In Mel Kiper’s latest Mock Draft, just released a few hours ago on Espn.com, the draft guru has the Titans taking offensive tackle Laremy Tunsil. This comes as no change as Tunsil has been the slotted selection for the Titans by Kiper since February.
In Kiper’s initial mock draft, he had Tennessee drafting defensive end Joey Bosa No.1 overall. Kiper applauded Bosa’s special ability and the likeliness to be a star in the National Football League. That report by Kiper came out before the meat and bones on the Draft process began, a time when questions about Bosa’s attitude and off-the-field issues could be a real concern.
As scouts and NFL front offices look at Bosa, there has been a slight fear that the defensive lineman will not be as dominant as they had envisioned. Everyone wants the next J.J. Watt, not just a pro bowler like Mario Williams but a dominant, revolutionary player; and fear that Bosa is not that is more relevant than ever. His size and pure strength do not man handle opponents, but rather the use of hands and technique to get off blockers is what worked for Bosa in college.
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Lineman, and especially tackles in the NFL are bigger, stronger, quicker, and more laterally fluid which makes Bosa’s transition to the NFL more of an uphill battle than initially perceived.
Just like Bosa and all prospective top-10 picks, Laremy Tunsil was picked apart as a prospect earlier in the draft process. The massive lineman was involved in a domestic dispute before the 2016 season and also had many scouts criticizing his lack of durability due to a slew of injuries. However, Tunsil battled through the attention and criticism by not making any waves and eventually having the domestic charges dropped.
On the field, Tunsil continually gave teams the chance to see he is athletically a monster for his size. That has left Tunsil the most likely pick according to Kiper. Kiper feels Tunsil just fills such a need for the Titans at offensive line with a prospect to be delighted about.
Kiper also touched on possibly considering Jalen Ramsey at number one:
“At this point, I think that while Jalen Ramsey is the type of talent you could consider here, the need to protect the face of the franchise wins out unless they find a way to trade out of this spot.”
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From Kiper quote, one can infer that Kiper believes the Titans ultimate preference lies in trading the pick for many assets. The openness from the Titans organization about possibly trading the pick makes the assumption realistic in thought. The Titans have a plethora of holes on their starting front and can benefit from all the young talent they can get.