All-Prospect Team

The 2020 NFL Draft is still a week away, and, for some reason, I was able to complete my normal scouting exercise well ahead of schedule. So I thought with the extra time I would have a little fun.

I’ve been breaking down prospects like this for six years now. I do around 60 each year, which means I have studied more than three hundred prospects who have entered the league since 2015. With so many that have come and gone, it’s easy to find myself comparing this year’s crop to players that entered the league in previous drafts. Who are the best players at each position that I have scouted? And how do the top players from 2020 match up?

Below I’ve put together a starting 22 out of all the prospects I’ve scouted. I based this entirely off of what I thought of them entering the draft, relying both on my memories and on the scouting reports I wrote up at the time. Naturally there will be some hindsight bias, but I think I was relatively fair picking both players who have prospered and players who never panned out.

In addition to selecting starters for each position, I called out a handful of honorable mentions who almost made the cut. In this group I’ll also throw in some of my favorite players from 2014, when I did some light scouting but not nearly with the same depth as in the six seasons since.

OFFENSE

QB

Joe Burrow, LSU, 2020

Thank god for Burrow this year. Because if he wasn’t available, I would have had to pick between some slightly more embarrassing options. My top quarterback in 2015 was pretty much a dead tie between Marcus Mariota and Jameis Winston. Five years later I’m still not sure who won that battle, but I know that we all lost. My choice would likely have been between them and Mitchell Trubisky, who at least technically still has a starting job, for as long as he can hold off recent trade acquisition Nick Foles.

Fortunately 2020 provided a clear choice for the best quarterback I scouted. Burrow doesn’t have the strongest arm, but aside from that he is well above average in everything you look for in a quarterback. Poise under pressure, accuracy at all levels of the field, anticipation of throwing windows, playmaking ability. In a single season he leapt over Tua Tagovailoa—another very impressive prospect—to become the clear top choice in this year’s draft.

(Writing this now I realize I don’t inspire a lot of confidence in my quarterback forecasting ability. In my defense, it hasn’t been all bad. I was higher on Pat Mahomes and Lamar Jackson than most people, and I was all over Paxton Lynch being a bust. But I haven’t been great at picking out the top option in the draft. I feel good about this year though.)

Honorable Mentions:

Teddy Bridgewater, Louisville, 2014

Marcus Mariota, Oregon, 2015

Jameis Winston, Florida State, 2015

Mitch Trubisky, North Carolina, 2017

Tua Tagovailoa, Alabama, 2020

RB

Ezekiel Elliott, Ohio State, 2016

I have only judged three running backs to be top ten caliber players, and in retrospect I probably overstated their value by placing any backs at that tier. Of the three, I chose Elliott as the best due to his versatility, and his lack of off the field concerns (Todd Gurley had injury issues, and Joe Mixon had an assault arrest).

Gurley and Elliott have obviously become stars, for running backs. But Gurley has since been released only a year after signing his big second contract, and the Cowboys are probably regretting the new deal they gave to Elliott (and if they aren’t, they should be).

I am a little curious why they haven’t utilized him more in the passing game. He did have 77 receptions in 2018, but for only 567 yards. This was after averaging more than 10 yards per catch his first two years on much lower volume. He then had only 54 catches at the same efficiency as the year before in 2019, the worst of both worlds. His skills as a receiver were a big part of why I thought he was more valuable than a normal running back, and the fact that he hasn’t made the most of this is an indictment of the team that invested so much into acquiring him.

Honorable Mentions:

Todd Gurley, Georgia, 2015

Joe Mixon, Oklahoma, 2017

WR

Amari Cooper, Alabama, 2015

DeVante Parker, Louisville, 2015

CeeDee Lamb, Oklahoma, 2020

On the surface this seems like another position group that didn’t turn out the way I expected. Cooper is a very good receiver but probably not the top three pick I projected him as, and while Parker is coming off a breakout season that saw him collect 1202 receiving yards, that doesn’t quite make up for the pedestrian first four years of his career. But in truth, it isn’t as if I missed out on a lot of talent. The only true superstar to come out of the past five drafts is Michael Thomas, a player I liked but didn’t quite trust my judgment of because he played in a run-first offense that asked him to do little on the outside.

Still, the names you’ll see in the honorable mentions aren’t the prettiest. The two receivers I had ahead of Thoomas in 2016 both turned out to be major busts, and I was similarly high on Kevin White in 2015 only for his career to go nowhere (in large part due to injuries).

It’s been a weird few years in the receiver pool. Most of the top ten picks have turned into either busts or replacement level players. I was never particularly high on Corey Davis, Mike Williams, and John Ross, but I'm still slightly surprised they have been as poor as they have. The best receivers have largely been players who went in later rounds that I didn’t scout—Kenny Golladay, Chris Godwin, Stefon Diggs. This year has good depth at receiver, and I will be interested to see if someone like Lamb can break the trend and become the genuine star we’ve been lacking.

Honorable Mentions:

Sammy Watkins, Clemson, 2014

Mike Evans, Texas A&M, 2014

Kevin White, West Virginia, 2015

Laquon Treadwell, Ole Miss, 2016

Josh Doctson, TCU, 2016

TE

OJ Howard, Alabama, 2017

Howard hasn’t lived up to expectations, and it’s still up for debate how much of that is his fault. He didn’t end up in the best situation in Tampa Bay, especially once they added Bruce Arians, a coach with a long history of minimizing the tight end position. But as a prospect he was as good a tight end as I’ve seen. He was a freakish athlete with flashes of dominance as a receiver, to go along with excellent blocking ability. There is still hope he can finally break out this year with Tom Brady running the offense, and if he does it would validate what many people saw back before he was even in the league.

Honorable Mentions:

Eric Ebron, North Carolina, 2014

David Njoku, Miami, 2017

Noah Fant, Iowa, 2019

OT

Laremy Tunsil, Ole Miss, 2016

Andrew Thomas, Georgia, 2020

As I went through this exercise, I quickly found that many position groups had one clear top prospect, with a much tighter group fighting for the second spot in our starting lineup. That was the case here at tackle, where Tunsil was an easy pick to hold down the first slot. He slid some on the actual draft night due to a leaked video of him smoking marijuana that feels laughably innocuous only four years later, but he was clearly one of the top prospects available in 2016. I still haven’t encountered another tackle that moved quite as easily as him and had the strength to stonewall opposing rushers in their tracks.

Thomas isn’t at the same level as Tunsil, and I doubt he’ll reach the same peak Tunsil has steadily ascended to through his first four years in the league. But Thomas is my top tackle prospect for 2020, which happens to be the best offensive line class I’ve scouted. He doesn’t have the overwhelming athleticism of some of the other tackles I’ve seen, but he’s a more than capable athlete, to go along with a technically refined and mentally sound pass protector. He’ll slide in as a starting left tackle right away for whoever drafts him, and even if someone like Mehki Becton eventually surpasses him, I doubt Thomas’s team will regret missing out.

Honorable Mentions:

Jake Matthews, Texas A&M, 2014

Taylor Lewan, Michigan, 2014

Andrus Peat, Stanford, 2015

Mehki Becton, Louisville, 2020

OG

Quenton Nelson, Notre Dame, 2018

La’el Collins, LSU, 2015

Guard is a strange position, because many of the players I thought would make the best guards played primarily tackle in college, and several ended up at tackle at the next level as well. Nelson is obviously an exception. He was freakishly dominant at guard in college, and he’s freakishly dominant at guard in the NFL too. He was one of the easiest choices in this entire exercise.

If I had stuck with a pure guard, I likely would have chosen Dan Feeney. He hasn’t been great since the Chargers drafted him, but he’s at least an NFL starter. Even so I had him as a late first round selection, well past where I would have chosen Collins. Obviously Collins went undrafted due to some truly bizarre circumstances, but the talent he had was that of a top ten pick. He hasn’t lived up to that billing since joining the Cowboys, but he’s been a solid starter as part of one of the league’s best lines, both at guard during his early years and since moving to right tackle.

Honorable Mentions:

Zack Martin, Notre Dame, 2014

Dan Feeney, Indiana, 2017

Dalton Risner, Kansas State, 2019

Jedrick Wills, Alabama, 2020

OC

Garrett Bradbury, NC State, 2019

This is not the most inspiring list based on how they’ve panned out so far in the NFL. The jury is still out on Bradbury, but he is coming off of a brutal rookie season that saw him look physically outmatched over and over again. He has always been a bit small even for a center, and his lack of physical strength was a concern of mine entering the draft. In a year or two he can hopefully add enough strength to round into a decent starter, but so far returns have been very negative.

Simply put, I haven’t scouted a lot of centers. The best career so far from a player I scouted who ended up playing center in the NFL was probably Cody Whitehair, but I didn’t even consider him as a center since he primarily played tackle at Kansas State (and he has since moved away from center to guard). Aside from Bradbury, the only real first round prospect I saw from the center position was Billy Price, who has somehow been even worse during his time in the league.

Honorable Mentions:

Billy Price, Ohio State, 2018

Cesar Ruiz, Michigan, 2020

DEFENSE

EDGE

Myles Garrett, Texas A&M, 2017

Chase Young, Ohio State, 2020

It was this position group that really got me started on this exercise. Chase Young was so far ahead of the rest of the edge prospects in 2020 that I found it more reasonable to try to compare him to past standouts than to members of his own class. Garrett is a clear top choice among edge rushers, and among all players I scouted, truth be told. He was as close to a perfect prospect as you could get.

After that it was an extremely tight race between three Buckeye defensive ends. Honestly picking one of these three feels a little pointless, since any of them would be an easy choice as an NFL team’s top pass rusher (and the Bosa brothers have already proven this at the next level). Of the three, the easiest to differentiate was Joey Bosa, who didn’t have quite the same speed up the field as the two that followed him.

Young and Nick Bosa were basically identical players. Both incredibly explosive off the ball, both lightning quick in a way that makes it almost impossible to touch them, much less block them. Both entered the NFL just okay when it comes to power, lacking the sheer overpowering force that put Garrett a notch above them. In the end I chose Young more because of the length of track record than anything else. He played 34 games in college and recorded 40.5 sacks, to Bosa’s 29 and 17.5. And while I usually don’t pay much attention to stats when scouting, I’m fine using them to break a tie this close.

Honorable Mentions:

Jadeveon Clowney, South Carolina, 2014

Khalil Mack, Buffalo, 2014

Joey Bosa, Ohio State, 2016

Nick Bosa, Ohio State, 2019

DT

Quinnen Williams, Alabama, 2019

DeForest Buckner, Oregon, 2016

The edge rusher position has churned out most of the truly elite-of-the-elite prospects I’ve scouted, and Williams is one of the few from the other position groups that belongs in the same category. He’s as good an athlete as you’d expect from a top three picks, but what really set him apart in college was the way he used his hands. He was pretty much unblockable at Alabama, and though his rookie season didn’t live up to expectations I still have hopes he can reach that same pinnacle in the NFL, if the Jets don’t stifle him as they did to fellow top ten pick Leonard Williams.

It was quite a battle for the second defensive tackle position, and you really can’t go wrong with any of the options. I was tempted to go with another 2020 player Javon Kinlaw, but as a sheer physical force he can’t match up with two earlier entrants into the league. Both Buckner and Ed Oliver came into the league as one of a kind physical specimens—very different stylistically, but both showing promise of total domination with some issues to clean up. This is one place where some hindsight bias might have snuck in, since Buckner has established himself as one of the best players in the league while Oliver is merely coming off a promising rookie season. But Buckner was a little more polished than Oliver entering the draft, bringing physical power to go along with his burst that Oliver hadn’t quite gotten a handle on.

Honorable Mentions:

Aaron Donald, Pittsburgh, 2014

Ed Oliver, Houston, 2019

Javon Kinlaw, South Carolina, 2020

LB

Roquan Smith, Georgia, 2018

Zach Cunningham, Vanderbilt, 2017

This group is more about the honorable mentions below than the players listed above. Based purely on talent Jaylon Smith and Myles Jack are the two best linebackers I have scouted, but both entered the draft with major uncertainty due to knee injuries. They had a rough go early in their careers, but they have since established themselves as quality starters, particularly Smith. Still, it’s worth wondering what they could have been if they had been as healthy during their pro career as they were in college.

That isn’t to say that Smith and Cunningham weren’t both excellent prospects as well. Neither has really established themselves as the true superstars I expected, but both are above average players at the linebacker position. Smith missed some time in his second year which hurt his development, and it’s still reasonable to expect him to break out in the next year or two. Cunningham hasn’t put it all together yet, but he is one of the best coverage linebackers in the league, and at 25 years old he still has time to develop into a star in the middle of the defense.

Honorable Mentions:

Jaylon Smith, Notre Dame, 2016

Myles Jack, UCLA, 2016

CB

Jalen Ramsey, Florida State, 2016

Jeff Okudah, Ohio State, 2020

Marshon Lattimore, Ohio State, 2017

As with the edge rusher position above, the second slot here comes down to a pair of Ohio State defenders. Fortunately most teams play with three cornerbacks, so this time I don’t have to choose. You have the athletic marvel in Lattimore, with the 4.36 forty yard dash and the explosiveness to erase any mistakes he made. And you have the technician Okudah, who doesn’t make mistakes. Lattimore has obviously become one of the best cornerbacks in the game when he’s healthy and on the field (and health was a concern for him prior to the draft, part of why he fell out of the top ten), and this year Okudah will hope to join him.

And of course, there’s Ramsey, who was the best of all worlds. He ran a 4.41 forty, and he had the balance and ease matching a receiver that I’ve only ever seen Okudah match. He left college with experience playing safety as well, demonstrating versatility that only made him more valuable as a prospect. And while he’s had some rough patches the past couple years, when he’s on he is a step above any other cornerback in the NFL.

Honorable Mentions:

Vernon Hargreaves, Florida, 2016

Denzel Ward, Ohio State, 2018

Greedy Williams, LSU, 2019

S

Derwin James, Florida State, 2018

Obi Melifonwu, UConn, 2017

One of these picks was easy. James was my top overall player in 2018, a versatile playmaker with extraordinary athleticism who has already lived up to expectations in the NFL. He is everything you could want a modern safety to be. He can cover man-to-man, he can erase segments of the field in zone, he can fill in the box, he can even rush the passer.

The rest of the league is still looking for a player who can do everything James can. Isaiah Simmons is a top prospect this year, and he almost made this team based on his once in a generation athleticism alone. But he isn’t as instinctive as James, and he’ll enter the league with a lot of work ahead of him before he can be a top player.

Melifonwu is probably the biggest whiff in this entire exercise. He was another Combine superstar coming out, and when I watched his tape I saw a player who excelled in man coverage and had the potential to do so much more. It’s puzzling to me that he has been such a flop, but reports out of his first stop in Oakland were that he was never really dedicated to the game of football. This is one of the biggest challenges of scouting, because no matter how talented a player is there are always variables you can’t account for.

Honorable Mentions:

Budda Baker, Washington, 2017

Malik Hooker, Ohio State, 2017

Justin Reid, Stanford, 2018

Isaiah Simmons, Clemson, 2020