{"id":747070,"date":"2026-02-12T13:29:20","date_gmt":"2026-02-12T13:29:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/747070\/"},"modified":"2026-02-12T13:29:20","modified_gmt":"2026-02-12T13:29:20","slug":"poor-landing-spots-for-top-10-2026-nfl-draft-prospects","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/747070\/","title":{"rendered":"Poor Landing Spots for Top 10 2026 NFL Draft Prospects"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ohio State safety Caleb Downs<\/a> is the top-ranked prospect at any position in this year’s draft. A versatile playmaker who gained pro-style experience under Matt Patricia this past season, his floor is extremely high, and it’s hard to see him as an outright bust with any team. <\/p>\n

However, Downs is at his best working closer to the line of scrimmage and may lack the tools to excel early as a back-end safety. <\/p>\n

Downs may not reach his ceiling in a pure deep-safety role that doesn’t take advantage of his positional versatility. Of course, it’s hard to imagine any defensive coordinator forcing a blue-chip prospect like Downs into a situation that doesn’t maximize his talents. <\/p>\n

It’s less difficult, though, to envision Downs landing with a team that simply doesn’t value the safety position. The Cincinnati Bengals, for example, could desperately use a player with Downs’ capabilities, but they may never be willing to give him a second contract. <\/p>\n

Cincinnati used to have a playmaker at free safety in Jesse Bates III. The Bengals let him play out his rookie contract, gave him the franchise tag in Year 5, and let him leave in free agency after that. Downs could see a similar fate with the Bengals, who have generally shied away from paying defenders.<\/p>\n

Downs might put up strong numbers in a talent-starved Cincinnati defense, but he’d probably also have to wait five or more years before seeing a second contract. <\/p>\n

Worst Landing Spot: Cincinnati Bengals<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ohio State safety Caleb Downs is the top-ranked prospect at any position in this year’s draft. A versatile…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":747071,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[7,6,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-747070","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nfl-draft","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-nfl","10":"tag-nfl-draft"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116057903488015487","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/747070","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=747070"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/747070\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/747071"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=747070"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=747070"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=747070"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}