The Arizona Cardinals own the #3 overall slot at the top of this year\u2019s NFL draft. A lot of ink has been used on the team taking an offensive lineman. And GM Monti Ossenfort just may do that.<\/p>\n
Then again, the top of the draft is full of elite pass rushers. In rounds 2 and 3, there are plenty of top-tier offensive guards and tackles.<\/p>\n
The point here is that the Cardinals can grab a top-shelf pass rusher early in the draft, and then take whatever offensive line prospect is needed using the high picks in both the second and third rounds.<\/p>\n
Not to slight the idea of drafting an offensive lineman with the #3 pick. OT Francis Mauigoa from Miami, Utah OT Spencer Fano, and OT Monroe Freeling from Georgia are all excellent choices and would be a huge welcome in the desert.<\/p>\n
Free agency brought in four key offensive linemen, so the need to grab a blue-chip guard or tackle has been lessened quite a bit. No team can have enough pass rushers, and by selecting one early, this would create havoc with Arizona\u2019s pass rush with Josh Sweat on the other side.<\/p>\n
Draft projection: Round 1<\/p>\n
\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014-<\/p>\n
Career Forced Fumbles: 10<\/p>\n
Career Tackles for Loss: 42<\/p>\n
Accolades: Unanimous All-American, First Team All-Big-12, Big 12 Defensive Lineman of the Year, Pony Express Award winner, DCTF All-Texas College First Team, Lombardi Award finalist<\/p>\n
Expert Draft Site Analysis<\/p>\n
Bailey is a lightning-fast edge rusher with devastating speed around the edge. Bailey has tremendous first-step quickness, and he explodes off the ball. Bailey can fly upfield and blow by offensive tackles even when they know his speed rush is coming. Bailey shows a variety of pass-rushing moves as he has an excellent spin move, darts to the inside, and has some functional power. Bailey shows impressive speed to power rushes and has upper-body strength to get a bull rush as a change-up on offensive tackles. The bull rush and the speed to power take tackles by surprise, and that makes Bailey a tough rusher to defend. Along with being fast off the ball, Bailey has easy acceleration to eat up ground in a blur. He is a dynamic pursuit defender and a true speed rusher quarterback hunter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Arizona Cardinals own the #3 overall slot at the top of this year\u2019s NFL draft. A lot…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":849301,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2078],"tags":[375,390,85477,2757,2604,1327,7,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-849300","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arizona-cardinals","8":"tag-arizona","9":"tag-arizona-cardinals","10":"tag-arizona-cardinals-discussion","11":"tag-arizona-cardinals-draft","12":"tag-arizonacardinals","13":"tag-cardinals","14":"tag-football","15":"tag-nfl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116335360492252194","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/849300","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=849300"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/849300\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/849301"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=849300"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=849300"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=849300"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}