2017 NFL Draft: NFL Player Comparisons for This Year's Top Prospects
Heading into Monday Night Football this week, 18 teams already have accumulated six or more losses, which, in a league where 10-6 squads miss the playoffs, is concerning with four weeks left to go in the season. What does that mean? It's about to be draft season for the majority of the NFL's fanbases.
To give you all a head start on April's draft class, we'll cover some of the best comparisons for the most talented players in this projected draft class. We say projected, since underclassmen, who make up the majority of top selections, don't need to declare for the draft until after the bowl season is over.
Over the next five months, you're going to listen to plenty of jargon about these prospects but in an attempt to boil players down to bite-sized evaluations, comparisons serve a strong purpose in draft season. We'll explain why these prospects, be it production, athleticism, narrative or all of the above, compare to players selected in the 2008 draft class at the latest.
Myles Garrett, EDGE, Texas A&M
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Myles Garrett very well might be the first overall pick in the 2017 NFL draft. The third-year junior has yet to declare for the class but in the current status of the draft, it would be shocking if a potential top-10 pick returned to school for his senior season.
The Texas A&M pass-rusher isn't a new face for college football, as he was Scout.com's top defensive end coming out of high school in 2014 as a 5-star player. After 31 sacks and 47 tackles for a loss, with a bowl game to go, Garrett is ready for the NFL.
When thinking of a comparison for Garrett, you need to keep in mind he isn't an elite edge-bender. He's an elite pass-rusher at the college level, but no one is going to mistake him for a Von Miller or even a Melvin Ingram, and considering his size, it makes sense.
Some will link him to a player like Julius Peppers, who was the second overall pick in 2002, but there is a more recent example of a player of his style succeeding in the NFL. In 2010, Jason Pierre-Paul was drafted 15th overall out of South Florida and if you're looking for a comparable player to Garrett, he's at the top of the list.
Garrett is long and built, but lean, so some might think he's going to come in around 250 pounds, but NFL Draft Scout's projections have him around 6'4" and 268 pounds, just two pounds off of Pierre-Paul's combine weight. Both are elite pass-rushers who lack elite bend but are all-around players with incredible athleticism for their size.
Pierre-Paul currently has 50 career sacks, including two double-digit sack seasons, and has a top-40 contract for a defensive player on an average salary basis, according to Spotrac. Injury and a freak firework accident derailed the pass-rusher's career a bit, but peak Pierre-Paul, a first-team All-Pro, is a high-enough bar to set for Garrett.
Jonathan Allen, EDGE/DL, Alabama
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Jonathan Allen may be an odd projection for some, but if you really study how he fits into Nick Saban's defense, he's not hard to figure out at all. Saban's defense is very flexible, with both even and odd fronts on the line of scrimmage, and Allen plays end in both looks, plus a defensive tackle role in even fonts.
Because he plays some 3-4 defensive end and 4-3 defensive tackle, and because he's projected to weigh in at 291 pounds according to NFL Draft Scout, there are draft analysts who think he's an interior defensive linemen. That is false.
Take a look at NFL Network's Daniel Jeremiah's poll of NFL executives from November. There are those in the camp who believe he's a defensive tackle like Tampa Bay's Gerald McCoy or Miami's Ndamukong Suh, but there are also those who believe he's an edge-defender like Philadelphia's Brandon Graham.
The truth is somewhere in the middle. If you're talking about who the top senior prospect in this class can be out of the gate, he's incredibly similar to Atlanta's Adrian Clayborn, a 2011 first-round defensive end who was considered large for the position at 281 pounds.
Clayborn fell down to the 20th overall pick because of an Erb's Palsy issue that stemmed from his birth and his hybrid position projection. Clayborn has struggled with health in the NFL, too, but when he's been healthy, he's posted 17.5 sacks in his three best seasons combined.
While that doesn't seem like much, for an athlete who has a background of at least a part-time interior player, that's more than impactful. In today's NFL, when you hear "Michael Bennett type" 20 times a draft weekend, someone of that talent, who is healthy nonetheless, is a player at a premium position.
Allen's peak is higher than Clayborn's, but he can produce like Clayborn on Day 1. Clayborn, a rotational player, had 4.5 sacks on the season before his injury, which would rank fourth among rookie pass-rushers this season, despite his snap count.
DeShone Kizer, QB, Notre Dame
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No one has had a rise and fall like DeShone Kizer did this year in college football. Kizer wasn't even Notre Dame's starting quarterback by name until the first week of the season when the Fighting Irish lost a 50-47 shootout to Texas in Austin.
At the time, the narrative was that both the Longhorns and Irish were "back" and contenders down the line. At the end of the day, Texas finished with a 5-7 record while Notre Dame finished with a 4-8 record.
Kizer, who has the talent to make any deep ball imaginable and is a key figure in the Irish's ground game as an option runner, flashed talent early in the season which hasn't faded away, even as his team faded away from the limelight. When you isolate him as a talent, even statistically, there is an interesting comparison on the board: Jameis Winston.
Using their final season's statistics, including NFL Draft Scout's combine profiles for both Winston and Kizer, here's how the two compare to each other.
| Name | YPA | Rate | TD % | INT % | Height | Weight | 40 | Wins |
| DeShone Kizer | 8.1 | 145.6 | 7.2 | 2.5 | 6041 | 230 | 4.76 | 4 |
| Jameis Winston | 8.4 | 145.5 | 5.4 | 3.9 | 6036 | 231 | 4.97 | 13 |
In every category, Kizer is either about equal to or superior to Winston, but he's not being discussed as a similar player because Winston was labeled as a "winner" coming out of Florida State, when he was the first overall pick of the 2014 draft.
Last year's first overall pick, Jared Goff, was a part of a California program that went 14-23 overall during his three years at the school, though, so maybe Kizer's NFL stock won't be tied as closely to his team's record as we believe.
Kizer has the potential to get hot in any game, but is also a bit reckless at times. As we've seen with the first overall selections of both Winston, another redshirt sophomore, and Eli Manning, though, that won't stop NFL teams from handing him the car keys whenever he decides to go pro.
John Ross, WR, Washington
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As it stands right now, Nick Saban's Alabama Crimson Tide are 14- to 15.5-point favorites in the first round of the college football playoffs against the 12-1 Washington Huskies, per OddsShark. If there is one player who can make the difference for the Huskies, giving them a chance to win the game straight up, it's receiver John Ross.
Ross is listed at 5'10" and change by NFL Draft Scout. He's not a big receiver, so that makes his 17 receiving touchdowns, which rank second in the FBS, even more impressive.
His ability to not only threaten with slants, but fade routes, at his size in the red zone is incredibly rare. In the open space, he's a weapon who can beat anyone in a one-on-one matchup, too.
When you take all of that into account, including his projected 4.35-second 40-yard dash speed, there's only one comparison to make: DeSean Jackson. Here's what their collegiate numbers look side-by-side for their careers.
| Name | Height | Weight | 40 | YPR | Rec. TD | Ret. Yds. | Ret. TD |
| John Ross | 5106 | 190 | 4.35 | 15.6 | 22 | 2,043 | 4 |
| DeSean Jackson | 5096 | 169 | 4.35 | 15.0 | 24 | 671 | 6 |
Like Ross, Jackson was an All-Pac 12 player at the University of California. Since he turned pro, Jackson has combined for 8,399 receiving yards, 45 receiving touchdowns and four return touchdowns in his NFL career, that has earned him three All-Pro honors.
The Washington product is the closest player to Jackson we've seen since Jackson and if he meets expectations, he's well worth being the first pass-catcher off the board in April if the junior declares for the draft.
Tim Williams, EDGE, Alabama
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The most important aspect to defensive football is putting pressure on the quarterback. The deepest position in this draft is edge defender, either 4-3 defensive ends or 3-4 outside linebackers.
For that reason alone, it's no surprise many of the top picks in this class are going to be primary pass-rushing prospects. One of the more well-known draft targets is Tim Williams of Alabama, who, if his teammate Jonathan Allen wasn't in this class, may be the top overall senior prospect in the draft.
As a rotational player in Alabama's 4-3 defense, Williams has posted 17.5 sacks and 26.5 tackles for a loss in the last two seasons. In all likelihood, he probably could have declared last draft class as a top-100 talent, but his return to the Alabama program has been felt and if they can continue their undefeated season though the playoffs, it will be a fairy-tale ending for the listed outside linebacker.
Williams is an incredibly talented player behind the line of scrimmage, but due to his size, there are going to be questions as to whether he can hold up at the point of attack in the NFL as a three-down player. Some might say he's similar to Atlanta's Vic Beasley, but the best comparison, at least for his Day 1 projection into the league, is much closer to Bruce Irvin, who was drafted in the first round in 2012 out of West Virginia.
Irvin, who has played with both the Seattle Seahawks and Oakland Raiders in his NFL career, started his rookie season in the NFL as a 24-year-old, the same age Williams will turn next November. He was an incredibly athletic yet undersized and overaged prospect entering the draft process, and he saw early success with an eight-sack rookie year, but a suspension and eventual move from defensive end to outside linebacker hurt his ability to make an impact as a pass-rusher.
He's still trying to find his land legs with the Raiders but if he wasn't mismanaged so poorly, he might have been a double-digit sack player early on in his career, like Beasley is in Atlanta. For reference, Williams, a true edge-bender like Irvin, is listed by NFL Draft Scout as a near 6'3" , 252-pounder, while his Mountaineer comparison registered in at 6'3" and 245 pounds in Indianapolis.
Leonard Fournette, RB, LSU
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Like Myles Garrett, Leonard Fournette is about as far from an unknown commodity as you can get in college football. Three years ago, according to Scout.com, Fournette was the No. 1 high school back in the nation and a 5-star recruit.
After three seasons, which comprised of 3,830 rushing yards and 40 rushing touchdowns, Fournette looks like he's ready to test the NFL, at least from a talent perspective. If new full-time head coach Ed Orgeron is able to get him to return to school for a senior season, he may receive an extension before he coaches another game.
When you look at Fournette's skill set, though, there is an inconvenient truth to a comparison to another former SEC standout: Trent Richardson. After his career with the Alabama Crimson Tide, Richardson was drafted third overall by the Cleveland Browns who traded up to select him.
Richardson, after a 950-yard, 11-touchdown rookie season, was traded to the Indianapolis Colts mid-season in his second year, and now as a 25-year-old he is out of a job in the NFL. In terms of build, it's hard to find a better comparison than Richardson for Fournette.
Richardson was a 228-pounder who ran a 4.48-second 40-yard dash, while Fournette is projected to run a 4.45-second time at 230 pounds, according to NFL Draft Scout. Alabama even went as far as to call Richardson back to Tuscaloosa to run scout team reps as Fournette heading into the LSU game this year, according to Matt Zenitz of AL.com, when the Tide held the back to 35 yards on 17 carries.
The year before that, Fournette rushed for 31 yards on 19 carries. For as much of a home run threat that he is, the Tiger can only really make plays in the holes his offensive line opens up.
He's not a LeSean McCoy type of player who is playing one-on-one, making defenders miss, to get into the open field. If Fournette can get behind a great offensive line, like Oakland's, he might have an Ezekiel Elliott-like rookie season, but if he's stuck behind a patchwork offensive line like Richardson was handed in Indianapolis, he's set up for failure from the start.
