Cleveland Browns make a decent, but hardly spectacular selection in Corey Coleman, the wide receiver from Baylor.
The Cleveland Browns finally made a pick after trading down for second time in the 2016 NFL Draft. After having traded down with the Philadelphia Eagles so the Eagles could pick Carson Wentz, the Browns traded again from the eighth pick in the draft to the 15th pick in a trade with the Tennessee Titans. The Titans picked Jack Conklin. Finally, at 15, the Browns made their first selection of this year’s draft by taking Corey Coleman, the wide receiver from Baylor. This pick is by no means bad, but he’s not a great pick either.
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Coleman is a tremendous athlete. At 5’11” and 194 pounds, he is not particularly tall but he’s thick. This is important because it will allow him to fight for ground outside to create separation and attack the football. He’s got 4.37 speed, which is good, especially with Robert Griffin III who has had a deep speed threat both at his time at Baylor in Kendall Wright and his time with the Washington Redskins with DeSean Jackson.
Although his 3-cone drill and short shuttle are unavailable, it’s not a huge stretch to think Coleman has tremendous agility. He is absolutely electric with the ball in his hands and it didn’t hurt Coleman that he played in the wide open Big XII where defenses are already spread out and the Baylor offense pushes them out even further.
Coleman’s production was tremendous, scoring an incredible 20 touchdowns on 74 catches for 1,363 yards. He warranted consideration for the Heisman Trophy. Some of that happened to be form meeting function as he was put in the perfect situation and utilized incredibly well, but he a ton of credit too.
The problems with Coleman are numerous, however. The biggest is his route running. Coleman basically ran three routes. Go, Hitch and Screen. In fact, only seven of his routes the entire year weren’t those three routes. He wasn’t asked to do it and even Hue Jackson hinted at that fact in the press conference.
Hue Jax on #Browns Coleman, admits "it'll be an adjustment for him for him'' but says WR coach Al Saunders will do great job with him
— Mary Kay Cabot (@MaryKayCabot) April 29, 2016
Normally, in addition to athletic testing, players would spend time trying to focus on positional drills to prepare them for the NFL. Unfortunately for Coleman, he had to get sports hernia surgery after his season was over, which cost him a substantial amount of time.
Coleman was unable to participate at the NFL Scouting Combine because he wasn’t ready due to the recovery. He had to use all the time leading up to his Pro Day to train for his athletic testing. He performed extremely well in those tests (those that are publicly available), but that’s time he couldn’t spend learning to run routes.
Browns senior offensive assistant and wide receivers coach Al Saunders is going to be spending a lot of time with Coleman and trying to get him to learn as much as humanly possible. The Browns may simply look at Coleman as a bit of a project, coming up with ways to utilize him as more of an athlete now before really getting him to be a polished receiver in the future.
Coleman is aggressive, will attack the football and is able to high point to a certain extent. These are all good qualities to have. The flip side is that Coleman also dropped his share of passes; 10 in all. That may not seem like that many but he only caught 74 passes this year, so that’s a pretty high percentage. It has to improve.
Coleman also won’t have the space he had at Baylor. Art Briles’ spread system also features twin receiver sets on the outside as far to the sideline as possible. It forces opponents to make a difficult choice as to how many guys they keep out there as opposed to in the box. That concept creates ton of holes and space for a player like Coleman, who takes full advantage.
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Lastly, the next player Coleman blocks might be the first. Often times in the Baylor offense, when the ball is run inside, the receivers just stop moving, period; they stand and watch. Some of this might have been due to the sports hernia but to this point, there is nothing to say Coleman has or will block effectively.
Coleman can become a great pick but so much of this is about potential rather than what he is now. But the trade that moved them down to 15 netted them an extra third rounder this year, 76th pick, which gives them back to back picks in round three and three in that round overall. They also got another second round pick in 2017, where they have already added a first round pick courtesy of the Eagles.
Teams made some far more questionable picks. The Baltimore Ravens taking Ronnie Stanley is frankly confusing considering how poorly he tested athletically. Leonard Floyd going ninth was strange. Keanu Neal going seventeenth to Atlanta and Will Fuller going 21st to Houston are extremely questionable.
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Meanwhile, the Detroit Lions got Taylor Decker at 16th pick and the Minnesota Vikings took Laquon Treadwell at 22. For my money, those were better picks than Coleman. So Coleman is an alright pick. They could have done better in my mind and they could have done far worse. Hopefully, the Browns will keep the 32nd selection and take Chris Jones, the Defensive Lineman from Mississippi State.