South Carolina edge rusher Kyle Kennard<\/a> was on the board for the Bolts in the fourth round at pick No. 125.<\/p>\nKennard, who won the Nagurski Trophy as the nation’s top defender, was also a Second-Team All-American and First-Team All-SEC selection after tallying 11.5 sacks, 15.5 tackles for loss, three forced fumbles and two fumble recoveries.<\/p>\n
“Very good pass rusher, motor, effort,” Hortiz said. “He’s got power, he’s got speed, just love the motor and the way he plays, fits right in there with the mentality.<\/p>\n
“We know some coaches on the staff that Jesse [Minter] and I worked with,” Hortiz said. “As soon as we made the pick, they were like, ‘You are going to absolutely love him.’ We were fired up to get him.”<\/p>\n
Kennard, listed at 6-foot-4 and 254 pounds, will have the chance to learn from Khalil Mack, Tuli Tuipulotu and Bud Dupree in 2025.<\/p>\n
The Chargers were once again among the better special teams units in 2024 under Ryan Ficken and Chris ‘Beep’ Gould.<\/p>\n
But Hortiz and the front office made sure to give that phase more reinforcements with the selections of Kennard, Lambert-Smith, safety RJ Mickens and defensive back Trikweze Bridges.<\/p>\n
Each of those players were asked about special teams on their post-pick video conference, with each saying they were eager to make an impact wherever they could.<\/p>\n
Hortiz on Saturday said Ficken and Gould are valuable parts of the draft process for the Chargers.<\/p>\n
“Every player we talk about, we have Coach Fick and ‘Beep’ chime in and say what they think of them as a special teamer,” Hortiz said. “Some guys are projections and they’re grading them based off their offensive or defensive film.<\/p>\n
“Other guys play core four. When you’re stacking the board and you look to Fick and he says, ‘I love this guy, let’s get him,’ that’s great. It gives you more confidence in the player,” Hortiz added.<\/p>\n
When the fall rolls around, look for this group of Chargers rookies to be active on special teams.<\/p>\n
A year ago, the Chargers took Alt at No. 5 overall out of Notre Dame. Among the fun storylines was that his father, played 13 seasons in the NFL as a tackle for the Chiefs.<\/p>\n
“It worked well last year,” Hortiz said with a smile.<\/p>\n
The Chargers went back to that well twice with the selections of Gadsden and Mickens in 2025.<\/p>\n
Mickens’ father, Ray, played 10 seasons in the NFL as a defensive back, eight of them with the Jets. He was the No. 62 overall pick (third round) by New York in the 1996 NFL Draft.<\/p>\n
Gadsden’s father played six NFL seasons for the Dolphins. He caught 227 career passes for 3,252 yards and 22 touchdowns, including the final touchdown of Dan Marino’s career.<\/p>\n
Hortiz said the fact those players have NFL pedigree is an added bonus as they now transition to the league.<\/p>\n
“That helps define who they’ve become but it’s not necessarily who they are,” Hortiz said. “Their fathers are certainly pros and they got to see the lifestyle and the work ethic that they’ve shown them.<\/p>\n
“They put that into practice and certainly have great example setters, but so do the other players we took. It’s just their parents might not have been pros,” Hortiz added.<\/p>\n
Alexander said: “It’s always cool to get a kid with NFL bloodlines.”<\/p>\n
Alexander has them, too, as his father, Hubbard, was a longtime NFL wide receivers coach with the Cowboys, Vikings and Saints.<\/p>\n
Hubbard Alexander actually coached Oronde Gadsden when be broke into the NFL with the Cowboys in 1995.<\/p>\n
“I knew him about 30 years ago. My dad coached him when my dad was at the Cowboys and he was a rookie receiver with them,” Alexander said. “The apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree when it comes to his son \u2014 a red-zone threat, he’s really long and able to extend and make catches outside the frame.<\/p>\n
“You see him as it reminds you of his dad, some of the things he does. It’s cool when you get a full-circle moment like that,” Alexander said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"3. Kennard a steal in Round 4 It’s not often that the SEC Defensive Player of the Year…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3788,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4],"tags":[39,37,3460,7,34,38,6,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-3787","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nfl-draft","8":"tag-2025-draft","9":"tag-app-homepage","10":"tag-articles-5-takeaways","11":"tag-football","12":"tag-homepage-cp","13":"tag-homepage-headlines","14":"tag-nfl","15":"tag-nfl-draft"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114409042606933608","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3787"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3787\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3788"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}