3. EDGE AJ Epenesa – Iowa
While we throw around the term ‘edge’ to describe any player that’s primary responsibility is to rush the quarterback, to me, it’s a bit too loose of a description — AJ Epenesa is a perfect example of this. In my mind, a true ‘edge’ is a player that can play either with his hand in the dirt or standing up in a 3-4 defense — I don’t believe Epenesa can do that in the NFL.
Once the darling of the NFL Draft process as a consensus top-ten selection, Epenesa has seen his stock drop precipitously after a shoddy combine performance. A 5.04 40-time is worrisome for an edge rusher in the NFL where usually the most athletic players play.
The production is surely there for the former Iowa Hawkeye as he racked up double-digit sacks in back-to-back years in 2018/2019. He deserves props for doing this in the offensive lineman factory that is the Big Ten Conference.
However, he just is not a scheme fit for the NY Giants. In Lance Zierlein’s scouting report on NFL.com, he took the words right out of my mouth when he described his weaknesses as being, “Sluggish to gather and change direction with below-average lower-body bend.” Does that sound like a player that can thrive as an outside edge-rushing threat at the NFL level, specifically in a 3-4 base defense?
Epenesa is a savvy pass rusher that wins with flawless technique and strength, but that isn’t the most common recipe for success for a standup rusher. If we were discussing him in terms of being a 4-3 end – which I truly wish we were with this team – I’d be very interested, especially with his recent fall down draft boards.
Epenesa obviously wouldn’t be in play for us with the #4 pick, but should we trade down he could be tempting due to this being a weak edge class and with it being such a huge need for us — that would be a mistake in the top half of the first round.
Furthermore, we could see a scenario where Gettleman pulls a ‘Deandre Baker move’ and trades back into the first round to land him, which would also be a mistake.
Unfortunately, he just is not a scheme fit for us right now, as he played a decent amount of 3 technique himself in college and would be a bit redundant. The NY Giants need an athletic-freak type if they are going to take a chance on a rusher to take over one of the starting 3-4 bookend slots; AJ Epenesa should not be that.