2019 NFL Draft: Christian Wilkins is one of draft’s safest prospects

Former Clemson defensive tackle Christian Wilkins might not have the ceiling of some of the elite prospects in the 2019 NFL Draft, but his floor is high.

If an NFL team wants to play it safe in the first round, then Clemson defensive tackle Christian Wilkins would be an obvious choice. He’s a first round talent, and what you’ve already seen from him is what you’re going to get.

On a loaded Clemson defensive line that featured two other prospects who could hear their names called in the first round, Wilkins was always the glue that held the group together. In four years with the Tigers, Wilkins managed 40.5 tackles-for-loss, including a career-high 14 as a senior.

He could have chosen to go pro after his junior season in 2017, but he felt he had unfinished business to attend to in college. He returned and helped lead Clemson to one of the best seasons in college football history. They became the first team to go 15-0 since Penn in 1897, and the first undefeated national champion of the playoff era.

Wilkins lived in Alabama’s backfield during the national championship game, spearheading an effort that helped the Tigers hold one of college football’s most explosive offenses scoreless for the final 44-minutes of game time.

Now Wilkins enters the draft in the same spot he was in last season: as a no-doubt first round pick who will be able to step in and provide an immediate contribution to whichever NFL team chooses him.

Strengths

Wilkins’s greatest strength is probably his floor. He’s as pro-ready as any prospect in this draft class, and he’ll be able to make an impact as a rookie, almost certainly cracking a defensive line rotation right away if not outright earning a starting role.

Wilkins plays with an excellent motor, never taking a snap off. He’s got impressive instincts and shoots off the snap to get into the backfield. He’s aided by an impressive array of power moves. He sheds blockers easily with his violent hands.

His intangibles make him even more of a coveted prospect than his impressive physical traits. By all accounts, Wilkins is a high character guy who will immediately provide a boost to the locker room he inherits.

Ideally, Wilkins could be a culture-changing player for a locker room with a losing mentality. Odds are, though, based on his current draft projections, that he’ll end up on a winning team already and the rich will get richer.

Weaknesses 

While Wilkins will provide an immediate boost as a run stopper, he’s not likely to provide much upside as a pass rusher. Across his 55-game Clemson career, Wilkins managed just 16 sacks, and never topped more than 5.5 in a single season.

He could use a bit of technical refinement as well as he doesn’t always play with proper extension and leverage, something that was mitigated in college by the fact that he was typically quicker and stronger than the interior linemen he was facing.

While there’s value in knowing what you are going to get, he doesn’t come with the game-changing upside of Quinnen Williams or Ed Oliver. And that’s okay, not many players in this draft do.

Wilkins won’t be competing for NFL defensive player of the year honors, but he’s undoubtedly going to be a solid NFL starter for a decade, with the potential to be a multi-time Pro Bowler.

Draft Expectations

Wilkins is likely to find himself as the third defensive tackle taken in this class behind Williams and Oliver. He probably would have been fourth, but Jeffery Simmons’s ACL injury likely knocks him down to day two.

His ceiling in this draft is probably No. 14 to the Falcons, depending on what happens with Oliver. If the Houston product goes in the Top-10 as expected, and Atlanta doesn’t move up to try and acquire him, he will be firmly in play when the Falcons are on the clock. That might be the ideal fit for Wilkins, too, because he can provide a winning culture to one of the worst defenses in football in 2018, while also playing for a team with the upside to compete in the NFC if they stay healthy.

The Giants, Vikings, and Titans could all have interest in him inside the Top-20. He would also be a really good fit for both the Eagles and Colts, and it would be a big upset to see him fall past Indianapolis’s pick at No. 26.

Projection: First Round