George Karlaftis
 

I can't stop fixating on this guy in the first round. The more I see him in the early 20's in mocks, the more I want KC to make the deal to go get this kid.

He reminds me of Ryan Kerrigan and Justin Smith. If he's somewhere in between, he'd be well worth a 20-ish pick. I just like his game. Great power in his punch. Good hand usage. Alot of moves but a staggering bull rush. Great feet. Excellent burst off the snap. What he doesn't have is great bend and agility which negates his speed rush.

But those traits, the ones involving power and speed-to-power, those win in the NFL. I don't care about his 40 time. He ran faster than the Bosa brothers. It's fine. He has elite vertical and broad jumps and a respectable bench press. I just imagine the day he gets stronger, and he will. If he learns to use better power rush technique, he's going to be very solid.

I think a lot of the lack of sacks this past year was the volume of double-teams and no other real threat on Purdue's defense. You watch his games though and he's putting tackles in the dirt. He's getting hits on the QB. He had a solid win rate as a pass rusher.

I love this guy as a SDE prospect. I want him to be a Chief. If you can go out and get a Sam Williams in the 2nd to pair with this guy as a bendier, more athletic WDE, I think you'll have an incredible pair of bookends for the foreseeable future.

So, am I missing something? Do I not see some fatal flaw?

He’s Breeland Speaks 2.0. /s

Why? All his main accolades/success are against lightweight OTs he pushes those guys around, but when that doesn't work he's neutralized very very low ceiling could be good but not a gamewrecker

Guys with higher floors and lower ceilings get slept on a bit by the draft nerds. I'm as guilty of it as anyone.

But you're spot on in how he'd fit with someone like Williams or even Ojabo long-term.

He's a set and forget SDE and a guy who you can just write into the lineup alongside Clark from Day 1. Then as Ojabo or Williams get up to speed, you have a really nice strength/speed pairing.

And like I said, I'd go after Jones/Wyatt to complement the whole thing. If you could get Karlaftis/Jones/Williams with the first 3 selections, you'd absolutely murder this draft.

But my philosophical opposition to trading up remains pretty strong this year.

Karlaftis and Ojabo are my dream picks at 29 and 30.

Agreed. Not a fan of trading up but if he's there at 29, I'd absolutely love to take him.

This just isn't true. Have you actually watched him play?

It's funny, but if you kick around the mock drafts, you'll find the Chiefs have so much damn draft capital they can go after 3 DL and 3 WRs and still be able to get a DB and LB that can probably play early in the season. And that's without doing any trade-downs to get additional day 2 capital.

I'm still torn between Karlaftis and Cam Thomas.

Yes, I wanted to get excited about his play considering the media reverence but his moves are sheer power to the QB, pushing lighter guys like they're JV. When he deals with OTs who prepared for it like technicians who can get him off balanced are "punch" when he's out of the stance not so great. Ultimately, I was hoping to the maniacal explosion and effort that Jared had, or having picture perfect technique who plays faster than expected.

I was looking for it but left unimpressed if you want a game changer.

Cam Thomas does look like a possible monster

The thing is, the idea that he only pushed around lighter guys isn't true.

He pushed around EVERYBODY, including some very very good B1G tackles.

I'd still be a bit shocked if they actually end up with 2 firsts this year. I think they end up moving one of them for some DE or WR prior to the draft.

They are not trading a 1st round pick for a WR.

It would be relatively counter-productive to trade a potential HOF WR to turn around and trade the best part of the compensation for a lesser WR. I'm not even sure who would be on the market that would command that at this point. The same goes for DE.

Most of the teams that needed to clear cap have done so and those that haven't don't have those types of guys to trade, unless you think the Titans are trading us AJ Brown or the 49ers are trading us Nick Bosa.