ESPN’s Todd McShay and Mel Kiper combine for rocky Bengals 3-round mock draft

This is an important draft for the Bengals. The front office decided to re-sign Marvin Lewis after his contract expired without a single playoff win. The team has also preached changing how they do things, and to be fair we have seen some of that. The Bengals are getting rid of Jay Gruden’s offense and replacing it with Bill Lazor’s. The team also brought in Teryl Austin from the Lions on the defensive side of the ball. Cincinnati also made a pretty big trade by moving back to the 21st pick and acquiring left tackle Cordy Glenn in the process. Still, they need to prove they are ready to draft players who are ready to come in and help this team get back to the playoffs in 2018.

That brings us to the newest mock draft from Mel Kiper and Todd McShay. Their added twist to this draft is they alternated who was picking for each team. So Kiper took the first pick, and then McShay did the second. This sort of changes how mocks are generated because it can bring up possibilities that you weren’t thinking of. Like if McShay took a player earlier than Kiper has him ranked, he has to think of who would go to the team he usually has that player landing with.

The results varied as far as how it worked out for the Bengals. Here is who the Bengals took with the 21st pick, which was made by Kiper.

21. Cincinnati Bengals (from Bills)

Kiper’s pick: Kolton Miller, OT, UCLA

The Bengals’ tackles were a disaster last season. Cordy Glenn should be an improvement, and Miller will compete to start.

This is an awful pick and it isn’t just because they didn’t take one of the far superior interior offensive linemen. I could see the Bengals grabbing a tackle here just because the interior linemen class is a little deeper. What pushes this over the edge as a really really dumb pick is that offensive tackle Mike McGlinchey was also available and went right after the Bengals’ pick. It appears Kiper views Miller as a better prospect than McGlinchey, but that would be a disastrous pick.

I still wouldn’t like picking Miller, regardless of who else was available. He scares me for the same reason Orlando Brown scares me. These larger tackles have issues in the NFL more times than not, and despite Miller showing off some pretty good numbers at the Scouting Combine, his tape shows plenty of issues with speed rushers. I don’t think his ceiling goes past being a starting right tackle, and his floor goes a lot lower than that.

The rest of the draft went like this:

46. McShay’s pick: Austin Corbett, C/G, Nevada

Mel took his guy Kolton Miller in the first round, but Cincy should double down on the O-line if it breaks this way.

77. Kiper’s pick: Anthony Averett, CB, Alabama

Averett had only one interception at Alabama, and the tape shows a corner who struggles to find the ball at times. Still, 4.36 speed masks other problems

100. McShay’s pick: Tim Settle, DT, Virginia Tech

It seems like this mock gets longer every year! Settle provides some nice depth for Cincinnati along the defensive front.

The rest of the draft went a lot better for the Bengals. They took Corbett soon after the center Billy Price was taken. Corbett offers some extra flexibility as a center or guard if the Bengals did address the interior offensive line again later in the draft. They wouldn’t be handcuffed to having to take a guard because they took a center earlier or vice versa. His lack of length means he won’t be competing for a tackle position, but his rock solid technique will keep him in the starting lineup for awhile.

The Averett pick is solid. He is a blazing fast corner who needs coached up to really get the best out of him. He needs to do a better job of playing the ball after not breaking up enough passes and only recording one interception. He has the man coverage ability the Bengals could be looking for though. With that said, there are bigger needs than center for Round 3.

What is frustrating about that pick is the Bengals passed on center Frank Ragnow, and in their eyes it may have been hard to go offensive line three picks in a row. Still, I think that’d be easy to sell to the Bengals’ fanbase after the past two seasons. Ragnow is just too much of a value there in the third round, and his addition would eliminate pretty much any remaining weaknesses left along the offensive line.

The final pick in the defensive tackle Settle is a great value pick. He could grow into the guy who ends up next to Geno Atkins, and eventually replaces him once that time comes if he continues to develop. His rare size to speed ratio makes him a great third round target. His issues really are all coach able technique issues, which doesn’t get much better for a third round pick.