The disruptions and travel restrictions created in reaction to the novel coronavirus pandemic have upended the process leading up to this year’s NFL Draft, a series of events, workouts, and meetings that seems to produce wildly different results from team to team anyway. Each NFL franchise employs its own scouts and puts together its own reports and grades, but the added difficulties from the coronavirus could send more shockwaves through the draft than we typically see.
That could help the New Orleans Saints in a big way. With just two picks in the draft’s top 100 selections, the Saints must make the most of their resources. And if what NFL Network’s Daniel Jeremiah is hearing is any indication, the Saints could cash in even more fraught than usual draft.
Jeremiah noted on Twitter that most teams he’s spoken with agree on which prospects make up the top of this year’s draft class; there’s wide agreement on which four receivers stand above the rest, for example, as well as the top two cornerbacks. But things get sketchy after that. The wideout graded fifth-best by one team could be perceived as the twelfth-ranked prospect by another.
If that’s the case, the Saints could end up landing on familiar ground, as they did in the 2017 draft. That year, they lucked into Wisconsin prospect Ryan Ramczyk, who they had graded as a top-15 player, at the very end of the first round. That’s a coup they might pull off again this year if other teams target prospects the Saints haven’t rated as highly before New Orleans is on the clock.
Let’s sketch out an example. Let’s say that the first 18 draft picks go as expected, with players the Saints internally project to be picked in those slots getting taken off the board. But then the next few teams ahead of them pitch curve balls, selecting players the Saints may have graded as prospects worth taking at the end of the first round or the beginning of the second. That would leave a couple of prospects available that the Saints graded as surefire first-round picks.
So be ready for some surprises on draft day. As Jeremiah pointed out, right now it’s impossible to project what’ll happen after the first half of the first round. And while it might behoove the Saints to stay put at No. 24, they could play a part in that uncertainty with a bold trade up the board, as we’ve seen happen before (in 2018, targeting Marcus Davenport at No. 14).
