The 2021 Mock Draft Extravaganza kicks off with the draft's first eight selections, starting with how the Jaguars will fit Trevor Lawrence, and why Zach Wilson is the guy for the Jets.
After that, things get interesting. Is Mac Jones really the pick for the 49ers at 3, or is Kyle Shanahan looking for a more expansive skillset from his next QB. And will the Falcons go ahead and grab their next quarterback, or do they continue to build around Matt Ryan for the final years of his prime.
The Bengals have a decision to make between offensive line and receiver as they look to get Joe Burrow some help, the Dolphins have a chance to reunite Tua Tagovailoa with an Alabama receiver but should they take it? The Lions need help at every position you can think of, and the Panthers have to go offense, and might finally end their desperate search for their next quarterback.
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Hello, and welcome to the m m QB Monday Morning NFL podcast. I'm your host, Gary Gramling. I am joined by Jenny Brannis of the week Side Podcast, and anyone who's listened to the show in the past knows that we do in April. These will be the mock Draft shows, a a four part extravaganza coming up here in which Jenny and I and maybe Connor drops in at some point. But um, we sort of play general manager slash coach slash god perhaps for each of these teams, and uh go through draft needs and figure out what prospects might fit with the um with each franchise. Here, Jenny, this is this is gonna be your first, your first run on these are you Are you feeling confident? Are you feeling nervous? What's what's going on here? Let's let's talk this out. Well, you prewarned me last night. You said that if I was going to rejoin the pod this week that I would step into the vortex. So I had mentally prepared myself, Gary. So I don't feel quite as ready as as Andy Bennitt would, but you know, at least I was advised to, you know, ready myself for this gauntlet. Well, and he never knew the prospects, so we can certainly, uh, we can certainly run through the draft needs here and I will reprise my role as prospect orc and uh and assigned players of these teams. And the way we do it is this is less a who we're predicting they will take and more a who we think they should take, who we advise them to take. So I mean, you don't even need to look at draft grades or anything after the draft. You can just go back and see if they took the player that we said they should take and and sort of, uh judge your level of anger off of that. But uh, the way we do this is eight teams per show, and we're just gonna go through draft order, and when we get two teams that are coming up for a second time in the first round, we us don't count those against the eight, So we will end up doing all thirty two teams, including the ones who don't have first round picks, and we will just sort of assign random uh day two dudes to those teams when we get there. But um, we are of course starting with the top eight, and we're gonna have a lot of quarterbacks in this show. Uh, and Jacksonville Jaguars is where this draft begins. It's pretty much done. They're they're taking Trevor Lawrence and we're gonna come up on the Jaguars again later in the first round. But I guess we can kind of talk about, uh, what do you expect of Trevor Lawrence in year one at this point? Getting dropped into certainly what was a bad team last year, but you have new coaching staff, they made a lot of signings and free agency, will see if they work out or not. But uh, it seems like it's a little more stable there than it's been in the past. Yeah, I think that is the ultimate question. Now we know they're going to take Trevor Lawrence. Urban Meyer essentially admitted it to Peter King last week, so they're not even playing along with the charade, which is honestly somewhat refreshing Gary. But now the question becomes how ready can they get Lawrence to play? Will they be able to build a successful, you know, team around him and system around him, and will it work out? And there are so many expectations for Lawrence. Evaluators have been waiting for him to arrive in the NFL since he was a true freshman. So now that he's here, now he's in this situation that there does seem to be a lot of optimism. You know, people in Jacksonville think Urban Meyer is involved with you know, details on everything in the organization. They think that's a good thing. Um, they think that there's a lot of hope for a better direction. But it's still a experiment for the Jaguars. They're still going the sccessbull college coach turned NFL coach route, and I think there is a lot of unknown with that as well. So after they get Lawrence, what other players will they be able to get in the draft to help him succeed not just this year but in the years to come. Yes, successful college coach who not not to overstate it, but didn't coach the last couple of years. So we'll see what Urban Myers, uh, what his offense might look like in the NFL, since you're not gonna go one to one with what you ran at at Ohio State. But uh, it's gonna be interesting. Trevor Lawrence is a guy who schematically you can do pretty much whatever you want. Uh, if you want to, uh run a bunch of QB power like they do with Cam. You can do that with Trevor Lawrence. And you want to run quick game, you can do that. If you want to run uh you know something a little more uh McVeigh shanahany you can do that. I mean, you have so many options with what you can build and how you can build it around Trevor Lawrence at this point, and um, it is, He's he's a no brainer number one overall pick. Uh it is. You know, you can go back to Andrew Luck as the last sort of you know, surefire as surefire as they get quarterback prospect coming to the league. So, uh, you know, this is the Jaguars reward for going one in fifteen, because we reward teams for going one in fifteen in the NFL. They do it these days. And they're gonna have Trevor Lawrence on a super cheap contract for three years and they have a chance to build something down there. Yeah, and I guess you mentioned we'll we'll get to them again, you know, later on in the first round. So they have a lot of places to add players around Lawrence to continue to build with him. Um, but they do still, I mean they did make some good additions in free agency, but they do still have a lot of needs. You know, they could certainly stand to take a tackle, another fiver, another tight end, So they're definitely offensive players that it would make sense to continue to put around Lawrence. Yeah, I could use a tackle. Marva Jones is a nice compliment to d J. Shark. But maybe you maybe you want someone a little younger and that number two receiver spot. But uh, we'll see, Uh, we'll see how it goes. So uh, in our mock draft, we are officially giving the Jacksonville Jaguars Trevor Lawrence and that that drama is now gone. Um number two the New York Jets. This is probably gonna be another spot where a quarterback is going. I don't know where you stand on this, Jenny. I I just, uh, I think if you're in doubt with your quarterback going into year four here and you have a chance to sort of hit reset on the rookie contract and bringing a new guy, and not to mention too, it's a new coaching staff coming in here, I I think you do it. I I'm not giving up on Sam Donald, but I just don't think it makes a whole lot of sense to hang on to him, and you know, unless you were really down on the uh the other three or four first round prospects here at quarterback. Yeah, I agree, but I will say that they need to learn the lessons from what happened with Donald and why things didn't go right, because if you remember back to the year that Donald was drafted, he was thought to have been the safest prospect, maybe not the highest ceiling, but people thought he had the highest floor among the first round quarterbacks drafted. So what went wrong for them to be in this position again where they're taking a first round quarterback? But that's clearly their intention. You know, obviously when the forty Niners traded up, they went to the three spot because the Jets didn't want to budge from two, which indicates they are taking a quarterback. Um, so you know they have They signed Corey Davis in free agency. Is that the answer at received or I'm not so sure, But that's one piece that Donald was really lacking in the last few years. There wasn't a strong receiving corps um. They had to do a rebuild of the offensive line. So you know, Joe Douglas certainly wasn't here for most of Donald's tenure, so that doesn't fall on him. But you also need to look back at what went wrong, how the roster got to this point, and how you're not going to let it happen with the quarterback that you do take. Yeah, there were just a lot of things that didn't work out roster wise, obviously didn't work out a coaching wise during the uh the last couple of years here in New York. Uh, Michael Floor is in here as a new offensive coordinator. He obviously comes over from San Francisco with Robert Sala. So you're gonna see that uh, that Shanahan's style uh offense here, which obviously it's it's it's quarterback friendly. I mean, you've seen a lot of guys across the league in these systems be quite uh um, quite productive here. And I'll say this, and we brought it up in this podcast the last a couple of times. The were way early on two. But you know, the quarterback class doesn't look great. It doesn't look like there will be any sort of veteran free agent type guys available for team searching for a quarterback. So, uh, these three guys seem like they are going to be. And three guys I'm right now referencing Trey Lance, uh, Zack Wilson, and Justin Fields. And you can throw Mac Jones in there. Who I'm sure we'll come up later in the show or this series. But UM, if you are thinking you are going to need a quarterback in the next two years, it's almost like if you have a chance for one of these guys, it's really hard to uh to pass up on them at this point. So, UH, Zack Wilson is the guy everyone's kind of penciling in here there. The three between Wilson, Fields, and Lance are all really tricky evaluations. Uh. Wilson's kind of a one year wonder. Lance obviously, we know, you know, not only coming up from an FCS school but only played in one game last year. He's also a one year starter essentially. And uh and Justin Fields. I have some um reservations about the offense he ran at Ohio State. I don't think it did him a ton of favors, but it probably also well possibly also prepared him better uh for the NFL. But Zach Wilson seems like he's the guy at this spot. And I just wanted to highlight one thing on Zack Wilson and I find fascinating is big time arm talent. And when you see guys like you know, Josh Allen is the one who sort of stands out. But you know, obviously you threw them homes in there, you know, any of these guys with just these monster arms. Um, when you see these guys get their feet set and uh and just uncork a throw. I mean, you know, even going back to Wyoming, some of these, some of these fastballs Josh delivers are it's almost like an audible gasp when he throws it. Uh. It is just an another class of arm talent. As far as Zack Wilson goes. When his feet are set, you almost don't see those kinds of throws. It's not a he's not under armed by any stretch of the imagination. He he just you know, he doesn't throw that I don't know, a hundred twenty mile fastball that some of these other guys do. But when Wilson has to move and throws these sort of off platform, sort of strange body contortion type of throws, it's almost like he doesn't lose anything on those like he can throw those just as easily as he can throw h you know, the ball with his feet set, which is just a really uh uh you know, really strange combination of of strengths here. And uh you know, obviously he ran that offense well when he just had to run it on time last year. But it seems like he is the number two guy in this draft, and you know, it's certainly he'll fit what they want to do here in uh in New York under Michael Floor. Yeah, that's a really interesting observation, and I think that is a very important trait to have in today's NFL, right to be able to make throws from different arm angles, to make off balance throws. You know, there's always this collective awe when Patrick Mahomes does these things, and he certainly has a unique ability to do it. But you basically do have to do a lot of things off schedule and you have to sort of make plays happen where it doesn't seem like a play could happen. Uh. And so if he has that ability, that would be a trait that would be hard to pass up on. So we will go to the forty Honors now with the with the Jets taking Zach Wilson and obviously coming up for a quarterback here. They traded up from the twelve spot with the with the Dolphins, and then the Dolphins jumped back up into the into the top six. But uh, the Fortys have a very interesting choice here at quarterback. Everyone want to see who who Kyle Shanahan is going to take as a you know, sort of this this quarterback guru here and the options he has are again is really interesting. Kyle Shanahan wants quarterbacks who who play quick, who make quick decisions, who don't play out of structure a whole lot. Uh. If you are looking at the three remaining first round quarterbacks here, I know a lot of people want to pencil Matt Jones in here. Mac Jones stylistically fits what Kyle Shanahan does. Uh. Justin Fields I think potentially can fit in here. But the one christ in the fields and I think this might be a result of the number of option routes they run an Ohio state that sort of has him holding onto the ball longer. But if you're looking at Justin Fields tape, I don't know if he automatically is someone you would pencil in as as sort of a sure five excuse me, sure fire Kyle Shanahan type of quarterback, and then you have Trey Lance, and I think Trey Lance is the is the best fit here. Uh. They've said they want Jimmy Garoppolo to start at least at the beginning of twin twenty one, and we'll see how it goes. But uh, to me, it comes down to Trey Lance or Matt Jones if indeed Zack Wilson goes to and I don't know. We had the discussion with Albert Brier last week about what constitutes sort of a a high floor quarterback prospect in one and it's not what it used to be, where you sort of look at a guy and say like, oh, he's productive and he's he's a good game managers. I've got. It's almost the guys who, uh, the guys who can do a lot of different things, the guys who have movement skills where you know, if if, uh if they don't work out in your sort of traditional offense, you can do things with them other than what you would normally do. And I think Lance falls into that category. I do not think Mac Jones does. I just don't I find it hard to believe that the Fordnandes would come all the way up to three to get mac Jones at this point. Yeah, so they can come up to three. They obviously there is a quarterback that they could get three that they like. So somebody beyond Trevor Lawrence and Zach Wilson that they would like in the three spots. And I think your reasoning makes a lot of sense. The fact that Garoppolo is still on the roster, and I guess, look, things could change, who knows, but it in theory if he stays on the roster and starts some games as has been what the team has indicated, then you don't have to play the rookie quarterback right away, which generally is the right way to go. That often works out best for the quarterbacks if they can learn a little bit and then come in later. And so I think because of that reasoning, then you could go with a Tray Lance or somebody that you would you would want to have a little bit of time to make that leap to the NFL coming from North Dakota State for instance. Um So, I think I would agree with you, Gary, and I um I think your explanation too of wanting a quarterback with different skill sets is so important, and I think over the last few years perhaps that's led to some of the misses on quarterbacks because what what you're looking for has been morphing, and teams haven't been quite sure how to how to adjust to that or how to evaluate that, and how to place a different importance on skill sets that are becoming more more critical to succeeding at the NFL level. Yeah, our our buddy Greg Bishop had done a piece on Josh Allen back in it was September October last year. But uh, he was talking to Jordan Palmer, who you know is is sort of the quarterback coach out and uh out in California who worked with a lot of these guys. But uh, Palmer made a comment along the lines of this is not a direct quote, but it was something like, you know, Josh Rosen might be the last guy we see go in the first round who doesn't have movement skills as a major strength. It's just where the game is going at this point. Um, and I would put I would put Mac Jones in that lass as sort of a you know, a guy who has he's he's a he's a solid athlete. Um, he's certainly not a guy you're gonna build around his movement skills, though, Um when it comes to building your offense. And I think that's enough of the limitation to sort of take him out of this. Uh. You know, top five draft pick conversation here, as productive and as as good as he was, and frankly be he was better than two a tongue of ioloa at at Alabama last year, and you've heard that from some of the Alabama receivers at this point. But um, he's going to come up a couple of times in the uh in these shows, I believe, and maybe maybe as soon as number four to the Falcons, but probably not number four to the Falcons. So uh, we're we're giving trade lance to the forty niners. And actually, one more thing I want to bring up with the forty Niners is the Garoppolo factor here. And you know there's a report, uh this past weekend that they want a first round pick for Garoppolo and everyone sort of got to do their their guffaws and whatever else and and and point and laugh. But uh, I mentioned earlier, and I mentioned a couple of times on the show not a great quarterback class coming up in two If they play Garoppolo this year and they get the kind of season they thought they were going to be getting out of Garoppolo the last two years, and you know he stays healthy and and on the field and just sort of has it, has a solid quality season here a year from now when when he's you know, he'll be finally year that deal. It's it's non guaranteed. He does not make a whole lot of money for a starting quarterback NFL at this point. Uh, you know it would be uh, mid twenties. Uh is what you're looking at for a for a capit. He could absolutely have a big market after this season. It's it's certainly not a guarantee. If he plays like he did last season, he will not have a big market and they'll just move on from him. But uh, there's no reason to just right off Jimmy Garoppolo as a completely wasted acid at this point. Uh. He is a guy who they can trade next off season. That's a good point. Gary. The Atlanta Falcons at four, Uh, this is this is another one. Do they do they take the quarterback or do they not take the quarterback? And I guess they're just they're one of those organizations. I don't think Matt Ryan is done, but they're probably looking at this and sort of telling themselves, we're never going to pick this high again. Ever, so what do we do here? Last time they were up this side, they took Matt Ryan. Uh, here they are twelve years later, thirteen years later, and um, they have a chance to get their next quarterback. Yeah, this is a really interesting spot, Gary, because what you said looking forward. You know, we know that teams consider the next draft class as they make their plans for the current one. So the point you made about maybe draft class doesn't look as good for quarterbacks, although we know guys can come out of nowhere and change things. But if they're considering that, and you're saying, hey, we're at four, we're at a prime place to get a quarterback. But at the same time, they just restructured Matt Ryan's contract, so now he has dead cap hits that are over forty million each of the next two seasons. So it indicates that they're planning to stick with him. So do you take the quarterback at four given that you have indicated that you're you're wanting to stick with him, um, or do you take you know, a top weapon for Ryan or some other area of the roster where you have a need. So this is gonna be a really interesting question and we'll sort of answer how they feel about Ryan. This is and and Albert Brier mentioned a last week's show they've had all their main decision makers, Arthur Smith and UH and Terry Fontine at all of these pro days for the quarterbacks, and that would sort of signal to you like, oh, they're interested, but they also could be making people think that they're interested with it. So they come up and UH make a big offer for the number four pick for the fourth of these sort of big four quarterbacks available this year. So you could see it either way. UM, when you look at the rest of the roster. It's just really interesting with the Falcons because we've said for like three years every time around around the draft, like like, boy, they just need more talent on this defense. They they need more, especially as far as edge rushers go. Uh, you know Dan Quinn running that sort of Seahawks style cover three defense for all those years. They just weren't talented enough to make it work. And now you have Quinn is obviously out. Arthur Simith is the head coach, Dean pas is in as the defense coordinator. Dean ps a guy who can manufacture a pass rush without sort of top talent here, So uh, you might sort of cross edge rusher off of this list of at least urgent needs. I mean, you always want to be good at that position, but I don't think it's kind of neat. It has been for the last couple of years for the Falcons here. I think the bigger needs if you're looking at this all vent you're you're probably looking at offensive tackle at this point and uh and obviously have a really good offensive line class, and you have to top ten prospects in a in a Penney Sewell and Rashaun Slater uh in this class, so you could you could take and you know you have not only a top pass protector, but we know in this Arthur Smith's offense you want to do a lot of wide zone running and those are guys who are you know, athletic left tackle types who can get out there and uh and and really be a big part of your your rushing offense here. So I think offensive tackle makes a lot of sense. Quarterbacks, certainly if you're thinking, uh, you know, we've got maybe two years left with Matt Ryan if you're being pessimistic, and maybe we just get the next guy now. And like I said with Garoppolo, if they want to deal Matt Ryan, there's going to be a market for Matt Ryan, uh this upcoming off season. Yeah. So they there's a lot of different directions. And I think this is clear really where the draft starts. I mean, you can pencil and quarterback for the top three picks, and you're starting at four, and you have no idea which way they're going to go. They could go quarterback, they could go any number of positions. Um. So I think that the Falcons are really intriguing um intriguing slot. And that's added to that is the fact that they do have this new regime, So you don't really have any tendencies to go on. What should we do, Jenny, I think we're I think we're looking at justin Fields, or we're looking at one of the offensive tackles, probably probably Penny Sewell. I think he's really ideal for for what the for what Arthur Smith does with his with his run game. Here, let's go offensive tackle. Gary, all Right, Penny Sewell from Oregon to the Falcons. Big blow for the Bengals. It's always just being the Bengals. Is is sometimes a big blow. It we are to the Bengals at five and obviously quarterback is is not a need here in any way, shape or form. Uh will see if you know, if Justin Fields is still on the board, do they end up trading out of this spot? But we are of course locked in. We are not doing trade downs in this mock draft exercise as we call it. But uh, Bengals, they need offensive line help, they need uh, probably receiver help, and there are a ton of receivers available, and uh, if you're not looking receiver, you are looking rashaunse Later here. But as far as receivers go, you could take Jamaar Chase, who's the top receiver in this class, and reunite him with with Joe Burrow, and that is I don't know. It's always a it's always a feel good storyline if you're if you're the Cincinnati Bengals, Yeah, if Stool is not on the board, I could very easily see them trading down and then getting an offensive lineman wherever they trade down to. Because there will be a lot of teams that may want to come up for a quarterback. Um, so, but we're not doing trade scary, so that eliminates that option here. Yeah. Yeah. The other thing that this receiver class is we've said this, this will be the second straight year where we're just saying like, wow, this is a historic receiver class coming out, and you saw how it affected free agency this year where a lot of these receivers, you know, whether it be Juju, Smith, Schuster or guys like that, who were expecting to get big deals just didn't get big contracts here. So it's almost like receiver is such an important position. Uh, you know, we always we don't do it because it's just boring at this point. But the running back conversation about how it's just not a high value position and you know, you can plug anyone in there, you can't necessarily do that with receiver. But there's just so many talented receivers coming into the league and so many available, uh, whether it be via drafter free agency, it's almost like that has just flooded the market and devalued the position overall. So if you're the Bengals, are you just saying like well we can. You know, we got Tee Higgins in the early second last year, so why don't we just do that again instead of taking uh, Jamaar Chase here, even though again Jamar Chase would be a neat to see with with Joe Burrow once again, yeah, it would be neat to reunite them. And yeah, there's a lot of teams in the top ten that have a receiver need. I just think that for the Bengals, the line need is so glaring because of what happened to Burrow last year. You know, obviously he has a season ending e c L tear and just constantly under pressure. So it's hard to see them not going offensive line. All right, Jenny has banged the table here and we are we're going to give Rashaun Slater the Northwestern offensive tackle that will be there. Uh. If if this is how it plays out, will be interesting to see how they sort out him and Jonah Williams. Riley Reef is there as well as sort of a stop gap type solution there uh in Cincinnati. But uh, there we go. Two tackles off the board, justin fields still on the board as we get to the Dolphins, though, with the Dolphins trading out of three you would do? You would think they kind of you know, resign themselves to not taking a quarterback, and they have said publicly to what is their guy? Yeah, so if somebody wants to come up to six and they could get more picks and move down, could totally see that happening. Because if the Dolphins are going to take a receiver back to your earlier point, Gary, there are a lot of receivers, So do you make that swap somebody wants to come up to get fields you moved down, you still get a good receiver. Maybe you have three guys you like at the receiver position and you figure, we we'll still be able to get who we want if we move down. Then you know, I don't know, this seems to be their thing, just amassing draft picks. So it's hard to rule that option out. Yeah. Uh, It's it's interesting because I would say there's there's a big three with receivers here. I think Jamar Chase is clearly number one, but you would put, uh, you know, I mean I think DeVante Smith and Jalen Waddle to two Alabama guys are both the you know, I think they both would have gone above any of the receivers taken last year, So you have three really good receivers. There's I just find it really interesting and it's whatever. It's it's it's overblown. But Jalen Waddle and DeVante Smith both reportedly said, uh that they prefer mac Jones over to a tongue of ioloa. And so there's this whole like, you know, I don't know, two months ago, there was all this like, oh, you gotta get him, DeVante Smith, gotta get him. Jalen Waddle, he knows him from college, you know, get him comfortable type of thing. And and to bring in one of those guys after they're like, yeah, I think mac Jones is better is kind of I don't know, that would be an awkward conversation. I guess that they weren't necessarily bashed TA and obviously they have reason to pump up their uh, their teammate Mac Jones, who is going into the draft and still sort of trying to find his place in the NFL, whereas To is kind of established in Miami as far as we know at this point. But um, it would I would think be an awkward conversation. So you're what you're trying to say, Gary, is you want to go Jamar Chase at the spot for the Dolphins. I look, I think Jamaar Chase is just better than the other two guys, not significantly so, but I find it difficult to justify taking either guy over him. And I think that the fact is better comments kind of kind of clinches that. From there, you go. I like it. It's the best decision for a lot of reasons, all right, Jamaar Chase L s U quarterback, quarterback, L s U wide receiver to the Dolphins for Tua tongue of Ioloa, and uh, that'll be don't be nice there. I think Will Fuller was a nice addition to that receiving corps this offseason, but I don't know if he's a long term guy. And uh, you know, everyone plays three receivers at this point anyway, So, uh, Jamaar Chase to Miami, which brings us to the seventh pick and the Detroit Lions, who are really just a bit of a blank canvas here at this point. I would not rule out quarterback with the Lions, if you know, in our scenario here, justin fields has fallen to them. But I mean you just look up and down this roster they kind of need. They need everything when it comes down to it. Yeah, they have As you said, blank slate is just kind of the best way to describe it. They have a lot of rebuilding to do, and I think they realize that and know that it's going to take a while to get this roster where they needed to be. Uh, it's just really hard to overlook the glaring need at receiver. And you know, I think you have Jared Goff. They would be interested in seeing, well can they make it work with golf. They also have this someone intriguing backup, Tim Boyle, who beat Love out to be Roger's backup last year. So I think they go receiver here um, and I think they see what they have with golf um. And as you've said, there's a lot of receivers to choose from. I think that makes a lot of sense. I you know, the one thing that's really interesting to me is, uh, Brad Holmes is obviously the new general manager there, and uh, they do have glaring needs in the defensive secondary. But I wonder one year after the older team just took Jeff Alcuda, who did struggle as a rookie. I wonder if they just have the stomach to take a Caleb Farley or uh Patrick's retained the second or something like that and uh and go cornerback back to back years or does that just not affect them because they're just saying we're the new guys. But um, if you're looking at the streets receiver class, I like Jalen Waddle better than Devonte Smith. However, I think DeVante Smith is a better fit with Jared Golf and and Golf with what he does stylistically, uh in you know, in what's going to be a new look offense here for the Lions. So um, I would like Davante Smith in this spot. Uh. I don't know if there's anything you do to stop me here, Jenny, but uh, that's that's that's where I'm going here, DeVante Smith to the Lions, who again just it's it's a full on rebuild going on right now in the in Detroit and they could go a number of ways here. Uh. And that brings us to the final pick of our first installment of the Mock Draft series, and that is the Carolina Panthers, who uh last year spent the entire draft on defensive picks this year, you figure they're going heavy on offensive By the way, if you hadn't noticed at this point, much much stronger class on the offensive side of the ball than on the defensive side of the ball. Here, but the Panthers have been looking for for a quarterback. They are some might say, just desperately looking for a quarterback at this point. I think there, I think they're okay to live with Teddy Bridgewater for another year. But in this scenario, you have so many question marks around what Deshaun Watson situation is going to be in UH, they want a new quarterback. If Justin Fields is there, it feels like it makes a ton of sense. If they decided not to go with Fields, you are again, I I think you're just desperate to get help on the offensive line. But of course, in our exercise, at this point, UH, you have basically lost the top two off the offensive linemen off the board. UH, Slater and and Sewel are already gone, and the other option is Kyle Pitts the Florida tight end. If you wanted to get even more athletic and and dangerous with your with your past catching group here, although obviously that receiving group is a strength for Carolina at this point. Yeah, I think you're right, Gary, they've been despered in the quarterback market. I don't think there will be any clarity with the Watson situation in the next month, and I think it makes sense to take a quarterback this year. As you said, they could live with Bridgewater, but if they're sitting at eight, or even if they want to move up for for Fields for instance, um, as we discuss other trade options to potentially move up, um, I think that is their pick. Yeah, justin Fields going to Carolina here, Uh it it'd be really interesting in the scenario if Fields is off the board and they're looking at mac Jones. This is one of the spots where I think it's it's kind of a danger spot for mac Jones just because, uh, he's not a guy who creates his own time and space as well as some of these these other young quarterbacks on the league. So if if you plug him in there behind what's uh not a great offensive line, I think you're you're asking for trouble there. Of course, they could always just play Bridgewater for the first part of APE and figure out later. But um, yeah, I think, Uh, I think quarterback is probably the answer here if the two tackles are not available for the Panthers. And uh, that's that's it. That's that's our top eight. Our top eight is penciled in here, and uh, we have lots of mock draft to go over the rest of the month. And I don't know this is this is just going to be a really interesting draft, like you said, Jenny, once you get to four, and uh, the way the rest of this first round unfolds, Yeah, I feel like I really miss mess things up. Gary. I don't know what your plan at four had been before I piped up and said, uh said not to go quarterback. But um, I think it is instructive because it is I always use this word, but it really is like a choose your own adventure from that point and once you make one decision, then all the others follow from there. And there are just so many options at four for Atlanta. If Justin Fields becomes a star, you will never be the fake general manager of the Falcons. True qualified myself. All right, that'll do it. We'll we'll be back next week with picks nine through sixteen. And uh, like I said, we're gonna hit all thirty two teams as we always do, just to just to go over the draft needs as part of the exercise. Uh, Jenny, will we'll talk you next week? Maybe maybe Connor or comes and chimes in and we uh we get more cooks in the kitchen than this whole thing just becomes a total mess. Looking forward to it. Gary. The MMQB Monday Morning NFL podcast is Jenny Brandis and me Gary Gramling. We are produced by Shelby Royson Sis. Executive producer of podcast is Scott Brody. Mark Bravick is Emeritus editor of the MMQB, and Andy Benoit is the founder of the MMQB NFL podcast. Be sure to subscribe to this feed, as well as the feeds for The week Side Podcast and The Albert Breer Show. They're all for free on Apple Podcasts, and once you do leave a rating and review for all of them, it really does help other people find the shows, which are also available on Spotify Radio dot com, Stitcher, si dot com, and wherever else you listen to podcasts.