The 2024 NFL Draft is fast approaching. The PFF big board is live, mock draft season is in full swing and the 2024 NFL Scouting Combine has wrapped up.
This year’s offensive line draft class boasts plenty of high-end talent. Notre Dame’s Joe Alt and Oregon State’s Taliese Fuaga are among the headliners, though top interior players like Oregon’s Jackson Powers-Johnson are also being selected in the first round of mock drafts.
With 12 offensive linemen in the top 50 of PFF’s big board, it’s an excellent year to need offensive line help.
Let's look at Duke‘s Graham Barton, the two-time first-team All-ACC tackle who took over as Duke’s blindside protector as a freshman in 2020.
Click here for more draft tools:
2024 Mock Draft Simulator | 2024 Big Board | 2024 Draft Guide
2024 Player Profiles | 2024 Mock Drafts | NCAA Premium Stats
SCOUTING SUMMARY
Barton should switch from tackle to the interior (likely center) in the NFL. He has good quickness and explosiveness from a loaded stance, where he can get low and load his weight on his quads before the snap.
His grip strength is impressive, although his tendency to not let go leads to some holding calls. He has a mean streak in the run game with the leg drive to bury defenders. He is a good athlete off the ball and in space to be a successful second-level blocker.
Barton struggles against power and will need to improve his anchor against interior defenders. He is experienced at tackle, but his foot speed and length are issues there.
WINS ABOVE AVERAGE
WAA represents the number of wins a player is worth over an average college football player and is a metric evaluators can utilize to assess performance.
It combines how well a player performed in each facet of play (using PFF grades) and how valuable each facet is to winning football games. The result is a first-of-its-kind metric that allows for cross-positional valuation and predicts future value at the player and team levels.
HOW PLAYER RANKS IN THE STABLE METRICS
The PFF pass-blocking grade does a fine job of describing an offensive lineman’s success as a pass-blocker, but it becomes even more stable when isolated to just “true pass sets.”
True pass sets are plays without play-action, screens and designed rollouts where there are at least four pass-rushers and the quarterback stands in the pocket for at least 2.1 seconds. Isolating more specific situations helps us project a lineman’s future pass-blocking performance.
Run blocking is generally a stable measure of play. However, negatively graded plays are more stable for offensive tackles, while positively graded plays tend to fluctuate. The opposite is true for guards and centers on the interior.
Barton fared fairly well in pass protection but often got beat by bigger and more experienced defenders.
While it’s not a stable metric, Barton graded positively on 14% of his run-blocking snaps, something that NFL teams will love along the interior.
BOTTOM LINE FROM PFF's 2024 NFL DRAFT GUIDE
Barton is a tough lineman with strong hands and a mean streak in the run game. His best position in the NFL is likely at center, as he brings starting-caliber traits there.
© 2024 PFF - all rights reserved.