Ep. 69: 2024 Draft Class Superlatives | Jags A.M. Podcast

Welcome to jag Zamine Kay Nannie Stevens. The twenty twenty four draft is now behind us. Who get some new players headed to Jacksonville and a whole lot to talk about. Do have some breaking news off the top here though, as a list of unsigned free agents as well as some cuts to the team wide receivers. A Jones is being cut as well as kicker Joey Slide. So, Brian, that news coming out Brian Thomas Junior was their first draft picks. That means they mean to cut to the

And it's just a numbers game.

The Jaguars will save about five million dollars against the cap in twenty twenty four, not that they needed to, John, they've got lots of room.

Well it's yeah, it's uh. I don't love it. I mean, I like Zay and I like what he brought. I think it would have been good to have that option, but in the cap era, when you're trying to save money, roll out the future. It is a you know, it's not a sign of our times. We've been in this time forever. But it is a function of the salary cap. You know, I let's not forget before he leaves, big, big,

Well, he left his memories too, right the two point conversion against Baltimore in twenty twenty two that gave them that win, that started the winning streak, and he had a big one in Tennessee a couple of weeks later where he just tight roped that.

Was caught by the pylon camp.

He leaves a lot of great memories in the fans' minds if they think about what's a Joe might put that team?

Good win, healthy, tough year last year, so roster casualty as of this point, we're going to bring our guests now, though. Trevor Sikhma from Pro Football Focus, of course, their lead draft analyst, Tart, Thanks for joining us.

We got some news there.

We do want to talk about our first round draft pick, Brian Thomas Junior, of course, and what that addition to the offense is going to mean for Trevor.

Yeah.

You know, it's funny.

When I saw this pick, I was like, Hey, this is a really good pick, and then I looked.

Up, Oh, I think they're going to be more vertical on offense.

And actually the checks were pretty dang vertical last year in their offense. When you look at you know, big time throws, total yards, total attempts, passing.

Grade on throws that were twenty or more.

Yards down the field, they were top ten in all of those categories. And so Brian Thomas Junior and the addition of Gabe Davison free agency, that just puts their foot on the gas even more for that being an identity of their offense, Trevor Lawrence ha said a couple of four thousand yard seasons, but I genuinely think that with their offense now, the skill set that they have at wide receiver and that mentality that we saw from twenty twenty two, this could be a potential five thousand

Want to do.

Now they just have the pieces to do that even better. So like the draft pick, especially now that I went and look back and said, this is exactly where they were going, it's the type of player that allows them to do that even more and more successfully.

Trevor has offensive line taken a step.

Back in terms of value for wide receivers because it was a great offensive line draft and the Jaguars went receiver, which it didn't seem like they needed to fill as significantly as I thought offensive line. Or is Brian Thomas just that special that he couldn't pass on it?

Now?

I think that it's a little bit of a combination of both.

Right, Trent balk there the general manager, I think throughout his general manager career, whether it's been in Jackson Mill or his time in San Francisco.

Like he's going to gravitate towards athletes.

I mean the Mason Smith pick in the second round is just more evidence to that. But when you look at Brian Thomas junior, the size man six or three two ten pounds, four three three speed, I mean that's just pretty rare for that size and speed combination, so you gravitate towards that. But I do think that we are in an age where picking wide receiver, even over something is what we thought is pivotal as offensive tackle

But also it is just the fact that.

Wide receiver more often, like you said, is getting valued as a premium position like pass protectors, like pass rushers. So we're seeing that more and more. And obviously this traf was a good state before.

And the Jaguars obviously focused on special teams a lot late because of the new kickoff rules. Did you see that as a major trend around the NFL, and it seems to me like the league is really going to be at a point this year of trying to figure out what these new rules mean. They sort of think they know and they're going to experiment with it, but it might be a year or so before they really figure out how best to take advantage of them.

Yeah, it's gonna be fun to watch this year, And by fun, I mean some teams are maybe gonna be a little disastrous and other teams are absolutely.

Going to hit a home run. And every team is trying to take that third phase.

Of the game and make it into a plus for them, right, something that's going to be very important. We've heard over the years pass that old field position matters so much, and that's such an important part of the game. It's why kickers and punters and kick returners have been drafted decently highly over the last couple of years, at least every now and then.

But this is totally different.

Now you have an opportunity to pick a totally different type of kick returner that could really be advantageous to the game. I mean, you guys, know, everybody out there watches the games over the last couple of years, every single kickoff, they're just through in the back of the end zone. I mean, that's how every drive is going to start, right at the twenty five yard line.

Now it's a little different.

You have an opportunity to really make a difference and flip the field a little bit more in your favor with guys who can see the field.

A little bit more.

Right.

Kick returners used to just be all right, let's put our fastest guy back there, have them receive the ball and run as fast as he can, and hopefully our blocking team will be able to get guys blocked up. Maybe we can get a rushing lane and hit something up the sideline. But now, with the contact window being much closer together, kick return is much more about.

Seeing the field.

Like it's almost about running back vision at this point, you know, what are you in space? So you're gonna look at a lot of these numbers, these one cut backs, these shifty wide receivers, these guys that make players miss in open space. That's actually going to be prioritized, in my opinion.

More than just straight line speed.

You want to be able to hit the home run, but shoot if you can get an extra ten, five, even five yards on a kickoff return because you just see the field very well, you see the blocking very well. That is incredible advantageous at a consistent level. So it's going to be very interesting to see how these teams kind of navigate those new kickoff roles.

Trevor, when we look at this class as a whole for the Jaguars, Trent Balky definitely went for some size, some physicality. That's something he talked about at the end of last season. They weren't big enough, they weren't strong enough. You see a lot of six to six guys. You see a lot of three hundred plus pounders, maybe not developed yet. But he definitely went for that, Let's get these big people in here and try to train them up.

Well, I think it's hell boom or bust.

Anytime you're talking about a draft pick, right, I think sometimes that's a little unfair when you talk about general managers or making selections, you just go, oh, this guy's a boomer bust. There's no such thing as a guarantee at the NFL level when you're talking about college kids going to the pros. So everything's got a little bit of a risk to it. But certainly when you look at this draft for the Jaguars, at least for the

I think that is a question.

Now he's a younger guy, so you expect that he's gonna get better, but really good off of a vertical plane, but can he developed more nuanced in his route running canny diversify his routree more than just those vertical routes and things off of a vertical stem.

That's what you're looking to see.

So there's a little bit of risk there if he's just a vertical wide receiver.

Yeah, okay, it was picked a little bit high, but even for.

Just that, I like I said, the size, speed combinations incredible. Mason Smith total projection, right, I mean, five star, number one overall recruit at one point is able to play as a true directman at LSU gets injured, Tears' his acl which is a couple of plays into twenty twenty two, and then this past year in twenty twenty three, you could just tell there was a combination of he had not played a lot of football and he's still trust

Every second'm a Pro Football Focus lead draft analyst. Thank you for joining us. You appreciate it.

Appreciate it.

Guys.

All right, stay with us here on jagsam coming back. We're gonna go over some superlatives for the twenty twenty four NFL Draft class. After the break, Move the.

Freight, Move the Freight.

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Hey, Jerry, how you doing, man?

Good?

Hey, congratulations, We're just gonna bring you right down the road.

Let's play bowl there.

Let's go.

Congratulations man, Here's here's here's our gimp Okay, congratulations.

That a couple of party.

Hey, remember we talked about the mall.

Congratulations man, Man, never get sick of hearing those calls. That's third round pick Jarry and Jenkins out of Florida State. Kind of left Trent Bok on Red.

Bear as well.

We didn't get a little excited at the party. But we love those calls. We love you know, dreams coming true for all of these draft picks, and it's exciting to get the new players in.

Here, you guys. Yeah, And he's an intriguing guy. I talked to h the four state secondary coach yesterday. Played at a very high level out side. They moved him inside last year because they felt like his experience and his awareness inside, which you have to have to play the nickel. Really took him to a different level. It's what they need. I mean, he has the skill to eventually move outside. It certainly sounds to me like he will be the guy to beat in terms of the nickel.

Yeah, and they spent a lot of time with him when he was at the local pro day because he didn't work out. He stood on his combine in his Florida State Pro day. And I talked to Doug yesterday about him, and he sees his immediate contributor on special teams. I mean, steps right in and it's a guy who can be one of your better special teams coverage guys right out at the gate.

Let's talk about some of our guys. We're going to do some superlatives, like we're in high school once again. We'll go over this twenty twenty four draft class with start out with the first round pick, because why not, Ryan Thomas, you and you're most likely to succeed because the first round pick, so you better succeed.

But as we.

Mentioned, I mean, this is a great threat for Trevor, and I think it's nice to mention as well. I mean, a young player that can grow with Trevor, right, Like there's they brought in some veteran receivers when they for you know, when Doug came in and kind of overhauled everything for Trevor to work with. But now it's someone that you have locked up for the next couple of years to grow with Trevor.

Really long arms and big hands. I mean you see that when you see him reaching for it, which allows him to go out and get that fifty to fifty ball. Clearly, Johnny also has great body control because you see him in the corner of the end zone or down the sideline with a guy in coverage and still making the catch, which will be great on third downs.

Right to be able to keep this team on the field, be.

Able to have to throw to a guy and know that he can elevate and go get it.

Yeah, he has every tool. The thing that you hear about him needs to develop or out running. Trevor talked about it. That's big in the NFL. I mean it's hard in the NFL to just be great based on physical tools, which he has, so his task to reach. You know, the thing said about him was outside the top three. He had the skill set to be a one. The development part will be the key for him bare

Him a little leeway to learn as he comes in.

Yeah.

I think as you watch the tape from this past season. Early in the season, he was still kind of recovering from that knee injury, but each week the tape got better and better. And it also helps that we have his defensive coordinator from college, Matthouse here in the staff room as well, that I can really speak to his ability and his character.

John that Matt House connection, the new inside linebackers coach, was the defensive coordinator at LSU last year, and he got a couple of his guys in the building for sure.

Yeah, I'm sure that helps when you're investing in a player to be able to turn into a guy. So what kind of kid is this? You know, beyond everything they're telling me, you got somebody in the building they can tell you, Yeah, I'm not BS and you. This kid's x y Z. You know, Brian said it all weekend. This kid has every trait. You're taking a guy later in the second round who has a first round pick potential. If everything goes right, is it boom or bust I guess,

So the first thought that I had when they drafted.

Him was that the Titans took Jeffrey Simmons out of Mississippi State a few years back and he had torn his ACL and he knew he wasn't going to be ready until his second year, and that has paid off in spades for them. This guy has the same physical profile as Jeffrey Simmons as Chris Jones terms of height and length and strength. If the Jaguars can get some sort of super production from this kid, if he can reach his potential, what a great pick.

This could be.

Because when you watch the Titans play, Jeffrey Simmons is the best player on their defense.

Sometimes he's the best player on the field.

So you're going for that lightning in a bottle with a guy like this and hoping it pays.

Off big time six five and three hundred plus pounds. I mean, obviously he'll also get to like that exactly, and you're gonna get to work with, you know, and Eric Armstead who's long and tall as well. So I hope they can pick up some pointers on that line there and develop as things go along. Let's go a little later in the rounds. Let's go to Cam a little. I think this is our most confident player, John, you were you were hearing some of that zoom he had.

Yeah, look, why not. I mean, if if you have a choice between a kid who comes in and really thinks highly of himself and really doesn't at kicker, you may as well think you're good and then not worry about what happens if you show it. So you know, it's the old cliche kickers. You sort of put him in the corner and whatever they want to do, it's okay because they're a weird ad bunch.

Until you need him to kick a game winning field goal. That takes you to the next round of the playoffs, like Roley Patterson. I mean, you couldn't have been in the stadium that day, sure against.

The Chargers a year ago and not have thought, I wonder what's going through his head?

Right?

Sure, so you want this kid to come and be willing to swing his leg and give it his all. He's got the leg strength to kick from sixty right. Whether he's accurate from there or not in the National Football League remains to be seen. But I think the interesting part is they really like and both Doug and Trent told me this yesterday, they really like his ability to control the ball and drop it into that zone because if it goes into the end zone, that's a penalty,

And look, since Doug got here, they've sort of been looking to solidify that kicker to get their six seven year guy, whatever that is. So they took a draft pick in what otherwise was not considered a great six seventh round drafts. So you take that year and do you have to kicker.

And you see, if you saw it, well, they said he'th farwell out to work out all three of the kickers, and this is the guy he came back raving about, and he was the second kicker taking in that round.

So they got the guy that they wanted without having to move up to get him.

You're that confident at twenty years old, the youngest kicker to be drafted. So that's a good sign.

I can't even remember twenty much less if I was confident that so long.

Ago, so long ago. Let's go back to some of the big linemen. Jordan Jefferson. I'm gonna give him most competitive because he got a little bit of an attitude. I think we've all seen this video of him at the Shrine Bowl tossing a helmet around football.

Is not a nice kid, but sometimes.

And that's what we need sometimes, right because how many times would we say maybe a little attitude wouldn't help once, it wouldn't hurt once in a while for this team. And if you can have that on the line, maybe you know him and Cam can. I think Brent from Action News was saying that they should have a helmet talks in competition.

Think they're they're so.

Adept at that.

Yeah, we've seen through the years around here with some guys it's gotten him cut.

You hope he doesn't do that here, but you do like the attitude.

And look, if you're in the trenches all day, you got to keep that attitude alive.

Yeah, and he's a straight nose tackle. Now, I mean, like, so you've brought in a guy who is sort of your athletic guy. Next to him his nose tackle, You're starting to see a little bit about what Ryan Nielsen wants from his defense. Fourth round, right, so you can get big. That's where you're supposed to get your big run stuffer. If he's that, he was the strongest guy at the Yeah. So combined again, it all goes back to we talked all weekend about traits, and I'm more

All right, We're gonna close things out with mister congeniality, Jarion Jones, my personal favorite personality. He's gonna be a team favorite for sure, I can just tell. And he's also a huge Jag fan growing up. He talked about that when we got him on the media call.

So when I was growing up, you know, I was a big Maye Jones Drew guy like I was a big Maurice Jones Drew guy like. I was a super fan of him, you know, I was. I watched just about I think every game that he played, you know, And when Jalen went there from Florida State, like I was tuning into every game, him playing inside outside, just the way he brought.

Like what he brought to the game.

You know, I kind of fell in love with.

Jack watch Jalen was there, and especially while Mary's Jones drewers they you know.

So just now me being.

Able to continue that Florida State pipeline and come in and make plays and do what I do best, you know, it's it's a blessing.

Man.

You have the number one thing he has in common with Moys Shins. He's a big fan of Moys. I love yeah, he h Yeah, that's the kind of kid that gravitates to Morys.

In the third round, You're hoping to get a guy that can come in.

And play, but you're also hoping to get a guy that loves football because it's going to take a lot of work to get him ready to go.

And it looks like he's willing to put that in.

And you heard him on that call earlier, emotional, obviously excited to be picked, but he also said I'm ready to go.

I'm a dog, let's go. Well, it was neat about that quote. Is you really heard what's in it? For a lot of guys draft weekend, all of said he gets drafted and he realized he's going to get to continue living his dream for X number of years, and so many guys on draft weekend, you know, you know it's ending at that point, so clearly he savors it. You know, he's sitting there telling Doug, I love football. Well that holy heck, I get to go play it some more. Pretty cool.

Absolutely stay with us here, We're going to do some ozone mail bag questions for you after the break here on Jack's I am Jags Fans. You can get up at fanatics dot com with all the latest Jags styles. Shop now get today's special offer fanatics dot com officially licensed everything.

Family.

Okay, then we've got ozone mailbag presented by fanatics, And there's so many questions, John, and sometimes only you have the answers.

Sometimes only I get the questions.

Oh, fair enough, you try to give us the answers, and we do appreciate that. So our first question today comes from Bradford from Orange Park.

And Uh, it was does Lawrence's fifth year option, uh, which he and Travis etn got on Monday? Does that preclude them from signing long term contracts? And I kind of get the question. If you don't go into real detail in a story, you said say, well, okay, well they got the fifth year option. Well that means there's no. The answer is no. You give the fifth year option to basically secure the player. The team has the right they can sign Trevor, Lawrence or a traves Et in

Just thought, Trevor's fifth year number is twenty five million dollars and that's a big number, and a lot of times in the first year of a new deal they want to get that number lower so they have more cap flexibility. So you'd probably like to see him get a new deal done so that you can manage the first year of that number.

It is something we see with quarterbacks a little closer to training camp, ray a little later in the summer. Things usually seem to come through before training camp.

Yeah, the mahomes Borough, like a lot of them have been July, say, closer, much much closer the week before. Yep.

Our second question is a little bit about draft dogs. Right, These guys all are great off the bus, but I don't see any dogs I help them wrong. Do you see any dogs?

Dog?

Yeah?

I was.

There's a lot of self proclaimed dogs, for sure.

I was a little intrigued by the question because I got you know, I listened to three minutes of zoom calls with these guys and watched the b roll, you know, for five seconds of highlights. I I'm not good enough to know that that means their dogs or not, because dogs means you're yelling at people a lot or beating you. I don't know. It's it sure seems like there's some confidence. H But we'll find out if they're dogs once the

Dog, You can't possibly know until you get them into the fourth part of a game and you need to make a play and they do where they don't.

Right, So you got to be a dog. You can't just look and act like one.

Fair enough, we'll see when they get into game action. Let's round things out with a little bit of an hour later. Do you think most fans think of the draft in terms of what can help the team win this year, while most gms are thinking about what can help the team win more so the following year.

Well, I think most fans are thinking absolutely about what can help them win this year. The GM has to have an eye on that. But as I wrote in the text answer to this question, if the GM's not looking past the year that he's drafting in, he's doing a disservice to the team. You can't just draft for that year. So yes, I think there's a huge disconnect

This is why you have a coach who coaches the team and a general manager who manages the roster, because somebody has to have that macro view and to be able to see three and five years down the road. We have seen it where coaches make short term decisions to win now because their jobs are so year to year, and those aren't often the best long term decisions. The best in recent memory here is the decision of twenty seventeen to take Leonard Fournette instead of Patrick Mahomes.

How might that have been different.

Right, because Leonard Fournette was a very good player to one playoff front. Yep, you sort of even knew then that it was short term gain, long term pay.

One hundred percent, And it's so easy to look back and have hindsight twenty twenty. But that is such a glaring short term solution for the Jaguars. They knew that they needed the running game to make Blake Bortles more effective to play to the defense which they had built and bolstered through free agency. And it was a good decision because it got in the AFC title game, but that only lasted a year if they'd taken Mahomes.

Who knows what might have been.

There's a lot of might there because you don't know how things work out. But you have to have a big picture of you with draft choices, because few and far between are those guys that come in and just light the place up as.

A rookie time.

We'll tell on this hard to judge a draft right away, of course, that's what we've been doing all day, but it'll take a while to see where these draft picks end up. Stay with us for a little bit longer. We talk about what's coming up, including rookie minicap.

Yoh, it was good, Bro, it was good.

Welcome to Jacksoville.

Man, appreciate it. Appreciate it. Excited to be there.

You can't wait beating it down here. Bro, it's gonna be It's gonna be awesome. You love the guys. Can't wait to have you brothers.

Yep, appreciate you.

How's the how's the knife and everything?

Good? Yeah, it's been going good so far. Excited families in sight of everybody's here.

Man, I'm happy for I don't want to take too what's your time? But yeah, I'm sure you got some media stuff all that.

Yep, appreciate it though, bro.

Yeah, bro, all right, man, I'll see you soon. Enjoy I know your probably can come down here tomorrow. Enjoy it, man, soak it up. Congratulations, Tell your family, I said, what's up?

Yeah, wait to meet you, bro, got you appreciate your fair them all right?

Roy Ever, long's talkings, new Target.

How's it going well? I just slayed twenty nine? Pretty good, pretty good day, good day. That was cool though.

If anyone can relate, it's it's Trevor, I'm sure.

Yeah.

So we've got rookie Minniember. We're just discussing this the end of next week, one of John's favorite times of the year. We get these rookies in here and running around twenty fifteen.

Dante Fower popped his ACL in the first ten minutes we came in the camp, and so mini camp went from being actually a physical endeavor to more of a.

Mental right, which is what it should be. It's guys have been.

It's intro, it's here's where the bathroom is, so you know when you come back next week you can get to it. And no, and but here's how so that you're not running around and having no idea what's going on, you try to give rookies as many reps. They'll give them some reps this weekend. You do OTAs, and you bring them in early during training camp, training camp so that by the time they get like a fourth read on something, you're not walking around and going, wow, look at the MEC.

But it is an important point because these guys have been training for running forty our dashes and three cone drills and bench pressing. They haven't been doing football stuff, and so you put them on the field right away, and they're not acclimated to it. So it's it is much more about here's how we work, Here's how we meet, Here's where everything is in the building, so that you are more productive when training camp roles.

And strength guys and trainers have begged coaches for years to realize, don't work these guys when they first get here, for years that they didn't listen. Finally, over the last couple of years, with some injuries like that, most teams are doing it this way, which is basically, this is an introductory orientation, if you will.

More than we won't say anything crazy from them in mini camp. But is there any player in particularly you're looking forward to seeing in person?

You look for athleticism, right, So, I mean, it'll be cool to see Mason Smith because I'm sure you look at him and say, well, that's that's what I thought it was.

Well, Miles Cole, the came from Texas Tech, who's a project in the seventh round. But talking to some of these guys, these coaches yesterday, apparently Ryan Nielsen was banging the table to get Miles Cole thought so much of his traits.

Well, and the big thing you don't want is there's what eight nine draftees, as a GM or a scout, you don't want to be walking off the field that many camp going, you know, which occasionally happened.

I've been here in the past.

So that's the big thing to get through that weekend. They all want to get back to their office and go alright, alright, okay, we're all right there. These guys can at least line up so because it doesn't happen as often as you used to, but occasionally happens.

All right, that's what we got mini camp headed. Next week, we'll get all these rookies in the building. We appreciate you joining us. We'll see you next week on JAG's Am.