After seeing how the season played out, how would things have gone differently for the Jacksonville Jaguars in the first two rounds of the 2024 NFL draft knowing what we know now?
ESPN recently tried to figure that out. Each of their 32 beat reporters recreated the first two rounds of the 2024 NFL draft.
In the first round for the Jaguars, they still ended up with wide receiver Brian Thomas, but took him at their original draft position of 17th overall, rather than trading down to pick 23 where Jacksonville selected him last April.
Thomas put together a huge rookie season. In what was a loaded wide receiver draft class, Thomas was not only the most productive of the bunch, but he was one of the most productive receivers in all of football as well.
He finished 2024 catching 67% of his 129 targets, averaging 14.7 yards per catch. Thomas ended the year with 1,282 receiving yards, good for the fourth-most among all receivers, along with scoring 10 touchdowns.
With his speed and route running ability, Thomas is a threat at all levels of the field, and perhaps the most impressive part of his production is that defenses knew he was getting the ball and still couldn’t slow him.
Then in the second round, the Jaguars passed on defensive tackle Maason Smith and instead selected safety Calen Bullock, who was originally the 78th overall pick by Houston.
Bullock filled the free safety role in Houston as a rookie and had terrific ball production with five interceptions and five pass breakups.
He also allowed a completion rate of just 45% and held opponents to just 12.2 yards per catch and graded out quite well as a run defender by PFF’s metrics.
As we all know, the Jaguars’ secondary was often picked on last season, ranking 24th in completion rate and in the bottom three in passer rating, interceptions, and yards per pass attempt. Safety will be arguably the team’s biggest need this offseason.
“If the Jaguars knew safety play would have been a major issue in 2024 (a league-high 14 pass plays of 40 or more yards), they would have taken Bullock, who led all rookies with five interceptions to go along with 51 tackles,” wrote ESPN’s Michael DiRocco.
Smith, meanwhile, played 384 snaps as a rookie and totaled 14 pressures and three sacks. Smith ranked 133rd in PFF’s run defense grade and was 100th among defensive tackles in pass rush win rate.
