San Diego Chargers 2015 NFL Draft Wrap-Up

The 2015 NFL Draft saw many surprises. The windy city hosted the NFL’s 32 teams, all trying their best in the first official step of getting to the Lombardi trophy.

Many selections were expected (Jameis Winston, Marcus Mariota, Brandon Scherff), however many of the draft’s selections surprised us (T.J. Yeldon, Jaelen Strong, Brett Hundley).

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As for the San Diego Chargers, the Bolts had yet another great draft under Tom Telesco, selecting Wisconsin RB Melvin Gordon, Miami ILB Denzel Perryman, Texas State CB Craig Mager, North Dakota State OLB Kyle Emanuel and Arkansas DT Darius Philon.

Overall, San Diego came into the NFL draft as a team with a 9-7-quality team and left the draft as a potential 11-5 squad. How, you ask?

Not only did the Chargers go out and fill all of their needs, but they did so with some great players. And although the Bolts only left with five draft picks (due to trading away their fourth rounder in order to draft Melvin Gordon), San Diego made quality selections.

In typical Tom Telesco fashion, we saw some draft trends and surprises.

For those of you who do not know the Chargers draft record, they have been known for their variety of selections.

Historically, the Chargers have selected all over the board with the number one pick, selecting more defensive backs than any other position (11, in fact, according to Pro Football Reference). 45.3 percent of their first-round picks have been offensive players, while the rest of that 54.7 percent was defensive-oriented players

What is interesting to note is that over time, the Chargers have selected players from a variety of colleges as well as positions.

Over the Chargers’ 55-year history (going on 56), the University of Southern California has produced the most Bolts draft picks (20) with Notre Dame (15), Florida State (14), and Tennessee (13) lagging just behind.

As we saw, none of the Bolts players came from any of those schools.

Many were egging for a block-buster deal between the Chargers and the Titans to get Marcus Mariota out of the University of Oregon.

As we saw though, San Diego smartly opted to select Melvin Gordon in the first round instead. Some surprises: no offensive linemen were selected by the Bolts. It’s a good thing that they Bulked up on defense, a part of their team they really need help on.

So, what does the drafting of RB Melvin Gordon mean to the Chargers? It means a potential and a future to win. These players, like many rookies in past seasons, have had the ability to turn a team of pretenders into contenders and I think that we may have that here with these five draft picks.

In this article, I will be wrapping up the Chargers 2015 NFL Draft and their 2015 draft picks with comments an analysis.

Pats head coach Bill Belichick said it best when speaking about the biggest challenge that faces rookies.

In an interview with reporters he was quoted as saying, ”

“I don’t care where they came from, I don’t care what position they play. None of that makes any difference…Welcome to the NFL. That will start Thursday…The strong will survive. The other ones will fall off. And we’ll keep going.”

Next: Chargers get RB of the Future with Gordon