With all that pesky football out of the way, we can now look forward to the 2017 NFL Draft. The Draft this year will take place in Philadelphia for the first time since 1961, beginning with the first overall pick on Thursday, April 27, and running until the final compensatory pick has been taken some time on Saturday, April 29.
This is where the best and brightest players who have either run out of college football eligibility or who have declared early for the chance at becoming a pro, will hope to hear their name called by one of the 32 NFL teams. Between now and the end of April we will be looking at some of those prospects and where better to start than a Heisman Trophy finalist who splits opinion on his viability to play on Sundays.
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There will be a lot written about Jabrill Peppers of Michigan between now and draft day, but the Big Ten standout will likely take it all in his stride. Peppers' issue is a bizarre one as the player that once played 10 positions for the Wolverines in a single game may actually be hurt in terms of where he is picked because of his incredible versatility.
Peppers is an electric and energizing player as you can see from this video. The NFL though (with a few exceptions) is super conservative in its approach to football. At the NFL level you can argue that every player out there is a versatile athlete, so as a result the personnel guys whose jobs depend on their ability to pick players to fit into a rigid lineup, want college players that are an expert at one position with the ability to switch to a similar position in a pinch.
Simply put, they don't need a guy that can play 10 positions very well when they can pick someone who plays two positions excellently.
There are however outliers to this way of thinking. One of them (and you may have heard of him) is a fella named Bill Belichick. Belichick has built his Patriots dynasty by outmaneuvering his opponents. One way he has done this is to take players with skill sets similar to Peppers and uses them to dominate games by creating matchups to exploit either offensively or defensively. Also, Belichick has the very last pick in the first round of the draft and a roster so loaded that he just won a Super Bowl.
If New England is interested in Peppers then this video that shows everything he does well will not turn them away from perhaps the most polarizing player in the 2017 NFL Draft.
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