B
Cincinnati Bengals
The Bengals turned the phones into found money: B.
by WymeDime ·
2024 NFL Draft
· 8 picks
· 1 steals
· 4 reaches
The Taulia Tagovailoa pick is the one that will follow the Bengals into the fall. They took him 63 spots ahead of his grade, and the board is not shy about saying so. Nothing here to lose sleep over; call it a B.
They won the margins on every swap, and it adds up fast. They covered a lot of ground and still skipped cornerback, which is a strange place to end up.
It is not that Stover is a bad player; it is that the Bengals had louder needs to answer first. The DeForest Buckner pickup adds a known quantity to a class of unknowns.
In sum, a sturdy weekend with one asterisk, the cornerback spot they never got to.
Pick-by-Pick
In the Round 1 slot they get a disruptor off the edge, and a steal at that. More want than need.
Blake Fisher in slot 88 is the kind of reach that only looks good if he outplays it. It plugs a real leak on the depth chart.
They bypassed pressing needs at cornerback, tight end and other spots to take Cade Stover, a TE-EDGE that was not the priority.
They left a pile of value on the table to take Taulia Tagovailoa this early at pick No. 161. A need, and now a little less of one.
Dorian Singer at Round 5, Pick 37 is an overdraft of the loud, memorable kind. The one spot they could not leave alone, and did not.
They took Joshua Gray at par in the 202nd overall pick, which is nothing to complain about. A sensible fit for a spot that needed help.
A big swing on Matthew Jones at Round 7, Pick 25, well ahead of any board in the building. It patches a soft spot without any drama.
No edge and no loss on Jalen Berger in slot 254; it is a wash and a sensible one. One more legitimate question on the roster, answered.