2019 Draft - Edge Rushers
 

I don't do draft research like I used to. But fortunately a lot of dorks out there do A LOT of it. It is of questionable quality, like always, but that has never stopped Mel Kiper from making a living doing it, nor will it stop me from posting. FFS no one has posted in 2 days.

So here are some edge rusher draft prospects to watch out for in the 2019 draft. If this goes well I'll do interior DL next.

Nick Bosa | DE | Ohio State
Height: 6-3 | Weight: 265
2018 stats: 14 tackles, 6 TFLs, 4 Sacks, 1 FF (in ~2 games)

Probably a top 3 prospect, maybe #1 overall, Colts have no chance. Supposedly more athletic than his brother Joey, who is a top edge rusher for the Chargers. His stats are not jaw-dropping, as he was injured early in the 2018 season and decided to sit out the rest of it to train for the NFL (and not further injure himself). Complete edge defender, but special pass rusher with excellent combo of strength, power, and speed.

Josh Allen | 3-4OLB | Kentucky
Height: 6-4 | Weight: 250
2018 Stats: 88 tackles, 21.5 TFLs, 17 sacks, 5 FFs, 4 batted passes

Freak athlete, hard worker, very productive, great length. If Bosa's last name weren't Bosa then Allen would probably be the consensus #1 edge rush prospect. May need to put on a little weight to play DE in the NFL and might be a better stand-up defender. Colts have no chance to draft him.

Clelin Ferrell | DE | Clemson
Height: 6-5 | Weight: 265.
2018 Stats: 45 tackles, 17.5 TFLs, 10.5 sacks, 3.5 FFs

Good athlete, well-rounded defender, great first step to get up into blockers suddenly, fairly polished already with a variety of moves and ways to beat his blocker. Plays smart and with good technique and is not just an athlete. It would probably take a run on QBs and some other luck for him to fall to the Colts but he is my #1 realistic prospect for the 1st round. If we don't get a top pass rusher in FA I would not mind trading up for him.

Montez Sweat | DE/OLB | Mississippi State
Height: 6-6 | Weight: 250
2018 Stats: 53 tackles, 14.5 TFL, 12 sacks

Despite size he plays like a lineman, not as effective standing up. Not good in space, he's better at the line of scrimmage. Wants to fight through linemen, not around them. Great first step at the snap. Might need more NFL bulk, which could affect his quickness. Day 1 star at the Senior Bowl, where he showed a variety of pass rush moves and dominated his blockers. Has crazy length with 36" arms. One nfl.com analyst sees a lot of Danielle Hunter in him, which is a pretty excellent ceiling. Colts have a shot to get him, but there probably aren't 25 better prospects than him in this draft.

Rashan Gary | DE | Michigan
Height: 6-5 | Weight: 287
2018 Stats: 43 tackles, 7.5 TFLs, 3.5 sacks

More of a tools player that has great potential. His 2018 stats aren't that impressive. Freak athlete. In this defense he could play base end on some downs and kick inside on others, though he'd need to be coached up to learn the skills to do that. Maybe drafted before we pick, and despite his potential I don't really want him.

Jachai Polite | DE/OLB | Florida
Height: 6-2 | Weight: 242
2018 Stats: 45 tackles, 19.5 TFL, 11 sacks

Speed/finesse rusher that can still play the run pretty well as evidenced by his 19.5 tackles for a loss. Plays hard, fights through or around blocks. Has multiple pass rush moves and can chain them together, doesn't just rely on speed. Very productive against top competition. 6 strip sacks in 2018.
You would think Mathis would be the best kind of teacher for a player of his size and play style. He apparently dropped 20 lbs. for 2018 so you wonder how well he would do if he had to bulk up to play in the NFL.

Brian Burns | DE | FSU
Height: 6-5 | Weight: 231
2018 Stats: 52 tackles, 15.5 TFL, 10 sacks

Seems like a speedy edge rusher with zero power. Lots of moves, and he had some good numbers against good competition but give me a break with this 231 lbs nonsense. I don't trust FSU pass rushers. I hope someone else picks him in the first. Seems like a poor man's Leonard Floyd. I hate these types of prospects. They put on weight for the NFL, lose their speed, and suddenly they suck. No thanks.

Anthony Nelson | 3-4DE | Iowa
Height: 6-7 | Weight: 270
2018 Stats: 45 tackles, 13.5 TFL, 9.5 sacks

Great length, motor, play strength, and pass rush moves. Not a great athlete. Good production came from effort and technique. More of a mid-round prospect with some good traits but maybe not enough athleticism to be a starter. May need to play inside some, which he has little experience in.

Zach Allen | DE | Boston College
Height: 6-4 | Weight: 284
2018 Stats: 61 tackles, 15 TFL, 6.5 sacks

Similar to Nelson above but with maybe less refined pass rushing moves.

Some other names I saw mentioned but that seem limited enough that they won't sniff our top 3 picks:

Jaylon Ferguson | DE | Louisiana Tech
Height: 6-5 | Weight: 255

D'Andre Walker | 3-4OLB | Georgia
Height: 6-2 | Weight: 251

Carl Granderson | 3-4OLB | Wyoming
Height: 6-5 | Weight: 261

Chase Winovich | DE/OLB | Michigan
Height: 6-2 | Weight: 258

Oshane Ximines | DE | Old Dominion
Height: 6-3 | Weight: 252.

I think the top 5 on your list are gone by 26.


A couple interesting notes from Matt Miller:

He also mentioned that there are some character/immaturity concerns on Jachai Polite.

Jaylon Ferguson is a guy I want to hear more about this week at the Senior Bowl. Can he hold up against better competition?

Been following him as well :cool:

Good stuff DT, love to see more. Guys I think the Colts would like are Omenihu, Gary, Sweat and Ferrel. Maybe even Polite and Jackson from Miami.

Thanks for the great info. Please do other ones.

Surprisingly, it seems that we have played our way out of the elite Edge rushers, unless Ballard is willing to trade up. Hopefully we can have a shot at some of the better interior rushers.

I really don't care where the pass rush comes from, but it must come in waves, from an 8 deep DL.

Nice work FatDT :cool:

Good stuff. Mostly agree with you, especially re: Gary. The Iowa guy looks like he might be a good fit for the power DE position in this system, and Sweat was the guy I thought the Colts could get, but that's unlikely if he's getting top 10 buzz after 1 day of Senior Bowl practices.

This is the reason I keep bringing up WRs and SSs. A player at one of those positions could be clear BPA at 26. Colts could end up getting better value on pass rushers in Rd 2.

I'm not sure I understand the "better value" concept.

I believe that there were many people on this board (and in the press) who said taking a guard at number six was stupid because you could get someone else later in the draft. How does Nelson's draft selection look now?

Now Leonard, that was great value at a second pick, looking back. But I'm betting there were some people who where critical because he was a small school guy, they could have waited until the 3rd round.

Every player in a sport can have a $ value placed on his by every single team. Some teams value other positions or talents differenly than others, or characteristics that a player may have or not have.

I think the Ballard really wants guys who love to play. They will need physical talent, but the LOVE to play. They are team guys, they are workaholics and they are driven. I'm not sure how you put that into a metric.

I have trouble believing Rashan Gary would be graded as a round 1 player. So even though he may be the 5th best, it really seems that only 4 are round 1 worthy picks.

The bold has nothing to do with what I said. It's really very simple. You create a ranked list of your individual prospect ratings. If you get to 26 and a WR is clearly rated higher that a pass rusher on your board, you take the WR and hope one of the pass rushers is available in Rd 2.

A lot of draft analysts think Gary will put on a show at the combine even though he never really dominated in college.

Positional value is definitely a thing. If you don't believe me, check out the franchise tag numbers by position. The reason people made the argument bolded above is because predicting a player will be an All-Pro talent as a rookie is folly, and from a positional value perspective, OG is not a position on which a good GM would typically spend a top 10 pick. Nelson worked out better than anyone could reasonably expect, which is why it ended up working out, but let's not pretend that Ballard wasn't risking drafting the next Jonathan Cooper at the time.

And he may very well. I just think a pick like that in the 1st is a luxury pick and not many teams in the NFL can afford to do it. The argument for him would be that he is raw and can be developed into a dominant player with NFL coaching.

My argument against that would be that the increase in competition level will only further stunt his development, and most teams don't have the practice time to develop a raw player. It would be one thing if he was raw and athletic and dominated in college on athleticism alone. But if he didn't dominate against lesser competition I think there's reason to doubt that he'll do it in the NFL. I would not use a 1st on him.

exactly. You just can't pick a project player in the first. You should be looking to add a starter. If you have a complete team with no holes, maybe you can afford that, but that describes no team.

Ok, I get that. It would explain Nelson. He was the BEST player available. And maybe just a bit more.

I will add this, that kid brought a boat load of intangelbles. It wouldn't and couldnt show up until they took a snap. And that is where Ballard will make his money. Finding the guy who brings something that isn't expected.

I think Polian called the combine and workouts as the underware olympics. If a guy can't show it in a game, what does it matter?

Yeah, I don't know what you are talking about.

Nelson was the big fucking dog in this draft and he was a PRO BOWL player out the gate. How did all the guys above him do? Nelson was all pro as a lineman, the toughest, most intellegent position in the game. And he will only get better.

And while people will say QB is harder, try sittin in a three point stance, LISTENING to audibles and then HOLDING your position until the snap and ajusting your attack depending on the change, and knocking the crap out of the guy in front of you.

This guy could be one of the BEST. He's smart (Notre Damn), atheletic, and his DRIVEN. He likes to beat the piss out of guys in a legal way and not go to jail.

That 6th round pick will look like chump change in the future.

I just looked at some mocks and it seems the majority of them expect all defensive picks in the first 5-6 spots, and Rashan Gary is projected at 4 or 6 very commonly. I just don't get that. I guess we'll see.

It's early in the process. At this time last year people were projecting Arden Key as an early first rounder, he eventually was picked in the 3rd. Just one example.

Agree.

In Jan / Feb, it is all about physical traits.

By March and the combine, the physical traits are all known and it starts being about who "projects" better to the NFL.

By April, it becomes much more realistic with the QB needy teams uptalking their hopeful future franchise QB and the offensive skill / secondary players whom have just killed it during the whole process rising.

I just hope Ballard and staff apply the same process as last season to this season and find another 3 quality starters (Nelson, Smith, Leonard) and 3 quality depth guys (Hines, Wilkins, Turray/Lewis) along with a handfull of solid depth guys and developmental (Cain, Fountain, Adams, Franklin).

Is that too much to ask? :)

Walk Worthy,

This isn't quite accurate. Most mocks had Key as an early 1st rounder early in the 2017 season. After he had some injuries and poor performance, few mocks had him as a 1st rounder by the time of the Senior Bowl.

Is 13 months ago close enough?

https://draftwire.usatoday.com/2017/...as-presents/2/

Key mocked 13th overall to the Dolphins.

The projection someone who would draft Gary that high would be making is J.J. Watt. The measurables are comparable, but the production isn't.

Fair enough. Maybe I was thinking of after the combine when some of the character concerns started coming out. He really fell off once teams took a closer look. Though, I think Gary will probably be a different story. He should shine at the combine, so he'll probably cement himself as a top 15 pick.

this post is fucking dumb

I wonder why he called Nelson a sixth round pick.

You understand that there was no way to guarantee this beforehand, right? The last two guards to go top ten before Nelson were Jonathan Cooper and Chance Warmack, both of whom flopped miserably and never even came close to living up to their top ten draft status. Both of them were All-Americans and hyped up as great players like Nelson was. Even discounting that and assuming he was going to be elite (which would've been a foolish assumption beforehand), an elite OG hasn't been worth as much as an elite DE, WR, LT, LB, DT, CB, etc. in the NFL over the last 10+ years. Considering 16 of the top 20 contracts for offensive lineman belong to LTs, and LTs don't get paid as well as the other positions I listed, it would seem that is a well established point among NFL GMs. That makes drafting a guard that high an even bigger risk. Fortunately it worked out, but no one could've known that Nelson would have a bigger impact as a rookie than any OG in the past 10+ years on draft day.

Few of us wanted Nelson, I watched ND a lot and he passed the eye test for me. Had Chubb been available and it was up to me the pick still be Nelson. Just my 2 cents. Had to protect the QB … :cool:

According to the guys on NFL radio, wideout is the second hardest position to learn next to QB today. Primarily because of all the audibling and being on the same page with the QB. I like Nelson and oline are usually some of the smartest guys on the team, but guard is more dependant on physical traits and fundamentals than mental processing.

I believe Key flaked during the offseason and disappeared. Some family issue. That started the question marks on him. Also rumors of lackluster practice effort.

If Nelson had a good season but not All-Pro, and Chubb still had 12 sacks, the decision wouldn't look nearly as good, and that was a distinct possibility on draft day. Jonathan Cooper and Chance Warmack passed the eye test in college as well, I'm sure.

Maybe for you not for me, Nelson is first time I would have ever considered a OL in top 10 outside of a LT. I was that high on this kid. Even if not an All-Pro out the gate if he kept Luck healthy I would be fine with that. :cool:

It doesn’t matter. Ballard gambled and won, Nelson is great. And we will probably go decades without ever drafting another guard top 10.

Stop being a fucking a fucking "Debbie Downer"! If's and's and butt's are for trolls.

Wouldnt that be a DammyDowner

Oh he absolutely gambled and won, but let's acknowledge it was a gamble.

Dude, every draft pick is a gamble. Always has been.