2017 Rookie Draft Redo: Round Two
November has arrived! Pro Basketball is back, congratulations to Houston as the new World Series Champions, and the NFL season has reached its halfway point. With the NFL season halfway, I sure hope you know if your team is a serious contender or just a pretender for this season. If you don’t know, you better sit down to do some serious and honest calculations to figure it out!
Once you have decided what you are, I suggest you hit the trading block and make the most out of what you have. In order to help you out, we are here with one last look back at the rookie class of 2017. I gathered 11 other DLF writers and we decided to do one more rookie mock draft with this year’s draft class just to see how things have changed. After all, we all know there are a lot of things to consider. How far up boards has Kareem Hunt risen? How much does Dalvin Cook’s injury hurt him? How do the big three tight ends stack up against each other now? Hopefully we can help!
For this mock, we worked under the assumption that it was PPR scoring, starting one quarterback, and that all drafters had a team without any glaring holes. We also ignored previous picks, so you might (and someone did) draft a quarterback in each round if you felt they were the best value available. Once the picks were made, I emailed each drafter a question about one of their three selections. Their responses will be included below. The draft was conducted between weeks eight and nine, so no week nine results, injuries, or headlines are included in this.
If you missed the first round, you can find it here.
Time for the second round!
First Four Picks of the Second
2.01 – O.J. Howard, TE TB
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2.02 – Tarik Cohen, RB CHI
2.03 – Aaron Jones, RB GB
2.04 – Marlon Mack, RB IND
The second round is about equal parts first rounders who have fallen a bit, previous second rounders who have held their value, and players who were late round or undrafted in fantasy drafts this spring who have shown something. The first four picks are no exception to that.
The round begins with O.J. Howard, a player who was routinely going in the 7-9 range of the first round this spring. While Howard has basically done what we should have expected, dynasty owners are fickle creatures. We want all of our rookies to produce immediately, even when that is highly unrealistic.
The issue is we have players each year who do, so when someone at the position doesn’t, they fall. That is exactly the case with Evan Engram and Howard this year. Howard has shown flashes, but he is going to need a bit of time to turn into the pass catcher we all hope he can be. Patience will be rewarded with him. If his owner is impatient, then he makes a great buy late this season.
Cohen come off the board with the second pick in the round. This spring, Cohen was often going in rookie drafts in the fourth round or later. I know he went undrafted in two of my leagues. Fast forward to the middle of September, and I saw him traded for a late first round pick. I think he has slowly dipped just a bit since then. Cohen has a lot of ability, but I don’t know if John Fox knows how to use someone with his skill set. I asked Adam Tzikas what he thought of his second round selection, both in the short term and the long term. Here is what he said:
“I decided to go pure upside with Cohen, taking him over the more recently rising Aaron Jones. The fourth round running back is pure explosiveness, with multiple long plays, even in limited time. If he can sneak some touches from Jordan Howard down the stretch, he could be a prime PPR back in the league.”
A very recent hot name has been Aaron Jones. I was almost expecting him to sneak into the late first round given how he has looked and the fact that he plays for the Packers. Green Bay has been searching for a running back for a while now. I think they lost faith in Lacy after his first two years, largely because he kept trending downward. The Ty Montgomery experiment seems to have failed as we should have expected.
Meanwhile, Jones has 346 yards and three scores over the last four weeks. He was just okay against two top ten defenses, but he dominated a pair of average defenses in the Cowboys and the Saints. To me, he looks like the future at the position. He isn’t an elite option, but he has enough talent to be a high end RB2 for the Packers. If I can get him for a second round pick, I’m definitely interested. I think it is going to take a first in most leagues.
I was a little surprised to see Mack come off the board with the 2.04 pick. I had him pegged as a second rounder, but I was thinking more of a late second rounder. I like the long term potential for Mack, but his inability to wrestle the starting job away from a 300 year old Frank Gore is a little concerning. In his limited role, Mack has had brief moments where he has flashed, but those moments just haven’t translated into extended success. Given some of the names still on the board, I would have looked elsewhere at this point in time.
Middle of the Second
2.05 – David Njoku, TE CLE
2.06 – Kenny Golladay, WR DET
2.07 – John Ross, WR CIN
2.08 – Taywan Taylor, WR TEN
The third and final of the big three tight ends comes off the board with the 2.05 pick. It seemed like most of the people had Njoku as the third tight end this spring as well, but the gap between him and the others was always very small. Here the gap was a full round. I asked Dan Sainio, who made the Njoku selection, if he really felt the gap was a full round and what his read was of the situation.
“All three TEs should still be closer together than how they fell in this draft. Engram went far too early, and Njoku a few spots later than I would’ve expected. Realistically all three belong between 1.08 and 2.02, at least in my opinion. We’ve never seen a rookie TE class like this, and I think the excitement may have gotten the best of some of us as it’s still a position that is worth far less than RBs and WRs.
While Engram has enjoyed some nice production early on, context is necessary to understand that the volume comes in large part to the lack of healthy WRs. That’s certainly not to say that he won’t have a nice target share in New York, expectations just need to be tempered a bit. Njoku has seen some work as well, but has been dealing with a QB carousel and a putrid Browns offense. Njoku is also two years younger than Engram and Howard, so I think it’s fair to say at 21 he’s nowhere near polished or complete, and has a greater ceiling.
To answer your question, I believe Njoku was easily the best value here. Howard seemed like a chalk pick where he went at 2.01, and Engram was most definitely a reach. They did go in the order I expected, though, so there is that.”
The preseason darling, Kenny Golladay was the next player off the board. Much like Cohen, Golladay has gone from late round to first round, and now back to the second round in terms of his draft capital. I think this is still just a bit high for the young Lion, but a late second isn’t out of the question. He has an awful lot of the traits you want in a receiver, but he is also a bit of a raw prospect. I think he has a lot of work to do before he can become an every down player, but he has definitely flashed a bit so the price tag will stay pretty high. I asked Kyle Holden for his thoughts on his selection of Golladay.
“I feel pick 2.06 was a perfect spot to take Kenny Golladay. I saw him being traded for 2018 first-round rookie picks when his hype was out of control during the preseason. That was a big rise from when he was being picked in the third and fourth rounds of rookie drafts that took place closer to the NFL Draft.
While the first-round price tag was always a bit high for me, I feel much better taking him in the middle of the second round. Doing so somewhat minimizes the risk in taking him since we have not seen him produce at a consistent level against elite competition yet. He has not produced much since his two touchdown week one performance but a lot of that can be attributed to his injury and a crowded wide receiver group in Detroit.
I see his upside as a red zone monster that still produces solid yardage totals, similar to what he showed in week one. He was one of the most hyped rookies of the off-season and I feel now is a perfect time to buy him after a lot of the hype surrounding him has died down. I am excited to see him return from injury and earn more snaps for the Lions as the season progresses.”
Much like Njoku, Ross has fallen from the middle of the first round to the middle of the second. Ross’s 2017 is basically looking like a lost year. He has one carry which ended in a fumble, one multi-week injury, and one target which was incomplete. To call his year so far disappointing doesn’t even begin to describe it. I can’t remember a top ten draft pick who struggled to even see the field this much.
The only good news is the Bengals did take him with the ninth overall pick. They aren’t going to walk away from him without giving him a chance to be successful. For a second round pick, I’m interested in giving him a chance. We just need to realize we probably won’t see anything this year.
Taylor has been one of my favorites since early in the draft process. He won’t ever be a WR1 or the top target on an NFL team, but he does have the skill set to be a very effective complement. Given that the Titans just spent an early pick on Corey Davis, that is exactly what they need. He needs a bit of time to adjust to the NFL, but he has already flashed from time to time. As the offense grows and builds chemistry, I expect Taylor to climb into the WR3 ranks and maybe even approach low end WR2 levels if the offense really gets going. If I can get a top 25-30 receiver in the middle to late second round, I’m all in!
Last Four Picks of the Second
2.09 – D’Onta Foreman, RB HOU
2.10 – Zay Jones, WR BUF
2.11 – Curtis Samuel, WR CAR
2.12 – Patrick Mahomes, QB KC
The last four picks of the second round have quite a bit of diversity among their ranks. The first selection in this group was Foreman. He has had a very inconsistent rookie year. At one point he was looking like he might earn a full blown 50-50 committee. Then he received just a single snap in week eight as the third string running back. It is tough to tell exactly what to make of it. He was a very polarizing figure this spring, with some loving him and others calling him very limited from a skill set standpoint. I asked Jake Anderson for his thoughts on his selection.
“D’Onta Foreman has had an up and down rookie season thus far. Lamar Miller has ultimately held Foreman’s role in check. His best performance was in week three against the Patriots when he turned just 10 touches into 90 total yards. One of the biggest question marks to his game was if he’d be able to used in the passing game, but he’s put those questions to bed by what he’s shown in both the preseason and regular season.
He has a shot at taking over the Texans backfield as soon as 2018 and being a workhorse in this high powered offense with the likes of Deshaun Watson, DeAndre Hopkins and Will Fuller. The Texans have a potential out in Lamar Miller’s contract after this season in which they’d only take a two million dollar cap hit to get out of his remaining two years left on his deal which would save them 14 million dollars that they could spend elsewhere.
I would recommend you check in with the Foreman owner in your leagues and see if they’re getting impatient with him. If you can buy for a 2018 second, you should jump all over that deal. If you’re a Foreman owner, you sit and wait patiently until he gets his shot at taking over that backfield, the dividends could be extraordinary.”
Personally, I think the Texans will keep Miller. He gets a lot of wrath from fantasy owners, but much like the much maligned Mark Ingram, Miller’s complete skill set is very valuable for his NFL team. None the less, at the current price tag it is well worth a shot.
When the tenth pick in the round came on the clock, I was a little shocked to see Zay Jones was still on the board. Yes, I do understand how terrible he has actually been. His catch rate, yards per target, and all of those numbers are breathtakingly terrible. Some of this is just the normal adjustment that the vast majority of rookies, especially ones from smaller programs, need to go through during their rookie year.
Another key reason in my opinion is his misuse by the Bills offense. Due to injuries, trades, and poor roster management, the Bills have asked Jones to fill a role which doesn’t work with his skill set. I think they are finally starting to realize that and changing what they ask him to do. He just had his best game of the year with a respectable 6 catches for 53 yards and a score. I think this is a peek into the future for him. I think he will figure it out and turn into a WR2 in the future. Given his current price, I’m definitely buying!
Samuel is a player I’ve struggled with for almost a year now. He is a great athlete with a very intriguing skill set. However, I couldn’t ever figure out how he fit on 90% of NFL teams. My confusion only grew when the Panthers drafted him a few rounds after drafting McCaffrey. Ultimately, I think Samuel is destined to be that player we always talk about as having huge potential, but you can’t ever trust him enough to start them on your fantasy roster. He is bound to blow up from time to time, but it will be unpredictable and inconsistent. If you are in a best ball format, he is definitely worth a shot. However, I’m not a fan in leagues with a traditional starting line ups.
A quarterback being drafted means that Bradley is back on the clock! I joke not because it was a bad choice, but rather because he was the only drafter who targeted quarterbacks in our mock and he actually drafted three of them! Mahomes in the second round was a very popular pick this spring. He has a lot of skills, and the offense he is in seems to have a lot of weapons. The only issue is that Alex Smith is having a career resurgence which could delay Mahomes seeing the field by a year or two. Here is what Bradley had to say about the pick:
“I talked about Watson being in an excellent situation, how about Mahomes being in an ideal situation. He’s already got three great weapons waiting for him when he comes in with Travis Kelce, Tyreek Hill and Kareem Hunt, and he’s being groomed under the tutelage of Alex Smith and Andy Reid. With the talent we all know he possesses, I have very high hopes for the tenth pick of last year’s draft. He is a great value at this point in fantasy drafts.”
That’s it for the second round. The third round will be coming your way soon!
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- Final 2021 Pre-Draft Rookie Mock: Round Three - April 28, 2021
- Final 2021 Pre-Draft Rookie Mock: Round Two - April 26, 2021
- Final 2021 Pre-Draft Rookie Mock: Round One - April 25, 2021
