The general consensus seems to be that Mike Evans is the 2nd-best receiver in the draft.
But is the general consensus right?
I’m not anti-Evans. Let’s see where he goes and what they’ll try to do with him. But I’m not sure that it should be a no-brainer that he’s selected before some other receivers.
Evans is huge, and I like that. He’s not only 6-foot-5, but we’ve seen him use that size to dominate against smaller defenders. I remember Johnny Manziel going to him over and over against Alabama (which is basically like an NFL defense).
I’ve heard Evans compared to Calvin Johnson and Vincent Jackson.
The trouble, however, is eventually these guys have to put on pads and start playing, and then the warts show up. In the case of Evans, he’s not as fast as those guys. He’s not anywhere close to Megatron. Coming out, Megatron ran a 4.37. Evans is sitting at 4.53, which is a half of a tenth behind Jackson. A.J. Green is another tall receiver who can really fly.
And if you look at past drafts, you’ll see plenty of other receivers who looked very much like Evans coming in. Big guys who used their size to dominate in college. Specifically, J.J. Stokes, Reggie Williams and Mike Williams (Southern Cal). With Stokes and Reggie Williams, I was shocked those guys didn’t rip it up in the pros. I thought Stokes was going to be another Jerry Rice; he was so damn good at UCLA.
But none of those three guys were fast enough. They were all 4.6-type guys.
With Evans, I think the hope is that you’re getting a Plaxico Burress. He was also big and didn’t have the speed, but was very good in the pros. But my fear with Evans is that he might wind up being another Stokes, Williams or Williams, where we’re all scratching our head in three years wondering what went wrong. If you watch his highlight tapes at Texas A&M, you’ll see a lot of contested catches. At the pro level, as Reggie Williams can tell you, those DBs get a lot better at contesting the catches.
The Steelers are the team that probably does the best job of drafting and developing receivers. They’ve done very well selecting smaller receivers in the later rounds. Antonio Brown, Mike Wallace, Emmanuel Sanders. Further back they selected Hines Ward and Nate Washington, two other smaller receivers. I realize they also selected Plaxico back in the day, but the point is that maybe this whole size deal is a little overrated.
Odell Beckham Jr. and Brandon Cooks will probably be the two receivers selected after Evans. My hunch is that at least one of those guys will be a better pro than Evans. They’re both damn fast, running under 4.40. And in the NFL, speed is awfully important.
| 6-FOOT-4 RECEIVERS SELECTED WITH TOP 15 PICKS | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Player | Height | Weight | Speed |
| 1995 | J.J. Stokes | 6.05 | 217 | 4.60 |
| 1995 | Michael Westbrook | 6.04 | 210 | 4.45 |
| 2000 | Plaxico Burress | 6.05 | 233 | 4.60 |
| 2004 | Reggie Williams | 6.04 | 229 | 4.60 |
| 2005 | Mike Williams | 6.05 | 230 | 4.60 |
| 2007 | Calvin Johnson | 6.05 | 237 | 4.37 |
| 2011 | A.J. Green | 6.04 | 205 | 4.49 |
| 2014 | Mike Evans | 6.05 | 231 | 4.53 |
—Ian Allan