{"id":763169,"date":"2026-02-19T20:56:18","date_gmt":"2026-02-19T20:56:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/763169\/"},"modified":"2026-02-19T20:56:18","modified_gmt":"2026-02-19T20:56:18","slug":"nfl-draft-analyst-has-dolphins-taking-lsus-mansoor-delane","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/763169\/","title":{"rendered":"NFL draft analyst has Dolphins taking LSU’s Mansoor Delane"},"content":{"rendered":"

LSU cornerback Mansoor Delane is a name picking up steam for the Miami Dolphins.<\/p>\n

The Sun Sentinel\u2019s Chris Perkins chose him<\/a> as the Dolphins\u2019 first-round pick at No. 11 after the Senior Bowl, and NFL Network\u2019s Daniel Jeremiah also tabbed him as Miami\u2019s selection in his second mock draft<\/a>, released this week ahead of next week\u2019s NFL scouting combine<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Jeremiah explained his pick and why Delane would be a fit for general manager Jon-Eric Sullivan and coach Jeff Hafley<\/a> in a Thursday afternoon web conference with reporters from across the country.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think they\u2019ll appreciate the fact that he\u2019s scheme-diverse,\u201d Jeremiah said. \u201cHe\u2019s someone that, if you want to play him in press (coverage), he\u2019s really, really smooth. He can flip and open up real easy. You want to play him in off (coverage), he\u2019s a fluid mover. He can really see things top-down, drop, make plays on the football.\u201d<\/p>\n

Delane would be a natural choice as a potential lock-down cornerback for a team whose starters at the position last season, Rasul Douglas and Jack Jones, are veteran free agents.<\/p>\n

Delane, a Maryland native, spent his first three college seasons at Virginia Tech and transferred to LSU for his senior year. He had two of his eight interceptions and 11 of his 27 pass deflections with the Tigers in 2025. And that\u2019s that opposing offenses often stayed away from him.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe got a little bored when I was watching him because teams just stop throwing in his direction,\u201d Jeremiah continued. \u201cBut I thought he\u2019s someone that\u2019s a loose, fluid, smooth athlete, with toughness, that\u2019s scheme-diverse.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe only true question on him is, do you really see him get really challenged and have to recover and show big-time top speed? \u2026 We\u2019ll see how he runs in Indianapolis, but that\u2019ll be the only real question there.\u201d<\/p>\n

If the Dolphins don\u2019t go with Delane or one of the other projected first-round prospects at the position, Jeremiah named cornerback as one of the deeper positions in the draft. He also deemed the defensive line class, especially with edge rushers, wide receivers and linebackers as such.<\/p>\n

The Miami Hurricanes are certainly contributing to the edge-rusher depth in this draft class, with Rueben Bain a likely first-round pick and Akheem Mesidor<\/a> also possibly a selection among the first 32 players chosen.<\/p>\n

\u201cBain is just more kind of an identity pick who just plays so hard and so physical,\u201d Jeremiah said. \u201cThe dimensions aren\u2019t going to be ideal, in terms of the length, but there\u2019s more that he brings than just what shows up on the stat sheet. Just the overall physicality and toughness that he plays with.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jeremiah deems Bain the third-best edge defender of the draft class, with Texas Tech\u2019s David Bailey and Ohio State\u2019s Arvell Reese ahead of him, although he has Bain selected before Reese, at No. 4 to the Tennessee Titans. Remember: They selected UM quarterback Cam Ward with the No. 1 pick last year.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of debate there with those top-two guys,\u201d he said. \u201cIt comes down to the potential of Arvell Reese versus what you\u2019ve already seen, and you know that you\u2019ve got an elite, elite fastball rusher in David Bailey.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jeremiah said of Mesidor: \u201cOne of my favorite players in the whole draft. He plays outside. He plays inside. It\u2019s just not fair with him against college guards. He just kills them in there. Violent club moves. He\u2019s got knock-back power. He can widen and bull-(rush) on the edge. You\u2019ll see push-pull moves.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just wrote, this guy never stops. There\u2019s never a breath you can take when you\u2019re trying to block Akheem Mesidor. He\u2019s an absolute warrior. He\u2019s older. That\u2019s another conversation teams will have to have.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added that this draft has plenty of players who are 24 or 25, and teams may look beyond age when making selections.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LSU cornerback Mansoor Delane is a name picking up steam for the Miami Dolphins. The Sun Sentinel\u2019s Chris…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":763170,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2049],"tags":[339,217,7,929,216,251,2972,2087,6,9],"class_list":{"0":"post-763169","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-miami-dolphins","8":"tag-college-sports","9":"tag-dolphins","10":"tag-football","11":"tag-latest-headlines","12":"tag-miami","13":"tag-miami-dolphins","14":"tag-miami-hurricanes","15":"tag-miamidolphins","16":"tag-nfl","17":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116099297353679983","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/763169","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=763169"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/763169\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/763170"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=763169"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=763169"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=763169"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}