Packers 2016 Draft: Last minute NFL mock draft

Pick #6 — Baltimore Ravens

Myles Jack

The Ravens don’t often find themselves picking this high; in most seasons, John Harbaugh has proven to be one of the better head coaches in the league in terms of keeping his team in contention.

This past season hit them like a truck, however; a terrible run of injuries, unenviable cap struggles, and bleeding young talent to free agency recently decimated the roster, and they need a talent influx fast, should they hope to return to their usual winning ways.

Ramsey would have been a godsend (the Ravens ranked #25 in Pass Defense DVOA in 2015; outside of Jimmy Smith there is little to look forward to in the secondary as the roster is currently situated), but he’s gone.

In this case, we have Jack and Tunsil remaining from the top-level candidates, and of course, each would be a majorly positive piece to work with.

Let’s start with Tunsil. At tackle, the Ravens have Ricky Wagner and Eugene Monroe. Wagner had a disappointing second year as a starter. Monroe is good when healthy, but emphasis must go onto healthy; he missed 11 games last season, and 5 the year before. The Ravens have seemed to still believe in Monroe, but there is a chance they decide to instead attempt to move him to clear room for Tunsil; the idea there would be move on from good but somewhat unreliable option to grab a stalwart.

Jack’s situation is somewhat different. With him there is the injury concern, but as I’ve said before that appears massively overstated and dubiously handled. It was just a meniscus injury (much less serious than, say, tearing a ligament), and reports say that the entire meniscus remained intact after surgery. I’m not big on conspiracy theories, but I’m wary of the suspect way people can tend to act in their own self interest; putting out rumors about potential future problems with Jack’s knee (so as to somewhat drop his draft stock, thus possibly making him more easily acquirable for a team that wouldn’t otherwise be in position to grab him) definitely falls under the kind of shady (yet sort of legal, if only because it would be massively difficult to prove a so-called opinion to be false in this sense) stuff an organization may do to get a leg up.

As you can tell, I don’t think the knee issue is even a true issue. With that in mind, the Ravens can best meet the combination of team need and best player available mentality by adding his dynamic talents to a defense that dropped towards off into the 20s in terms of defensive DVOA.

Plus, it just feels so much like a Baltimore kind of pick, doesn’t it?