Eric DeCosta expects to have a lot of NFL draft picks this April. He also expects a lot from those picks.
At his season-ending news conference last month, the Ravens general manager couldn’t say where the team would pop up over the course of the three-day circus; compensatory picks have yet to be awarded, and trades will inevitably alter the draft order. But the Ravens expect to have nine picks in the first four rounds, and, according to DeCosta, “we feel like all of those nine picks will probably come within our top-80 players.”
In a pivotal offseason for the Ravens, every pick will be important. But none will be as crucial as their first: No. 14 overall, their highest draft slot since 2016. With 300-plus NFL prospects headed to Indianapolis for this week’s scouting combine, DeCosta and Ravens officials will have to do their homework. After an 8-9 season ended short of the playoffs, there are roster holes to fill, postseason hopes to bolster and heaps of potential first-round prospects to evaluate.
Player testing will begin Thursday with quarterbacks, tight ends and wide receivers, and will run through Sunday, when defensive backs and specialists wrap up the combine. Here are 10 potential Ravens targets at positions of need.
Left tackle: Mississippi State’s Charles Cross
There’s no consensus on where the 6-foot-5, 310-pound Cross could end up on NFL big boards. Pro Football Focus has him as the best offensive tackle and fifth-best prospect in the draft class. Bleacher Report and ESPN analyst Mel Kiper Jr. rate Cross as the class’ No. 3 tackle, as well as the No. 11 and No. 13 overall prospect, respectively. NFL Network analyst and former Ravens scout Daniel Jeremiah has Cross at No. 25 overall. A strong performance this week could be enough to keep him ahead of challengers like Northern Iowa’s Trevor Penning and Central Michigan’s Bernhard Raimann. Combine drills will showcase Cross’ agility and change-of-direction skills, though he still needs to prove he has the power to thrive as a run blocker.
Right tackle: Minnesota’s Daniel Faalele
Four years ago, Oklahoma’s Orlando Brown Jr., a hulking and decorated offensive tackle prospect, fell out of the draft’s first two rounds with a disastrous combine performance. The 6-8, 387-pound Faalele, a projected second-round pick in most mock drafts, could go the opposite direction. Before the Golden Gophers’ 2019 season, the Australian giant was reportedly posting 29-inch vertical leaps, which would’ve tied for 14th among offensive linemen at that year’s combine. With three years in a college strength and conditioning program, what numbers might he put up in Indianapolis? Faalele is far from a can’t-miss prospect, but there’s also no one in this draft quite like him.
Left guard: Boston College’s Zion Johnson
The Upper Marlboro native enters the combine as perhaps the draft’s top pure guard prospect and a projected second-round pick. After transferring in from Davidson, the 6-2, 314-pound Johnson started his Eagles career at left guard, moved over to left tackle in 2020, then returned to left guard last season. He allowed just one sack and three quarterback hits over his two years inside, according to PFF, and graded out as a strong run blocker. During a dominant week at the Senior Bowl, Johnson even worked out at center. With his versatility and smarts — he’s working toward a graduate degree in computer science — Johnson could get a team’s attention late in the first round.
Center: Iowa’s Tyler Linderbaum
The 6-3, 290-pound Linderbaum’s fit in the Ravens’ rushing offense is up for debate — team officials have typically targeted bigger interior linemen for their power-heavy concepts — but his high-level production and athletic profile are indisputable. By conventional metrics, Linderbaum could run the stop-and-start shuttle run quicker than some running backs in Indianapolis. By unconventional metrics, he chucked a 60-pound hay bale last year 2 feet higher than former Hawkeyes teammate Tristan Wirfs, a first-team All-Pro with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, did in 2019. After two elite years at Iowa, Linderbaum’s expected to be a first-round pick. His performance this week could determine whether he’ll go in the teens or the 20s.
Nose tackle: Georgia’s Jordan Davis
The combine won’t be the best showcase for Davis’ skill set, but it should at least give teams a sense of his enormity. Georgia listed the 6-6 Davis at 340 pounds last season, and that might’ve been underselling it by at least a few pounds. Whatever he weighs now, he was an immovable run defender and solid pass rusher (three sacks) for the national champion Bulldogs last season. He earned unanimous All-America honors and the Bednarik Award, given to the sport’s top defensive player. Jeremiah said on a conference call Friday that Davis is a “pretty polarizing player” around the league, in part because of concerns over his viability as a three-down lineman. Gap-clogging nose tackles are rarely first-round picks in the pass-first NFL, but Davis could be an exception.
Defensive end: Georgia’s Travon Walker
Listed at 6-5 and 275 pounds ahead of his junior season at Georgia, Walker might still have room to grow. His weight at the combine could be a sign of where he thinks he’ll fit best in the NFL: as a stand-up outside linebacker or as a hand-in-the-dirt lineman? Walker played all over the Bulldogs’ defensive front last season, lining up most often outside the opposing tackle. But while Walker’s capable of helping out in coverage — his smooth zone drop and pass deflection led to an interception in an October win over Florida — over 95% of his snaps in 2021 came as a pass rusher or run defender, according to PFF. His middling pass-rush production (five sacks) doesn’t reflect his immense potential, which he could validate with a headline-grabbing performance.
Strong-side outside linebacker: Florida State’s Jermaine Johnson II
Johnson’s 2021 production speaks for itself. After two years as a rotational player at Georgia, he transferred to Florida State and broke out. The 6-5, 262-pound Johnson was named the Atlantic Coast Conference’s Defensive Player of the Year after recording a league-high 12 sacks and 18 tackles for loss. A strong Senior Bowl performance lifted him into Day One range; Jeremiah said Friday that he doesn’t expect Johnson to last past the middle of the first round. His impressive length, reliable processing and high-energy approach give him a high ceiling as a run defender. With impressive numbers in speed and agility testing, Johnson could convince a few more teams that he has first-round pass-rushing talent, too.
Weak-side outside linebacker: Michigan’s David Ojabo
The 6-5, 250-pound Ojabo doesn’t need an Odafe Oweh-esque workout to cement his first-round credentials, but his testing could invite comparisons to his high school teammate’s eye-opening pro day. In 2018, a year after Oweh ran the 100-meter dash in a personal-best 11.27 seconds for New Jersey’s Blair Academy, Ojabo posted a 10.93. He won’t get the attention this week that Wolverines teammate and potential No. 1 overall pick Aidan Hutchinson will, but Ojabo’s hype could rise to new levels after the combine. If his measurables are impressive enough for teams to overlook his inconsistent edge setting and still-developing pass-rush arsenal, Ojabo might end up as a top-12 pick.
Cornerback: Cincinnati’s Ahmad Gardner
With LSU cornerback Derek Stingley Jr. not expected to work out in Indianapolis — he’ll reportedly wait until his pro day next month to test — Gardner becomes the most interesting Day One corner at the combine. Cincinnati listed “Sauce” at 6-3 and 200 pounds — 1 inch taller and about 10 pounds lighter than Ravens cornerback Jimmy Smith’s predraft measurements in 2011. Gardner relies more on his length, physicality and ball skills than on his long speed, but his 40-yard-dash showing could be revealing. According to Pro Football Reference, only two cornerbacks since 2000 with times slower than 4.55 seconds have been taken in the first round: Deltha O’Neal in 2000 and Damon Arnette in 2020.
Safety: Michigan’s Daxton Hill
With first-round buzz already building, Hill can’t make the biggest figurative leap of any prospect at the combine. As for a literal leap, though? It’s possible. Hill, the younger brother of Ravens running back Justice Hill, had the second-highest SPARQ (speed, power, agility, reaction and quickness) score of any player in the 2019 recruiting class, highlighted by a 43.6-inch vertical leap. That’s less than 3 inches shy of Gerald Sensabaugh’s record-setting 46-inch mark, set at the 2005 combine. The more the 6-0, 192-pound Hill can show in Indianapolis, the better he’ll project as a do-everything chess piece in the NFL. He primarily lined up in the slot last season at Michigan under new Ravens coordinator Mike Macdonald, but he has plenty of experience in the box and as a deep-lying safety.
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