it at the second level. Quincy Roche is quite nice in the sixth, he was a big-time producer at Miami and perhaps a nice rotational rusher to bring into the mix. I quite like Buddy Johnson. I'm not sure he was the rangy coverage guy the Steelers were supposedly shopping for, but he's a decent downhill hitter. 

What I Didn’t Like
I really like Najee Harris the player and the person, both of those things are great. He's a huge back at 6’2 and 230 pounds, he can be a feature runner with his ability to handle a workload and make plays in the receiving game. But, there’s just too much evidence around the limited long-term value of taking running backs in the first round. The weird thing is, everyone was linking Harris to the Steelers in the first by draft day and absolutely no other team tried to jump them. It was watching like two magnets slowly descending on each other. 

Elsewhere, there was very little excitement, the Steelers leave the draft looking at FA to answer their left tackle situation - that has to be their strategy. They also have no answers to the purgatory of their current QB situation, which was expected. Outside of Roche and the round punter, it's a rough day three on paper. Dan Moore and Isaiah Loudermilk (phenomenal name) felt like overdrafts. Dan Moore has genuine issues anchoring down and needs seasoning. Whilst Loudermilk fits the odd front well, he's a rotational talent at best. Giving up a next year's 4th to take a player in the 5th is just a weird move all-round. I genuinely would not have blinked if both those two had ended up in the UDFA class. 
 

[goldfishwars]

24. Green Bay Packers

This Class In One Sentence:
A very Packers-esque draft, they have their MO and they don’t deviate from it – not even for Aaron Rodgers. 

Pre-Draft Needs 
OT, WR, IDL, LB, IOL

Selections
1. 29. Eric Stokes - Georgia | CB |
2. 62. Josh Myers - Ohio State | C |
3. 85. Amari Rodgers - Clemson | WR |
4. 142. Royce Newman - Ole Miss | OG |
5. 173. Tedarrell Slaton - Florida | DT |
5. 178. Shemar Jean-Charles - Appalachian State | CB |
6. 214. Cole Van Lanen - Wisconsin | OG |
6. 220. Isaiah McDuffie - Boston College | LB |
7. 256. Kylin Hill - Mississippi State | RB |

Picks Heading In
29.
62. 
92. 
135. 
142. 
173. 
178. 
214. 
220. 
256. 

What I Liked
I liked how solid day two and three were. Josh Myers is a very Packers-like interior player and Green Bay offensive line selections are like Pittsburgh Steelers with receivers – nearly every guy pans out well. He’s a big and incredibly smart guy, called all the protections at OS. He also has the size to play some guard, not overpowered there. I also like the Amari Rodgers pick, he gives the team something they don’t have - a YAC machine, who is great with the ball in his hands. It would not be a shock to see early playing time for Isaiah McDuffie, I caught onto him late and he plays with a relentless energy. Kylin Hill is a nice shot on a speedy running back, late on. 

What I Didn’t Like
It’s not really a draft that’s gonna set pulses racing, kind of a gloomy situation all round with the potential for Aaron Rodgers leaving looming over the whole situation. Outside of that, there's lots of ‘ah yeah, that guy’ – low-bust potential selections outside of Stokes which felt like a reach, certainly relative to where I had him ranked. There was a lot of speculation around where the Packers might go in the first-round pre-draft, corner, receiver, linebacker and defensive line were all seemingly in play. The likes of Teven Jenkins, Elijah Moore, Christian Barmore, Liam Eichenberg were staring them in the face at that time. Stokes does have some serious linear track speed, so there’s plenty to like and I understand that guys of his physical profile get that front office pumped up. But fellas, you’ve made a lot of high picks at DBs in the first round who fit ‘that profile’ and you’re back here again.