The New Orleans Saints are considered a Super Bowl favorite in 2019, while the Carolina Panthers, Atlanta Falcons and Buccanneers each have varying degrees of expectations this fall.
The Saints were the only team in the NFC South that didn’t have a first-round pick, but they still ended the NFL Draft with an impressive haul of players who will contribute to whatever run they end up making this season. The Panthers got themselves a steal in the first round (Brian Burns), while the Falcons shored up the interior of their offensive line. And let’s not forget Tampa Bay, who added one of the class’s elite defensive prospects in Devin White.
But with the good also came some bad. Every team in every division would like to have a do-over or two, and we’ve already reviewed the other NFC teams’ do-overs here:
NFC East
NFC North
NFC West
We won’t know how each draft class truly pans out until a few years from now. So this assessment is based on pre-draft scouting reports and what the team’s roster composition was at the time. Sure, if they made a few moves since the draft concluded, we’ll take that into consideration. But for the most part, rosters have remained pretty stable.
Remember: We’re only replacing the player who was picked with a player selected after him. It would be foolish to suggest a team should’ve taken someone who was already off the board at the time they selected, so we’re not factoring in trade-up scenarios.
It this installment of our ‘Draft Do-Overs’ series, we’ll touch on the NFC South.