NFL Draft 2024: Final one-round mock draft feat. Patriots' surprise non-QB pick

2024 CFP National Championship - Michigan v Washington

Other players I considered:

Michael Penix Jr., QB, Washington – I could absolutely see a team jump back into the first round to select him, secure the potential of a fith-year option, but with Penix you already have a guy that is 24 years old as a rookie and we know plenty about what he is, even though we may not be fully sure what the transition to the pros looks like, and the injury history at Indiana is of course concerning. 34 to the Patriots is very much possible or I could see the Raiders potentially trading up early in the second round, if they don’t end up making a move early, very much in the mold of what happened to Will Levis coming out of Kentucky last year, as the second pick of day two.

A few other receivers I was thinking about, but we’ll get to one here in a second. Just felt the need to mention Xavier Worthy from Texas, because the NFL obviously loves speed and this is officially the fastest man to ever enter the league – so I don’t expect him to hang around for very long if he doesn’t actually go in the first round.

Kool-Aid McKinstry, CB, Alabama – My number 3 corner, worthy of going somewhere in the 20s. I was kind of going back and forth with him and Wiggins – who is just ahead in my rankings – for who the Lions would pick at 32 and with how much single-high they like to run, he would’ve also made a lot of sense for the Steelers, but recovering from the foot surgery and not having done the agility drills at his pro day, as good as I think he is at anticipating routes and disrupting receivers off the line, in this case he has to settle for early 2nd round.

And two longshots that I wanted to bring up here quickly:

Marshawn Kneeland, EDGE, Western Michigan – Had an excellent Senior Bowl week, followed up by some great combine testing at 6’3”, around 270 pounds. Someone with incredible play-strength and untapped potential as a player who wasn’t always put in position for major production.

Edgerrin Cooper, LB, Texas A&M – In a fairly underwhelming linebacker class, he stands out in terms of athletic ability and some of the high-end plays he put on tape, as a guy that can shoot gaps & create TFLs in the run game, blitz from different angles & has the loose movement skills to make plays in coverage. N.C. State’s Payton Wilson I have just ahead of Cooper as LB1, but of course he comes with a pretty scary medical history