5 Takeaways from Doug Pederson’s pre-draft presser

Jacksonville Jaguars coach Doug Pederson and general manager Trent Baalke spoke at a pre-draft media luncheon Thursday. Here’s everything you need to know from their combined presser.

With the 2024 NFL Draft set to kickoff in 7 days, the Jacksonville Jaguars front office is finalizing their draft board. On Thursday, Head Coach Doug Pederson and General Manager Trent Baalke spoke with the local media during their annual pre-draft media luncheon. While most team’s media pre-draft interviews rarely reveal much about which position group or players the team is leaning towards, the Jaguars have historically been slightly more transparent under Trent Baalke. Nevertheless, they are generally pretty helpful in providing insight into the staff’s thought process and prioritization.

Together, Pederson and Baalke answered a variety of questions pertaining to their decision-making process and team-building philosophy, while also providing some additional insight into their personnel decisions.

Here’s everything you need to know.

Full Presser Video:

Trading down preferred over trading up?

When discussing the temptation to trade up in the draft, GM Trent Baalke delivered this gem that I fully agree with for this team.

“Well, if you talk to the analytics people, they’ll tell you never move up. Acquire as many darts as you can, keep moving back. You just got to look at the board and let the board speak. We spent 360-something days putting this thing together and to try to make something happen and force something to happen, sometimes backfires on you. You chase something and it doesn’t pan out, so you lose out there and then you lose out on the guy you would’ve picked and the two guys you would’ve picked with the other picks you gave up. If you’re going to move up, you better be right.”

This is a situation where I aThis is a situation where I agree with Baalke, with the caveat of never giving up a lot to trade up, unless it’s for a quarterback. The pure numbers reflect the probability of trading up, and winning the trade normally favors the team trading down. Additionally, the misses in these trades are historically significant, whereas the hits are normally not as impactful in comparison. Overall, the risk/reward simply isn’t there for most positions outside of quarterback. If the trade is for WR1 in the draft, that may make some sense. But to take on that risk for the WR3 in the draft? That seems worthy of a conversation.

Nevertheless, taking this statement in its full context could explain why this front office has historically been more prone to either sitting pat and picking, or trading down in the draft to collect more bites at the apple.

Could a trade up for WR still be on the table?

Fans and media in and around Jacksonville have often mocked Washington WR Rome Odunze or LSU WR Malik Nabers in potential trade-up scenarios to the Jaguars via a trade-up. However, on three separate occasions, GM Trent Baalke mentioned a potential trade-up example, specifically naming the 12th or 13th pick of the draft, currently owned by the Denver Broncos.

“Yeah, there’s a lot, as you know, that goes into it. We feel good about the group that’s there at different positions that we’re focused in on a little bit. But you don’t know what’s going to happen, you really aren’t going to know what we’re going to do until maybe the 12th or 13th pick. Then, we’ll look at the opportunity to potentially move up. If we get to 16 like we did last year, then somebody calls and there’s a chance to move back one or two, you just don’t know. You’re playing it on game day.”

Baalke, later in another answer again stated something similar.

“The only thing we can control is be calculated on if we really target someone and we really feel we need to make a run, let’s say get up to 12, get up to 13, we’ll be prepared to do that if the right person is there. Look at the other side, like we did a year ago, we trade back twice and get the same player.”

It’s quite possible that this may be a little purposeful gamesmanship from Baalke, with an eye on moving into the top 10. However, it felt more likely that the 12th to 15th pick range may be where the team currently is most comfortable trading up to, at the current prices.

NFL Network’s Daniel Jeremiah stated something similar in his Wednesday media conference call.

“I love Rome Odunze. I’ve said he’s my favorite player in the draft. I just think where Jacksonville is right now, I think it makes more sense for them to maybe stay where they are or a little baby move to go get a corner.”

Additionally, the staff seems to be encouraged by the depth of this wide receiver class, with the later rounds being more their speed.

“I think it’s a very good group of receivers, obviously. I think those three that everybody is talking about are really good football players. I think there’s some guys in the next wave that are really good football players, too. I think there’s good players like that all the way through the draft in that position. There’s going to be some later round guys that make a mark for themselves at some point in their careers in this league as well. It’s a good group, there’s a lot of variations of guys, guys strictly in the slot, guys strictly out on the perimeter. There are some guys that can move around the formations a little bit more. It’s a good group of receivers.”

As I always say, we are in peak “Annual Lying Season”. As such, it’s always difficult to point out what is truth versus simple front-office gamesmanship. I would still be sort of surprised if the Jaguars were totally out on trading up to picks eight through ten if one of these top receivers were still available on the board.

Offensive Line early looks unlikely

Needs, needs, and more needs. Similar to his statements in the 2022 and 2023 drafts, General Manager Trent Baalke hit on the importance of filling team needs for the earlier draft picks. He and Doug would touch on this often throughout the presser.

“You try to find the best players, that’s what you try to do in the draft. We have some needs, obviously, that we need to address and the board’s got to fall the right way. Needs are paramount, but we’re going to stick with our formula and draft the best players available.”

He later touched on it again.

“Well, most of the time, there isn’t that big of a separation between a need and another position. When in doubt, you’re going to take the need, if it’s close. If there’s a great distance between the two, you’ve got to weigh that out. Usually, what we’ve done in the past, is stick with the formula and take the best player available. Now again, if it’s close, we’re going to take the higher need.”

Both Coach Pederson and Baalke commented on this issue of needs versus best player available three to four additional times throughout the presser. In the end, it would seem that the team will continue their multi-year philosophy of drafting for need in round one, looking for the player to make a more immediate impact.

However, some may argue that there could be a significant “need” around the corner on at offensive tackle, with both Cam Robinson and Walker Little both scheduled to be free agents in 2025. However, Baalke expressed comfort in knowing the team could have multiple opportunities to add to the offensive line with the depth of this year’s class.

“Yeah I think it’s a very good group. Again, it’s a group whether it’s inside or outside. I think there’s great value throughout the draft, I think you’re going to find starters in the fourth, fifth round. That are eventually going to find their way into starting,” Baalke advised those in attendance.

With the team pretty consistently hammering an organizational goal to do better at “drafting and developing,” the offensive line would seem to be a key area to see the fruits of this improvement in onboarding and development moving forward. We should hope to see future growth from Cooper Hodges, Luke Fortner, and any mid to late round incoming rookies in the future.

Surprise! CB is (seemingly) a priority

While likely not a surprise to many out there, it was still refreshing to hear that those who have been projecting corner as the likely position of importance for this team are not necessarily off base. When asked about this group of cornerbacks, Baalke was quick to mention how varied the league-wide opinions of this class may be.

“I think it’s a good group. I think if you looked at 32 boards, you’d probably find 28 different ways to stack the top 10 corners in this draft. You might find 32 different ways. I think it’s that close. I think there’s good value, they’re good players, the make up and character of these players are all different, it’s all over the board. It’s going to be interesting how that group falls off the board on draft day.”

This class, however, is also extremely deep. Additionally, there are varying opinions on the top corners, as they have varying strengths, with some being better in zone coverage, whereas others may be better in a press-man defense, such as the Jaguars’ projected scheme. This makes the order of cornerback rankings across the league highly varied, as it can be highly dependent on the type of defensive scheme the picking team plays. Trent stated something similar in one of his responses to a related question.

“I think the system plays an important role in that as well. How are you going to play the corners? You going to play them off-man? You going to play them on the line of scrimmage? On press and run with guys? So, I do think that plays into it. I think there’s really good depth and really good skill at the corner position in this draft more so than maybe the last couple of drafts that I’ve been involved with here. So, it’ll be interesting to see how these top guys fall off the board.”

Based on the answers to these questions, in comparison to the responses when later discussing other position groups, it seems likely that the Jaguars will look to prioritize the CB position as early as round one in the 2024 NFL Draft. However, with the depth of this class, all is not lost, even if this doesn’t occur. Nevertheless, CB being a strong possibility would jibe with the comments on potentially trading up to the pick 12 to 13 range mentioned multiple times, potentially for either Quinyon Mitchell or Terrion Arnold.

I would personally not be shocked if the team even chose to double-dip, first selecting one earlier in the draft and later selecting another on day three.

Trevor Lawrence extension feels imminent

When asked about the potential of getting quarterback Trevor Lawrence signed to a contract extension, Baalke had this to say in response.

“I try not to force anything. We’ve had some great talks and great conversations. I spoke with his agency again last night. We’re working, but you can’t force this stuff. I said the same thing with Josh’s [OLB Josh Allen] situation, I said it would take some time and it did. But we’re glad it got completed when it did so we could go into this offseason program knowing that’s behind us and we can move forward. We’re working at it, we’ll continue to work at it. Ownership is involved, obviously. Coach is involved; we’re going to put our best foot forward and hope to get something accomplished here.”

With Lawrence entering his fourth season, the team has until the May 2nd deadline to decide whether to enforce his (and Travis Etienne’s) fifth-year option. While nothing particular sticks out in Trent’s statement, the overall sentiment coming out of this presser was that Trevor’s contract extension would likely be completed soon. The current forecast is that it is likely to be completed before week one of the season, with a best-case scenario to potentially be completed before this Thursday’s draft. Lawrence’s team would likely prefer to have any contract extension completed before the coming May deadline, as the fifth-year option figures to significantly alter any current deal being hammered out.

Find all our draft coverage at Big Cat Country’s Jaguars 2024 NFL Draft home page.