Minnesota Golden Gophers will field 3 impressive WR prospects in 2019

The Minnesota Golden Gophers will never be considered a pipeline of NFL talent, but their 2019 squad has a chance to field three impressive wide receivers, two of which will be eligible for the 2020 NFL draft.

In the past we’ve seen some decent talent to come out of Minnesota. Players like Marion Barber, Laurence Maroney, and Eric Decker come to mind.

This season, the Golden Gophers will showcase three wide receivers in Tyler Johnson (Senior), Rashod Bateman (Sophomore), and Chris Autman-Bell (RS Sophomore) who could help resurrect Minnesota’s offense, assuming they receive steady quarterback play. They’ll also challenge for pretty high draft grades in 2020 and 2021.

Last year, Minnesota started true freshman Zack Annexstad at quarterback. Annexstad struggled with accuracy all season, completing only 51.9% of his passes before getting injured. He won three of his seven starts, with all three wins coming in non-conference play.

The offense improved with Tanner Morgan (freshman) under center. It’s resulted in an unsettled quarterback competition throughout the spring.

Regardless of who’s throwing the ball, the Gophers will have one of the most talented trios of pass-catchers this side of Alabama. Johnson’s name has been floated around early in the 2020 draft process; he’s already one of draft twitter’s crushes at the position.

Johnson can work the slot, outside, be a deep threat, or weapon in the screen game. His craftiness in his route running pops and his ability to make people miss in the open field is a positive. He has great vision to find the daylight in the defense, both when running routes and with the ball in his hands.

Although Johnson is drawing tons of hype (as he should), he isn’t the only receiver on this team who’s a skillful route runner. Bateman, while possessing a different physical makeup, has similar tools when it comes to getting open.

Bateman is 6-2, 200 pounds. He’s a creative route-runner who gets a good release from the line of scrimmage. He has better hands than Johnson, too.

Bateman still has a year before he is eligible for the draft and is the likely candidate to take over the role as the leading receiver for Minnesota moving forward. He’s more of a traditional “Z” receiver — the outside receiver position — but is not limited to that spot.

The other draft-eligible player of the trio is  Autman-Bell. He isn’t the route-runner that Bateman and Johnson are, but he’s not afraid to do the dirty work.

Autman-Bell is a physical receiver, his game has some JuJu Smith-Schuster to it, with how he likes to play the position with a physical edge. Minnesota is a run-heavy offense and Bell doesn’t shy away from the blocking aspect of the game.

Autman-Bell doesn’t mind throwing his body into the middle of the field either. He’s fearless.

While Autman-Bell may not be as box-score heavy as  Bateman and Johnson are, he is still valuable and productive in his own right. He had 28 catches for 449 yards in 2018.

Bateman and Johnson tallied 18 of the teams 20 receiving touchdowns, and should only look to add to that number with Bell contributing more as well. Bell, averaged 16 yards per reception despite lacking elite downfield speed.

If Minnesota is willing to throw the ball more in2019, they’ll have a chance to be one of the better offenses in the Big-10. As a result, their trio of receivers will become risers throughout the 2020 and 2021 draft seasons.