During the 2017 NFL Draft, the Buffalo Bills traded down and gained a first-round pick in the 2018 NFL Draft. They also landed All-Pro cornerback Tre’Davious White later in round one, making 2017 a pretty great haul. As the SB Nation NFL team bloggers re-picked the first round, we were hopeful White would last until Buffalo’s original pick, but he didn’t.
After Patrick Mahomes and DeShaun Watson went 1-2, George Kittle made a huge leap up the board from a late-round pick to the top three. Christian McCaffrey and Myles Garrett stayed in the top 10 and Jamal Adams remained with the New York Jets, the only pick to stay the same.
Then White was picked by the San Diego Chargers (because it was 2017, after all) at 7 overall. considering White fell to pick 27, that’s a considerable jump up the draft board for White. He also became the first cornerback off the board after being the fourth in the original draft.
Our next choice was cornerback Marshon Lattimore to replace White, but he went at pick 8. Ryan Ramczyk went 9 overall and the Buffalo Bills were officially on the clock.
Looking at the remaining players made it pretty easy. While we considered a couple of offensive weapons, when you take into account that head coach Sean McDermott was running the draft and general manager Doug Whaley was on his way out, leaning to a defensive player would make a bit more sense. It didn’t hurt that they were able to add an All-Pro pass rusher for McDermott’s defense, either.
With pick 10 in the 2017 NFL re-draft, the Buffalo Bills take Wisconsin pass rusher T.J. Watt.
Watt was originally selected 30th overall by the Pittsburgh Steelers. In Pittsburgh, he plays the outside linebacker spot in the 3-4 scheme but in Buffalo his hand would be in the dirt.
In three NFL seasons, Watt has 34.5 sacks, two Pro Bowl nods, and was named All-Pro in 2019. He led the league with eight forced fumbles a year ago while finishing third in defensive player of the year voting.
We are running two rounds of the re-draft so we’ll have a bit more to talk about in a later article. Here’s the top ten:
- Cleveland Browns QB Patrick Mahomes
- San Francisco 49ers QB Deshaun Watson
- Chicago Bears TE George Kittle
- Jacksonville Jaguars RB Christian McCaffrey
- Tennessee Titans DE Myles Garrett
- New York Jets S Jamal Adams
- San Diego Chargers CB Tre’Davious White
- Carolina Panthers CB Marshon Lattimore
- Cincinnati Bengals OT Ryan Ramczyk
- Buffalo Bills EDGE T.J. Watt