College Football Bowls 2016: 10 NFL Draft prospects who can help their stock
By John Buhler
Many of college football’s top players are playing in bowl games. Here are 10 2017 NFL Draft prospects that can improve their stock in their bowl games.
It’s the middle of December, 2016. That means we’ve finally gotten to the bountiful harvest of holiday season bowls to enjoy. Some matter –pretty much the New Year’s Six– and others not so much.
However, there are ample opportunities for players looking to enjoy the 2017 NFL Draft to have one last statement game. Here are the 10 players playing in holiday season bowls that can absolutely improve their draft stock with great performances in their bowl games.
One game that will garner a lot of attention from NFL Draft scouts this holiday season has to be the 2016 Hyundai Sun Bowl between the Stanford Cardinal (9-3) and the North Carolina Tar Heels (8-4).
There are two players in this game who will probably go in the first round of the 2017 NFL Draft. Stanford Cardinal running back Christian McCaffrey will be a mid-to-late first-round pick and North Carolina quarterback Mitch Trubisky might even go No. 1 overall this spring.
Eyes will be on McCaffrey and Trubisky, but the biggest beneficiary of this game has to be North Carolina senior wide receiver Ryan Switzer. Switzer has been a productive wideout for the Tar Heels all four seasons he’s been in Chapel Hill. He set career-bests in receptions (91) and receiving yards (1,027) in his last year with the Tar Heels.
Switzer has proven to be an effective slot receiver at the college level and has shown strength in the return game for North Carolina. His issues stem mostly from being 5’10” and 185 pounds. Switzer should be able to make an NFL roster, or at least a practice squad in 2017.
CBS has him as a fourth-round caliber player. If Trubisky goes off in the Sun Bowl against a less-than-stellar Stanford secondary, expect Switzer to be the recipient of many of those passes. Switzer’s draft positioning isn’t going to exceed late third-round status in all honesty. However, a great game in the Sun Bowl will put him on more teams’ radars as a third-to-fifth receiver and special teams player on Sundays.
Productive players keep coaches in their jobs. Switzer may be small, but he projects as a productive slot receiver at the next level.