The 2024 NFL Draft is a little over a week away and NFL Network’s Peter Schrager released his first mock draft of the season. The Good Morning Football host emphasizes that this is not what he would do, but what he is hearing from his sources around the league about what will happen. As with all mocks, take the selections with a grain of salt as the best thing about the draft is how unpredictable it truly is.
Let’s take a look at Schrager’s mock draft and see how he has the first round shaping up.
Quarterbacks
1.01 — Caleb Williams, Chicago Bears
1.02 — Jayden Daniels, Washington Commanders
1.03 — Drake Maye, New England Patriots
1.04 — J.J. McCarthy, New York Giants (trade with Arizona)
1.23 — Bo Nix, Minnesota Vikings
The first four quarterbacks are pretty standard in mock drafts, though their landing spots could vary. The outlier is Nix, but I will expand more on his being included in the first round later. While nothing is assured in the draft, it really feels like Williams needs to go ahead and look for real estate in the Chicago area. Washington and New England tend to flip-flop between Daniels and Maye, but the consensus still has Daniels going No. 2 and Maye No. 3. Daniels did notably say that he wants to play for the Patriots, but that hasn’t been enough to drop him down a spot. McCarthy is consistently being mocked at No. 4, although it has been to New York and Minnesota.
First defensive player drafted
1.08 — Dallas Turner, Atlanta Falcons
Verse spent two seasons at Florida State and one at FCS Albany. He played in only 25 games with the Seminoles, but that didn’t stop him from making an impact. Verse ended his career with 89 total tackles, 18 sacks, and 29.5 tackles for a loss. Bleacher Report compares him to Ryan Kerrigan, while NFL Network’s Lance Zierlein compares him to LaMar Woodley.
Best pick
1.21 — Jared Verse, Miami Dolphins
The EDGE class is projected to have solid depth while not being very top-heavy. After Turner goes early, Verse is the next-best EDGE on the board. The fact that he falls to Miami here should excite Dolphins fans. The team lost Christian Wilkins and Andrew Van Ginkel to free agency, and Verse should be able to slot right in and be an early contributor to the defensive line.
Worst pick
1.23 — Bo Nix, Minnesota Vikings
1.32 — Ja’Lynn Polk, Kansas City Chiefs
I just don’t get these picks. Maybe it is PTSD from the overhype of the 2022 NFL Draft. At one point, five quarterbacks were mocked in the first round, and only Kenny Pickett—who has since been benched and traded—was selected in the first two rounds. I’m not sold that J.J. McCarthy deserves to be chosen in the first round, let alone adding in Nix behind him. I also don’t think that Nix is necessarily the fifth-best quarterback in this class, as this would have Minnesota passing on Michael Penix Jr.
The problem with Polk being chosen here is just that it leaves Keon Coleman and Troy Franklin on the board. Both have been consistently mocked ahead of Polk and there haven’t been many reports to show any reason to think differently. This would maybe be a curveball pick by Kansas City, but there’s not really a reason not to choose Coleman here.
Final thoughts
This mock draft shows just how many offensive players could be taken in the first round. Notably, Schrager has two trades occurring: the Giants moving up to get McCarthy at No. 4 and the Indianapolis Colts moving up with the Chicago Bears to get Malik Nabers at No. 9. The latter trade would be awesome, but Schrager thinks that a future second is all it would take for Indy to move from No. 15 to No. 9, and that feels like it wouldn’t be enough. Overall, the moves make sense to a degree, but how you react to this mock draft depends on how big of a gap you see between players at their respective positions. Schrager has been notably accurate with his mock drafts, but it still feels like there are some head-scratchers here.