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What will the Green Bay Packers look like next year? Who can say! After trading Aaron Rodgers to the Jets, the Packers' quarterback situation is in flux for the first time in over 30 years. Nobody knows if Jordan Love is the long-term answer, but he'll enter 2023 as the starter. The bigger problem, though, is that the Packers have largely neglected building out the rest of their offense; Rodgers delivered such consistently great results that the Packers never really had to invest in his supporting cast, trusting that he alone could produce a good offense. For the most part, they were correct. But with Love at the helm, their barren receiver room and non-existent options at tight end suddenly loom large. Headlined by Jaxon Smith-Njigba are the best options for the Packers to kickstart their rebuild with the 13th pick in this week's NFL Draft.
Jaxon Smith-Njigba, WR, Ohio State
The last time Jaxon Smith-Njigba was fully healthy, he was unguardable. While he was largely invisible this year at Ohio State as he dealt with a wealth of injuries, he was so great in 2021 that he's still the unanimous WR1 in this year's class. In 2021, Smith-Njigba was arguably the best pass catcher on a loaded Ohio State offense—despite splitting time with first round picks Chris Olave and Garrett Wilson, Smith-Njigba was the Buckeyes' most dangerous receiver, capping off his sophomore season with a historic Rose Bowl performance.
It's possible to find faults in Smith-Njigba's game, but they're hard to find. He's an exacting and efficient route runner, snapping in and out of his breaks at every level of the field; he's a freakish athlete with an 8.3 Relative Athletic Score, putting him squarely within the top 20 percent of wide receiver prospects over the last 25 years. Whereas most receivers make some necessary tradeoff between power and finesse, Smith-Njigba erases any distinction between the two. He's a technician with hops, a speedster with sure hands. Even if this draft lacks a no-doubt superstar talent like JaMarr Chase in 2020 or Marvin Harrison Jr. next year, Smith-Njigba will undoubtedly become the favorite option of Jordan Love or whoever else is throwing to him in Green Bay. According to Evoluxion Analytics, a boutique analytics consulting firm that works with NFL teams, Smith-Njigba grades out as the best receiver in the NFL Draft and the third best player overall. The Packers might be picking too late to draft him, but he's the easy choice if he's available.
Quentin Johnson, WR, TCU
Whereas Jaxon Smith-Njigba's goodness lies in the subtler aspects of wide receiver play, Quentin Johnson's talent is immediately obvious. He's huge and he's fast. He's uncommonly tall (6'3), fast (4.48 second 40 yard dash) and explosive (41.5 inch vertical jump, 11'02 broad jump), giving him a 9.6 Relative Athletic score, good for the 96th percentile of all wide receivers since 1987. More than being a workout warrior, though, Johnson was unstoppable last year, catching 60 passes for a whopping 1,069 yards and six touchdowns. More, he reserved his best performances for the biggest games. He racked up 14 catches for 206 yards and a touchdown in a road win over #19 Kansas, eight catches for 180 yards and a touchdown against #8 Oklahoma State, four catches for 139 yards against Kansas State in the Big 12 Championship Game, and six catches for 163 yards against Michigan in the Fiesta Bowl in the CFP Semifinals.
Still, Johnson sometimes evinces a concerning looseness on the field. Passes occasionally slip through his hands and his route-running isn't as precise as it should be. Watching Johnson, you get the sense that he's never had to develop ancillary skills beyond running really fast in a straight line and out-jumping a cornerback for the ball. But as far as skills though, that's a pretty important one to have; it's not like the Packers will be asking Jordan Love to run the same ultra-complicated offense as Rodgers anyways. In this sense, Johnson is the perfect receiver for Love and the new-look Packers to draft and grow with. Evoluxion's expected points added model projects Johnson as the second best receiver behind Smith-Njigba and one of the ten best players in the class as a whole.
Dalton Kincaid, TE, Utah
We're not saying Dalton Kincaid is Travis Kelce—that would be insane. But we are saying that, at Utah, Dalton Kincaid often looked very Travis Kelce-ish. A 6'4, 246-pound tight end with the refined route-running of a slot receiver, Kincaid is a matchup nightmare. Linebackers couldn't keep up with him in coverage; cornerbacks and safeties lacked the power to tackle him. As such, he was arguably the best tight end in college football last season, nabbing 70 catches for 890 yards and eight touchdowns, the latter two ranking second amongst all tight ends in the nation. To wit, Evoluxion Analytics has him as the 21st best player in the NFL Draft and the second best tight end.
For years, the Packers have largely ignored their tight ends both in the NFL Draft and in free agency, opting instead to trot out a procession of late-round young guys or low-cost veterans. Accordingly, Kincaid would add an entirely new dimension to their offense; the Packers haven't had a Pro Bowl tight end since Bubba Franks in 2003. Even if Kincaid is a bad blocker and is more of an oversized receiver than a true tight end, he's exactly the kind of dependable safety blanket that Jordan Love will need in his first year as a starting quarterback.
