NFL Stock Exchange: An NFL Draft Podcast - 266. Ranking 2025 NFL Draft Safeties (Summer Scouting)

Episode Date: August 30, 2024

0:00 - Intro 8:25 - Hunter Wohler, Wisconsin 13:05 - Rod Moore, Michigan 16:05 - Akili Arnold, USC 19:20 - Xavier Nwankpa, Iowa 29:25 - Dante Trader Jr, Maryland 35:30 - Xavier Watts, Notre Dame 41:50 - Billy Bowman Jr, Oklahoma 49:40 - Lathan Ransom, Ohio State 55:45 - Malaki Starks, Georgia 1:02:15 - Kevin Winston Jr, Penn State

Welcome to the NFL Stock Exchange podcast. In this episode, we are wrapping up the 2024 Summer Scouting Series with the safety position. What a journey it has been, all the way from quarterbacks here to safeties, and we have a fantastic group for you. So much so that Connor and I are giving you our top eights. We never give you our top eights for safety, but this safety class coming up is special.

A lot of names to know, a lot of good players here. 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 Sycamore. That is Connor Rogers. Fresh in the new house, baby. We got the new house feel. It looks like you're kind of, you know, in the old captive. Yes, I logged on and I said to you, I said, I promise I'm not being held hostage. I just have 45 boxes around me. Nothing unpacked. I do love that you put the helmets immediately behind you so that you could be like, no, no, no, I'm not in a prison.

I'm not being held against my will. Dude, I had to do, I promised somebody I would do like a media hit with them. And I moved here Friday and the media hit was Monday. But we actually, of course, right after we moved Friday, we had to go away for a little bit of the weekend. So when I got home from NBC on Monday, I was like, oh my God,

I was like, I have to record something. And all I have is some white walls behind my desk right now and 40 boxes in this room. So I just put the bookshelf up with the helmet. And I was like, where's the bookshelf? I was praying, I was like, you guys just punch in, right? They're like, oh, we take a wide sometimes. I was like, no, like please.

So push comes to shove i tried something actually if you zoom in like if you go tiktok version yeah you look very professional you would think i'm in my old apartment yeah because it's a whitish wall with helmets behind it but this is not the long term plan we start hitting this the the wide lens and people start worrying you know they start what would be the sign that you would think I'm actually being held captive? What's the take I say on the podcast? You're like, Oh God, somebody is actually in front of him holding a gun, holding him at gunpoint. Yeah.

If you started getting negative about the Jets at all whatsoever on one of the few years that you could actually get in on them, then yeah. So I think that that would be a, that would be a. Four win season coming, incoming. That would be a, that would be a four win season coming, incoming. That would be a true cry for help. Buddy, we are putting a bow here on the summer scouting series for this episode.

We are at the safety position, the final position that we have here for summer scouting. Really excited to kind of wrap this all up and give you our final thoughts on this safety group, which was a lot of fun to get to. Connor and I are going to give you our top eights. And safety is very versatile, right? There's a lot of different ways where you can play the safety position. Before, I think a lot of people just talked about it as free safety versus strong safety or box safety. But now, I mean, there's a lot of safeties that in today's league, they'll rotate down to the slot quite a bit. They can be,

like pseudo edge defenders. These guys can come all the way down into the box so a lot of different ways to utilize safeties in today's version of american football and we're going to talk about a lot of that here as we get into these top eights but dude again i i've had so much fun with this series it's one of my favorite ones that we do all year and this safety class actually gave us a really good one to end on here. It did because you nailed it, Trevor. There's just so many types of players, body types, athleticism variants, I think roles and skill sets. So I really enjoyed watching this group because I felt like each player was a little bit of a different experience where, you know, some other positions you could kind of start to get not tedious, but in a group of, okay,

this bucket or this bucket. And with safety, I feel like there's maybe four to five different buckets. And I went into this process, you know, I knew about three or four names off the top of my head. And I actually had a couple of surprises that I think are really impressive football players that we're going to talk about today. All right, let's get right into it because we got eight guys that we want to cover. And, you know, the way that I rank safeties is I categorize them as either free safeties or strong safeties. But then for this episode, I'll kind of put them in a big bucket and give you just top eight overall safeties. And so let's do kind of what we've done before. Try to be a little bit rapid fire eight through six, and then we'll break down the top five a little bit more individually,

spend a little bit more time on those guys. Who did you have eight through six? So at eight, I had Rod Moore from Michigan, who was on last summer's safety episode that we did. I know Moore started out the season, you know, missing a couple games and, you know, came back and was obviously a strong defender for championship defense seven hunter waller from wisconsin a big safety i mean like a legitimate you know six two maybe

plays around 215 yeah it you know really really smart player uh plays in the box plays in the slot plays free he was a fun watch and then six for me was somebody i said on the corner episode i would rank as a safety and that's sebastian castro ah okay plays the slot for iowa but castro to me when you really grind into his role and tape is whether he's a big nickel defender at the next level or a box safety I don't think Castro's just going to be this he's a slot corner like he could play a little slot corner but when you go into his single coverage reps against the shiftier wide receivers I don't think that maximizes his skill set and when you look at him playing downhill I was blown away by

how tough and how smart and how aware he is. I mean, Castro being six on my safety list for a guy that's really playing slot corner in college, wildly impressive and a big part of a great defense that I think he'll seamlessly transition to being a strong safety at the NFL level. Yeah, I already kind of gave my thoughts on Sebastian Castro when we did the corner episode because I break up wide corners and slot corners.

And so I had him in that category. But if you just had to say, okay, you've got to put Sebastian Castro in one bucket or the other general cornerbacks or safeties, I would put him in the safety bucket. Like if there's a position that he's going to play at the NFL level, when he is not in the slot, like you mentioned, it's going to be coming from depth. It's going to be somebody who's going to be in probably a two safety situation, two high safety situation, where he's got the freedom to either play a robber roll over the middle or just come downhill, be able to face tight ends or go up and get running backs if they're taking swing pass out

of the backfield, something like that. So I agree with sort of where you positioned him. If it's corner or safety, I also would put him in the safety category but tough as nails football player man he is going to be he's going to be a fan favorite and honestly he's going to be a coach's favorite too we're going to get throughout the nfl draft process and you're going to hear you know he's a senior right he's he's a classmate isn't he so he's going to go through the process of either the shrine bowl or the senior bowl and i can already tell you eric galco or Jim Nagy, they're going to be tweeting about this guy. They're going to be saying, hey, NFL draft community

maybe is not as high as they need to be on this player because he just seems like a good football player. It's going to be like recruiting in EA College Football. Both the Senior Bowl and the Shrine Game are just going to send the house at Sebastian Castro every time. Hard sell. What matters to this guy i gotta figure it out i'm still i'm still i'm still trying to master the uh the recruiting part of that game because i i went through my the first dynasty not too long ago because i was doing a lot of the mini games i was doing a lot of like the play now stuff whatever

and i actually got into the dynasty and you've got like what is 700 hours or something that you can allocate to recruiting and before the season even started i've allocated like all of my hours i didn't realize that like that's all you got you pick some up throughout the weeks but it's not enough that it matters no i screwed myself although i was like first for like 15 players at the beginning of the season but once we got down to the top threes it was here's a little tip for you if you hit send the house or something on that and it worked after a week you can clear it get the 50 hours back and then do something else on the player this is something i had to learn the hard way yeah all you got there it's probably the most useful thing any of you are getting from this podcast today. Yeah, 100%.

Is that, yeah. Send the house, get all the info, then go hard sell. So let's talk about Hunter Waller as well. You had him. I had him at seven. Okay. I have him at nine. So he's just outside of my topic.

I get it. But yeah, yeah, yeah. You're out of the blood. Correct. Like, shouldn't even be playing the game. Like an abomination. Stick them a Waller family rivalry. It goes back centuries.

No, it's a good. It's like the Hatfield and McCoys. It's a good football player. Yeah, it's like the Brackens and the. I don't care. What is it? The Brackens and the something and House of Dragon. The Sickamas and the Wallers.

So look, Hunter Waller, safety from Wisconsin. You mentioned he's got great size to him. Six foot one and a half. You have 215 pounds. I mean, that is 77th percentile in height, 79th percentile weight for the safety position. That's compared to NFL guys. So you absolutely love to see it. This is somebody who I like to note the high school background.

And for Waller, it was a very successful high school background, not just individually, but also as a team. And this may sound like stupid or cliche, but I feel like you, you, you feel that in the way he plays, like he's a total team player. He does all the dirty work. He does whatever you're going to ask him to do. You mentioned how versatile this guy is. Not only did he win, um, Wisconsin's Gatorade football player of the year as a senior, he won two state championships. Like he was a part of big time winning programs in high school. So he knows what it's like to be a part of a winning program, what it takes. And I think

he's brought that to the, to the style of play that he has at Wisconsin. So I genuinely think he does a lot of things.. He is a tackling machine. He had a shit ton of tackles in high school, and he had a ton of tackles once he got into the lineup at Wisconsin. So no matter where he is, he's going to be a help in run defense. He's going to be a plus in the run game for you. I also think he's a very calculated player. Doesn't really get burnt too much.

For being out of position, I should say, the biggest issue with him is just, I think his athleticism is probably average at best for the NFL level. I agree. And that's probably why I've got him here, but a rock solid football player who I don't know how high he's going to get drafted, but he could be in the NFL for a long,

long period of time because of how he approaches the game. It's spot on. He's somebody that will do the dirty work around the box. He just handles so many roles in this defense. I mean, you look at the snap counts for 2023, 409 in the box, 144 in the slot, 249 at free safety, 29 on the line of scrimmage defensive line, eight at outside corner. And then he's playing on the punt and field goal teams. This guy's on the field all the time.

Football player, baby. Physical aspect of it. on the punt and field goal teams this guy's on the field all the time and he's all player baby physical aspect of it um he's just that hybrid strong safety outside linebacker kind of defensive back that he's all around at the 13 tfls last year pff logged it as 13 tfls slash no gain stops they're wildly impressive plays like you brought up that the athleticism that was number one of the weaknesses for me i don't think he has high end speed but he sees things so quickly that it's the equivalent of a player that has really good speed that sees it on a normal level because he has really good awareness and instincts uh and i thought play development instincts were his best attribute he understands how the play is developing what the blocker is trying to do to him and the right lane and pathway to the ball carrier and the play i think the physicality and coverage will transition well to covering tight ends at the

next level i'm not putting waller in the slot and saying like you know trying to think of a really good and i cover cd lamb like when they play him in the slot right and that's an extreme example maybe a lesser example like josh downs like he should be covering bigger match-up kind of players right so by the way did you know did you realize like how intelligent he is i saw he had a gpa in high school above four four two nine gpa in high school and i think he's always been an academic all american in college which maybe he's got some of those jim leonard vibes think he's better than me yeah it's a great reference uh it's great spot on i mean just it just all comes together for this guy and like you said he's not a first round athlete so that's why we're talking about him

in this group but i think he'll be a rock solid NFL player for a long time, personally. Yep. I like him as well. My, well, I guess I'll just, I'll just read my eight through six because there's another guy that we're going to talk about here. Akili Arnold,

I have at number eight. He was at Oregon State for a while. Now he is at USC for his final year of eligibility. Rod Moore is the next player that I wanted to talk about. I have him at number seven. And then Xavier Wonkba from Iowa is who I have just outside of my top five at number six. But I did want to touch on Rod Moore here before we went to some of these other guys because you had him at eight, I believe.

Where did you have him? Seven is where I had him. Oh, okay. Really talented player. Athleticism is what you love about this guy i'm not really worried about the injury history really you know like obviously he he well actually shoot i i totally forgot i was thinking about the early uh injury that he had last year i forgot that he had a non-contact injury and we're not even seeing him play this season so that was that's

that's a major part of his scouting report that totally slipped my mind. That is a major part of what we have to talk about here with him. But even when he's on the field, Connor, I worry about how slender the dude is. It's the number one thing I wrote. 182 pounds. And to be honest with you, there were times when he'd have to take on a blocker where he'd give him a little pop and I'd be like, okay, didn't really expect that from 182 pound safety. So I like it, but there's just only so much that you can do to make up for being

182 pounds. And that is zeroth percentile for the safety position so i wonder if he is one of these guys who might actually end up being a corner in the league instead of a safety you know like players who have translated their book and he hasn't played a ton of like outside corner but like uh mike mckenzie's the first guy that like comes to my mind right like the former green Bay Packer, where I think he was drafted as a safety, but he mostly played corner at the NFL level. He was kind of like a bigger, taller, more slender player.

And I think Rod Morris got sort of similar athleticism to him. So I wonder if a conversion to corner might be in Rod Morris future, but it all depends on how he comes back from this ACL injury. It really does. Yeah. It's, you know, obviously I should have led with that when I read his name that he's going future but it all depends on how he comes back from this acl injury it really does yeah it's you know obviously i should have led with that when i read his name that he's gonna miss they're expected to miss the entire season from the torn acl and the offseason workouts but this is somebody

that has a couple years of tape right now where at least the nfl has that much tape on him yeah and knows what they're getting and you brought up the athleticism trevor i i will say just from pure tape study i i was left wanting a little bit more. Me too. I thought I was going to be a little higher on him. I really did. Me too. Coming into this,

I thought more was going to be top five safety for me. I wrote up the first weakness was very slender frame and it impacts his play strength. He gets wiped out in the box against the run game and screens. Yeah. Just like when a screen blocker gets out in front, it's here's the perfect example.

The two guys in front of him that I read off Waller and Castro kill screen blockers. They kill them. Yeah. And I didn't see that from more, but more is athleticism. You look at the four interceptions in 2022 when he's roaming in coverage, there's flashes of brilliance,

but there's flashes of brilliance, not stretches of brilliance. So yeah, a solid player. He'll be an interesting project for someone to draft and, and, you know, continue his rehab and get him right for his rookie season. Yeah. So number, uh, number eight for me was Akili Arnold. And I wanted to make sure that I brought his name up because I didn't really have any buzz on him before I went into this exercise. And Dalton Wasserman at PFF actually was somebody who I heard his name first when Dalton was giving him some pub. He said he was one of the best coverage safeties in the country. And so I was like, oh, okay. I haven't heard of

him before. So I looked him up and I really am. I'm a fan. He's just, he's a little bit smaller. He's six foot flat, 200 pounds. That's 34th percentile and 24th percentile he's he's a little stiff changing direction he's not like the best fluid athlete out there but there's so much of what he does that is it comes from such a high football iq for the position so he was originally a three-star cornerback out of in. So he's been around college football quite a long time. This is his sixth year. So he's played a lot of football. So that has, but that has turned into high football IQ.

I think in a lot of ways. Here's the strengths that I have written for him. Good pre-snap communication, good post-snap recognition, a willing and decently strong tackler, despite being a little bit smaller in size. He's got some smooth movements for a slot defender. I mentioned sometimes the change direction when he's, when he's top speed, like that can be a little bit stiff, but when he is playing in the slot, he reverts back to that corner background. And you could see some

of those fluid, those quick short area movements from, so it helps him be a nice slot defender. And, um, and I think that he could play press really confidently that was also something that i love from because the size being a little bit smaller it probably says okay you might have to be a slot defender at the next level and i get a little bit worried when i say athleticism's sort of an issue for players and then try to put them in the slot because in the slot like you mentioned i mean you mentioned cd lamb lineup in the slot like you can't be devoid of athleticism and try to grab to guard cd lamb there's just too many good receivers that are playing the slot but he does so so confidently and understands leverages understands the timing when to get hands on

guys knows how to manipulate things knows how to uh play comfortably in trail techniques so he just does all of these things really really well and i thought we saw some good coverage grades last year from him because of it. 81.3 coverage grade in the slot. That was his highest coverage grade free safety. It was also 76.1, but he's a little bit of a smaller player. I don't think he's going to be this. Yeah. Like top, top, top 50 type of safety, maybe even top 75. We'll see how this year goes, but he plays the position so smart and it's hard for me to really give up on guys who can manage the space that they're given as a safety as well as Achille Arnold does. So I'm a big fan of his. Somebody I got to get eyes on after hearing that. I heard what you said in the beginning, like, hey, I didn't hear a ton of

buzz about this guy. I didn't hear a ton of buzz about him. Somebody that I will watch throughout the season for sure. Uh, as we kind of add to the depth of the safety class, which goes to show you the depth of this class looks pretty good when you have, I thought my eight were really, really strong and to hear there's people outside of it that can make that jump is exciting. Yeah, no, it, it, it, it's a good group. And, And I want to get to my number six guy because I think you'll have him in your top five, Xavier Wampa. But before we do that, we had a little bit of appetizer for college football last week. Now it is time for the feast this coming Saturday. We're very, very excited about that one in college football getting kicked off because now we got a new tape to watch these guys. It's going to be great. Don't miss any of the action. Jump in at DraftKings Sportsbook this year. Full slate of games is coming Saturday. We've even got the big matchup in Atlanta, number one, number 16, but there's so many great matchups throughout the day.

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a good transition into the top five or am I gonna have to wait a little bit here you're a little he's number three for me okay it's not too bad no no i was worried if you were gonna have a one yeah yeah and then it's like a little bit too big of a gap show's over okay so you have him at three. You like him a little bit more than I do. What'd you like about Xavier Wongpa from Iowa? Well, I could see how you landed there for him because this is my number one projection guy, right? He's the highest player I have on the list

without him having solidified it it is what I would say. I'm just looking at the traits that this guy has at 6'2", 215. I believe he's the highest recruit to ever commit to Iowa. I think so. Can you confirm? I'm pretty. Now, here's the problem with that. Just when we say things like that.

Recruiting rankings now, there's so many different recruiting, like recognized recruiting rankings now there's so many different recruiting like recognized recruiting rankings and services but the point is this guy was a big deal coming out of high school he was a five-star recruit and depending on where you get your recruiting rankings he's the highest recruit to ever commit to iowa so and i believe he flipped back and forth like might have flipped to alabama at one point iowa eventually lands him this was a big deal for iowa he's a true junior like i said he's 6 2 2 15. sturdy big build he's got length he's explosive and fast when he hits the gas another guy that plays everywhere last year 342 snaps in the box 234 in the slot 233 at free safety he also plays special teams i i love the way iowa develops players by the way it's just like yeah you're gonna come here and you're gonna play special

you're a five-star super recruit and oh yeah you're also like run down the field on kickoff it's just i don't know baby you better love it but get out it really is and and they're about that life and this defense is they pull they really play as a collective unit. There was a play, Trevor, that I saw of him on tape where Rutgers was, I think it was a quarterback run. It was some kind of run that had Menungai as a lead blocker. And we know how tough Kyle Menungai is. I mean, he is like 30 pounds of muscle in a 10-pound potato sack. He's that kind of jacked.

And this this dude, Womka, wiped him out, like put him on his ass where menunga's feet went up in the air. And I was like, whoa, that is a true. I'm going to watch the Rutgers game. That is a true sophomore getting after it downhill. Now, once again, there are flashes. I think he there one question I wrote for him, can he create takeaways in 2024? Because here's how you go in the first round.

We live in a world where linebackers, safeties, and running backs, and tight ends traditionally have to do something extraordinary to go in the first round. That's the world we live in right now. Love it or hate it. Wampka has special tools. He's a really good football player right now already going into his true junior year. If he can create turnovers that change the game, then he's around one safety.

That's a giant if giant if, but he has so much talent that I love the player. I absolutely, I love the player. I think that at minimum, he looks like a day two starter, like day one starter. Yeah, he is, I think his floor as a safety is really high just because, I mean, if nothing else, but because of God-given talent, six foot two, 215 pounds, that's 83rd and 86th percentile for the position.

I mean, he is built like a player who will last at the NFL level for this position. And you mentioned the five-star tag that he got out of high school. That comes from good athleticism as well. I read that he was a track guy as well, had a long jump, participated in a long jump. I'm not sure if he was a sprinter or not. I just found the long jump from him. also like he played baseball as well. He played all three phases when he was in high school. So, you know, playing all around at Iowa is nothing new to him. Connor, I agree with you completely. The area that really held him back from being a top, a top five safety for me is, I don't know why this might be sort of how he's taught by his coaches.

I thought the way that he approached the play is just way too conservative right now. Like he, he's not nearly as aggressive as I think that his size, his speed and his strength could allow him to be. He was a safety in every sense of the word. And perhaps, again, that is what Iowa's coaches are telling him. Maybe they are telling him, you roam the back end, nobody gets behind you, nobody gets past you. But that's a different message than saying, hey, we want you to kind of creep over the middle, watch the quarterback size, go get the ball when it's in the air. And he doesn't play like that. I just felt as though his play style was much more conservative

than I thought it was going to be for a player who is as athletic as he is. So to me, this is a huge year because if now he's going to be a true junior this year. You know, he wasn't even draft eligible last year. So if in this year, he really cranks up his aggressiveness, even if it's just in spots to go after the ball when it's in the air, then all of a sudden, this guy can definitely shoot up my rankings and shoot up the draft board. But right now, he just plays too conservative. And I wonder, is this how you approach the position? And does it make you uncomfortable if you ramp up that aggression? I don't know. That's the question, or those are

the questions that I'm really looking to get answered this year, because I don't know if you read this. Dude, he had 16 interceptions in high school. That's insanity. And not shocking. 16. All the traits are there he is long explosive smart so when i saw that even as just a true sophomore for as much as he's played he only has two interceptions i was like that's a little weird and then you watch the film and you go well you're not really putting yourself in a position to go get those interceptions. And I just wonder if this year will yield more of that. So it's nothing on him. Honestly, again, if this is how they're teaching him how to play,

then I think that it will all play out in the end. That's sort of the caveat of summer scouting, right? We scout these guys and we sort of tell you where they are now, but we also have to tell you what could be in their future and he is somebody who has a much higher ceiling than just being safety six for me in this class but that is how i saw him in his current state and what i'm hoping to see more of him this season my working theory on it is he was a young guy playing in a veteran filled defense that, you know, Jay Higgins and Nick Jackson in the middle, Sebastian Castro, like all these really responsible vets.

Cooper John was in that defense, obviously. Right. And eight of the 11 starters from last year, I think are back. This is a defense that has continuity. You look at this script of what, how Iowa had to play last year. I mean, just as a reminder, they beat Iowa State 20-13. They beat Purdue 20-14. They beat Wisconsin 15-16.

They lose to Minnesota 12-10. They beat Northwestern 10-7. They beat Illinois 15-13. They beat Nebraska 13-10. They are constantly playing, walking on eggshells that like our offense does nothing for us. I guess you can counter and say, well, wouldn't that want to make you more aggressive on defense? I don't think they are coached to do that. I think they are told never break because we might not score more than seven points today or nine points today, 10 points today.

And I think it's hard as a safety to take chances when this is the environment you're in. And I really am rooting for Iowa to be better offensively this year, because I think it'll bring out a different level to this already great defense. Who you got a five. Who do I have at five? That would be my fellow lax bro, Dante Trader.

Oh. No, no, sorry. I'm a dummy. No, no, yeah. I already said Sebastian Castro at six. Yeah, Trader at five. Trader at five. Oh, that's okay.

All right, all right. So talk to me about Trader, because I don't have him in my top five. Another big projection guy. He is a fascinating case. Maryland safety, six feet tall 190 pounds super athletic this is someone that started to that all 2022 and 2023 at safety for maryland while he was also last year an all-american lacrosse player for maryland yeah i read that he was the like the number three recruit he was top 10 in the country as lacrosse.

Yes. Top 10 in the country, which is it's like, it's hard to put that into perspective for people unless you've, you've played lacrosse at a high level while like I wasn't playing football and lacrosse and like figuring out, like I can't relate to this, but just thinking about it, the fact that he's doing both at college

is not appreciated enough. It is so insane to me that he is an All-American on an elite college program. Maryland is a great college lacrosse program year after year after year. And then he's also the starting safety on the football team.

So why I have him at five is I think if he commits to football full time, right? All his problems are going to be like really mitigated. I mean, his problems right now, Trevor, he takes the cheese on fakes. Like blade development instincts are so raw.

It always feels like he's a step behind yeah he's still learning how to balance when to just unload his shoulder into someone versus wrapping up it's all fundamental aspects of the game he's so gifted athletically he plays so fast he plays with no fear he could play free he could play downhill he, time comes, he commits to football, he's just as good as these other guys already. But he's an all-American lacrosse player at a great lacrosse school where in the spring, why guys are putting on muscle, trying to get faster, trying to mentally prepare.

He's out trying to win a championship in one of the craziest d1 sports in the country yeah right like in the intensity level of a lacrosse season after a football season at the d1 college level is absurd it is absurd to me so trader is he's a gem of a prospect because he is the big, what's in the box kind of thing. This could be something really, really fun and exciting. But I respect it so much more that he's impacting their lacrosse team too because I think it's a really unique path. Him being safety 10 for me going into the year, I think should tell people the potential that this safety class has.

Right. That's a good point. Because I focused on sort of where he is more than you kind of focused on what he could be when I have him at number 10. Because I agree, like in his current state, you could tell he's a really great all around athlete, really great body control, good core strength, fast fluid, very balanced footwork. I mean, his back pedal is very smooth. I think you change direction very well. He's got those long arms, which you absolutely love, but sometimes like tackling technique. And again, some play actions, some misdirection. Okay. Uh, you know, like this guy's passing through this zone.

Now I'm taking him over or now I'm leaving it for you. Like those nuances of playing safety aren't there for him. And if you were to take him in his current state and drop him in the NFL, he'd get in a little bit of trouble. So we definitely need to see more for him naturally in that way. But for him to be safety 10 for me,

there are plenty of other years when even in his current state, I'd be like, yeah, all right. Safety four, safety five. I'll take this guy to believe in. And I just think that this safety class is pretty deep as we're sitting here going into the preseason. So I didn't have him in my top eight, but I'm actually glad that you got him in the show there one way or another, because the lacrosse background is one that is incredibly interesting. And it makes him quite an interesting project

or prospect, I should say, and somebody who is going to be fun to follow throughout this college football season. I don't think he's playing lacrosse anymore. I was just going to say, let me make it clear. He's made it very evident football is his pathway because he played on their lacrosse team in 2023. Yes.

And he didn't his freshman year, which I thought was funny. I think it's interesting, too. Is he going to go back one more time in 2020? He's not, obviously. He's going to be getting ready for the nfl draft but yeah i wanted to make that clear that so he didn't have a spring before his last season going into this year he will have what i believe is a full spring football yes i should have been very evident about that we haven't seen him really play like that full commitment yet where now lacrosse is apparently out of the picture yeah we got there eventually hey if he doesn't

make it in the end like if things go wrong two years three years into the nfl he'll go he'll legitimately go play professional lacrosse like it's always good to have a backup plan you know he's that talented basically you know we all we all get to that point in our you know in our lives where we go where we have a bad day at work at different stages though would you say at different stages some of us stop being athletes when we're 17 and then and some of us get to switch professional sports and when we're adults traders that guy crazy he is all right so number number five for me uh the man who i believe led the country last year in interceptions xavier watts from notre dame okay where'd you have Watts? I had Watts at nine. Okay.

I figured when we got to five and he wasn't five for you, that he was probably just going to be outside of your top eight. Yeah. He was right behind Rod Moore. And I, I really don't, I'm excited to hear what you have to say about him. Cause I almost put him over Rod Moore.

Like there was part of me that liked him more than Rod Moore, but I can't quit the dude. I can't. Yeah dude i can't yeah yeah that's that's basically where i would have came i watched i watched like five games of xavier watts and i was telling myself like you don't really like this dude as much as you think and then i'd see a couple plays and i was like yes you do i could not quit xavier watts who is the he is a redshirt senior now at notre dame He has a safety. He's got an interesting background. So he's five foot 11 and a half, 203 pounds.

That's 28th percentile and 35th percentile, but right around 205 for a safety, like it's not that big of a deal. I mean, if you go up to, I just have this number right in front of me. If you go up to 208, that's above the 50th percentile. So it's a huge jump just because there's a lot of guys that really sit around 205 at safety. So 203, it's not a big deal. Just go to, you know, like Little Caesars Caesars, get a whole hot and ready pizza. You'll be at 205 in no time.

It's not a big deal. So he was actually a four-star wide receiver recruit back in 2020. That makes sense, by the way. Appeared in two games as a true freshman, and he kind of struggled to get on the field as a wide receiver. And then he transitioned over to the defense side of the football for the next year. They kind of like tried him at linebacker sort of this like slot linebacker,

like a star position type of a linebacker. They call it Rover at Notre Dame, or at least they did back in 2021. I don't know if it's changed with the terminology with Marcus Freeman being the head coach there, but then he ended up becoming a safety and he played safety in 2021. I don't know if it's changed with the terminology with Marcus Freeman being the head coach there, but then he ended up becoming a safety and he played safety in 2021 for 11 games. Then he had four starts at safety in 2022. And then he played in and started all 13 games last year, won the Bronco Nagurski award as the best defender in the country while starting at safety for the first time as a full-time starter last year for Notre Dame. He's just, again, I can't quit the guy. I don't, there, there's, there are times when I

will, Connor, he was the most, he was the most up and down rollercoaster of a, of a, of a scouting evaluation that I have. And when I say that, I don't necessarily mean that he was making the greatest play i ever saw and then the worst play i ever saw it was more of like play by play i'd say okay you're moving well enough to play safety at the nfl level and then there'd be another play i'm like ah but are you you know like i i don't i i just like okay right i'd be like all right you're literally that me that gif of you know like shaking your head and then like oh no yeah that was that was me watching his tape because there were so many times when he'd be full speed and he'd look a little stiff to change direction the routes would be the pursuit angles would be a little bit more rounded i was like all right that's gonna get you

in trouble at the nfl level and then there'd be other times where he'd be in a backpedal or he'd shuffle and he'd mirror a wide receiver and go, okay, that I liked, that part I liked. And then, of course, you've got the seven interceptions. Obviously, the seven interceptions, some of them were luck, some of them were right place, right time. But then you've got the Caleb Williams over the middle interception. I don't know if you watched that one specifically at USC where he just takes a, he recognizes this play so instantly that Caleb's going to throw this pass over the middle that he beelines it straight. And to be honest with you, it's such a good play and it's such a good play by Watts. I actually think it might've actually been out of structure of the defensive play that was called. And I don't actually blame Caleb Williams that much for it because Caleb throws the ball basically where he should and watches where he shouldn't, but it happened to be the

exact right play. And you go, all right. Cause that was one of the best plays that I've seen from a safety this year. And he just, he made it. So I'm going to list off some strengths and weaknesses this is kind of what I got that was his best game by the way yeah and I watched I didn't watch all of his games but that was the best one I watched where I was like oh like this was his standout performance I do as well he's at times he's got twitchy movement skills like there are times when he really can stop and start really well good man coverage movement skills from the wide receiver background. He understands how receivers move and he understands how to mirror them pretty well.

So when he's asked to play man coverage, whether it's an off man coverage or close to the line of scrimmage, if he's going up against a tight end, he could do it pretty well. He can handle the threes on a trip side or whatever it is. Tackling is not as bad as the missed tackle rate

that he had last year, which was like 18%. I'm like, dude, what are we doing here? But then I'm watching more of the film and I go, okay, yeah, you missed the tackle, but if you had to make the tackle again, I don't think you're going to miss it again. It's just that you happen to guess a little weird there. Sometimes the movements can feel a little too frenetic with him.

He's got the wasted steps. But Connor, obviously there's an internal conflict with me here because you're in your voice. There are a bunch of pros and cons with Xavier Watts, and it'd be much easier if it was a lot more streamlined one way or the other, but it's not.

And I think that that encapsulates why a fifth year red shirt senior did not declare for the draft after winning the Bronco Nagurski award. Great point. I think the NFL probably also sees a lot of good, a lot of bad, and they don't really know what to do with it. So we probably got an NFL draft advisory board grade and it might've been like an early day three grade. But in reality, I think that this player can be a day two type of safety. We've just got to see more of the good than the bad this year we'll see it's that's a perfect summary of it it's funny how it's always funny to me when we watch the same players that are not tier one players but we see them the same but we stack them a little bit differently um Watts was intriguing to me but I I agree about the consistency and we'll see what he could do for his stock this year.

Because that Notre Dame defense has a lot of NFL talent on it, by the way, this year. It really does. Yeah. And I think that he's a part of it. 100%. So he ended up at five for you, right? Yep. Okay.

So four for me, and I feel like we're going to be really similar on this guy, maybe, is Billy Bowman Jr. Oh, buddy. Yeah. Four? Yeah. No, I got him at three. Okay. me and i feel like we're gonna be really similar on this guy maybe is billy bowman jr oh buddy yeah four no i got him a three okay it counts same close enough bowman is really interesting because he's probably the smallest guy in this group he's 510 191 ish i got had a five nine. Yeah, 95. I would watching on tape. I thought it was like it was like very a dating at 510. Listen, we've all been there, folks. He's going to be he's going to be between five nine and 510.

That's fine. So Billy Bowman, he the best way possible. He really is a knack around the ball. It had some of that vibes of like, I don't think he's the best way possible, he really is a gnat around the ball. It had some of that vibes of like, I don't think he's the same as Antoine Winfield, but that style where it's, you know, a smaller guy in the back end, that's just always around the ball in the running pass game. He is very quick when he goes into ball Hawk mode, sideline to sideline, you can really see range with this guy where you could ask him to play single high you could ask him to do a lot

of things on the back end from a coverage perspective I really like the player's DNA Trevor there's an energy he brings to the field that stands out on tape that you kind of know he's trying to raise everybody around him and it's consistent quarter by quarter and I thought that it was just very obvious this is a guy that's clearly like a leader on that defense that really loves football and loves the grind of each play yeah there's some big weaknesses though with Billy And I thought that it was just very obvious. This is a guy that's clearly like a leader on that defense that really loves football and loves the grind of each play. Yeah. There's some big weaknesses though,

with Billy Bowman right now. And it's not the number one thing, you know, people are going to ask him how will his size affect him if at all, but he missed 22 tackles in 2023. And no matter how you slice it, that's an alarming number. And I think some of it has come to balance issues.

I think some of it is his lack of size. You know, over urgent at times it's just you got you really almost have to cut that number in half or else it's going to significantly hurt your draft stock in my opinion i love billy bowman i i liked him i liked him a lot last year um before we got to the uh draft declaration date and he said that he was he was going back to oklahoma i had him as i think he was safety too okay behind behind tyler newman for me wow okay so and i think that he was still like around the 50s or 60s in my like overall big board rankings but and tyler newbin was 28 i think so it's not like they were like super close but bowman is the guy that i liked next from this safety group i mean he he his tape last year is so much fun he's got legit nfl range i actually i think that billy

bowman's got the best range of any safety in this class. I completely agree. Pure coverage skills. Yes. Roaming. He's the best one right now. Yep. I think that he can get from the opposite hash all the way to the sideline better than any other safety can in this class.

His footwork is cornerback-like in how he backpedals, how he shuffles, how he can mirror different wide receivers if he's asked to play man coverage in the slot. He will come downhill for tackles. Now, it is to be seen how effective he will be once he gets there, but he is a willing run defender. He is urgent to help in run defense or at least put his body near where it needs to to fit the run. And so I think that that is at least encouraging,

even though the run defense grade of 57.7 is not great and needs to be better this upcoming season the tackling strength is a consistent issue you know he's missing tackles high I think throughout his career I think that we have seen that he gets a little bit overzealous and over aggressive with his pursuit to the ball whether the ball is in the air or whether it's in the hands of a ball carrier but connor nine career interceptions like this dude is a ball hawk he brings you the best plays of what you would want from a free safety it's got to be more reliable and run to in in run defense there's no doubt about it but he gives you the ceiling and it's again that is a player that i want to bet on somebody who has that kind of coverage ability it's what made quitting kaylin bullock so difficult for me and eventually like

and eventually we got there right it was just like it was too much to overcome the tackling just did not get better for him but i think the bowman is a more willing tackler um he just he just needs to get as strong as he can be. There's only so much weight that he's going to be able to put on his frame to be able to play that position the best way that he can. But dude, as a free safety, I think that he is somebody that I want on my football team.

He's got the attitude of somebody that I want on my football team. And he's got that mentality for takeaways with that athletic ability. So I love Billy Bowman. He is, he's he's he's gonna be one of my favorite players in college football this upcoming season i love it yeah i do agree with you on the coverage side of things if he just becomes a little bit more reliable

tackling he's gonna go in the top 50 i think yeah baby let's go so i had womka at three yes who did you have that i know you need to do four and then you could even transition to three because i already did my third safety right so i still have to list my number four guy uh and then we have the top two which i think are going to be the same but before i list my my fourth guy gotta shout out a couple of our friends you know gotta pay the bills here football season it's finally upon us been an interesting offseason to say the least no doubt about it got the blockbuster trades got all sorts of trade rumors by the way as we were recording this podcast 49ers agreed to a deal with brandon iuk so he's staying in san francisco 49er he

cursed cousins on the falcons and then the draft michael pennix jr a little circus going on in atlanta all kinds of stuff. Covering the NFL offseason, it is always something that you've got to listen to multiple outlets to be able to cover it the way that you need to. This season, we will definitely be listening to a new podcast called The Offensive Line with Annie Agar.

Annie's an NFL insider. You might know her from her Uncomfortable Team Meetings series that we have on social. The Offensive Line with Annie. She just hangs out with NFL stars, celeb super fans throughout the league. uncomfortable team meetings series that we have on social um the offensive line with annie she just hangs out with nfl stars celeb super fans throughout the league and uh they're gonna be hanging out all season long unpacking the week's lines odds for all you betting people out there spreads with her and her uh usual brand of uh sharp whitten banner so this podcast it's it's packed with humor it's must listen um if you're trying to keep up with all the news in NFL culture,

watch it on YouTube, or you can listen on the Wondery app, wherever you guys get your podcasts. And then before we get to my number four safety, I do want to say this episode sponsored by our friends over at BetterHelp. With everything that you got going on in life, it is very easy to let your own self care get put on the back burner. But guys,

it absolutely should not. When you aren't yourself or when you, or when you are your best self or when you aren't your best self, I'm sorry, it is hard to put your best foot forward. And so that's why therapy is a great way to take a little bit of time out for yourself to recharge, recalibrate, all that good stuff. I've said this on this podcast before, I've been doing therapy for about a year and a half. And it originally started as something that I sort of like needed help working with and working through. And it originally started as something that I sort of like needed help working with and working through. And now it's basically just, it is, it's that recalibration and recharge. I go every other week and it's a really cool way to just learn more about myself, how I take,

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and you can switch therapists at any time with no additional charge. Just like leg day, never skip therapy day with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash NFLSE to get 10% off your first month. That is betterhelp, H-E-L-P.com slash NFLSE. Latham Ransom. Do you watch him?

Ohio State? Yeah, I've heard of him. I watched him. I had him at safety 10. Sad. Sad. It really is good class. Good football player.

Now, I'm a little worried about latham ransom right he starts off pumping it like boasting pumping his chest out in the air and then he goes but i'm shaking in my boots coward all right i might have screwed this one up so i got him at safety four but it's a big health if with him so he's a red shirt senior going into this season. One, he's got good size, six feet tall, 208 pounds. But last year, he got injured, and it was a non-contact Liz Frank tear in his foot. Liz Frank injuries, nothing to play with. It's not great.

It could even derail some promising football careers. We have seen that in the past. It's not a kiss of death, but it's something that you got to watch out for. He's healthy now. He's going to start the season. So we're good to go all in theory. But a reason why I like Ransom is because of that athleticism. He's got great size, which I already mentioned, but he pairs that with fluidity, great long speed. The recovery speed is there. How quickly and smoothly he can flip his hips like a corner. This is safety coming downhill in the slot. And I got so much faith in this dude to cover guys in the slot, more so than a lot of other safeties that I watched in this group. I just feel like the combination of athleticism, the tackling is very, uh,

it, it, it's very reliable. Um, does not shy away from taking on blocks, takes a lot of pride in doing what exactly he needs to do in the run game. So he's got a good run defense grade 72.1 last year because of it. I think the range is good because of that athleticism.

It's not quite like what is for Billy Bowman or the guy that's going to be a number one that I'm going to be number one that I'm going to talk about a little bit. But to me, there is so much to like about him because he moves like a corner in a lot of ways, except for he's six feet tall and over 200 pounds. We don't often get defensive backs that are like that. So he's got a little bit more of a slender build,

but it's okay because I think that his play style lends itself to that with how well he moves in coverage, how much range that he covers, and the fact that he is still pretty fearless when it comes to run defense. So you're going to want him in space more than you're going to want him near the box just because of the build. And I think he's got good eyes in run defense, but when you play him closer to the line of scrimmage, like, yeah, that is where he can get blocked up a little bit. Some of the guys just have a little bit more weight on him, naturally push him around a little bit more. But at least he's willing.

He's in the right spot. He knows how to disengage blocks when guys aren't really overpowering him. But really, Connor, to me, it comes down to that foot injury. If he comes back, the same version that we saw last year, I'm pretty pumped about that. I think that could be a top 75 type of a player top 75 type of a safety so i got him at number four for everything that he could bring to table with his athletic ability yeah you have to it's kind of he was in the similar

bucket to me as rod moore that i just loved some of the athleticism and movement natural movement back there it's just that you brought up the injury that's going to be a big thing to watch physicality is going to be a big thing to watch so uh as you just hear gracie going nuclear i apologize to everybody no gracie no gracie's a big fan of latham ransom she's literally enraged with me that latham ransom was not in my top eight so my apologies yeah gracie's on my side i can hear it i can hear it in the bar she's like please listen to me or she's proving further to everybody that I actually am being held hostage. Yeah. She's, she's, she's telling everybody out there. Uh, well, she's telling you actually that you've got it.

You've got to be able to figure it out because if your takes are wrong, Connor, then you can't buy her toys. And that's really what, that's really what the bark is all about. That's what, that's what we're talking about here. So look, Gracie knows ball. That's all I'm trying to say. She doesn't like toys. Hey girl, you want to say hello?

No. Okay. Doesn't like toys. A hundred pound dog that doesn't like toys. Can you figure out, can you figure out how to entertain a hundred pound grape? Wait, like,

like not a ball, not a rope, nothing, like once in a while, I'll throw her a tennis ball and she'll go get it like once or twice. Wow. No, nothing.

She's above it. No, I understand. It's to be food related or just or just running the amount of 40 yard dashes i have done aching every following day is uh yeah that's it just no no frills like remember when jj watt boasted that he was like i'm working working out this off-season. We have no electricity and TVs. And then it turned out being like a super palace. Gracie actually takes that to heart. She's like pure pavement, pure speed, and literally just raw kibble.

Wide open road, baby. I love it. Safety three for you. Safety four for me. No, but who is safety three for you? Billy Bowman. I forgot. We went out of order. for me. No, but who is safety three for you? Billy Bowman. I forgot. Yeah, but we went out of order.

We did. Yeah, yeah. Ryan, I mean, Ryan, our producer, is just, you know, sweating profusely. He doesn't know what's coming next. We are absolutely playing Jenga with the safety. Yeah, we're throwing a Tim Wakefield knuckleball, and then it's a Paul Schemes heater, and then it's a... Who threw the Evas pitch?

I'd fall out of my cleats. Who threw the Evas pitch? Ah don't know something he was he was with the race and it goes like 60 miles an hour yeah i don't even really understand what it is somebody explained to me they're like oh yeah it's the evas pitch it's like how do you just invent a new pitch what are you talking about you could do whatever you want honestly when it comes to baseball but they took out the sticky stuff all right so trying to find check this one out bill spaceman lee through an ephus referred to as the leafus or the space ball or the moon ball this is so good this is so good you know you come for this summer scouting but you stay for the EFIS pitch analysis. You really do. That's how you get here.

All right, who'd you have at two? I don't know if you're going to be surprised. I had Malachi Starks at two. You have Starks at two? I have Starks at two. Am I the only man in draft media that doesn't have Starks one? Probably. Probably. I don't know if I'm being booed off the

stage right now or tomatoes are being thrown at me or there's somebody out there that's just holding their fist up and yelling yeah or like yeah like i really don't know i hope so back it into their parking spaces yeah no we don't align with those people but you do now you do now i am that guy i am the backing of malachi starts it too okay about you all right so malachi starks true junior from georgia uh you think he's undraftable tell us why yeah undraftable 6-1-2-0-5 junior uh believe he was a former five star i know he's a big he was indeed shocking georgia landed a big recruiter how did they do it yeah tough three picks last year seven pass breakups, five TFLs.

An awesome player. Really an awesome player. I think he's going to end up in my top 40 on my big board, maybe even higher. And so is the guy ahead of him, obviously. So the fact two safeties. I was looking last year when you brought up the conversation about where Bowman would be for you. And I had forgotten. Not only I didn't have a first round grade on a safety. I had a second round grade on newbin and then i didn't have anyone else greater in the first two rounds i had a couple third rounders so this class is a big upgrade like to put it in perspective

so i had newbin with a two bullard hicks kitchens and Bishop with late third rounders let me look if I was throwing grades for summer scouting I'd have the guy ahead of Starks and Starks at least with second round grades and think they could play their way into the first I'd have Wampka with the second round grade Bowman with a fringe second or third like that's totally different from last yeah i had i gave newbin a late first early second round grade okay i gave kaylin bullock a late second early third and then every uh dadrian taylor demerson ended up being safety three for me. I gave him a third and everybody else was a fourth or, Oh no,

no. I did have Jaden Hicks also had a late second, early third. So, but yeah, I'm with you. I would have Malachi Starks, Kevin Winston,

Jr. Billy Bowman, Jr. All above whoever was my safety two last year. I'm with you. Yeah, right, exactly. It's just a totally different level of talents. So I want to put that in perspective

so it doesn't seem like I'm just nuking Starks, who's a really great player, free safety, in the box, slot corner, special teams, good at everything, literally good at everything, fluid mover, change of direction skills are phenomenal. P puts clamps on targets going over the middle like when a tight end really tries to run over the middle he's he's sticky he's in the hip pocket he's aggressive at the catch point he's a really clean tackler when he takes the right pathway to ball carriers my number one question good caveat right there my number one yeah. Good caveat right there. My number one. Yeah. I'll tell you why he's not my number one safety.

He consistently takes questionable angles that pop up on tape. And it's. It hurts him at times in the SEC. It would really be a problem in the NFL today. And he can clean this up. But I think it's a way bigger issue that people are acting like he's like the next great safety prospect that he could be. He's not today until that because surrendering the big play with bad angles is it's just a non-negotiable for a first round safety to me. And I saw it happen quite a bit on on tape last year.

That is the really frustrating part about him is the weaknesses. I have I have two little bullet points in his weaknesses. Movement skills can look a tad out of control at times. Right. And he can be a little too aggressive in his pursuit angles. And that shows up. And the rest of what he brings to the table, lower weight number, but a well-built safety. Long wingspan for passes broken up.

Top speed is very impressive. He has a sprinter background. He ran the 100-meter dash in 10.55 in high school, and he had a long jump of almost 25 feet. Constant pre-snap communicator. Smooth, fluid hips to maximize his range and deep coverage. Sound tackler, like you said, once he gets there. Elite ball skills.

Somebody who can really play the ball once it is in the air. There is so much about Malachi starks that is fantastic he just doesn't take the best paths to the ball and gets burned for it i don't know why and it's not a one-time thing it It's not. It was more than I thought it was going to be. I have him at safety one, but I, it sounds weird saying this, but like I liked him less than I thought I was going to because I had to account for how many plays in which I just didn't think that he read it right. Or he misjudged his own speed.

He misjudged the ball carrier speed whatever it was and i was kind of surprised because with his best plays i mean he could judge things beautifully but there were more reps than i was expecting to see where he just he just misjudged how he needed to get to the ball yeah that's i mean we can't emphasize this enough he's a really good player and he's a special athlete yeah i have a first't emphasize this enough he's a really good player and he's a special athlete yeah i have a first round grade on him he's my safety one exactly but like that it's a it's a red flag that he has to clean up or he will not go in the first round in my opinion or it would be a mistake if he did if it's if that weakness is the same amount of an issue

going into the draft but i think it will improve this year i really do otherwise i wouldn't have him ranked even this high where he's like i said he's going to be in the top 40 on my big board he might be in my top 30 i have kevin byard as the early comp for him that's fun because they have the same body type pretty similar built byard's a little bit thicker than he is but like both dudes really good ball production, really good ball skills, know where the ball is going to be able to go get takeaways. Really good athletes. I think that

when I was watching him, I was like, this is pretty Kevin Byard-ish to me. Yeah, I see that one. It's the only comp that I'm working with. So he's safety one for me. So Kevin Winston Jr. from Penn State. Safety one. He might be one of my five favorite players in this from summer scouting and it's not when I always say favorite players like

there's just something about them you just love doesn't mean he'll be a top five player on my big board because for a safety to do that I don't even know what they would have to do it's they'd have to have Inspector gadget arms and run four two at this point. Well, Kevin Winston Jr. It's weird to say this about a player from Penn State. But might be one of the best kept secrets in the country right now. I don't really know why he's not treated like he's a star. Not going to lie. Didn't know anything about him before I got to think about exercise.

And he's a really good football player player it is wild how good he is and so you just all right so let's let's just jump right into the player as a whole so kevin winston jr he's safety for penn state he's 6-1-2-0-5 same listed as malachi starks he's a team captain he's one of the best tacklers I've ever evaluated at the safety position for his age, for his age, for his age, like based on his age, where he is now. Not like comparing him to somebody starting in the NFL today, because that's not fair. Basically, a underclassman summer scouting safety because he's a junior, right? He is a true junior. He's a true junior. Yeah.

His his tackling as a sophomore is maybe the best I've seen for safety. He's urgent, smart, aware. Yeah. He doesn't miss tackles. He understands how to wrap. He understands how to hit. He understands how to come to bat. You can either come to balance or you can't.

He's tremendous at coming to balance. He wants to stick his nose in every single play. And the reason why that meshes so well with him is because he's so unique at coming to balance that he has the urgency to be in every play and he has the balance to be in every play. Some guys don't have the other. So if you're really urgent and want to be in the play, you can overrun the play. But if you know how to come to balance, sometimes you're so worried about breaking down and come to balance. You're too late to the play. I think Winston Jr. is so phenomenal at meshing the two together. And I think he has a complete sixth sense around

the line of scrimmage. There was plays I saw him making the run where he knew he literally knew exactly what the offense was going to do. He knew exactly what gap he had to go through he knew exactly what the run concept was inside outside i think he's really responsible in coverage right now i want to see him make more plays this year it's the same conversation as wompka that if winston has four picks this year where he turns the tides of a game he he's a no brainer. First rounder. No brainer. Yeah.

But he's got one career interception right now. You need to do that to be a first round safety. And that's why I don't have a safety necessarily in the locked into the first round, but he's really smart in coverage. Like he doesn't allow big plays. Really? I'm probably going to have Winston jr.

And Malachi Starks in most of my mock drafts that i do i i i'm trying to unpack this trevor and you kind of hinted at this i don't know if i liked him so much because of the surprise factor or if he's just that good it's probably both i guess i i heard heard so much about starks and i thought he was really good but i was shocked at the one red flag i'd written down with winston jr I knew almost nothing about him and I'm watching the tape and I'm like, this guy's one of the best defenders in the country on the back end right now. And he's so consistent for his age and athletic and smart. That I was just so pleasantly surprised. Yeah. I mean, he, he, he checks a lot of,

of boxes of what you want from PFF grades too, right? Like he plays mostly at free safety or in the slot. Which I love. And he had a 77.9 coverage grade of free safety, 72.4 grade in the slot. And even in the box, it was 69.9. So almost a 70 coverage grade when he was in the box as well. 90.6 run defense grade. That goes to like, he just does not miss tackles. He really is. He's not somebody who's going to, 90.6 run defense grade that goes to like, he just does not miss tackles. He really is.

He's, he's not somebody who's going to let you down and run defense at all. Despite coming from depth. A lot of times from the free safety spot, he's got one career interception, but his force and completion percentage was 20% last year. And that's a much more stable metric. That's 97 percentile for safeties.

So with point, I immediately looked to see if he was on Bruce Feldman's freak list, and he's not. And I'm kind of shocked that he's not. One, because he plays at Penn State, and it feels like every single Penn State player would be. But again, nobody's talking about this dude. Three-star recruit.

Like Penn State gets five and four stars in their sleep. Three-star recruit. Dad played football at James Madison. Yep. Seems like a real casual guy. Likes to swim and ride bikes in his spare time. I did see that in the bio. I did see that.

It's like this guy showed up and everyone was like, who the hell is this and why is he so good? Yeah. You know, this was the initial kind of comp that came to my head. And I fleshed it out and actually like it does make sense but i feel bad because it's like a penn state penn state connections people are like oh you're just watching the jersey but like i know where you're going his place now is jaquan brisker it's a hundred and he looks like brisker and pads right like i did

like just the aesthetic but the good part about brisker is exactly what you said about like coming to balance brisker would go full force at you but he would stay in control so that when he got to the ball carrier he'd hit you in the mouth like he'd be able to lay the shoulder on and and that's what kevin winston jr does i have a first round i have it so obviously like these grades are are there's a lot that has to play out so they're not solidified at all but like i have an early preseason first round grade on malachi starks i have a late first early second on kevin winston jr so like he's right there for me again like this is somebody who i and i think that if he gets more takeaways in the passing game and i would say even if it's not in the form of interceptions even if it is once again the

forced incompletion percentage is high, I'm going to bump up his ball skills and he's probably going to, like my formula is going to spit out from his film grade. It's going to spit out like a first round grade. So I genuinely think that we could get at least two safeties in this class right now that would have been safety one in last year's draft. Yes. They're just more athletic.

I loved Nubin. I did too. But Starks and Winston are more athletic players than him. Yes. So is Bowman. And Bowman also. So is Bowman. So is Womka.

It's a five-star. It's Womka. The safety class is good. It's a good group. It's a good group to close our summer scouting on. I'll tell you that. Yep. Yep.

We love you guys. Thank you so much for watching the entire summer scouting series. I'll tell you that. Yep, yep, yep. We love you guys. Thank you so much for watching the entire summer scouting series. This is a blast for us. We had more people watch the summer scouting series this year than any year that we have done this. By a crazy margin.

It's not even close. Yeah, like sometimes that naturally just comes from getting some more subscribers through draft season, people stick around. But like you guys really have stuck around and I can't tell you how much that means. It's just, it's so cool to not only be able to do this at the depth that we've gone through this particular summer scouting but also hear the back and forth between you guys read all the comments read what you guys are saying whether you agree or disagree with us but also like some

of you have thrown in some of your scouting reports for players in the comments your rankings and that's what we love the most. And so from quarterbacks all the way to safeties, thank you guys so much for getting involved. It has made the summer fly by for me. I hope the same with you, Connor, because this has been so much fun for me to do. Next on the list is completing the big board.

I get like, oh, it's kind of like a kid on Christmas Eve. Dude, what motivated me to get safeties done. I thought you were going to say to get out of bed. What motivates me to live? What motivates me to stay alive is the fact that we're recording this, obviously, on a Thursday. So this is going to come out Thursday evening at some point, maybe Friday morning. I don't know. Cause it's we're recording it late, but tomorrow is Friday tomorrow. My big project is to completely update the PFF big board with all the summer scouting that we have done through offense and defense.

I think I'm going to have like 150, 175 players on there. They're all going to be, I'm going to update that sometime throughout the day on Friday or Friday evening. It's all going to be updated and ready for you guys to look at and reference and for us to adjust throughout the college football season as college football kicks off this weekend. So I'm super excited to get to that. Are you doing a, are you doing a formal big board? We're planning the show on the show.

Right now we are fully planning the show on the show. Are you doing a formal big board or We're planning the show on the show. Right now, we are fully planning the show on the show. Are you doing a formal big board, or should we do the big board episode next week or something? What do you want to do? I think we'll do the big board episode next week where we arrive with our top 50s. Yeah, you want to do top 50s? And we build the NFL SC board combining our boards together.

Yes. Which is, if you ever want to see two mock draft dummies do as much math as they can to figure out how to mesh these, tune in. You won't want to miss it. It's the funniest thing we do. It's an absolute disaster. Yeah, at the end, it's so beautiful. It's... All right, so we'll do that episode.

Yeah. I won't leave my house this weekend. Okay. I won't even, I won't even acknowledge my wife. I have a big board to build. Wow. Wife flex. Oh, you like that?

Yeah. Yeah. The wife, the wife flex guy gets married at the beginning of the summer. And now he's just trying to flex on all of us. Okay. So why don't we do, let's just use my fiance again. You got downgraded. You got relegated.

When my girlfriend gets home from work. You get relegated to fiance. We'll see if you can climb back up next year. My friend with benefits. We'll see how that one goes. She'll really appreciate that. That'll go over great. So let's do the big board episode

for our early episode next week. And then I don't know if we're gonna do the mock draft episode on thursday it's gotta be a it's gotta kick off a week right yeah but mock draft okay so um wow this is this is a tough scene welcome to the boardroom folks do we do we do the mock draft on monday and then like the big board on wednesday i don't know if something feels wrong about that but right right i think we we could do the big board and then just do the mock draft later in the week all right we're gonna people are gonna click on the we're gonna do the mock draft that got us out of bed right on wednesday so we're doing the big board episode

for monday and then we'll do the mock draft on like wednesday or thursday sure i'd like to do wednesday if we can but i will do it earlier in the week than we normally will do an episode because we know everybody will want to ride that high of the big board and thursday night football god that's nuts that's thursday night Yeah, I got something else crazy for you. Ready for it? Friday night football, baby. I know. In Brazil. The Eagles. Right?

It's the Peacock game. I'm a company man. Matthew Barry says that on our show all the time, and now I'm just still in it. It's got to be Packers-Eagles, the Friday night game. Yeah, it's Eagles. It's Eagles. You're right.

What time is that game since? Well, no. Brazil's not like in Asia. Boy, that's probably the dumbest thing i've ever said on the podcast what time is that game is south of us i believe they are i believe it is yeah and i know there's actually a nice contingent of brazilian listeners of this show so i apologize for my absolute moronic statement of thinking your time zone could be like in the pacific anyways the game's on at 8 15 easter yeah 8 15 a.m it's on at 8 15 a.m your alarms for 3 a.m not because the time zone changed they just feel like playing it then so there we go thank you guys so much for watching and listening we really

appreciate it uh if you stuck around this long, you're true addicts. We love you. Thanks for hanging out with us all summer. We're going to have a lot of really great content for you throughout the season. We'll do some NFL stuff. I saw some people in the comments who were like, hey, I like the draft, but I don't really get into it until draft season. But I love you guys' podcast.

Can you do more NFL stuff? We have a mix throughout the season. We'll do some natural NFL coverage. Yeah, we'll cover the rookies plenty, be able to take our scope around the league. But we do want to keep a lot of what we do here on the show NFL draft-centric because we know that that's what you guys come here for, that kind of analysis.

And we want to try to be, quite frankly, best podcast in the world covering the NFL draft. That's right. That's the goal you know that's what we uh that's definitely what we want to do we appreciate you guys you won't you'd have to kill me i will not stop until this draft this draft podcast is the best at covering the draft in the world yeah and then the day after that you won't have to get out of bed no i'll just be there forever that's it but if it's number one i will i will rest. Yeah, then you can rest. And now I finally rest.

Like Thanos, you know? And now I finally rest. Look upon a great draft universe. And tell us what you like from the show. Some people really like the Fixing Team series. Some people really like our Rookie Breakdowns, which we're going to do all that no matter what. But if you really like one thing more than the other,

we're doing two shows a week now. So there's more room for suggestions and fun stuff. What do we call our show with where we would hold up the paper? No notes. No notes. I have so much fun with no notes. We might need to do like bonus episodes of no notes. Yeah.

Yeah. It's good. And we could even let like listeners decide some of the topics via dms yes yes yes yes it's gonna be a dude i'm so excited about this season it's gonna be so much fun to watch the scout college football we've got a lot we've got even more flexibility this year to do all different kinds of shows on this channel which i'm really excited for and you guys are just a part of it as just as much of a part of it as we are so like connor said please let us know what you want to see more of and we'll try to make it happen because this is

a show of the people i'm trevor sick about that is connor rogers thank you guys so much for watching and listening to the nfl stock exchange podcast see you guys next week Thank you.