If you watch any football, you would know that the draft has past and you already have achieved all the scouting on your favorite team\’s new pick in this year\’s draft. As far as my favorite and hometown team the Washington Redskins are concerned, I undoubtedly have done more than enough research on all of the new pick-ups that the Redskins have added to the squad. These new additions include No.2 overall pick (OSU) Chase Young DE, No. 66 overall pick (Memphis) Antonio Gibson RB, No. 108 overall pick (LSU) Saahdiq Charles T, No. 142 overall pick (Liberty) Antonio Gandy-Golden WR, No. 156 overall pick (San Diego State) Keith Ismael C, No. 162 overall pick (Michigan) Kaleke Hudson, No. 216 overall pick (Arkansas) Karmen Curl S, and No. 229 overall pick (NC state) James Smith-Williams DE.
Now starting with the most important and biggest focal point of this draft, and taking a look at Washington\’s number two overall pick Chase Young, it seems as if he has proven with the film he already has that he is worthy of that number two spot. If we look at the most vital positions in football they have historically been a quarterback or a guy on defense that can pressure the quarterback with. Looking at the Super Bowl MVPs in years past, they have been either a QB with a pass rusher on defense tying in second place for most Super Bowl MVPs by position. The Redskins not only landed somebody that can bring pressure, but also do it at a high level. Looking at Young\’s junior season stats at Ohio State, he averaged 16.5 sacks for his team in his last season finishing with the most sacks in the NCAA this past year. Along with 6 forced fumbles that have come from getting to quarterbacks and running backs early and hitting them with so much force that a fumble was bound to occur.
Washington has intertwined the previous year\’s draft picks with this year\’s draft picks to form a stout defense. With this new piece to the Redskins defensive front on paper, let me just say that they look unstoppable. When I say unstoppable, I mean that any team in the NFL will struggle to stop this front if they all can remain healthy. Here is the front on paper, DT Johnathan Allen, NT Daron Payne, DE Matt Ioannidis, DE Chase Young. These four names alone will give an offensive coordinator a fit when trying to stop the intense pass-rush that these defensive tackles will bring. When this core is healthy the Redskins defense can be a stubborn group not allowing over 100 rushing yards for any team a season ago before injuries took over midway through. Combining picks from years past including Allen and Payne to now mix with Young will be a disruptive pairing. This is not all though, because now that the defensive front is set up, the linebacker core looks just as lethal. The LB core will consist of SLB Montez Sweat, OLB Ryan Kerrigan, OLB Thomas Davis Sr., and soon to return MLB Reuben Foster. So with a newly polished defense, it will be interesting to see how Coach Ron Rivera will fit these new pieces into his defensive scheme that is completely different from the one Washington was using in the past. As Rivera will implement a 4-3 scheme instead of a 3-4 that Washington was accustom to. This new concept will have 4 down lineman instead of 3 and with strong linemen and fast linebackers with the blitz concepts that Washington can now obtain, I see Young having plenty of success in this defense once the season premieres.