Surprises in first NFL.com draft guru top 50 … Daniel Jeremiah, who has replaced Mike Mayock as the NFL Network’s primary draft analyst, has posted his first top 50 prospects overall for the 2020 draft for those that haven’t seen it already. And there are some real surprises in this list. Jeremiah, for example, has Auburn DT Derrick Brown as the #2 rated prospect overall, just behind Ohio State DE Chase Young, but ahead of LSU QB Joe Burrow, who just about everybody else has rated as the top guy overall. Jeremiah also has South Carolina DT Javon Kinlaw at #7 and maybe in the biggest surprise, Louisville OT Mekhi Becton at #10. We’ve certainly heard whispers that Brown and Kinlaw are indeed players to keep an eye on, but we haven’t been able to find any of our sources that see Becton anywhere near that close. In other surprises, Jeremiah has TCU DT Ross Blacklock at #18 and Arizona State WR Brandon Aiyuk one spot later at #20. On the other hand, Jeremiah has Iowa OT Tristan Wirfs at #13, Georgia OT Andrew Thomas at #25 and Iowa DE A.J. Epenesa at #28, which are somewhat to considerably lower than what we have been picking up from the scouting community at this time. Also for the record, Jeremiah has Oregon QB Justin Herbert way down at #21, actually one spot behind Utah State QB Jordan Love. In the past, Jeremiah, whose grades are his own, has differed significantly from the herd at times about certain players (and has probably been off-base more often than he’s been on when he has gotten off the beaten track), but we have tagged his preliminary list because as an NFL Network/nfl.com analyst, he’s about as connected as one can get in the business. So we’ll be watching to see whether he is in fact already onto certain trends or just trying to look different than the rest of the pack. Stay tuned. (Also just a little shout out to our good friend Pete W who called us literally months ago to warn us not to sleep on SC DT Kinlaw!)
