NFL Draft: Jacksonville Jaguars Team Draft Retrospective

This article is part of a series that looks at each NFL team’s recent draft history with the hope of extracting information about the way they think and the players they value. The analysis is limited to the past five drafts in the interest of relevance, and the first three rounds because that’s where most impact players are taken.

This entry will focus on the Jacksonville Jaguars.

Draft History

In the past five years, the Jaguars have taken the following players in the early rounds. Their positions and the rounds in which they were drafted are listed next to their names.

2006:   Marcedes Lewis, TE (1)

            Maurice Jones-Drew, RB (2)

            Clint Ingram, RB (3)

2007:   Reggie Nelson, S (1)

            Justin Durant, LB (2)

            Mike Sims-Walker, WR (3)

2008:   Derrick Harvey, DE (1)

            Quentin Groves, DE (2)

2009:   Eugene Monroe, OT (1)

            Eben Britton, OT (2)

            Terrance Knighton, DT (3)

            Derek Cox, CB (3)

2010:   Tyson Alualu, DT (1)

            D’Anthony Smith, DT (3)

Breakdown by Position

Here is the number of players the Jaguars have drafted for each position:

Defensive tackle: 3

Defensive end: 2

Linebacker: 2

Offensive tackle: 2

Cornerback: 1

Running back: 1

Safety: 1

Tight end: 1

Wide receiver: 1

Impact

Marcedes Lewis is one of the better tight ends in the league. Maurice Jones-Drew is one of the top halfbacks in the game, and helps out as a receiver and blocker as well. Reggie Nelson played fairly well for Jacksonville before being traded to the Bengals. Mike Sims-Walker has become a fairly productive wideout. Eugene Monroe and Eben Britton have formed a very solid offensive tackle tandem. Derek Cox is a solid young corner. Tyson Alualu, unquestionably the most surprising pick of the 2010 first round, played very well as a rookie.

Trends

The Jaguars have invested heavily in the defensive line, taking five players there. Both ends have been busts, but they found a keeper on the interior in Tyson Alualu. Otherwise, the players they’ve drafted have been spread out fairly evenly among the positions, suggesting that they value fixing their needs year to year rather than emphasizing a particular position.

Jacksonville has shown an unusual tendency to key in on a given position each year and take multiple picks to address it. For the past three years, their two highest draft picks have both played the same position. This unique approach was disastrous in 2008, successful in 2009, and mixed in results last year.

2011 Outlook

Despite all the picks the Jaguars have used on defensive linemen, only one, Alualu, has contributed. Their only other effective lineman is veteran Aaron Kampman, who has a dubious injury history and is probably nearing the end. Jacksonville must once again address the line in this upcoming draft.

Luckily, this year boasts a very impressive class of defensive linemen. With the 16^th overall pick, the Jaguars will have defensive end options like Ryan Kerrigan (Purdue) and Justin Houston (Georgia). Jacksonville likes well built, versatile ends, and Kerrigan and Houston both fit the bill. Too bad they’ll both be gone in the first, or the Jaguars could have pulled off another one of their famous positional double dips.

Jacksonville doesn’t really need to take someone for the interior, but there are some great tackles available like Corey Liuget (Illinois) and Cameron Jordan (California). If they really like one of these players, they could put together a very fearsome duo at the position.

The back seven could use some upgrades too, especially in the secondary. Safety Rahim Moore (UCLA) is the kind of smart, high character player the Jaguars look for, as is cornerback Curtis Brown (Texas). A linebacker like Mason Foster (Washington) or Bruce Carter (North Carolina) could be targeted as well.

On offense, the Jaguars need to start thinking about a long term solution at quarterback. Incumbent David Garrard has done a nice job managing games, avoiding turnovers, and creating plays with his legs, but he’s not the type of QB capable of carrying an offense on his back. Considering that that’s practically a prerequisite to winning a Super Bowl these days, the Jaguars have to at least consider the options in this draft.

The most highly rated quarterbacks likely to fall to them in the first round are Ryan Mallett (Arkansas) and Jake Locker (Washington). Mallett has too many character related red flags for their liking, but Locker’s upside could intrigue them. However, he also has some pretty worrisome accuracy issues, so the Jaguars may prefer to wait. In the second round, somebody like Colin Kaepernick (Nevada) could appeal to them.