NFL Stock Exchange: An NFL Draft Podcast - 186. 2024 NFL Draft Summer Scouting: Cornerbacks

Episode Date: August 15, 2023

Hosts Trevor Sikkema and Connor Rogers continue their Summer Scouting Series with their cornerback rankings. The two talk about the names to know for the potential 2024 class, where they stand heading into the 2023 college football season, and give you their Top 5 pre-season rankings for the position.

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It's awesome. Sign up now at youtube.com slash BS, device and content restrictions apply. Local and national games on YouTube TV. NFL Sunday ticket for out-of-market games excludes digital-only games. Welcome to the NFL Stock Exchange Podcast. In this episode, we're talking cornerbacks, baby. Talking about the shutdown dudes on the outside, covering all these crazy talented wide receivers that we talked about a couple of months ago. So we're going to give you our top fives going

into the season. Talk about the guys that play on the outside, some players that play in the slot, but there's so many good cornerbacks around the country. So we're giving them way more than just our top five. So break those guys down in depth, but we'll touch on plenty of prospects that we have been watching at the cornerback position as well. I'm Trevor Sycamore with me as always is Connor Rogers.

Let's ring the bell. Welcome to the opening bell of the NFL Stock Exchange Podcast. I'm Trevor Sikama. That is Connor Rogers. Joining you guys for Cornerback Day. We only got two more episodes of the Summer Scouting Series left here, and cornerback is one of them. So if you've all been hanging out with us throughout the entire summer, you know the drill. We're going to give you our top fives. But as Connor and I do in the pre-show meeting, so yes, we do talk briefly before the show,

but we don't do any planning. Don't worry, guys. We realized that our list of corners that we watched, kind of very different. So not only are we going to talk wildly different, he's top five guys and we are going to rank them going into the season. There's a lot of players. I think at the end of the episode that we were at least going to give

shout outs to tell you our thoughts on them. That didn't make those top fives because I think there's a lot of guys to get to Connor. How the heck are you, my friend? I'm good, man. I'm kind of excited for this because I feel like because of that accident, which it was, we didn't intend to watch a lot of

different players. We're going to cover more ground today. Normally, I feel just naturally we watch a lot of the same amount of guys, like either the databases we use are the same. We go off PFF grades, obviously. So like the guys who we go off pff grades obviously so like the guys who grade well we'll watch a lot of those guys but just somehow we both logged on and i was like oh who did you watch and sometimes there's like two guys you got you watched that i didn't watch or vice versa and there's like seven guys right because of our list you watched 14 i watched 13 and i do think the second half of each of our lists were totally different yeah totally different it was basically just connor listing on a name and i go nope you

were like nope nope nope and i'm like wait a second that means there's a lot of guys i didn't watch that you did which is really funny and it's we say this all the time not to feed a fed horse right or just go over it over it again but we are still and we're kind of at the end of it we're still in that eligible eligibility oddness of the class yes right where it's you got i mean there's corners that we had to watch or will have to watch that are 60 year players and they are real nfl prospects yeah you got like doctors and lawyers in there i mean seriously seriously it's it's really wild so that plays a big part into it of how these classes are so um you know expanded and summer scouting is always a nice little brief overlook

of the class but it'll be really fun to, I can't wait to catch my breath. Like I've already been texting with people and you included about quarterbacks that we didn't get to watch, um, and really catch up on this class when we build a board and track it throughout the years, we will do on this show amongst many other things amongst many other things. So yeah, man, it's, this is going to be a fun one. Connor as preseason football has kicked off and as this is the cornerback episode this is the perfect time to ask you did you see Eli Ricks with the pick six for the Eagles against the Ravens because your boy and those listening to the podcast last last year remember eli ricks pre-season cb1 baby i always believed he always did never wrong just early that's right just way too early uh ended up as player 203 for me he wasn't drafted

right when all said and done undrafted man so somehow i was way higher on him than the league and i thought i was so much lower on him than everyone else uh it's cool to see I I it will wear out its welcome but I love the first two games of the preseason because I mean you spend month at for you literally you and I spend a year but a lot of people spend month after month scouting a draft class and just to get to see them make plays at the NFL level, even if it's the preseason is so awesome. It's so awesome. Preseason lies all the time, but it's fun to kind of believe in the magic as it's happening. And it's you just love to see the guys that were undrafted, you know, get to make plays and try to make a roster. I think the preseason is the perfect amount of time now, you know, like four games was kind of too many, right?

I think that we were used to it for a long time because a good warm up getting into the regular season, you got four preseason games, and then that goes into 16 of the games that like actually count, if you will. Not the preseason games don't matter. They matter. They just don't count. But I think that with three, it's that perfect feeling of like you mentioned we're all super hyped right now for any preseason action that we could possibly get all right then next week we get to

see some of the uh you some of the other backup players get get into the action and then right when we're getting to the point where we go okay i'm kind of done with the preseason it's week three of the preseason and the starters actually play like you see a lot of those starters yeah and then it gets right into the regular season so it's actually love it's over i actually love the three game format for preseason because it feels really great and i wanted to shout out a tweet that we got that you actually sent me that has to do with keeping track of these rookies. Because you mentioned we follow these guys year round in the pre-draft process, on draft weekend, getting into the early parts of their NFL career. And a Twitter account called Let Joe Cook tweeted at us and then a lot of other really great draft analysts as well and said, we need to show that tracks rookies and back of the roster guys throughout their early development at least throughout the preseason so we're still on a one episode a week schedule right now going into

august but that's going to ramp up to two a week once september and the regular season comes around and we are going to devote a portion of our nfl coverage to specifically that we know that you guys are here because you want our NFL thoughts and you want to come in here and talk NFL stuff, which we do as well, but it's also a draft focused pod. So we're going to try to be better at that this year of making sure we know like, Hey, this guy, he was a six round pick. We liked him pre-draft. These are the things that I thought he could do well in the NFL. And they're actually doing them. Even if it's in short spurts, even if it's in small sample sizes, we're going to try to make sure that we do a good job of looking back and

tracking the development of these draftees, not just, Oh, they were drafted. We don't care anymore onto the next one. Exactly. There's a lot we get to do on this podcast. And I think kind of doing the season with the rookie class is a really good thing for us to add to it because it just meshes so well with what we do with the draft class. We know these guys in and out, and it also gives a little bit more shelf life to that class because it feels like we discard a class so quickly and pick up another. And that's absolutely what we're going to do today is we go through all the corners. But during the season, it will be fun to track the rookies. And we're not here to just tell you

like, Oh, it looks like B. John Robinson's going to win rookie of the year. We want to actually track all of the guys that are getting to play as rookies in the NFL, standing out, whether they were a sixth round pick on drafted, a top 10 pick, whatever it may be. So we hear you. We appreciate the suggestion so much that we are absolutely going to follow that throughout the year we're not trying to be the toy story meme you know or they're just like i don't want to play with you anymore and it's just like the graphics drop it you were drafted now we don't care about you anymore but anyways let's uh let's get to this cornerback class deep right and i mean it makes sense because every single team in the FBS and beyond,

you got to have at least five corners that you can run out there at any time. Four or five corners that you got to run where you can not just fill out a dime package with four DBs out there, but of course, rotational guys in there as well. If guys go down, you got to get players in there too. So you know that with every single team in the country, they've got at least five corners that they've got to be able to play at any given time, which makes it, I'm not going to lie, one of the tougher jobs to do when doing summer scouting because, you know, you're kind of joking about it at the beginning of the podcast, but your list of guys that you watched is so different than the list that I watched. And that's because the database for all the players

that you would maybe want to get your eyes on their corners is so vast. So we're trying to narrow it down as much as we can for you. Make sure that we're giving you the names that you need to know. And Connor, with the list of guys that you watched, who came in at number five for you as we head into the preseason number five was a bit of a surprise for me and i like when this happens you do your watch list and it you have in your head one way of how it could go or the names that are really you know going to compete for the top five and then you have a name that just ends up better than a lot of those guys and that is absolutely the case in number five with TJ Tampa from Iowa State the

long athletic explosive corner this is someone who hasn't gotten a ton of recognition yet he's I'll tell you what if you just want a little intro to him just you know google TJ Tampa basketball highlights and see the dunk this dude put on when he was a Florida high school basketball player in Florida. He obviously ends up at Iowa State. I believe he was recruited pretty heavily by some really big time programs. And not to say I would say it's not. They churn out defensive players and offensive players at a pretty high rate right now under Matty Campbell. But I'm pretty sure Georgia made a big run at this guy. So, I mean, this dude was a big athlete coming out of high school,

but maybe still overlooked and still overlooked right now as a prospect. You turn on the tape, he's six one, he's a hair under 200 pounds. He's got really, really good length. He's long limbed and explosive. He's going to jump at least 40 inches at the combine. I would take the over on that. He's going to run really, really well. You watch him. He can open up and run like the wind down the field. I think for an experienced player, because remember he's going into his senior year, something I really caught on to this summer more so than ever is guys knowing when to open up and run down the field versus guys being too late at doing that. And it's not that they're slow. It's that they

didn't anticipate that they need to get vertical with the target. And I think Tampa shows a really good understanding of that while also being a very gifted athlete to just flat out do it. He has a reach that allows him to make some pretty rare pbus when you watch the past breakups through this class you know there could be plenty that the ball is just there and the player is just there and they make a play he has that long long reach where it's like wow i can't believe he got to that ball even if he's beat when you have recovery speed and very rare reach it's one of those situations where you are never beat. It's just a matter of how you make up for it. If you want an intro to TJ Tampa,

turn on the Oklahoma game last year. They, for whatever reason, kept challenging him, and he kept answering the call consistently. He made some incredible plays. He looked smooth in coverage. He can cover down the field. I mean, this is a really good player. He really is. I know probably coming into the season, he's probably more of a day two projection. We'll see what he could do this year to maybe even climb up a little bit. I think he could be more physical in coverage. I think he's got the traits to be a physical corner. I think he can even ramp up the physicality. I think he can convert some of these PBUs into interceptions with the ability and the tools that he has.

And as the anticipation even starts to crank up more, but I, my process with corner over the summer compared to pre-draft is I am looking for athletes and how guys move almost more than anything. When I go through the pre-draft process, anticipation, recognition, IQ, awareness, it matters maybe above all. But right now, if you're an athlete that's at least average and all the other things I just said, you got a pretty good shot.

And Tampa's a really, really good athlete that it feels like the green light is starting to come on for him with all of the other things. And I think it's going to play at the next level. This is the kind of corner of the NFL is looking for right now. Can you run down the field with these freakish wide receivers? Can you find a way to compete at the catch in a league that is so strict and nitpicky with penalties and he's got it in that regard you know i'm embarrassed that i didn't watch this guy he shouldn't be because it's gonna happen to me no no no but you gotta you gotta understand what we're talking about here the man's name is tj tampa okay this is fair and he's actually from saint petersburg florida which if anybody knows about the state of florida and how it's laid out saint petersburg is literally right next to tampa they

call it the saint pete tampa area that is the bay area in tampa in tampa bay and so not only is the man's last name tampa he's basically from tampa i'm from that area as well. My username on Twitter is at Tampa Bay Trey. So I'm embarrassed. I'm embarrassed, Connor. We're starting off the podcast with some embarrassment for your boy here because I got to watch it, man. I'm now wondering how this guy didn't go to Florida. I would like to know how he didn't go to the University of Florida.

But hey, great on Matt Cantwell and Iowa State for stealing him away. He sounds like a really, obviously a great prospect that i gotta get some eyes on i'll i'll read up a couple of pff stats as a little bit of an intro to how i'm gonna talk about some of these guys too um we talked about it a couple of podcasts ago that although we like all the data obviously that we have a pff we collect it for a reason some are without question more translatable than the other when it comes to the cornerback position there are you know coverage grade is sometimes really tough not only because you know you got to know the exact play you got to know the assignment sometimes it's really tough to put um an attaboy or blame on a player that if you're

really not sure at all what the coverage is, sometimes it's tough to make sure that you're getting that exactly right. But the stable metrics, if you will, that we have in our database are single coverage cover grades and then coverage grades from a clean pocket on throws that come at least three seconds after the quarterback has it. So what do those two things do? Well, they contextualize and try to individualize what a defensive player is doing by himself outside of the rest of the structure of the defense. Cause that's what we're trying to do, right? Obviously it's, it's an 11 man. Defense, you got to play together in order to have success. But when you're talking about draft prospects,

you're always trying to remove a guy from his situation as much as possible to evaluate the talent that they have. So coverage grade, obviously, something that I think is good and useful. It's more useful than raw interceptions or something like that. But we are able to get even more detailed into coverage grade. And certainly anytime that you're aligned in single coverage, right? You're looking at the man right in front of you and you're wondering how you do in coverage against him. That's valuable. And then the other area of coverage where the quarterback has the ball for at least three seconds and we did not track

a pressure that tells you that pass rush did not directly benefit how you played coverage it's still just you versus the other guy so in both of those those areas, TJ Tampa still graded very well. I'm looking at his stuff right now and the raw coverage grade for him, 81.4, that's a really nice coverage grade. In single coverage, it goes down and it's always going to go down a little bit, guys, but it only goes down to 76.8. And for the other guys that we'll list on this show, you'll realize that that's a really good score there and then the time to throw and the clean pressure just updating it right now that one is 71.6 as a coverage grade if you've got above 70 coverage grades in raw coverage single coverage and lack of pressure coverage like you are doing

your job extremely well in a lot of different categories he also has 12 forced incompletions which we also track as a pretty stable metric if you're somebody who gets a lot of forced incompletions that means you got good ball skills you got good timing you got good length you're always around the ball when the ball is coming to the catch point so i just wanted to for even though i haven't seen him yet fortify you having him in the top five and you liking him a lot by pointing out some of that um unique pff data that we have to those metrics which are more translatable than a lot of other things that you'll look at in the stack column those served him well so i'm excited to get to watch him you'll like him i mean in a

league that values length and being explosive and being able to run and being able to play the ball i thought he checked the boxes on all of those things and it feels like he's really really developing at iowa state which how many times have we seen that with players over there i'm sure somebody will have a counter, but like what school takes three stars and makes them into four or five star caliber college football players more. So it feels like right now than Iowa state, especially on the defensive side of the ball. And he's the next guy up and he, he at number five, he'll be my guy that will rise throughout the season, throughout the draft process. And I think we'll finish as a top five corner. I'm going to watch him this week, man. All right. So

my number five guy to kick things off. I think this is somebody that you did not watch yet. And that is Max Melton from Rutgers. No. And he's in, I say my backyard, even though not only do I live in New York again, but Rutgers is a little bit of a pain in the ass to get to. But yes, as terms of college football, this is as close as a guy in my backyard that I'm excited to see. So I'm excited to hear what you have on him. I actually don't know where Rutgers is. I knew it was very middle of nowhere, Jersey-ish.

But I didn't know. Hold on, I'm pulling up the map because I got to know if you have no excuse or not. Oh, I go down for games almost every year to scout when Ohio State comes into town. But hey, Isaiah Pacheco's in the league right now. Bo Melton's out there. They got Max Melton. See?

And Max Melton, really good transition. You mentioned his brother. Yes. Cole Mellon. So he's got the NFL bloodlines to him a little bit. He's older. Oh, yeah. Plays wide receivers.

At Rutgers as well. Plays for the Green Bay Packers too. This guy was a three-star cornerback. Measures in at six feet tall, 190 pounds. So six feet tall, six feet, even for a corner, six, the first percentile, and then 190 pounds for corners.

Actually the 38th percentile. I actually thought that that would be higher. Yeah. I mean, that doesn't bother me. You're right. Like it's a threshold position. If you're.

When I say 190, 195, I'm like, okay, that's fine. Yeah, sure. I don't need you to be 210 pounds out there like a strong safety we'll get to cooper dejean in a little bit don't worry about it don't jesus christ

i'll take it when it's available so uh so yeah he's got the he's got the nfo background um just doing a little bit of wikipedia background searching as well uh his father gary also played football ruckers and his mother vicky played on the women's basketball team at ruckers as well so very athletic family so okay going over some of those scarlet knights literally every last one of them apparently they are the the bloodline runs deep so some of those PFF data points before I get into some film analysis for them, coverage grade 70.2. So flat 70.2 coverage grade in single coverage, 56.8 coverage grade versus a clean pocket where it's 61.3. So those, those numbers are fine. You know, I think that some people might look at it and go, Whoa, hold on PFF grades in the fifties and sixties, like that ain't good. But you are really pinpointing the, I would say, highest stress situations. And we'll get to some

guys that are higher on this list that play well in those categories. And that's why they are higher on the list. But I don't want anybody to freak out when we read out some of these numbers and they go, oh, fifties and sixties, this guy can't play. He's cheeks. That's not really the way that you should look at it. It's more of just a contextualizing thing to say, you don't want these numbers like 30s, 40s, like straight up can't play whenever they're on an island or whenever they're left their own devices. So that wasn't the case with him.

The coverage grades are fine. Nine forced incompletions, played 510 snaps on the outside, only 19 in the slot. So this guy is an outside receiver. I think that I'm just going to be, he's going to be like one of my guys. Like, I think he's just good. That's the way that it's going to be. Cause I've seen him on cornerback lists.

He's a little bit further down and I don't know where the league's going to end up being on him because he is a senior. So he's not an underclassman for the first time. So obviously he came back to school, but he's your TJ Tampa. It's the same conversation. It's the same conversation. He's feisty, dude. I watched him very first game.

I watched him is Rutgers playing Ohio state. And let's face it. All due respect to the Rutgers football program. Rutgers lines up against Ohio State every Saturday in the fall, unfortunately. They're not going to win. They're not going to win the football game. It's just, it is a predetermined, it's essentially, can you find what channel Ohio State's on before they're up 7-0 on Rutgers?

That's basically kind of what week it feels like more often than not and yet no one was up to the challenge man he knew who Emeka Ibuka was he knew who Marvin Harrison Jr. was and he did not back down at all whatsoever when he was told to go up and play press coverage against either of these guys the hands were up he was in their face wasn't afraid to get physical when those guys got even with him, there wasn't panic in his game. He was being subtly physical with them. I think he's got good all around athleticism,

whether it's him flipping his hips, opening up, tracking with guys deep down the sideline, or even when, you know, he's kind of tracking with him and then the run and a comeback route, he's got to stop at a dime. He's got to stay sticky with him.

I feel like he had baseline athleticism for the NFL. Now, it's not elite. Some of the guys that we're going to get to a little higher on this list, they had more elite athleticism, but I just felt like he was so smart. He had a great mentality. You could tell that he loves to trash talk. I felt like you mentioned the spacing, the spatial awareness. I think that is huge for

playing corner, especially for a lot of these guys that are asked to play both man and zone. You're playing press, you're playing off. There's so much that you have to take into account and you got to have really good instincts in order to be a versatile corner that way. And I thought that he had a really good showing of instincts in, in whatever his whatever his assignments were. So highly competitive player, feisty dude. He'll do the dirty work in the run game whenever he can. And even though he just wasn't the best athlete that we're going to talk about today, I just love the style that he played with. I loved how he attacked the ball in the air,

and he feels like he's just going to be one of my guys throughout this process. So I don't know if he's going to end up as a top five corner when it's all said and done but going into the season wanted to give him this prop because he is somebody who I think is being underrated right now compared to what I've heard of him versus what I saw on tape I love it and I'm excited to see him and I'm always excited when Rutgers has somebody that you know has a legitimate shot to not just be drafted but be a legitimate prospect throughout the process. And I think the fact that you and I just kicked this off with two senior corners at number five

is really, really exciting because we've seen a lot of corner talent go through the all-star circuit process, the all-star games, or just get even more opportunity. And there's something to developing at the position at the college level as well. I mean, there really, really is. It is very hard to just play three years of college football and then be drafted in the first round where you're expected to start a corner at the NFL level and keep your head above

water. Now, there's some freak shows that have been able to do it, like Marshawn Lattimore, Patrick Sertan, and Sauce Gardner, but those examples are not really what you want to attach your wagons to. You need to be able to find the guys that are outside of the first round and can really play. And obviously, that's how you and I felt about those two. Which brings me to number four, because I think it's the exact opposite conversation and that is nate wiggins out of clemson who is a junior who is all tools he's listed six to 185 pounds when you just watch nate wiggins play and then to be fair to nate wiggins right because i'm making it sound like he is just a ball of clay and somebody's got to find a way to form it. This dude is coming off a first team all ACC season at cornerback. He had 12 PBUs. He had a 98 yard pick six. When you look at the pluses, I mean, the length, excellent leaping ability. It's on display very often when the ball's in the

air, especially in the red area. I think his back pedal is very smooth. I thought he has plus short area quickness. You watch him in the conference title game against smooth. I thought he has plus short area quickness. You watch him in the conference title game against USC. Keep in mind, Drake May is going to be an NFL quarterback and potentially a very highly drafted one. And I thought that was maybe Nate Wiggins' best performance. It felt like he brought it in the biggest high-intensity atmosphere. And as that's towards the end of the season, you're watching a sophomore player who is a bigger crew and there's big expectations.

You're watching a sophomore player really grow into his own. And I think he carries over that momentum into his junior season. When I bring up him being on the other end of the spectrum, compared to some of the senior corners, he's still learning timing. He's learning how to play the ball with timing. He's learning how to play the ball with timing. He's learning when he has to get his head around on deeper routes. He'll see some of the more advanced corners, read the receiver's body language and hands and eyes, and they'll turn and be there to see the ball. With a guy like Wiggins, who just hasn't had that same experience, a lot of it is, I need to stay in the hip pocket. I need to stay in the hip pocket.

I'm athletic. I'm just going to put my head down and run with him. And there's not as much constant playing the ball. But I think there was a lot of examples of where you're starting to see that green light come on with him. I liked Wiggins a lot. Honestly, I'll say this right now. Wiggins was a hell of a lot closer to my number three corner than I had any expectations of him to when you look at the trajectory he's on. So if you want to bet on a guy that isn't getting the same hype as I think the top three corners, which look I'm close to consensus in the industry right now, if this guy ended up being the first corner taken in the draft, I would be like, OK, yeah, I mean, he has that kind of ability, he has that kind of length and size and movement skills, and he's been getting that much better

rapidly for such a young player. So this this is someone where I will actively track throughout the season, because if he stays on this trajectory and he starts finding the ball even more and he starts looking a little bit cleaner on vertical plays i mean this is somebody who is a no-brainer first round pick but he has to stay on that trajectory because there are technical aspects of his game he's still cleaning up yeah wiggins is one of those players that this happens when you have an nfl draft mindset like when you view college football through an nfl draft lens you will see guys who are freshmen or sophomore,

not draft eligible. And you'll see them make a play live. Like, well, we're just watching a game and you'll say to yourself, like, who is that? Right.

And then you'll look up the bio and you'll go, okay, great. True sophomore. I can't talk about him for another year. Unfortunately, but Nate wing is, is one of those players who last year, I watched him make a lot

of plays when I watched Clemson Live. And again, I initially looked it up, saw he was a true sophomore, and then he just continued to make these flash plays. And I was like, man, I'm really excited about this guy. And he has an interesting, I would say, journey that he's been on while he's at Clemson. By the way, he was right behind Melton for me. I really debated who I was going to have as my CB5 between Wiggins and Melton. Both of these guys are very close, so this is a good conversation to have. In doing some background reading on him, he didn't really play much as a freshman. The reason why is because Dbo sweeney was like

he was immature straight up he called right he's like he he was not bought in he he was not doing the little things that you need to do during the week during practice to earn those snaps to earn that playing time and he has since praised wiggins since that freshman season for really buying in, becoming a pro, if you will, and doing what he's needed to do to lock down a starting spot and also just start to play a lot better. And I think that that's why I don't say this is a cop out. I, I, I just, I totally agree with you. If Wiggins elevated his game. And at the end of the day, he was a top three corner and getting drafted in the top 20. I'd be like'd be like all right okay I can absolutely see that as a blueprint of where he is in his football journey right now because you mentioned he's got the size six foot two 185 I mean he needs to get

bigger he needs to get stronger I'll get to that in a sec but you know you love the length you love uh how big he is how he could go up against these bigger size corners. He's mainly just an off-coverage zone corner right now. And I think that that's another area of his game that he could continue to round out. I looked this up. Of the, what was it? 691 snaps that he had as an outside corner. 80 of them came in press coverage. That's very low.

So he just does not have, no, okay, sorry. 691 is the total amount of snaps that he played on the outside. 481 is the total number of coverage snaps that he played on the outside. But only 80 of those came with press coverage and so for a guy who is six foot two moves really well i mean he is a smooth mover for a player that is six foot two the hips will flip the heat the the the feet are quick he's got good long speed to him he does not play in press coverage very much so that's something that i hope we see

more of him next year and obviously that's a scheme thing that's a defensive coordinator thing i'm just gonna say it's all a clemson it's not him so that might not be in the cards for him but that's just something to note um i'll mention it some of those pff stats again single coverage our overall coverage grade 83.1 so really nice you like that anything in the eight is really nice because coverage grade guys is it's really tough to grade well i mean you'll see corners who are good who are grading in the 70s in coverage just because it is such a difficult job play after play to have a super high coverage grade and have it very well so anything in the 80s very nice 83.1 coverage grades in single coverage 75.1 so again nice

uh clean pocket 66.1 so those are fine 10 forcing completions i mentioned 691 total snaps on the outside only five snaps in the slot so this guy is just an outside wide receiver i think he's pretty comfortable playing on the left and right it's pretty even split like it's not like he's just a left corner or a right corner which you sometimes see with zone schemes they flip him constantly which is nice i think he's got really good recovery speed i think he plays on his toes so he can always change direction put his foot in the ground really start to go a different way. I think where he does need to continue to work with technique, he's got a great feel for spacing with so much off coverage experience to where he, you really started to see it as sophomore year.

He's baiting throws, man. He's a good enough athlete to do it. And now he's really gaining confidence in athlete to do it and now he's really gaining confidence in himself to do it he was able to bait a lot of throws which is what you want to see in his own coverage corner and i even have this down he had one incompletion or sorry he had one interception last year he had three dropped interceptions and i felt like there were two of his other forced incompletions that I felt like he could have fully turned his head around and got his hands on the ball for.

So this dude had one interception last year. He could have, to me, had five. He could have had five interceptions. And I think that's what we're talking about when we say he could take that next step because a major difference between having one takeaway and having five takeaways. And the big difference is more confidence and more recognition, better technique. And I think that that could be in the cards for him. Look, the run support mentality from him, it's getting better, but he's got to get stronger.

He does. Some guys are dense at 185. He's not. He's's light he gets pushed around he's not a big impact player when he goes to get ball carriers um so that was that that is something where i would love to see wiggins get between 190 and 195 and i don't mean combine weight i'm not talking about chugging as much water as you possibly can get between 190 195 as a playing weight and i think he's an even better player um than what he is right now so i liked wiggins a lot i'm glad that you had him in that top five and it's just a tale of how a season goes right when you see a young guy a first year starter get better as the season goes on and like you said trevor get more comfortable and do a lot of things he blocked a kick against unc i mean like you said the staff really pushed

him after year one to do more and and really be a pro version at college right like be a pro here be a professional and buy in and it's just it was a massive massive step where you go he doesn't need to duplicate that but if he just starts is continues to take these kind of steps it's the talent is all there but i agree with you too it is it is very hard to evaluate a player that has significantly less experience in press although he has the tools significantly less experience impressed than all the other guys that we're talking about today. All right. Number where are we? You're up for,

I'm in four, number four for me. Somebody's got to tell me what I'm missing. Okay. Oh boy. Did you watch Josh Newton from TCU? I did watch Josh Newton. I like Josh Newton a lot,

man. Sure. And I feel like most people don't. Really? Okay. And I just, and I, maybe, maybe I'm totally wrong. Maybe it's just because I have not heard the hype from him, but he is one of those sixth year players. Okay.

So first and foremost, clearly the NFL doesn't like him. Right. Because the point, because if he got anything close, I would think to some sort of a day two grade last year, you were redshirt senior last year. TCU made it to the national championship. You ain't gonna repeat. He already transferred too.

He's from Louisiana Monroe. He would have left. And so I guess getting, because you're right. So he was a former two-star wide receiver prospect, by the way, from Monroe, Louisiana, played his first four seasons at Louisiana Monroe, red shirt of that first year while he transitioned from wide receiver to cornerback. And then he ended up playing at TCU last year, obviously, but like the film at TCU, I thought was good last year.

I thought he was a really good football player. And I'm very surprised that we're talking about him here. And I think I'm even more surprised that I really didn't hear much of him last year. Because even when the draft eligibility and the declaration window was still open i didn't hear anything about josh newton we talked about travis hodges tomlinson the other corner who we liked but i did not really i don't i don't want to speak for you did you did you scout noon last year no not at all so i didn't as well because i nobody was really talking about it and you go back and you watch the tape, and guess what?

The tape is from last year. The tape was what was his draft eligible year last year, and I thought the tape was good. So he himself, another guy who is 6'1", 190, so it's the same thing, 61st percentile, 38th percentile. Coverage grades. Overall coverage grade, 85.3. Good.

Single coverage grade, 85.3. Good single coverage grade, 75. Good coverage grade from a clean pocket. 71.5. Good. If you got both those numbers in the seventies, you're playing pretty dang well. He had three interceptions with one interception that was dropped in 14

forcing completions. There's a lot. There's a lot. That's, that's a ton of great ball production. That's three takeaways is fantastic and then for you to still be at 14 forced incompletions that means that when they're targeting you are making an impact on the ball he played over 800 snaps on the outside because of

how long tcu season was about 500 of them were on the right side 330 were on the left so um pretty much even split there had 54 snaps in the. So he is primarily an outside corner. But dude, I think that he was an explosive athlete. I thought he could really hang in short areas as well. He can open it up. He can go down the sideline with these players. I think he was a super smart cornerback. The feet were very quick.

Versatile in a lot of ways. I think he's got great mentality for the position. He didn't bring that same pride in run defense that he did in coverage so i think that those were a couple of areas of his game it's like all right well he's not really shining as much in run defense as he possibly could but when it came to him being one-on-one with players i was impressed man i watched that georgia game i thought he handled that mcconkey decently well i thought he handled ad mitchell decently well i can't remember who number one is on georgia it's slipping my mind right now but like he handled that player very well as well like i said he'd flip left and right side of the of the line of scrimmage sometimes in

the middle of uh of drive so you know he's got that versatility there i think i think this dude is a good football player now obviously I don't have him over the corners that I've got at three, two, and one, but I'm pretty shocked that Josh Newton wasn't in last year's draft class. And right now, from the tape that I saw last year, this is somebody that I'm at the very least drafted on day two, at the very least.

It is very surprising, right, when you go through it because easily draftable tape would have been eligible for the all-star process coming off a team that played in the national title game and this guy was a huge part of it i mean to put it in perspective like you said trey tom uh you know tre'davious tomlinson had more snaps than him at 974, but this dude had 907. And then it falls off a cliff for the TCU corners. I mean, the next one would be Abe Kamara at 523. Keep in mind, Noah Daniels had 40.

So this guy went out and really earned it for TCU. He played at a high level. I thought the number one thing with him is, because he's 5'11", 188. He's a former two-star receiver like you said the transfer from Louisiana Monroe and ended up being a starting impactful corner for a team that went to the national title when nobody thought they had a shot at going to the national title game I know it's a cliche but I really this is what I came away watching him

he's just so scrappy like you watch watch him against bigger assignments. And every time at the catch point, he's just scratching, clawing, fighting, swatting. He's a, he's highly, highly competitive. He's in my opinion, undersized. I don't think he's an elite athlete. I think he's an older prospect who's had a long road. I do think he gets really grabby when he starts to lose the foot race. And there are times when he opens up and runs, he loses the foot race. But if you're looking for somebody, he played 247 snaps in press in 2022. That's experienced. That uses his hands. That makes plays at the catch point that can play above his weight i think he absolutely fits that bill and he started for two years for tcu already so i get it trevor i'm not as high on him as you but i

walked away from this exercise after watching 13 corners i mean easily in the top nine or eight of them easily yeah i mean very easily and you bring up a question that i don't know why it didn't come up in my brain throughout this process. I think I'm just so focused on next year's class that you sit there and don't always think of these. It's a great question, though. Why wasn't he in the class and why didn't the league like him and why is he so slept on? Yeah, I'm not sure. I was shocked after watching his film, the lack of buzz that I heard of him from last year

and that this was really the first time that I was viewing him. It seems like I'm a little bit higher on his athleticism than you are. And I definitely agree he can get handsy and grabby. But I guess through my lens, I was seeing that as like, okay, he's comfortable getting physical. Because I didn't think it was egregious. I didn't think it was like, oh, I'm out egregious. Like I didn't think it was like, oh, I'm out of control.

I better grab this guy or he's going to go so far past me. I thought it was more subtle. I thought it was more controlled, but shoot, you know, this is, this is why I love going through this exercises because you're obviously somebody who's scouting I trust a lot.

So, you know, it's, it's great to bounce ideas off each other. As we kind of go into the season, we go, all right, well, now we've got somebody who sees his athleticism a little bit different as we watch him this year. Do I see that a little bit more? Do you see that a little bit more?

And then we kind of come back to it as we go through our midseason rankings. But all I have to say, man, like Josh Newton a lot, I was a fan. So I had him at CB4. So that brings us to the big three, right? I think we're pretty comfortable with that. I probably have a different two and three than you, although I will not guarantee that. I guess I should just continue going in order

because that's the point of the show. But I mean, it's just I'm grouping these guys because that's how they're viewed. They're the big three. Number three for me was Kool-Aid. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah yeah yeah we're gonna have a different okay I know Kool-Aid's number one for a lot of people and these guys are in it once again I keep calling them the big three because they are all really really good Kool-Aid at three

it's not an insult just like the other two a little bit better. I like number one. I like number one a lot better in this class. I was blown away. So number three, Kool-Aid McKinstry, Alabama corner, long, 6'1", 195. He's got, obviously, a pretty sick name. Yeah. Kool-Aid McKinstry is a sick name. His name is Kool-Aid McKinstry. It doesn't get,

I don't know if it gets better than that. Honestly, finished 2022 with 15 pass breakups and one pick, I believe true juniors, a true sophomore season for Alabama. So the amount of talent Alabama brings in, not only through the recruiting process and through the transfer portal, I mean,

you gotta be pretty different to just start as a sophomore corner there and obviously he did legit straight line speed to run vertically with wide receivers i mean this dude can absolutely run down the field with guys 299 snaps in press in 2022 and i'll this, the initial jam at the line of scrimmage is extremely effective with ideal hand placement for a young player. I was blown away. I know he's obviously clearly really well coached up, but also clearly really putting in the work and buying into the technique. He's he can go out there and run with anyone. So the fact that he's clearly taking it this seriously of how to become a good press corner goes to show you the work he's been doing with the staff at such a young age. Long arms, they chop the ball over the top against slants

and underneath routes. I mean, he plays things underneath really, really well. The 15 PBUs speak for themselves. I thought that's where they showed up. Highly competitive in the red zone, leaping ability to play the fade. I thought he comes downhill with a fury against swing passes and screens. I was like, okay. Like I loved it. I thought it was awesome.

Cause this, this corner class had some featherweights. Yes. Right. It's like, you see some dudes get kind of bodied around a little bit at times in the screen game you're like oh man it's gonna happen kool-aid plays with a little bit of an edge when when teams try to manufacture yards against him on his side of the field average

almost 16 yards per punt return in 2022 man's an athlete that's why you come to the pff podcast folks there you go 15.8 if you want the exact one to tweet out their content for threads and x all right so some of the negatives threads and x threads and x well he'll lunge and grab at intermediate routes like at the stem of the route he's overreacting a little bit at times it's like a lunge and then a grab and i'm like you're so athletic and that i and he's he's he is a smart player but that it's i'm like why are you overreacting you'll be fine he doesn't he doesn't need to do it he doesn't need to do it is what i'm saying he's just so talented he doesn't need to do it but he does it a lot

i thought he gets bumped around down the field and this is one that comes with a giant giant asterisk because it's like he's a sophomore in the sec starting for alabama and this goes back to like the nate wiggins conversation all over again i think kool-aid's going to develop physically that this is not as big of an issue as it is now but the point of summer scouting is to paint the picture of what a player is right now. And right now, he gets bumped around down the field. I mean, here's the thing. Refs are not going to call contact that is not hand contact, right?

Shoulders and hips bouncing around against each other, kind of like bumper cars. That's just football down the field. And when he's in those kinds of wars, he's kind of going places. He gets bumped around. I mean, that's the easiest way to say it. I thought pre-snap, there's times too where he's still kind of figuring it out. Once again, a young player.

You watch the play against Ole Miss where they have the screen for the touchdown on his side, and he just wasn't ready. I'm not going to put it all on him, but he just didn't ready um i'm not gonna put it all on him but he just didn't look ready and he looked a little overwhelmed this is the whole package physically i think the rest is still catching up a little bit at times and he's really been thrown into the fire as a starting corner for alabama but when you look for a long press corner that has straight line speed and does play with an edge and is physical and press and technically sound and press everything in the line of scrimmage, the technique is there. It's after the line of scrimmage, the intermediate and the deep routes and the physicality.

That's where it totally drops off. I like Kool-Aid a lot. Great name. He once again, trajectory guy, like like just keep growing keep developing and you will easily be a first round pick but i will say i surprisingly liked two corners better than him in this draft class right now i'm also surprised because i have because i have kool-aid to cb1 okay i mean it's gonna be popular i have i am as the top cb and i i don't i don't totally disagree with with your assessment of them i just i think the way that i'm viewing kool-aid is

so many of the things that you mentioned it's amazing yeah truly uh so many of the things that okay hold on wait wait by the way, where was the Wikipedia? I wanted to read. I was just going to do this. McKenzie was nicknamed Kool-Aid by his grandmother shortly after birth because his smile reminded her of the Kool-Aid man. That is tremendous. He signed a name image likeness deal with Kool-Aid during his freshman season. That's just incredible.

Yeah, so now he's Connornor cb1 uh as well after uh after reading that no last corner with a good nickname worked out pretty well i have um this is what i have in my little like spark notes summary version of him this is this is this is the last sentence that happened he needs to get stronger to mitigate separation yielded and penalties called on him in those situations but but after that i have a typo that i'm just now seeing but uh this is absolutely a first round player the way that i view kool-aid is he definitely has those deficiencies i don't disagree with you to me they're all just fixable right and i mean you

you talked about earlier in the podcast the things that you look for in a corner and it is one you got to be athlete like you have to be enough of an athlete to play this position it is a without question prerequisite if you are not good enough of an athlete it doesn't matter even how good your spatial awareness and your instincts are. The NFL is going to eat you alive. The players are too athletic. The game is getting too fast, and they're spreading things out too much. You've got to be able to keep up.

This dude, to me, is the stickiest corner in the class. Like when things are going right for him, and when I say that, I don't mean that they're few and far between. They often go right for this guy. He will get hands on you. He will stay in your hip pocket. It doesn't matter whether you're, whether it's a slant route, whether it's a comeback,

whether you're running a nine, whether it's a skinny post, whether it's a dig over the middle, whether it's a mesh route, it doesn't matter. This dude can stick with you. He's got the long speed to be able to do it. He's got the quickness.

He can stop on a dime. He can immediately go a different direction. I think he's got good hand usage at times, I guess is probably how I should say that. And I think he's got phenomenal instincts. You mentioned how many pass breaks ups he has in the forcing completion category that we track. 18. 18 forcing completions. That is a lot. That is some serious production on the ball. And one of the strength categories that I mentioned of his is that he is so good playing with his back to the ball. He is so comfortable at it. He reads receivers' body language.

He reads their eyes. He can see. If he's in trail technique with a guy, and trust me, the trail technique, he ain't that far behind. He's just trying to play it correctly. He's making sure that he can see right in the wide receiver's eyes because this is what they'll tell you. When those hands start to go up,

or even before the hands start to go up with the wide receiver, their eyes will get wide. When that ball is coming to them, wide receiver's eyes will get wide to locate the ball and track the ball. He can physically see that in wide receivers. You can notice it. And then as the ball is coming, he will time it to

get his hand up for the forcing completion without even looking at the ball sometimes. Now, of course, you want to get it turned around, you want to get picks, but like that instinct is so fantastic. I think that he is so experienced in press coverage as well. Of the 518 coverage snaps that he had, 427 were in press. So this guy has tons of experience doing that. A lot of good experience with his back to the ball. And you got to think about this too. He started at the back end of his true freshman season at Alabama. Who does that? You know how complex Saban's defenses is? Saban's the DB's coach. It's Saban himself. You understand how mentally sound you have to be at this position to be able to start as a true freshman?

That's nuts. That just tells you. You're right. It's pretty rare. I think how fantastic of a corner this guy is. The PFF grades, I'll just shout them out here. Regular coverage grade, 84.5. Good.

Single coverage grade, 83.0. Fantastic. Single coverage grade, 83.0. Fantastic. That's a great number. And then versus the clean pocket, it goes down to 65, which is fine. It's a big drop versus the single coverage. But again, anything in the 60s, you're fine with a clean pocket and more than three seconds of the quarterback holding the ball. So I guess I'll just – well, the weaknesses category,

I do want to say this first. So I watched the LSU game. I wanted to make sure to watch that because he went up against Malik Neighbors, who we both really love at wide receiver. Oh yeah. Malik Neighbors got him a few times with hand fighting and just out muscling him.

Would like to see Kool-Aid add some more strength. And then the other bullet point that I have is, doesn't seem like the type to commit a lot of penalties. But when he does, it's because of that strength issue. I also watched the Texas game where he's going up against Jordan Whittington and he's going up against Xavier Worthy. And both of those guys, when they would get him, especially Xavier Worthy, he would get overly grabby on them. And that's when it was easy to call a penalty on him when he really didn't have to. Because I think that you put it very, very well.

You got to get to the point where you're okay and you're comfortable just bumping a shoulder, bumping your hip into a guy, playing physical in that way. You don't got to be playing physical with your hands and i think the reason why he tried he gets his full body into trying being to be physical sometimes is because he doesn't have that density that he needs so again this is a guy who you gain another five to ten pounds to probably five pounds if we're being realistic and you're talking about a guy who can just be a lockdown corner that's why I have him at corner one because I think that all of that is in the cards for him. And the rest of it, the stuff that you have to have, some of the stuff that's very unteachable, if you will,

the athletic ability, the agility itself, the long speed, the instincts, the spatial awareness, the ball skills, fantastic for him. So that's why I got him seeded. I'm not going to argue against anyone that goes down that road because this is the beauty of summer scouting. There is so much projection at hand.

And the argument you just made is completely adequate for this guy being the top corner in the draft for right now going into the year. And because there is this year matters so much to the Kool-Aids of the world and guys like um who are we talking about Nate Wiggins is another guy like that guys that they're young and they're ascending players right and you want to see them continue to ascend now I will say Kool-Aid can have the same exact season he had last year and he will still go in the first round yeah because he's just got tools Lance he's already good in press um he's obviously a good punt returner on top of that. Right. So CB1 for you, Trevor.

CB3 for me. Wait, before we get to your next guy. Yeah, you got to do CB3. Yeah, I almost jumped. Oh, yeah, I have to do CB3. But before I get to my CB3, I guess. But wait, there's more. Got to talk to the good people about our friends over at DraftKings.

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10 million dollar best ball tournament only on draft kings with the promo code pff if you get a gambling problem call 1-800-GAMBLER. Agent eligibility restrictions apply. Voidware prohibited. See DraftKings.com for details. All right, CB3 for me. I was agonized on who to put at three and who to put at two here. The battle, the Big Ten battle?

Because these, I mean mean they're so different it's not even like the same stratosphere kind of player it's it's cheesecake and and apple pie dude you love both of them but how do you compare there's just it's it's tough they're both desserts they're both like sort of pies i don't know what he's called cheesecake tort whatever i don't know or yeah i had a debate with somebody one time and i was like it's not a cake it's more of a pie and they're like no it's a tort and i was like all right you get out of here number three for me ended up being the fine tort connor's gone i didn't spell that right

it's definitely not a wrongful act or an infringement of a right leading to civil legal liability you're about to get into a court of law with us oh man there it is with the knee a sweet cake or tart yeah I guess yeah it is a tort that person was right

yeah sadly sadly we must concede they were actually right we never we've never missed on a prospect but we have missed we miss desserts okay so i ended up having cooper gene uh from iowa as my as my cb3 here And it's sort of difficult to really contextualize everything that this player does because if I'm going to be honest, I'm probably going to talk about Cooper DeGene next week as well.

I know. I genuinely think this guy could be a phenomenal safety. When I watched the way he played and how so many of his best reps came from the slot, I was like, is this guy Antoine Winfield Jr.? No, I know he's not built anywhere close. He's way bigger than Antoine Winfield Jr., but Winfield Jr. was a phenomenal free safety during his time at Minnesota, and he also played really well from the slot. What's he

done from the Tampa Bay Buccaneers? He's a fantastic free safety and he's fantastic from the slot. Honestly, I feel like that's going to be the jeans best role at the NFL because he's six foot one, 207 pounds, 80th percentile and 93rd percentile. So this is a big dude. He's a junior. Y'all got gotta listen to his background because it's very important yes four-star safety recruit played quarterback wide receiver and

defensive back in high school all right this is an excerpt from max chadwick's article that he did on the gene when he interviewed him at high school, he was one of the most decorated athletes in Iowa State high school football history. In football, he holds the school record for career passing yards, career passing touchdowns, touchdown receptions, while also leading the Falcons to their first two state championships in program history. In basketball, his 1,832 career points are 55 more than current Sacramento Kings Harrison Barnes on the state's all-time scoring list. In track, he won the state championship in both the long jump, 23 feet, seven and a half inches and 100 meter dash 11.16 seconds. He also played three seasons of varsity baseball.

I mean, there might not be a more versatile athlete that we will talk about in the next like three years of draft class. It's insane. Insane. I just kept reading more and more and his game truly echoes all of that background and i can't remember if it was in the interview with max or a different interview that he did where he basically like he says like all of that shows up like the track background made me faster the basketball background gave me quicker fee

the football background obviously gave me a great feel for basically every position on the field. And it shows up, man. This dude is, the way that he plays defensive back, and he played mostly from the outside. He played 568 snaps as an outside corner, but he also played 144 from the slot. So just because he played a lot on the outside

doesn't mean he didn't have that experience in the slot. And those slot reps are the ones where you see him perfectly time a throw to where he undercuts it which goes into his six forced incompletions five interceptions and two more interceptions that were dropped that were like right in his hands like he played the ball absolutely perfectly. So the dude's ball skills are off the charts. His PFF grades were also fantastic. 88.3 coverage grade overall.

74.8 single coverage grade. 78.2 versus a clean pocket. And I will say that both as an outside corner and as an inside corner he graded above 70 versus a clean pocket so those are on plays where you don't get help from your pass rush this dude is locking players down for more than three seconds and so you know it's it i guess it's not really as much of lockdown because sometimes he's playing off coverage you know he's not always playing press um but the way that he plays the game i feel is just so unique the strength categories with him being six foot one 207 pounds they show up when he's at the line of scrimmage they show up and run support when he's tackling, when he's blitzing, when he is setting the edge and asking guys and making the ball carrier

come back inside for Jack Campbell to absolutely lay the hammer on somebody. You know, the strength shows up at the catch point. We know that he's bullying guys once they get into the break points of their route. His feet are slower than like Kool-Aid McKinstry's or you know um kaylin kings but the long speed makes up for it i mean his recovery speed is fantastic even though his acceleration is changing directions a little bit slower just because he's carrying more weight um i just dude i i thought that he was absolutely fantastic i feel like he's going to be your cb2 so i feel like it's a good transition into it.

But just to kind of wrap it up here for my explanation of him, my little summary for him is Dejean is a fun player to watch. He is a supersized corner who has a diverse athletic background in the game of football. He's such a smart player with awareness,

spacing, and all of his ball skills his feet are somewhat slow and his recovery speed isn't as twitchy as you would like but the long speed once he opens it up you see that track background there for him because he can catch up to a lot of receivers and a lot of passes because of this his best position might actually be as a free safety slash slot defender but make no mistake this is simply a football player that you want on your team i mean you nailed it he is a great football player he's cb2 for me i think that it's gonna a lot of people are gonna kind of pick around what his home is for an nfl team and i think an nfl team is gonna land on that in a league where personnel is so difficult

on and off the field, right? Where you're worried about heavy defending heavy sets when you're in nickel, which is based in today's NFL, or you're worried about teams trying to spread you out, but you also still can't give an inch for the run. This is that kind of a racer. The guy that I didn't really see limitations in any aspect of playing defense. I mean, 29 snaps on the line of scrimmage.

D-line is how we would list it. 89 more in the box. 137 in the slot. 543 at outside corner. Over 150 special team snaps. That's just last year. That's just last year because he's good at everything he's good at everything he brought three interceptions back to the house last year you brought this up excellent eyes and quick trigger and zone

I mean the way he can read and jump throws is just it's incredible he's excellent at that safety mindset at corner and what I mean by that is i mean real glass chewing like yeah you can try to screen my side of the field but then i'm a strong safety right i take off the corner mask and now i'm a strong safety so try that again um easily peels off one assignment to make a play on the ball versus another like he gets sit in zone and peek underneath and then realize oh the ball is going to go over my head i'm going to go help that guy and make a play on the ball versus another. Like he gets sit in zone and peek underneath and then realize, Oh, the ball's going to go over my head. I'm going to go help that guy and make a play on the ball. Five TFLs last year,

plus run defender. And the only question I have with him, I thought his recovery speed, and this probably goes back to what you said about his feet looked mediocre by NFL standards by NFL standards. It was mediocre. The back, the athletic background is out of this world

the mindset the demeanor the toughness he's an NFL corner if if if he wants to be he's an NFL safety if he wants to be he's a big nickel he's an outside linebacker in some packages I just he he's going to be a corner for me because I think he's such a good cornerback. I think he's athletic enough. He's big. But how you line him up at the next level will be fascinating because think about this, Trevor. We just saw Dalton Kincaid go in the first round, right? We saw Kyle Pitts go in the top five two years ago yeah two years ago think of the power slot we all pre-season we're hearing mike williams is gonna maybe play the slot this year the league is gravitating partially away from the little slippery and they're still out there out

there but the west welkers you know we're we're getting away from the little slots of the world and looking for big slots that can crack down and block can be mismatched players against small nickel corners can do a lot of different things that in the possession game and this is the counter to that this is the counter to that. This is the counter to that. If you're like, we don't live in a world where it's like, you can't take a nickel defender in the first round. You might need to now. You might need to find your nickel defender in the first round

because it's such a vital part of the field as these outside corners get bigger, faster, stronger, and defend so well outside the numbers, you need to attack the middle of the field. So what's your counter when teams start attacking in the middle of the field with bigger players? That also impacts the run game. The answer is Cooper to Gene.

So great player. Can't wait to watch him play this year. I'm with you 100%. As tight ends have, I think, increased their draft stock, certainly when you get guys that are very unique we saw kyle pitts obviously go in the top five we saw um don kincaid get talked about very highly and get drafted in the first round samuel torta went before michael mayer and he's more of in my opinion and off the line of scrimmage tight end this is your response it's players like cooper dejean who are your response if if if the draft

were next week this guy's getting drafted in the first round no question and it's probably he's probably getting drafted in the top 20 i would agree so that's that's why he he's fun man well i think we might talk about him a little bit um next week as well but right um i don't really care where you line him up he's just a damn good football player uh all right talk to us about your guy talk to us about cv1 well so this is number two for you just to clarify right yes two for me number one for you yep kaylin king out of penn state i i mean i was blown away i thought i went into this exercise and i know i said the big three but this dude was easily number one for me at corner sure he's a little smaller than a lot of these guys that well witherspoon actually just went top you know six or whatever it was so i guess that's not really

the case anymore before yeah witherspoon went to seattle i believe at four because richardson went five to the colts so no it was the other way around richardson went four there we go thank you um witherspoon went five see we already did the toy story like we just don't we are discarded the draft anymore it doesn't matter anymore it's all over uh who's rebuilding i want to talk about that right kaylin king listed 511 191 junior at penn state out of detroit michigan the uh the last corner taken in the first round at detroit michigan sauce gardner pretty good rookie season it's a much much different player than sauce gardner this is not a guy that's long with length but holy shit fluid easy moving athlete i mean as fluid and easy moving as they

come feather feet change of direction is plus plus legit tracking and ball skills. I thought he tracked and ran routes better than the wide receivers half the time out there. You could flip the uniform, but keep them at corner. And I would just assume that's the receiver. That's how much it looked that way at times. He is a master at reading the wide receivers reactions to know when to turn his head, to play the ball all the time. I guys in the NFL are not all of them, but like the,

besides the really good ones are not doing it on the level that I saw from him, where I was like, this guy is incredible at timing the ball, very savvy at picking up receivers on crossers very uh good communicator very smart pre-snap and post-snap he scratches and claws through screens screen blockers despite his size this it's not witherspoon because i thought witherspoon was rare like rare rare rare territory i want to make this very clear it's not that but the on-field

demeanor for an undersized guy was phenomenal phenomenal he blew up a screen versus ohio state and i was like it wasn't the witherspoon play but it's i know exactly what you're talking about where he splits the wide receivers and you just go straight into the ball carrier's chest i can't remember who it was but i thought this guy is a star a star i mean the biggest thing for me is he's got a slender frame with very average height and length and i might be polite by calling it average i think he's gonna look smaller in a class with Kool-Aid, with Cooper, Wiggins, who's tall, TJ Tampa, who's tall. I think Mellon was even six feet tall, wasn't he? Yeah, Mellon, they have enlisted six feet tall. Yeah, he's going to look smaller than a lot of these guys, but they just don't move like

this. This guy, they do. The average DB does not move like this this guy they do the average db does not move like this guy yep and i think he is so so fiery so competitive so polished i actually think i could put him on an nfl field today but i am glad that he's not because if we've seen penn state crank up physical development with guys and they go to the combine and test out of this like Olympians. They literally test like Olympians.

Yeah. I'm glad Caitlin has that this season, but I was blown away watching this tape. Athletically, he's special, man. Special. Let me tell you, it took me three plays to realize that i agree three plays and i i i agree with you a hundred percent i don't put him on witherspoon's level yet, but it's reminiscent. I mean, what made Witherspoon special was I've rarely seen college corners be able to truly stop in their tracks at the same exact time that

a wide receiver is at the same exact spot the receiver knows the route they're running the corner does not and it witherspoon's ability to click and close was something unbelievably rare like i think that king is i don't know if i would say it's that level but it's close like that is what you first notice about him is the click and close ability the stop and start the overall explosiveness, the way that this dude can open up and stay with wide receivers going all the way up the sideline. He gets to the point you're right. Once, once he figures out and it doesn't take him long,

I don't mean this to say like it takes him long to do it. Once he figures out that you're running a nine route, that you're just running up the field, he will run the route for you. He will, he will like get in front of you. He will out position you and he'll go, okay, when's the ball coming to us? Like there's no, there was no, like there's no trail technique. There's no like play with your back to the ball. He's basically the wide receiver at that point.

There were a couple of reps where he was doing that, which just goes to show how incredible of an athlete this dude is the pff stats for him elite 90.7 coverage grade elite 91.5 single coverage grade nuts and then coverage grade from a clean pocket where the time to throw is more than three seconds 71.9 which is still a great score three interceptions 16 forced incompletions 491 snaps on the outside about an even split left and right so it shows you it's not like this guy is just only scheme versatile can only play on the left or right side he's good enough an athlete playing any of them didn't really play from the slot. He only had nine snaps on the slot,

but you're not going to play him out there. Anyways, the biggest concern that I had with Kalen King is just the fact that he is such an incredible athlete. Sometimes his feet and his lower body are moving before his hands do. And he can like be a little out of control. Like when he's changing directions, sometimes the hands can get a little bit too far out.

Sometimes that they're just kind of like flailing a little bit. He just, he is such a good athlete that he looks out of control at times. So honing that in a little bit more, keeping the hands in, making sure that they're not like making sure that the hands not like out to the right. When you really want it to be going in towards the

defender or whatever it is setting up that scenario you just want to be a little bit more controlled i felt like he was just a little bit too out of control but shoot man that's for as athletic as this guy is and how well he can stay in the hip pocket of wide receivers that's nitpicking it it truly is it's just something that the more he plays now that he is draft eligible, because yeah, to your point, he's just true sophomore, man. We're just watching true sophomore tape of him. Easy to believe that he is going to be more of a controlled player. And that will make him even more impactful,

which is kind of hard to believe. Number one part about him that I love, he an emotional player very but in the way that you love like he's talking shit to you all the time like he is in your face every play when he makes a play on the ball and this was again witherspoon asked when witherspoon made a play on you he let you know about it and that is a necessity to playing the cornerback position when you play corner at any high level of football i would say in the nfl or in the fbs you have to believe you're the you are the best football player on the field every time you step on the field have to believe it have to believe it when you get on the field. Have to believe it. Have to believe it. When you get beat,

the next play after that is simply another opportunity to go show that you're the best football player on the field. That's it. And I think that's how Kalen King plays. That's how a lot of these other corners play, but you can just see it even on the All-22 tape. The passion that this guy plays with, and that's the kind of corner that you

want to invest in. So, I had him at number two. Loved him a lot. You had him at number one. I think that that makes a ton of sense. Let's, uh, let's recap the top fives before we get into some of these other corners that we're going to give some shout outs to. So who'd you have in five and just go from five to one. TJ Tampa from Iowa state at five, Nate Wiggins from Clemson at four Kool-Aid McKinstry from Alabama at three Cooper to Jean from Iowa at number two, followed by number one, Penn state's Kalen King. All right. I had Max Melton from Rutgers at number five,

Josh Newton from TCU at four Cooper to Jean from Iowa at three Kalen King from Penn state at two. And then I had Kool-Aid McKinstry from Alabama at number one. I think there's a handful of players that I'd like to just say some, some words on. Cause I know people in the comments are going to be like, hey, what about this guy? What about this guy?

Yeah, it's a good idea. We need to start doing more of that because people think we watch four players every show. No, I don't watch. Trust me, you would not believe how much of our weeks are dedicated to crafting this top five. Yeah, a lot of hours, a lot of hours.

Who do you want to shout out? Give me a couple guys and then we'll kind of go back and forth. We'll do some real quick cliff notes how about jevon bullard the slot corner from georgia slash and the safety is kind of this you know once again one of those nickel players he was the defensive mvp he was the defensive mvp of the natty against tcu i thought he looked really patient and calm so that was somebody that you know i want to give a shout out to on a higher scale how about um another guy that fits that tj tampa mold of being really long uh decamrion

richardson from mississippi state he's listed six two and a quarter he is huge length long strider covers a lot of ground energetic highly competitive very active tackler Then I'll do one more quick one here. Quinion Mitchell from Toledo had, this was, you want active film? He had five picks in 20 PBUs last year and he dropped five picks, Trevor. So this dude realistically- What are we doing? And I watched those two and I mean,

there was at least two of them. It's like, yeah, he definitely should have had that. So this dude could have had a 10 interception season, at least an eight interception season. He had had five but he also broke up 20 passes really really excellent understanding of routes and how to break on them um he had a four interception game against niu some real some real funny ones in there so quinion mitchell will be at a toledo definitely an interesting guy what you? A handful of players that I think that we could just give a shout out to Jason Marshall Jr. from my Florida Gators. He's an outside corner played 644 snaps on the outside. I like him a little spark notes version or a little spark

notes recap for him. He was a former five-star recruit coming out of Miami. Marshall's a bigger corner who boasts length, speed, and strength. He doesn't back down from a challenge against bigger outside receivers, which I really like. He's a calm player who understands how to bait throws, good spacing and zone coverage, and when he's in trail technique. He's a little hesitant in run defense and tackling at times. It can lead to some awkward tackling attempts, which he needs to get a lot more confidence in.

He yields a little bit too much coverage in cover three, and honestly, a reason why I didn't have him higher on this list. I mentioned the stop and start ability, the click and close, something that was a big catalyst for why Devon Witherspoon was my CB1 last year. It's strange because sometimes I feel like he's better at changing direction. But when guys are running comeback routes against him, he gives up like three or four yards of space. And it's like it takes him forever to chop his feet and to stop.

And that was kind of strange to me. So I'm wondering if that's going to be something that's consistent with his tape this year. Because, I mean, just straight up, you can't be yielding that much space in coverage when guys are breaking on routes. I mean, you're just going to get cooked any time that somebody's running a comeback route.

They know it's going to be an easy six, seven yards against you. And that can't happen in the NFL. So a lot to like about him. Bigger corner. He's like 6'1", about 203 pounds. So he liked the size, but just some things to kind of cover. I would just wish he would be a little bit stickier. When he's in man coverage, I like him a lot.

When he's in zone, I feel like he just, he gives up too much in zone. So a lot of like to man, but a lot to like in man, but not as much in zone. Denzel Burke, I know a lot of people are going to talk about from Ohio State. This is kind of what I had to say about Denzel Burke. Growing player. Sophomore tape showed a good baseline of athleticism to play the position. When he was playing free and moving from a place of confidence, he could be pretty sticky in man coverage,

but there were plenty of times when it felt like the confidence left him, and that's where he really started to hesitate, and that's when he'd get into a lot of confidence, he could be pretty sticky in man coverage, but there were plenty of times when it felt like the confidence left him and that's where he really started to hesitate. And that's when he'd get into a lot of trouble. Tape got much better as the year went on. He was more confident, which is good to see going into his junior year. More reps could yield a pretty big jump from him in consistency and ball production, but he definitely needs some improvement in ball production. Only had five forced incompletions, didn't have any interceptions last season. And then the single coverage and clean pocket grades were a little bit lower in coverage than what you want so i know a lot of people are going to bring up those couple of guys uh last slot guy that i will mention because somebody asked us to watch him um i think this is how you say his last name

mike samersill from michigan he's fun he really is crazy background. Born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti in the year 2000, his father was a newsroom director at a radio station and got death threats after the 2000 Haitian presidential election. And as a result, the family fled from Haiti when San Francisco was only seven months old. So then they moved to Massachusetts where he played high school ball, ends up going to Michigan, played wide receiver at Michigan for the first three seasons that he was there

before transferring over to defensive back just last year. And in one year of playing DB, I mean, the guy had some pretty great instincts. I'm not going to lie. So I'm really excited to see him. He's a little bit smaller. He's 5'9", 185 pounds, so 9th and 19th percentile.

But he's just a slot receiver, or sorry, a slot defender. 541 snaps in the slot and just 27 as an outside corner so he's small and that kind of shows up but he's feisty he's fearless he'll get up into dudes uh faces and press coverage uh he'll give his all when it comes to tackling he's a little bit limited athletically and then with the length as well he's going up against emeka ibuka at ohio state and there was a route where ibuka was just coming over the middle, and Sanstro honestly played it really well, dove to get the PBU. The arms just weren't long enough. He just showed up in a direct way where he couldn't make an impact on the ball.

So a little limitations there, but he's a really fun player, plays with his hair on fire. I do think he's a future NFL player, although right now I'd say he's a day three guy. All right. A lot of corners in this class that we're going to keep an eye on throughout the entire year. I mean, we have tons of duos to keep an

eye on, whether it's DJ James from Auburn and Nehemiah Pritchett, his teammate. Obviously, Kalen King at Penn State, his running mate is Johnny Dixon. Kamari Lassiter, of course, a Georgia with Bullard. You know, there's a there's a lot of tandems to watch as well.

So we'll be on top of all of it. Corner is maybe the. The longest process. Yeah, dude, it took me forever to watch these 14 guys. Oh, my goodness. I woke up Sunday before I even poured a cup of coffee or hell even i didn't even take a step out of bed i just grabbed my phone i texted you and i was like dude i need another day and you were like i was planning on monday anyway i was like good i was

like this i i'm just pouring hours into this and it's but that's watching a corner because here's the reality so much of watching corners is nothing happening that's part of the evaluation process and that's what that's what makes it so fascinating and every snap can be different you know like oh my god it's not like you can be like okay well i kind of already know what this guy is going to do it's just a matter of do i see consistency with it what do i see consistency with there's so many different things that could happen when you're playing corner every single snap is different so you got to watch a lot of these different snaps but yeah it has me excited for the field goal kickers summer scouting oh yeah

of course right of course yeah yeah uh did he make it yes okay good player did he miss okay bad from where okay 53 he's got a chance 48 no sorry stinks um a couple of other guys that i watched i watched tony grahams i watched kamari laster i watched malachi moore uh fentro cypress so like if you guys have any questions or thoughts on those guys hit us up in the comments i'll respond to them i'll respond a little bit more there um but oh yes i forgot to sneak in the second best name besides kool-aid mckinstry and this gives it a good run how about Woo Governor on Northern Iowa Woo Governor Woo Governor his name is DeMarcus but his his name is listed as Woo does he just do like the Ric Flair Woo like I hope so instead of you know like

the like the crossed hands like the no catch, no fly zone, he just does the two claps and a Ric Flair. Yeah, that would be... He'd be in my top five if that's the case. I can't even find where the nickname originated from. We'll work on it, folks. We'll bring you the best content going forward. Let us know what you thought of our rankings. And of course,

overall best way to do that is to get in on the comment section on the YouTube channel, youtube.com backslash NFL stock exchange. If you don't already subscribe to the channel, what are you doing? Smash subscribe, like the video. We'd really appreciate it. Really help the channel out. We're over 11,000 subscribers, which is freaking awesome. It was a big time goal to be over 10 000 before the season started so um this is really cool we're excited to rock with you guys as the season goes on we got one more position that we are getting

to which is the safety position in summer scouting and then like connor said we're going to take a little bit of time maybe it'll be a week but we might be able to do it in a week it might be a couple of days after that but we're going to get our big boards together like we did last year and connor's going to go over his pre-season big boards probably just going to be a top 50 i'll go over mine and then live on the show we will elaborate and come up with an official nflse top 50 big board going into the season. So all of that is coming. And then obviously that's going to give way to our very first 2024 NFL mock

draft, which we're going to do once the season gets kicked off as well. So be sure you guys are looking out for that. Connor, you got anything, got anything else for it? We get out of here. I just realized next week we get to evaluate Jalen Catalan for the third time. So shout out to the guy. We love Jalen Catalan on this podcast. I love Jalen Catalan. I'll never quit.

I'll never quit. He's going to be in my top five out of respect. I mean, there's just no other way. Even if we don't put him in there out of respect. He is now on Texas from Arkansas. Wait, he transferred to Texas? Yes, I know. This is kind of relatively new news to me, too.

When I started putting together the safety list, I was like, hmm. Fun player, dude. Oh, well, then he's in. Look, we're so back. He's never played it down as a longhorn before. So I'm taking all of his injury history, throwing it out the window. It never happened. Longhorn, great. It never happened. He's never been injured at Texas. Never been injured once.

I love it. I can't wait. It's Jalen Catalan and other Safety Week folks, so get excited for it. Appreciate you guys watching and listening to the show. We will see you next week. I'm Trevor Sikama. That's Connor Rogers. Thank you all so much for listening to the NFL Stock Exchange Podcast. We'll see you then. Bye.