2014 NFL Draft Grades: Carolina Panthers
By Josh Hill
The NFL Draft has come and gone and it’s now time to reflect on how each team did despite the fact that we won’t really know until much further into the future. Still, we can get a fell of how players might do in their immediate careers based off of what they did in college and how well they fit into the systems they were drafted into.
For the Carolina Panthers, they needed to address their situation at wide receiver and the fax that Cam Newton was about to enter camp with absolutely no viable targets to speak of. Aside from that, there were some defensive needs that needed attending to and the Panthers overall seemed to do a pretty decent job of making sure holes were filled.
Draft Picks
| Pick | Player |
|---|---|
| 1.28 | Kelvin Benjamin, WR, Florida State |
| 2.28 | Kony Ealy, DL , Missouri |
| 3.28 | Trai Turner, OG, LSU |
| 4.28 | Tre Boston, FS, North Carolina |
| 5.8 | Bene Benwikere, CB , San Jose State |
| 6.28 | Tyler Gaffney, RB , Stanford |
Best Pick: Kony Ealy/DL/Missouri
While I do like the Levin Bejamin pick, that one was made more out of necessity and sort of loses some of it’s ‘wow’ factor because of it. But the addition of Kony Ealy gives the Panthers another big body to terrorize offenses with and he’s going to be a part of a defensive line that was awful to deal with in 2013. If it was bad last last year, teams will have even less fun with Ealy now a part of the pillaging.
Worst Pick: No Second Wide Receiver
There’s no specific player the Pantehrs took that I don’t like, it’s the player they didn’t take. They needed wide receiver help badly and only addressed it with a first round pick. For a draft that was rather deep at wide receiver, the Panthers didn’t make many attempts to get Newton any additional young targets and that may be something that comes back to bite them come November and December.
2014 Draft Grade: C+