Eagles, Jets appear to be set up to own the 2022 NFL Draft

We are starting to get a clearer picture of where teams will be picking in the 2022 NFL Draft, and the Eagles and Jets are sitting pretty right now.

The 2022 NFL Draft won’t take place for nearly another six months, but as the 2021 NFL season presses on, we are starting to gain some insight as to where teams will be picking this season.

For the most part, it wasn’t hard to predict who the bottom-dwellers would be this year. The Detriot Lions were already a bad team with a good quarterback in Matthew Stafford last year, and they’re severely lacking talent, while the Houston Texans are in arguably the worst shape of any team in the league as Deshaun Watson sits out with pending civil cases against him.

In addition to these teams, I don’t think most analysts would have had high hopes for the Philadelphia Eagles and New York Jets this season. While these teams certainly don’t appear to be on the fast track to playoff berths, at least they do have one very important thing going for them.

Both the Eagles and Jets are set to have elite capital in the 2022 NFL Draft, and we have seen how quickly this can help turn an NFL franchise around.

Which picks will Eagles and Jets own in 2022 NFL Draft?

There is still a lot of football left to be played this season, and these teams could end up helping or hurting their draft stock. However, some past trades give them a very good outlook on their draft capital for next April.

Here’s a look at the picks these teams would have if the season ended today, via Jets beat reporter Brian Costello:

Thanks to recent trades with both the Dolphins and the Colts, the Eagles hold a whopping three first-round picks for next season — and they are on track to be very high. I don’t think Miami envisioned a dismal 1-7 start to the year. If the season ended today, Philadelphia would hold the 3rd, 8th, and 9th overall picks.

To be quite honest, I don’t recall the last time a team had so much firepower at the top of the draft. If the Eagles aren’t sold on Jalen Hurts, they could get even more capital from him via trade and use one of their first-round picks on a quarterback next season. They could also potentially grab a few blue-chip players that you could build a football team around.

While the Jets aren’t sitting quite as pretty, they still have some excellent draft capital of their own to work with. Somehow, their 2-5 record is only good for the 7th overall pick next year, but they also have Seattle’s first-round pick from the Jamal Adams trade — a pick that is on track to be the 10th overall selection.

New York just took QB Zach Wilson last April, and they aren’t going to give up on him already. Instead, they could use their draft capital to bolster the offense and get him even more protection — perhaps in the form of Alabama OT Evan Neal.

The standings can turn around quickly in the NFL, and there’s no guarantee that these teams will be picking this high when the draft order is finalized following the season. As of now, however, both the Eagles and the Jets are set up to own the 2022 NFL Draft.