March 26, 2026, 2:37 p.m. ET<\/p>\n
If the Jacksonville Jaguars<\/a> are going to adequately address arguably their biggest need in the 2026 NFL draft, then GM James Gladstone may have to strike early.<\/p>\n With 11 picks in total, including four in the top 100, along with what is a well-put-together roster overall, the Jaguars<\/a> do enter this year’s draft with some flexibility, which allows the draft board to dictate who they select.<\/p>\n However, a potential wrench in that plan may be the depth and overall talent of the defensive tackle class.<\/p>\n Defensive tackle is very much a need for the Jaguars. For one, more depth is a must with only five defensive tackles under contract, but in addition to that, more pass-rush juice is needed from this unit. The defensive tackle position for the Jaguars struggled to generate a consistent pass rush down the stretch last season.<\/p>\n Lance Zierlein of NFL.com<\/a> recently ranked the strength of each position group in the 2026 NFL draft. Out of the 11 units, defensive tackle came in at tied for eighth.<\/p>\n Expert NFL picks: Exclusive betting insights only at USA TODAY.<\/a><\/p>\n “With\u00a0Caleb Banks<\/a>\u00a0apparently\u00a0nursing a broken foot<\/a>, we now have three defensive tackles who could be borderline first-rounders in the Florida product,\u00a0Kayden McDonald<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Peter Woods<\/a>.” wrote Zierlein. “Beyond that talented trio, the position offers a series of future starters\/rotational contributors on Day 2.\u00a0Zxavian Harris<\/a>\u00a0isn’t for everyone, but the 6-foot-8, 330-pounder has impressive flashes on tape. Your team might need to draft a DT inside the first 120 picks in order to ensure quality.”<\/p>\n The good news for the Jaguars is that they have four picks within the top 120, but if there is a shortage of talent as Zierlein predicts, then other teams may feel that urgency to address this position as well, which could dry up the well, so to speak, rather quickly.<\/p>\n Gladstone has to be prepared to select a defensive tackle — and move around if needed — early in this year’s draft.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"March 26, 2026, 2:37 p.m. ET If the Jacksonville Jaguars are going to adequately address arguably their biggest…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":681486,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2060],"tags":[95878,7,212,125,2401,213,6,31186,95933,95882,95936,95896,95888,95906,95883,95881],"class_list":{"0":"post-836283","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jacksonville-jaguars","8":"tag-accessfree","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-jacksonville","11":"tag-jacksonville-jaguars","12":"tag-jacksonvillejaguars","13":"tag-jaguars","14":"tag-nfl","15":"tag-sstssportsnfljaguars","16":"tag-sstsnjaguars","17":"tag-tagamerican-football","18":"tag-tagjacksonville-jaguars","19":"tag-tagnational-sports","20":"tag-tagnfl","21":"tag-tagoverall-positive","22":"tag-tagsports-news","23":"tag-typestory"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116299681014224927","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/836283","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=836283"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/836283\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/681486"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=836283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=836283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=836283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}