NFL Stock Exchange: An NFL Draft Podcast - 200. 2024 NFL Draft Stock Watch (After Week 6 of CFB)

Episode Date: October 12, 2023

Hosts Trevor Sikkema and Connor Rogers give you some of the top risers on the big board midway through the 2023 college football season

This episode is brought to you by our good friends at NFL Sunday Ticket on YouTube TV. I'm sure by now you've all got back into your Sunday routines, but they could be even better. With NFL Sunday Ticket and YouTube TV, you get the most live NFL games all in one place, every game, every Sunday. And you can even watch up to four different games at once with MultiView, one of my favorite inventions of this decade. It's exactly what you need to catch all the action. Make your Sundays more magical. And also, YouTube TV is great. I got it this year.

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 are going through a new Stock Watch episode. We're going to have eight players to talk about with you guys. Well, actually, we're throwing a bonus in there. We're going to give you nine. Nine players that we've

seen in college football that are draft eligible, that are moving up the draft boards that you guys definitely need to know about 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 Podcast. I'm Trevor Sikama, that is Connor Rogers, joining you on a midweek episode where we are getting back to this show's roots. It is a Stock Watch episode, baby. College football, what's going on? There's chaos, we're into conference play now. A lot of heated matchups.

Connor, it is one hell of a college football slate this weekend. But we're here to talk about some of the guys that have been up and down throughout the season versus our preseason. Big board. It's going to be a good time. Connor, how you feel, my friend? I'm good, man. It was good to catch up on some prospects early in this week. See where, you know, what some of the risers are doing.

Some players that maybe we lightly checked in on some are making appearances. Well, new names as we always do and like you said Trevor it's a good time to do this because it feels like after this weekend everything else behind it is going to feel like a blur there's going to be new storylines there's going to be a top quarterback matchup with Michael Penix and Bo Nix there's just so much ahead of us that it's a good period of time to do a stock watch. I was going to mention that game, dude, we get Oregon versus Washington this weekend, baby. This could be a Titanic game for prospect evaluation.

Yeah. I mean, it's not just Bo Nix versus Michael Pennix. I mean, you got the corner from Oregon, Kyrie Jackson, who used to be an Alabama corner going up against Romo Dunze, Jalen McMillan, Jalen Polk from Washington. You've got Brandon Dorlis, who I really like on the Oregon defensive line, going up against your boy, Troy Fatton, now on the offensive line for Washington.

Like, this is a huge prospect matchup. We talk about the PAC 12 kind of like being at its peak right now, right before it's about to go away. This is the matchup that is really cool. I cannot wait for this one, man. It's going to be, it's must watch TV.

I'll treat this game. Honestly, like I would treat a conference title game almost like it's that big of a deal to me. And if, you know, obviously i cover the draft first and foremost um compared to actual college football and the draft ramifications there's never one game in terms of like the draft ramifications all matter from this one game

but in terms of the eyeballs on this game and the long roads that the two quarterbacks have had to get to this point on the national stage, it's a cool one. Yeah. No, it absolutely is. There's a couple other ones that matter. And I actually didn't plan on doing this at the beginning of the show. We won't go too deep into this,

but Caleb Williams goes up against Notre Dame at Notre Dame. That's huge because it feels like, I'm going to say it's been a cupcake schedule for caleb williams so far but let's get challenged on the road here right we don't see him in this environment very often i think is what you're angling at i agree and he's going up against a really good defensive line defensive line is playing really well in notre dame so i think that that's going to be a fun one miami at unc get a little tyler Van Dyke versus Drake May there.

I think that's definitely fun. And then UCLA versus Oregon State. Now, there's a reason why I'm really excited about this one. And I guess we can play that into the beginning of our Stockwatch episode, because the first guy that I'm going to bring to the table, Connor, I'm hijacking it. I know I normally give it to you right off the bat, but I got to hijack it here. Talisa Fuaga, the offensive tackle from Oregon State

going up against Latu Latu from UCLA. These are two of the best prospects that we have in this draft. Now, the stock watch part of it, we've already talked about Latu Pluny. You guys heard me talk about him in the preseason format and the preseason shows i recently moved latu up to my number one edge rusher position as a top 10 player and fuaga is one of those guys who i did not watch before the season i watched his teammate um Joshua Gray right was on some NFL draft board some early like watch list so I was like oh okay I'll watch him he's their left tackle and when I was watching him I was kind of underwhelmed by his tape last year I'm not gonna lie he's actually he's playing better

this year I will give him that but as I watched his tape I kept going who is the right tackle like who is this dude on the other side of the line scrimmage and i looked up his name but i i did not recognize the name at all whatsoever i not really heard anybody talk about it and so i didn't really put him on our radar we're just kind of running through a lot of different guys when it comes to summer scouting but um you know when we have we have our watch list and it's hard to deviate because we're trying to keep a set schedule. I watched him, Connor, and I'm going to let you know right now. He's in my top 25.

I immediately put this dude in my top 25. Six foot six, 331 pounds. And he is as much of a racer and mauler in the run game as you are going to find this year. The PFF grades are so good for this dude across the board this season. I mean, been insane compared to everyone else. So if you're listening to this podcast, good chance that you've had at least, you know, one ear, one eye towards the NFL draft. You've heard about how good Joe Alt has looked this season from Notre Dame Joe Alt and Talisa Fuaga are neck and neck for number one and number two graded offensive linemen in the entire FBS so that tells you what kind of category this dude is in he's got an 86.4 overall grade 77.0 pass grade, but a 90.1 run blocking grade.

This would be the third straight season in which he has had a overall blocking grade above 80. Every single year this guy has played, whether it was in a reserve role when he was getting limited time as a freshman or as a full-time starter for the first time last year of course this year as well he has been awesome he's one of those dudes connor where first of all i know i texted you about him did you get to watch him did you get i did so i he was on my summer watch list not as a priority watch only because obviously his teammate you already said joshua gray and i noticed the run blocking great over summer where I was like, dang, this guy is, you know, he's really grading out.

Well, he'll be somebody to keep an eye on as well. And then he didn't make our, our tackle show in depth. And then you look at him expanding on what he did last year, this year in our system. I just watched some of the impact blocks that he's made. And this is what we would call somebody that can relocate other humans. Yes, yes, that's a good,

that's a very good way to put it. So to give people a little bit of a, you know, a behind the scenes look at the PFF ultimate tool, we have a lot of different ways that the data in the film are categorized. Like you can put a lot of different filters on there data in the film are categorized. Like you can put a lot of different filters on there to say like, Hey, I only want to watch, you know, third down throws for a quarterback where the distance is more than eight yards or something

like that. Or, Hey, I just want to watch goal line or short yardage opportunities for running backs, whatever it is. One of the categories that we have that every prospect has this, this column is they're called key plays. And essentially it's any play that is graded as not zero. So zero in PFF system is, yeah, you did your job. Like you did what was expected. It was fine. Like you didn't screw up. You didn't make all the difference in the world.

Like you just, you did your job on this play individually. But key plays are the really good difference making plays or the really bad ones when you grade very highly you're gonna have a lot more key plays that are those major difference making plays i went to watch i cannot remember who they just played this past week but i went to watch this past week's game of fuwaga and i start the film watching process and i'm like six plays into it. And I'm like, am I on the key plays category? What's going, because, because he completely erased like four guys in a row on four consecutive plays.

And I made sure I double checked and no, I wasn't on the key plays. I was just on the regular plays. And that's what we're talking about here, man. This guy's got people moving strength and he's got that mentality too. When he throws you to the ground, he does the thing that offensive linemen love to do where they just, they will finish you to the ground where it is. I will throw you to the ground, but then I'm making sure you don't get up. And if the running back happens to be behind me, you're not going to have any chance to get up and tackle this dude so he's got a finisher's mentality and then in the past game I feel like okay he's a little heavy because he's six foot six 330 pounds

but I thought the handwork was great already the feet were still nimble for a guy his size there were times where his hands like he's baiting rushers that are coming at him to get them to flash their hands first, almost like a, you know, like a ghost move that a pass rusher would do, except doing that on the offensive tackle side of things. And it's that stuff that he's showing is just a true junior along with those physical gifts that tell me this guy can hold up in the NFL. I think from what we have already seen so far this season,

he has starting NFL tackle potential. And I, like I said, I love this tape. I've got him in my top 25 right now. He has a major test against Latu Latu from UCLA. And I'm really looking forward to seeing those two face off this weekend. I love it. He, like I said, I got to see some of the run blocking film. He is somebody that you can run behind. He can completely erase people in front of him. Seeing him, what we expect to see, plenty of reps, on an island against one of the best pass rushers in the country.

Maybe the most polished pure pass rusher in the country, I think. I think so too. Yeah, like I like the upside from an athletic standpoint of verse and chop more but i think if you had to drop one person on an nfl field right now and say beat the nfl tackle like layout to lot to has the deepest arsenal yeah so the deepest bag the deepest yeah there you go absolutely so that that's a great one to call out. And you mean you were texting a little about this guy, you know, over the last couple of days. And it's yeah, he he pops. He absolutely pops. And, you know, for a lot of teams needing right tackle, what he can do for your run game is just it's a total difference maker. And somebody else that's making a giant difference in their run game is USC's Marshawn Lloyd,

who arguably is having the best season for a college running back in the country right now. Arguably, there's been plenty of good ones. But when you look at Marshawn Lloyd, who transferred from South Carolina to USC, I mean, he is just completely changed their rushing attack and completely changed his game as well. And I'm sure there's more space for him running in this USC offense. But as much as that's the obvious Trevor against Arizona last week, he forced 10 missed tackles. He's already forced 31 missed tackles on the year. And you turn on the tape with this dude, the jump cut is extremely explosive.

He has one highlight that I posted on Twitter was that LT style jump cut, right? Where it just totally leaves the defender grasping for air. He looks really explosive when he has to run outside. But I also like the vision and patience to stay inside at times as well. And I think he has pretty run outside. But I also like the vision and patience to stay inside at times as well. And I think he has pretty good contact balances. Well, he looks for a guy that's five, nine to 10. It feels like his pound for pound strength is extremely effective, where I do

see tacklers kind of bounce off of him, especially when they hesitate because of how elusive he could be as well. So when you look at Lloyd, i think he has a little bit of ways to go as a receiving back staying on the field as a pass protector and overall affecting the game as a receiving back although he's made some some impressive plays there as well i just want to see the consistency with it but trevor as a pure runner i've been blown away with what this guy can do um because it's you know didn't watch a ton of him at South Carolina. I know he got a lot of work last year for that team, but he just looks like,

he feels like he is a totally different player in this USC offense. He has been one of the top risers from the running back group, from those players that we watched over the summer. There's no doubt about that. He has been, he's been he's been electric and you know USC's offense is I don't want to say like it's gimmicky like it does I feel like it does by nature create a lot of space for you because it's so stressful for how they will stretch the field and how they will stretch defenses out but

Marshawn Lloyd is creating on his own so I don don't want people to just be like, yeah, he's a back in USC system. Like it's not going to translate. He's still making guys miss and he's still got that athletic ability. So this dude was a former four-star recruit, ended up going to South Carolina. They were really excited about him. And he tore his ACL and missed his entire first season with South Carolina because of that injury.

Then of course you know how it is when you're covering recovering from an ACL injury all right well then 2021 was kind of just a I'm trying to get trust back in that knee last year was certainly his best year and then he transfers over to USC from South Carolina and uh and we're seeing the best version of Marshawn Lloyd right now. So, um, yeah, I, I absolutely love the shout out. I think that's a good one. I got two more running backs that I'd love to throw out at you that have really been standing out in college football. To me, the first one is Jonathan Brooks from Texas. I did not watch Jonathan Brooks going

into the year. Neither did I. I've only seen him on the broadcast. He was just a redshirt sophomore going into this year. He's a redshirt sophomore right now. So I'm like, all right, well, you know, we didn't know a lot about this player. There's no telling if he's going to break out. And even it's just a redshirt sophomore with as good of a year as he is having, there's no guarantee that he is going to declare for the draft,

but six foot tall, 205 pounds pounds 73rd percentile in height 26 percentile in weight i did some background digging on him because i like to fill out the little background section of the scouting report when i'm getting guys for the first time so he was a former four-star running back from the state of texas how about this rushed for rushed for 3 500 yards which is seventh most all-time in texas history and 62 touchdowns that is that's insanity 62 touchdowns in a call in a high school career like i know i got bored of scoring right he probably ran out of celebrations after 28 he just hands the ball to ref because all right i'm ready to go he's a little younger he's probably got those the the fortnight animations you know every every e-boat or whatever it is right yeah so how about this though in one game he rushed for 27. He had 27 rushing attempts.

501 rushing yards, which was 18.6 yards per carry, and nine touchdowns in a playoff game. 500 yards, nine touchdowns on 27 carries in a playoff game. That's absurd. It's just truly truly absurd i had to say it on the show no but he's playing he is playing great here for texas i think they're leaning on him very well you know i you i personally wondered what texas run game was going to look like not that it's a uh poverty program in any shape or form i mean they get good good recruits but you're not only losing bijan robinson you're losing roshan johnson as well which was somebody who people touted as hey

you know if roshan wasn't at texas he'd be an rb1 so many other places in the country when you lose both of those guys that's kind of tough so brooks takes over now as the redshirt sophomore and um he's just playing very very well he's playing well with his offensive line and independent of his offensive line he's got a 0.35 forced missed tackles per attempt average um i just think that he has a really nice combination of all-around athletic ability and the vision in confidence are getting even better those early games he was playing so far this season you could tell it was basically like all right i'm following my offensive line here no matter what and there's a little bit of that still but man recently

you could tell he's getting a little bit more confident on okay i'm gonna i'm gonna cut back here here's his own flow and i'm i'm i got enough confidence to cut back because i think this is where the space is going to be or you see him be a little bit more nimble on his feet with that really good size. So I'm seeing these flashes of him to be a fantastic all-around back as we are moving forward. So a young player, but somebody who I wanted to shout out on this show who's having a really good year. No, I love it i i love what you brought up of how he's looked different as he's gotten more touches because i see the confidence that you're seeing on the broadcast is that you know he's interesting i didn't know that about his high school background trevor and i'm glad you brought it up but you look at him i mean combining

2021 and 2022 he said 51 carries. So he's been, you know, whatever you want to call it, sitting in rice or, you know, he's cold. Like he's coming into the year as a starter, ice cold after being somebody that never didn't have the ball in high school. And then it's two years of not really ever getting the ball. And I think that's really important to keep an eye on how that confidence grows throughout the season as the guy after really having two years off. And I see what you see is somebody that is more confident going out of scheme when he needs to or trying to get a little bit more meat off the bone at times as well.

And it's easy to see when somebody has their confidence in the legs under them, they look more explosive and he's looked more explosive. So I really liked that one as well. Did you want to do your second running back or do you want to ping pong back? No, I like to keep the running backs all together. Cause these are, these are guys that like we didn't talk about over summer and they've just look awesome.

Ray Davis from Kentucky. So I haven't seen a lot of him dude i unfortunately saw way too much of him because he ran for 280 yards against my florida gators and it was tough watch for me but obviously you know ray is having a hell of a year and ray's been on quite the journey so he's he is a redshirt senior now with kentucky he's 5 foot 10 215. So he's, he is a red shirt senior now with Kentucky. He's five foot 10, 215 pounds. So he's a little bit bigger of a back three-star running back recruit out of New Jersey. But man, I mean, his story starts before he was a high school player in New Jersey, coming from New Jersey.

So he was born in San Francisco. He has 14 different siblings, spent time in foster care and even homeless shelters as a child due to both of his parents being incarcerated throughout his childhood. And so this guy has, he's got an incredible story that I encourage everybody to go look up and to read because people have done much better and deeper journalism on the true appreciation of where Ray Davis has come in life to even get to this point. And just kind of as a SparkNotes version of it,

with so much chaos and uncertainty going on in his life growing up, he really just went to sports as those like moments to look forward to in the week and throughout the day and everything and really he just there was a point in one of the stories i was reading that um he just wanted to essentially get to high school just to play high school sports and like then that was going to be it but like that was his goal like his goal wasn't college football it wasn't the nfl like he literally just wanted to get into a high school so that he could keep playing sports and they just could keep playing football and um obviously like he ends up becoming a three-star recruit in football

he starts his career at temple plays for temple uh plays there for two years ends up going to vanderbilt transferring to vanderbilt he played for vanderbilt the last two seasons and now he is with Kentucky and man this dude is fun to watch I mean as if the 280 yards against one opponent wouldn't tell you that already I mean he's averaging more than 0.3 missed tackles force per attempt he's got over 64 yards after contact this guy's contact balance is fantastic not only do I think he's got good vision to make sure he can avoid that contact, which he did plenty of times against Florida, when he does go up against different tacklers, he's got a really nice center of gravity, really good core strength,

and his balance is fantastic. That's a trait that I love for a running back. More than 64% of his yards right now have come after contact. And then when you look at the previous seasons and let's face it playing at temple all due respect temple and vanderbilt not the best offensive lines in the world more than 70 of his yards every single year up to this year have come after contact so this is a dude that what i'm trying to say is Arthur Smith's going to draft in round three somewhere or might he will vulture touchdowns or somebody is drafting this dude who's going to

absolutely pound the rock but it's more than just that he's got a really nice yards per route run average he had 38 targets last year in the receiving game I think he's already got 16 this year and he's doubled his yards per route run this year and how Kentucky is using him and leaning on him. So we're getting the best version of this dude as a redshirt senior. And I know some people look at running backs who are upperclassmen and they shy away. They're like, no, no, no, I'm not really interested. If you're not, you know, 21 as a running back, I'm not really interested in you. Davis has the type of story, running style, production, everything of a back that i mean he's threatened in the first round or anything but anywhere from the mid rounds i think

this guy could have his name called it could be a really nice part of an nfl committee that's a fun one i always like the guys that not only come from adversity like that, which is really sad, but really impressive, but also it's taken him a while to get that recognition, right? We live in a world where, especially with the coverage nowadays, we see a five-star recruit, he commits somewhere, and then by his sophomore year, he could be a national name. And then before that junior year, you're already declaring him a top 10 pick in the draft and that college career is already over and good for the players that can do that but how about the guys that are redshirt seniors and have to kind of you know fight it out to even be drafted or break into a camp and find that nfl career and that is clearly uh a player like that

yeah and i think that ray dav Davis is absolutely one of those players. Hey, we'll get to your next one, but this time of year, everybody knows it's about setting up that routine, that checklist, whether it's the back to school, you're getting the work grind ready, whether it's, you know, handling things for your family, whatever it is, you're setting up your checklist of what you want to get done. And the most important thing on that checklist should always be securing your family's financial future. Starting with life insurance. Fabric by Gerber Life makes it quick

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Connor, who you got next? How about Steve Linton, the pass rusher from Texas tech that transferred from Syracuse. And this is somebody that we, we probably briefly mentioned over the summer. It's not like some shocking name out of nowhere, but he definitely fits the mold of, you know, he's had a long road to get here. He, in four years at Syracuse, Trevor had five sacks.

Last week against Baylor, he had three. He had three against Baylor? I haven't checked in on him, so that's incredible. I've kind of been waiting for this week because tracking Linton's progress throughout the year, he is winning, notably as a stand-up rusher, at an effective rate.

His total pass rush win rate this year is 18.2%. But weeks, his first one, two, three, four, five games, he didn't have a sack. He was just generating pressure. And that's still effective. It still gets the job done.

But you want to finish those plays. And then against Baylor, those pressures, it all just kind of clicked together. And he was just getting there a hair quicker. And he has the three sacks. And here's the thing with lynn right like you watch his full tape he's not going to be this every down kind of player i don't think he's a particularly effective run defender he is a stand-up situational pass rusher that has

some tools at six foot five 235 but what i like this year trevor in the role that tech kind of has him playing it kind of feels like maybe this is part of him transferring there. They're like, we know what you are. We think you have some tools and you can stand up on the edge from some wide alignments and really rush on an island. And we're going to let you do that. And he's trying things. He's trying a spin move. We've seen the arm over. We've seen the long arm. They've got him going on stunts because of the type of athlete he is and it's okay to see a prospect that has limitations you're not trapped in saying one day he's going to play 75 of the snaps in our defense but maybe you take him on day three of the draft and you go on third and long like if you're a team that plays with elite a lot we got a dude that can come in our nascar package and kind of make things happen and he's got a different array of moves and he's got

an experience as this stand-up athlete rusher so Linton's an interesting guy to track because even when you look at him before he transferred to tech from Syracuse you go man there are some tools there as an effective pass rusher but we just haven't seen it really turn into down by down production and it was good for him last week having those three sacks because the underlying numbers were there of beating the defenders in front of him but now he gets it in the traditional box score yeah no it's it's good to see i just as you were talking i was kind of going over my notes of him from the summer and it was a lot of what you were saying uh it was a lot of hey this player is probably a specialized guy at the nfl level he's not going to be called on as a run defender just because you know if you're a if you're even a stand-up outside linebacker you're sitting around

230 235 whatever he's weighing now that's still really light for the nfl and just as a run defender it's going to be hard to kind of hold your own but on those special packages I do agree I think that there is there's there's absolutely a space for that as you are building out your roster and it may might not be something that gets drafted above the third round but when you are rounding out your team you want guys like that that you can be able to throw out the line of scrimmage so um i definitely like that one did you you did you watch him for summer i can't remember did you yeah a little bit because i remember um do you like him a little more now is he you think he's playing a little bit better now i do i think that well i think he's getting an opportunity that's really what it is to me not that i'm not saying syracuse misused him or anything but it just feels like for tech tech has a total understanding by year

five of what he is and they're maximizing that so it's fair i i don't think i don't see him as somebody like challenging to be a top edge rusher in this class but a depth guy with tools that is also expanding his moves package he's somebody i will follow to the very end and i'm i think we'll see him at the senior bowl which is always one of my favorite parts of the draft process more for entertainment is those one-on-ones where we're down on the field yes uh you know and it's where we got to see darnell right last year and will mcdonald jones will donald it was pretty it's pretty freaking cool part of the process i think Linton, I think, will have his moments there. When you do have those specialized guys, when you get into those one-on-one situations,

sometimes you can make for some pretty good social media clips, and that's the case. Yes. Steve Linton might be one of those guys. Get your retweets from Steve Linton. Yeah, listen. Look, I'll Venmo him whatever Twitter sends me that month if he contributes to the engagement.

I really will. I forgot you're a verified. I am, yeah. Yeah, through PFF, by the way. I don't pay for it myself, but look. Hey, collect those checks. We're out here collecting those checks. Look, those $18 checks, I mean, they hit hard.

From memes. Yeah. The second I get them, I head to chipotle and i go yeah we're going we're going we're going we're ordering the car loft this today baby twitter's paying for this bad boy you bring your you bring your forklift with you and you order the car loft system bringing home and you got rice for four months uh okay so i'll stick along the uh the edge rush train here and i want to shout out man we highlighted latu at the top of the show an edge rusher that i absolutely love well his teammate gabriel murphy is also having another really nice year because he had a nice year last year as well

former north texas transfer six foot three round 255 260 but i just when i watch ucla especially their defensive line i don't know who their defensive line coach is but he needs a raise the way that latu and murphy i would say subtly yet precisely disengage the hands of the offensive tackles in front of them it's like they're so rarely locked up the hands are always moving they're swiping these things away it's it and Murphy all that to say Murphy is that kind of a player right now his pass rush win percentage over the last two years since he transferred from North Texas to UCLA it was 18.6 last year he had 248 pass rush snaps and through 87 pass rush snaps this year he's upped it even a little bit more into the 20s now he's got a 20.7 pass rush win percentage um and a 24.1 pressure percentage which is also up from what it was last

year so man i i just don't think this guy's getting enough love and it's not like they play him in specific situations where it's very obvious where his strengths are able to win i'm watching the game against washington state week, and they got Murphy lined up at 4-I in a tight formation. Like, they got him standing up over the nose. So he'll play 3-4 outside linebacker for UCLA, but they get very creative with where they play their guys. And I'm very shocked that they play Murphy between the tackles as much as they do, because he looks and feels like a player who you would just want to have attack the outside shoulder of offensive

tackles. And it's very clear that they trust him more than that. So he's not afraid to play inside. You can kick him outside, which I think is going to be his normal home as a three, four outside linebacker, but I don't think he's getting enough love, man. I think he is. I really do feel like he is a mid round pick type of a player who maybe not as specialized as the billing is on him right now.

I think he's more of an all around defensive lineman than that. So I'm just very impressed with his production once again this year. And he's been a player for that program, you know, for a couple of years now where when you look at that side of it too, I mean, it's, it's not like this is just, it has come out of nowhere in terms of what he looks like now. But yeah, he's another one that, you know, you can also kind of be overshadowed by your,

your teammate in that situation and right those are always interesting to me when you have a superstar on one front but then it's like hey don't overlook this dude that can also play he's not just cleaning up getting cleanup production from that other player too yeah so i like that i like that shout out from you and somebody that i will definitely keep an eye on this year. My last one, or second-to-last one here, is definitely the most high-profile name, I think. Oh, saving the best for last. Look at you. Second-to-last.

Sorry, second-to-last. Oh, yeah, you got two more after this. Okay. Yeah. Ohio State corner, Denzel Burke. Nice. Who had his big moment with that hit that I saw saw you you repost as well i mean that was a bone crushing hit not soul crushing this is time for bone crushing right very reminiscent of

denzel ward's hit very which is kind of funny something if you play corner for ohio state your name's denzel you are going to get an absolute bone crushing hit on a wide receiver at some point in your Buckeyes career. Burke's really becoming one of the more interesting defensive backs in this class to me rapidly, right? Because you look at him going all the way back to his background, his recruiting profile. He was a four-star recruit he was top 10 in his position group in that class which was athlete right nobody really knew exactly where he would land in the college level because in high school he played receiver and defensive back and he was really effective honestly as an offensive player as well the problem is he basically misses his senior season due to injury

plays one game of senior season, misses the rest of his year and was still a four star recruit. So this is a big time player. You look at the length, six foot one. He's very, very athletic. He's got good size for the position. Ohio State brings him in and they're like, OK, you're going to be a corner. And he's somebody that played right away for them and

looked really, really good as a freshman. Right. And then you look at 2022, some inconsistencies, but it feels like this year for Denzel Burke, it's all starting to sink in about him being a cornerback, right? He's got the length. He's got the speed. He can turn and run. He can close down and make hits underneath as well. I think he's got some ball skills. I mean, when you just look at the film and track some of the numbers here, he's only allowed 11 catches on 26 catchable targets, and he's forced eight incompletions. So this is somebody that is extremely disruptive at the catch point right now. Once again, I love the size. We talk about the top corners in this draft all the time whether it's Kalen King Kool-Aid McKinstry Cooper Dajin but I'm starting to see the back end around

one with TJ Tampa and Denzel Burke and that could also be top 40 top 50 but there are corners on the back end that are really good athletes that are finding the football this year that have unique backgrounds Burke being that athlete as a recruit Tampa having a basketball background that it feels like it's starting to click for them this year and I would bet on the athletes with size at the position that are starting to find the football Burke's going to be a really really big riser this year and at the rate he's going he could genuinely play himself into the first round burke was talked about as a potential first round pick going into this season and i remember you and i watching his film um this summer and correct me if i'm wrong but when when i was ranking him i certainly remember saying on the pod like i don't see that from his he had a bad 2022 it was a fall off from

21 and i don't really know why was he hurt i mean maybe college is weird because like you could if you know somebody at the school obviously we don't release this kind of info you can get better stories but publicly you don't really i mean look at treyvion henderson last year it's like oh cool he was playing with a broken foot at running back. Yeah, sure. Right. Like this is kind of the problem with college injuries. It kind of falls into the bucket that hockey injuries do where it could be like, hey, he's got a lower body.

Thanks. Did he stub his toe or did he tear his ACL? Yeah. Or did his leg get blown off by a grenade? You know, which one is. Dude, it's not. You'll never know until the playoffs are over. You'll just you'll never know until the playoffs are over you'll just you'll never know but more often than not when a guy has that kind of drop off of a year

it's there's something you don't know yeah i just wonder if he if he was not healthy because he looked way more confident as a freshman which maybe it was one of those things where i guess i'll call it blind confidence like hey I'm at Ohio State now I'm balling out I'm playing corner they move me to corner this is my position and maybe he just didn't get challenged a ton that freshman year so he was just riding high the whole year and then that sophomore year okay he's a full-time starter now now they're starting to throw the ball at him he's starting to lose some of those one-on-ones and maybe the confidence dip, but I did notice, because again,

I went back to my summer scouting notes as you were talking about him. I noted that the, I would say the last quarter of the season in 2022 Burke looked better. So I, I, I wonder if he was healthy. I wonder if he was hurt in the early parts of the year and then he was healthy at the backend part of the year, because this year, again,

we are seeing a much more confident player. And I don't know if he's going to be a first rounder. I got to really go back and do a deep dive on him. I've seen a little bit of it. I've watched a game of him, but I want to be able to watch more than that. But he's certainly, he is,

he is one of the risers that I've had on the PFF big board this year because of how well even he's been playing from from the little bit that I've been able to watch. Um, hey, this episode, this podcast is brought to you by our friends over at prize picks. have two prize pick entries for you that we're gonna pitch and talk about here so that you guys can understand what prize picks is all about what we're kind of shouting out here and why it would actually behoove y'all to get in on the action connor said he had a little bit yet you know moderate and humble success at prize pick yeah moderate is a good way to put it. No, the man's rich. The man's absolutely filthy rich. Ask me in three months if any of the money is still there.

That's why he moved locations, folks, is because now he's in a ranch-style mansion next to Central Park because of the success that he's had on. No, no, no. It's true. Prize picks is a very fun way to kind of get skin in the game and have some fun with NFL games. So, Connor, give me two price pick entries that you're looking at this week.

Let's just focus on Thursday Night Football. In the weeks that follow, we'll open it up a little bit. We'll talk about the Sunday games, but let's just focus on Thursday Night Football. What are two entries that you like? I like the slogan that you just reinvented for prize picks. Prize picks, it could change your life. Yeah, I think it's really good. Okay, so two entries I'm looking at. I like the slogan that you just reinvented for prize picks. Prize picks. It could change your life. Yeah, I think it's really good.

Okay, so two entries I'm looking at. You and I have decided we're going to focus on Thursday this week. You know, in the future, we'll open it up to a lot of different games here. I'm going to look at the two of the running backs in this game. And with Jarek McKinnon, his receiving yards entry is set at 13 and a half. I'm going to take more than that. Okay. Rather than more.

I think McKinnon, this is what the Chiefs do. They kind of, you know, preserve McKinnon. They don't need to use him a lot. I could see him getting that off of one catch, though, in this game. And then on the other side, with Javante Williams to the Broncos, I'm going to go less on his rushing yards that are at 35 and a half. I think Javante is clearly trying to work his way back from injury. I think the Chiefs are going to really force the Broncos to throw in this game. It's not like Jaleel McLaughlin where it's like, oh man, that one sweep he had, he went for 40 yards. Nothing against Javiovante who's still working his

way back into being his top form i just like the less on his rushing yards trevor okay all right that's not good for my fantasy team but maybe it'll be maybe it'll be good for uh for your wallet there so i will talk about for my two the most intriguing ones i'll go opposite ends in the spectrum for the potential trade target receivers that the Broncos have going up against the Chiefs here. For Corlin Sutton, his receptions are three and a half. I'm going less. I like that.

I would go with that as well. I mean, his targets are trending in the wrong direction over the last couple of weeks. I didn't love the body language even that I saw from him. It feels like – That's good. It was bad. Yeah. It doesn't feel like he's got that fire lit underneath him um and i think i think jerry

judy will all right jerry judy the receiving yards 52 and a half he's been close to it the last couple of weeks he had 50 receiving yards and 52 so this is is a good line, but I'm going more, I'm going more than 52 and a half receiving yards for Judy. He's going to see the opportunity to get dealt to a better situation and he's going to ride high. He's going to make it happen. He's going to, he's basically going to put his resume out there and ask for the dolphins to please trade for him. That's what he's doing. And that's a good one. I'm with you on on i think you're on thinking the right thing there because when you look at the

chiefs as good of a defense that they have uh they've been vulnerable in the slot before and i feel like judy does get some time in this like it's a lot of time in the slot this year right he's playing in the slot 70 of the time which he should he should he should that's his skill set yeah i mean compared to last year he was in the slot only 54 of the time so jump up we gotta we gotta we gotta get those numbers up yeah we gotta pump up those numbers so anybody that has not caught on yet a price picks it's a skill-based real money daily fantasy sports game. That's what it is.

How does it work? Well, you pick two to six players, and if they will go more or less than their prize pick projections, well, that's where you can win up to 25 times your money on any entry. At prize picks, you aren't competing against other people. It's just you versus the prize pick projections. Entries can be made in 60 seconds or less. It is that easy.

They're even offering frequent discounts, bonuses, and other exciting offers. Go to prizepicks.com backslash NFLSE. Use the promo code NFLSE for a first deposit match up to $100. So we're going to be talking about these things. I know. I know. So we're going to be talking about these prize pick selections or entries throughout the season.

So y'all go get that $100 match. Use the promo code NFLSC. PrizePicks.com backslash NFLSC. Use the promo code NFLSC. Get the deposit match up to $100. All right, I can't remember. No. Go ahead, go ahead.

I'm pretty sure PrizePix does. They do. 40-yard dash times before the combine. So if that promo code's still working, then we'll have a field day. You and I can sit here and do three shows on 40 times. The combine pick episode is actually going to have some cheddar cheese on it. Right. Thanks to our friends over at prize picks yeah uh who's your last guy we'll go your last guy okay so i always like to do

on these i like to throw in a name that there's probably like four people in the country talking about and three of them are definitely fans of the school and then just i try i try and then i try for it to be me so how about michigan tight end aj barner okay okay obviously not somebody that is a big focal point of their receiving game he is six foot six he's 250 pounds he transferred from indiana where he did catch three touchdowns last year, and it was a team captain. Michigan obviously runs the absolute hell out of the football,

and they got a good offensive line. Zach Zinner's been a really good run blocker this year. Again, no surprise. This dude, A.J. Barner, though, is a key cog in their run game. He really, really is. I got to watch his run blocking tape just because once again,

there's another guy that pops on ultimate when you look at you wrote, you explained it really well before Trevor of zero graded plays like you did your job. It didn't overly impact the play for negative or positive reasons. Barner just in the run game and he's had 124 run blocking snaps.

He's had what ultimate would define as impact blocks, I believe 30 plus times or something like that. 30% is it 30% or 30 just whatever? I think 31 of those snaps. So you're looking probably closer to 25-ish percent, which is still. I mean, still, that's 25 is really good. It's really, really good.

And I'll pull up the exact number before I close the book on him here. But he's had 17 pass blocking snaps hasn't surrendered to pressure and then exactly 25 of his run blocking snaps out of 124 he's had a positive impact block and i mean he's really strong he plays a really good leverage considering his height he moves, he's really strong. He plays a really good leverage considering his height. He moves well. He's a good athlete for his size. He's a tough guy in the trenches. He finishes blocks. He keeps his feet moving through blocks.

He climbs the linebackers. But I'll tell you this. They put him on the line of scrimmage, and he'll just go helmet to helmet against true defensive line players as well. It's not just, hey, I got the 225 pound linebacker i'm climbing to so barner the reality is these are the guys that do not get discussed at all during the draft process because it's just you know but there's guys that hang around the league

for 10 years as a tight end two or three because they can block and they're big enough to have an impact in the red zone if need be on wide open routes so barner deserves some love uh that transfer from indiana is working out really well for him and really well for michigan coming over as a team captain obviously a really good sign for his draft pedigree as well and he's somebody that will find a way into this tight end class as a true wide tight end. Love it. I love the shout-out. Love it. Now it's more than four people.

Now you won't hear his name until pick 234 in April. AJ Barra, you are pick 234. To the Houston Texans. Oh, Houston Texans. I actually like that. All right, last guy that I'm going to bring to the houston texans oh houston texans i actually like that all right last guy that i'm gonna bring to the table um i don't think i've talked about him here on the show before jalen sims the defensive back from auburn i don't think that we've talked about him yet we haven't he's i mean he's he's going off there's no other there's no other way to say it four interceptions big time interceptions

massive playmaker because of that he has earned an elite 91.3 coverage grade this season he is auburn safety six foot one actually let me make sure i get the measurements right here because i think they're a little different than what auburn has six feet tall so he's six feet tall 180 pounds now unfortunately for a, which he's playing now, six feet tall is the 34th percentile. 180 pounds for a safety is the first percentile. There are not many safeties who are that light. And the reason why he is that light is because he is a former cornerback. He basically in his entire career before this point played corner for auburn and it was mainly as an outside corner he played not much his true freshman season in 2019 i think you redshirted that year

2020 he played 189 snaps at wide corner the next closest was 14 snaps as a like box defender then he played 511 snaps on the outside in 2021 next closest was 15 as a slot corner so not not even close last year he played 235 as a wide corner a little bit more action in the slot and in the box but then this past year most of his snaps have come as a box safety or a free safety now a lot of his work again has been highlighted by the four interceptions that he has in coverage which have been highly impactful plays he's also only given up 32 yards in coverage the issue with Simpson and kind of the reason why I wanted to bring him up on the show because a lot of people are like hey is this dude a top safety in the draft or what i don't think so because the run defense grades and the

pass rush grades are low because just the body size is so low this is somebody who i think they moved him to safety because and i watched a little bit of his tape last year to see why they might have made the move. He is a good athlete, but he's not very comfortable playing with his back to the ball. And Auburn is a pretty aggressive scheme of you are on the outside. We're either playing you in man coverage or you're like an off cover three. And I think he was a lot better in off cover three because when they tried to play him in press coverage at the line scrimmage, he just did not look nearly as comfortable in trail technique. And when playing with his back to the ball. So it's tough to continue to throw corners on the outside when they don't

feel that comfortable knowing that if you play a lot of man coverage, that's just what you're going to have to be in. You've got to be comfortable in trail technique. You've got to be good at reading the eyes and the body language or the receiver to know when the ball is kind of coming your way without even looking at it you can't have that panic and it just felt like Jalen just didn't have that confidence playing with his back to the ball so they move him to safety and because he is able to keep his eyes downhill and where the ball is with the quarterback he's been able to bait them a lot more go and throw his body in front of these passes for

interceptions and it's been really it's been working out really well in coverage as you would hope would be the case for a former corner who is now playing more as a safety but there are deficiencies in the run game and in the strength portion of the game. And when those interceptions stop showing up, basically every week, like they have so far this season, what kind of a safety prospect is Jalen Simpson? And we'll exactly, you know, if you are in, if you are just straight up an interception machine, like we talk about Kalen Bullock like that, right. From USC, where his run defense scores and his

tackling not good but his range is so nuts and his ball skills are so crazy and he's got so many damn interceptions over the last two years that you almost go okay I guess we're just gonna have to live with it so it's it's it's essentially is Jalen simpson gonna be what caitlin bullock is or is it really gonna cool on him i think that's what the second half of the season is gonna be for him that's always the tough part right is the feast or famine nature at a position that you can't deal with some of the famine at times i think we have this conversation a lot right it's like there's positions that you can have high variance and i'm trying to think of a good example of a position honestly pass rusher like there's guys i would throw on the field and be like man honestly this dude is not going to set

a great edge all the time but he is so effective at getting after the quarterback that we can live with that. But offensive line and safety, when you talk about variance, like when you're bad is really, really bad. The play's over. The play is over because of you. So,

right. It's, it's a weird balance. Not to just knock the dude like that. I don't mean it like that, but it's how I look at scouting positions and from previous misses or what you learn and things like that yeah no i would agree and i'm not i'm not totally trying to like kill the scouting report either it was just a when we do these episodes yeah it's more of a we're bringing this guy to the table

here's what we kind of need to see from him as the as the year goes on and again if Simpson continues to be this this interception machine and he's just reading quarterbacks minds as a back-end player that's extremely valuable that that is something that okay maybe he's a little high variance but like Kalen Bullock you're still probably a top 50 player because of how you can impact the game with turnovers and every coach in the world tells you that that's what matters most so um I think that that's kind of where the conversation starts when it comes to what Jalen Simpson has been this season. We're brought to you today by our friends over at Manscaped who have taken a step up from ball-a-ween

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And that's why people listen to the whole thing. Yeah, so that is the StockWatch episode. Let us know what you have seen in college football over the last couple of weeks. We would love to hear the prospects that are going up and down. I'm updating the pff draft board to 200 players after this weekend so if you are a mock draft simulator user you will soon have the ability to look at a list of 200 ranked players for the 2024 nfl draft which will also unlock a fifth round in the mock draft simulator.

So if you are a PFF subscriber, you will be able to draft up to five rounds. You degenerates were handing it to you. We're giving it to you. It's like that. It's like that meme of the guy and the girl in bed and they're sleeping face in the opposite ways. Yeah.

And she's like, he's thinking about other girls and his, his cloud bubble is can't wait till the mock simulator can draft for seven rounds that's what i really think of right away with that we're trying to get there we're trying i'm trying to get there i'm trying to watch as many players as possible it's sickening you're at a great pace we're proud of yourself we gotta rank a lot of guys to unlock seven rounds but we will get there before the season is over. Yeah, I believe in this.

But yeah, let us know what you guys have thought over college football, what you've seen, some of these prospects, whether it's players that we have mentioned or players that we haven't mentioned here on the show. We'd love to hear from you. YouTube.com backslash at NFL Stock Exchange, the best way for you to be able to do that. If you are not on YouTube or listening to this audio only,

at Tampa Bay Trey and at Connor J. Rogers is where you can hit us up on X and Instagram. Connor, you got anything else before we get out of here? I think that sums it up pretty well. I'm trying to think what well next week is where we plan the shows on the show, which we are absolutely phenomenal at. I feel like we'll keep what matters most going. Yeah, I think so so i think we'll do it i think we'll do that again and then wednesday i mean leave in the comments what you want if you want a notes episode where we hold up topics if you want a stock watch if you want you know we could you know we could do we could do there's as as more people have been using the mock draft simulator there's more data on which players

have been selected the most for each team so i think that they're whether we do it on wednesday or some other time yeah we could have like this update of like fan base trends like who these fan bases are drafting for these certain play for these i'm totally down with that i think it's a great time to do it and then it's something we could look back on a couple months later and see how things change all right well if you guys like that idea let us know uh we could also do the no notes thing i think we'll bring that back no matter what so whether it's next week or or whenever we do it but uh y'all are in control of the show as much as us so let us know what you want to see on wednesday we'll probably have what matters most coming up on monday got that to look forward to i I'm Trevor Sykema. That is Connor Rogers. Thank you guys so much for watching and listening

to the NFL Stock Exchange Podcast. See you on Monday. Thank you.