No one can deny three things about the Broncos’ draft. One, they greatly upgraded the offensive weapons. Two, they got a whole lot of impressive athletes. And three, they bet on players they could develop, rather than ready-made products.
That stayed true on the third day of the draft, as Denver selected tight end Albert Okwuegbunam out of Missouri in the fourth round, linebacker Justin Strnad from Wake Forest in the fifth round, guard Netane Muti of Fresno State in the sixth round. Finally, they closed the draft with Florida’s wide receiver Tyrie Cleveland and North Dakota State’s edge rusher Derrek Tuszka.
Okwuegbunam was the best athlete in the entire draft at tight end and of the top-5 players at the position overall. He ran a sub-4.5 40-yard dash at the combine and should serve as excellent Noah Fant insurance as a seam-destroyer. He gives Denver the most headache-inducing tight end room in the league for defensive backs and shows promise as a blocker, though his injury history is a red flag.
Broncos fans probably felt set at the tight end position heading into Day 3, but one area they didn’t feel satisfied with was inside linebacker. They got their guy in Strnad, who is an absolute steal at the bottom of Round 5.
Strnad has the athleticism to hang with most tight ends and running backs out of the backfield, but his best skill was his instincts. At Wake Forest, Strnad seemed to always know where the ball was and did a great job of making plays on it. He’s a little smaller than you’d like and he’s recovering from a ruptured bicep, but at pick 178, you’ll take him every day of the week.
Just three picks later, the Broncos made sure to go the offensive side of the ball and drafted a personification of a steam roller in Netane Muti. You’d be hard pressed to find anyone stronger than Muti, not just in this draft class, but any one in history. His 44 bench reps at the combine were the fourth-most ever recorded.
Unsurprisingly, Muti is a road grader in the run game as he often buries defenders in the turf with no need for a shovel. He’s also surprisingly agile, so much so that Fresno State even tried him at tackle. Unfortunately, that experiment was cut short, as were the last two seasons of his collegiate career, due to injury.
The Broncos then had to wait a whole 71 picks to make their next selection, but they were still able to land the body-beautiful receiver Tyrie Cleveland out of the University of Florida.
Cleveland is a much more raw player than Strnad and Muti are, and he probably still needs more refinement to his game than even Okwuegbunam, but he doesn’t have the same injury concerns and the upside is very apparent, given his frame and 4.4 speed. If Cleveland can develop his route-running, especially from an effort standpoint, and improve his hands, he could develop into a number two receiver.
Two picks later, the Broncos went to the exact opposite side of the spectrum with a polished, productive, defensive linemen whose biggest question mark is athleticism in Derrek Tuszka.
Tuszka was a sack artist at North Dakota State, nearly averaging in the double-digits for sacks per season at 9.8 over his three-year career. He also has great technique with his hands, but it’s fair to wonder if he’ll find success against more athletic and better-coached tackles than he ever saw at the FBS level and if his lack of athleticism will just become more of a liability.