It’s too early to start predicting where Texas running back Bijan Robinson might go in this year’s NFL Draft – with the playoffs just beginning, only the top 18 draft picks have been decided – but that’s not stopping early tryouts.
Robinson won last season’s Doak Walker Award for top running back in the country and is widely regarded as the best running back in the draft. He rushed for 1,580 yards and threw for 18 touchdowns and left Texas as the fourth-best career player in Longhorns history behind Ricky Williams, Earl Campbell and Cedric Benson.
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Tryout drafts will become more relevant once the official order of the first round is decided after the Super Bowl. But here’s a look at where Robinson is predicted to go by the top 10 NFL and draft sites so far, in order of highest prediction:
10 early tryout drafts forced Texas to fall back in the first round of the 2023 NFL Draft.
Illustrated sports: 10th overall in favor of the Eagles
Focus on professional football: 18th, Lions
Draftek: 19th, to the pirates
USA Today: 23rd, To the Ravens
Pro Football Network: 23rd, To the Ravens
Yahoo Sports: 29th, to the bills
Bleach report: 29th, to the bills
Tanknation: 30s, to the bills
CBS Sports: 32nd, Orlam
SBNation: no runners in the first round
So, four and a half months later, the Buffalo Bills, Philadephia Eagles and Baltimore Ravens are tied with him.
Here’s what Bleacher’s report says, one of the ones he sends to Buffalo:
“Meanwhile, Robinson is one of the top five rookie talents aside from positional value. A possible drop on draft day shouldn’t be completely unexpected since organizations simply don’t value early backs. they once did.”
More: With many of its stars leaving, Texas is looking for the next men in running back, linebacker, quarterback…
And here’s what Pro Football Focus, which links him to the Lions, had to say: “The Lions have one of the best offensive lines in the NFL and it can stay intact for quite some time. At this point, it might make sense to put an elite talent like Robinson behind him and give the defensive coordinators nightmares. Robinson set a single-season PFF college record with 104 misses last season.”
There are many QBs in the 2023 NFL Draft; No RBs selected in 1st round 2022
A couple of Alabama players – quarterback Bryce Young and winger Will Anderson – are the first popular picks for first and second overall, depending on which draft draft you’re looking at. Excluding trades, the Chicago Bears are No. 1 picks, the Houston Texans are No. 2, the Arizona Cardinals are No. 3, the Indianapolis Colts are No. 4, and the Seattle Seahawks are No. 5.
Several quarterbacks are expected to make it through the first round – Young, Ohio State’s CJ Stroud, Kentucky’s Will Lewis and Florida’s Anthony Richardson, as well as several wide receivers, including TCU’s Quentin Johnston, Ohio State’s Jackson Smith-Njigba and USC. Jordan Addison is also the agreed first round pick. But be aware that the Bleacher Report talks about running backs when you’re trying to figure out which team might pick Robinson: running backs just aren’t a first-round commodity like they used to be.
There were no runners in the first round last year, there were two in 2021 (Nagy Harris and Travis Etienne) and only one in 2020 (Clyde Edwards-Heler).
The 2023 NFL Draft will take place April 27-29 in Kansas City.
