00:00Mock draft time, Mel Kuyper Jr., the godfather of the mock draft, ESPN.com.
00:05I'm guessing this is his last one before the draft next week.
00:10Mel Kuyper Jr., maybe he drops one on draft day, I don't know.
00:13Draft is a week from today.
00:15He did a two-round mock on ESPN.com yesterday.
00:18We know last year, probably Mel, to you youngsters out there,
00:21Mel Kuyper Jr. is probably best known for acting like he's related to Shadur Sanders last year
00:27throughout the draft, throughout the three days of the draft that it took to get Shadur drafted.
00:31He made the entire draft process about Shadur Sanders.
00:36It started with Cam Ward getting drafted, and then it just didn't end up being anything else
00:41except him venting about it.
00:42It was really frustrating, honestly.
00:45I feel like even if you were a Shadur Sanders fan, but also a fan of your own team,
00:50there was probably a point where you're like,
00:51could you please talk about the guy that my team just drafted, please?
00:55Yep.
00:56All right, so let's do this here.
00:58Mel Kuyper Jr. has the Texans using the 28th pick.
01:01He doesn't have them trading.
01:03And with the 28th pick, the Houston Texans select Christian Miller,
01:07defensive tackle Georgia, who is, via audio, a favorite of this show.
01:13And we'll have Seth break down how he plays here in a second.
01:15Here's Christian Miller.
01:16Just for those who didn't get to hear him when we played some of his audio last week,
01:20this was Christian Miller talking about why he went back to Georgia for his senior year.
01:26Honestly, it felt difficult from the outside perception,
01:29but for me it was like it was an easy decision.
01:31Like, as a man that wanted to be better, as a man that wanted to be great,
01:36you got to hold your own self to a certain standard.
01:38You got to hold your own self to a certain amount of accountability.
01:41And I told myself, like, Chris, are you ready to be an NFL player?
01:44You're not.
01:45And I didn't want to leave an unfinished product.
01:48I didn't want to leave without a degree.
01:49I didn't want to leave, not a team captain.
01:51And I wanted to get another national championship, which you can't sort of.
01:54But, like, that was my whole mindset.
01:55And I told myself, like, Chris, you get to go back another year.
02:02You get to be a team captain, graduate, and then get a little money.
02:08Get a little money while you're doing it.
02:11Joshua, it's mad.
02:13Okay.
02:14I think the biggest thing about him is that you see the way a lot of the scouts
02:20or the analysts talk about him is that they feel like there's an upside there
02:24that is definitely there and that he's capable of more.
02:29And nobody questions his work ethic or anything.
02:31It's just that, you know, you rotate in, you don't get as many snaps at Georgia
02:37as a defensive lineman as you might otherwise somewhere else.
02:40But I'm trying to figure out the one thing that I've seen that's a little odd
02:44is that I've seen people say that he doesn't have the mass that you might really want.
02:49But he has, like, 320 pounds.
02:51That sounds pretty big to me.
02:53Yeah, yeah.
02:53So I think what it is is that it's somewhere between he's not as –
02:59he's somewhere stuck between a nose tackle and a three technique, a more athletic guy.
03:04But he doesn't show a lot of the things that a nose tackle can do with his physical strength
03:09and all of that.
03:09So I think there's – this is probably – I'm guessing he's all over the place
03:13in terms of some teams liking him and some teams not.
03:16I could totally see the Texans being a team that feels like, okay, yeah,
03:20they haven't worked with Rod Wright and there's really a lot of untapped potential here.
03:24Well, and again, I'll go back to Nick Casario on Monday.
03:26We draft people.
03:28That sounds like a person they would really like, and we know he's a good player.
03:32That feels like someone they'd bring in and then they'll figure it out with him.
03:34Yeah.
03:35If he's that good, if he's worthy of the 28th pick.
03:37Would you be excited about this pick on draft pick?
03:39I would, yeah.
03:39I would – like, those guys, those top few defensive tackles that –
03:45this is – I guess this is the benefit of drafting late in the first round.
03:49You kind of go into it thinking, okay, yeah, like,
03:51these guys aren't projected to be future all pros or anything.
03:55So you've already reduced some of your expectations.
03:57But any of the guys that are projected to go at the top of the second round
04:00to the back of the first round, you can totally see their potential.
04:03Absolutely.
04:03So, yeah, I would – like, it's probably bad sports radio hosting
04:07that I'm not more polarizing on any of these guys.
04:10But really, at the interior offensive line, or the offensive line in general
04:14and with the defensive tackles, I would be very intrigued by pretty much anybody.
04:20I haven't identified anybody that I flat out don't want.
04:23But the only one that – like, a couple of the guys that maybe just whether they fit
04:29that swarm mentality or not, like Caden Proctor, I guess, would be a guy that I'm –
04:33I've got questions about because there's questions about his swarm ability.
04:37All right, let's do the 38th overall pick.
04:39This is a two-round mock.
04:40And with the 38th overall pick, the Houston Texans select, Chase Besantis,
04:45guard Texas A&M, who I believe was their first-round pick in the mock draft
04:49we did yesterday.
04:51See, I really – now, he I'd get excited about because I think he fits everything
04:54that the Texans want.
04:55And I know that there are a lot of people that don't even think he should go
04:58in the second round, at least on bloggers and various people following the draft.
05:02I think it's because he doesn't stand out in any one area as all that exceptional physically.
05:08But I think the total package is that he's got good technique.
05:13He's got really good body awareness.
05:15He does all the things you want him to do.
05:17He is very explosive by offensive lineman standards, and that doesn't always necessarily
05:22jump off the film to people immediately.
05:25It was – I saw – who was it saying this?
05:27Nate Tice saying the more he watched him, the more he started liking.
05:30And that's how I was with Chase Besantis, too.
05:33The first time I ever saw him, I was like, okay, I don't know why people necessarily think
05:37he's a big deal.
05:38Then you watch him, and some of it is just his consistency.
05:40And then his scrappiness, his willingness to get after it, and play genuinely tough football.
05:46Not fake tough guy football, but like genuinely tough, just tenacious, really getting after
05:53people, snap after snap after snap.
05:55It's different than like a fake tough guy like Trevor Penning was.
05:58He would beat up a strong safety, but then the next play get destroyed by a defensive tackle.
06:05But people would say, oh, did you see him beat up that 210-pound guy out of the MAAC conference?
06:10Wow.
06:11What a tough guy he is.
06:12Yep.
06:13Trevor Penning, backup offensive lineman for the Chargers last year.
06:16For the Chargers, yeah.
06:17Oh, he's pathetic.
06:17I think he re-signed there, if I'm not mistaken.
06:19His rookie contract was up.
06:21I know that.
06:21He's onward to glory.
06:22Yep.
06:23All right.
06:24The 59th overall pick, the Mel Kuyper Jr.
06:27two-round mock.
06:28D'Angelo Pons, cornerback, Indiana.
06:31Indiana, I'm guessing that the Texans probably are big fans of Kurt Cignetti and his program
06:36at Indiana, if I have a guess.
06:39And D'Angelo Pons.
06:40I think cornerback is sort of a sneaky position of need for this team right now.
06:45They've got two great ones on the outside, but not a lot of depth at that position.
06:49Well, and some of it with the defensive backfield is, all right, where's Jalen Smith now?
06:55Jalen Smith is another guy that had to recover from last year's injury.
06:59Yep.
06:59And there's, he'll be competing, you know.
07:03A lot of people were, he was drafted ahead of where expectations were last year, right?
07:07Yes, he was forecasted as like a day three guy and he went in third round.
07:11Yeah, yeah, yeah.
07:11Yep.
07:11Yeah, so I think that, but there's definitely room for competition there.
07:16And I think the depth in the secondary right now is, it's more of a concern than you would
07:21realize last year because everybody stayed relatively healthy for most of the year.
07:25But we saw what happened when Kamari Lasseter went out for a few series.
07:28Real quick, here's what's interesting about this Mel Kiper mock draft when we start to
07:32get into the middle part of the second round is there's a lot of guys sets from like 45
07:36to 51 or 52 that I think would be on the Texans board.
07:42Stowers, the tight end from Vanderbilt goes at 45.
07:45Jacob Rodriguez, the linebacker from Texas Tech goes 46.
07:48Anthony Hill, 47.
07:50Lee Hunter, 48.
07:51Mike Washington, the running back out of Arkansas, 49.
07:56Derek Moore, Caleb Lomu.
07:58Last year, the Texans were sitting at I think 58 or 59 and moved 10 spots up into that window
08:04right there to draft Ariante Ursary.
08:06Yeah.
08:07So, that 59th pick is going to be one to watch too, I think, to see if the Texans, because
08:13that's the range of the draft where there's probably some guys they had a first round
08:17grade on that are drifting into the second round a little bit.
08:20I think that there might be a better chance they're moving up from 59 to get a guy like
08:24they did last year with Ursary than they're moving back from 28 to get more picks.
08:28That's where it'll be fun on that day to kind of sit and watch with your computer screen
08:35pulled up, the best defensive tackle available, best offensive lineman available.
08:40Not that the Texans board is the same as those, but once you start to see kind of a coagulation
08:47of guys there in the second round, that's when you feel like, okay, maybe the Texans start
08:51maneuvering to get a guy into that band of players that Nick likes to talk about.
08:55Yep.
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