Breaking Down the New York Giants Draft: Greg Jones

The New York Giants draft was given nearly universal praise as evidence look at the consensus draft grades I compiled, which had the Giants at a B+ average and four out of the 10 sites gave the Giants draft a grade of an “A”. And that’s for good reason, as I broke down Prince Amukamara, Marvin Austin, Jerrel Jernigan, and James Brewer so far, I’ll take a look at the 6th round selection of Greg Jones the former Michigan State Spartan.

The Good

Thoughts from Jerry Reese:

Greg Jones – linebacker, has been incredibly productive over his time at Michigan State. One of the things that the late Tom Boisture taught me is when you scout guys, you respect production. This guy has tons of production. This guy has sacks. He has tons and tons of tackles. He’s played at a high level, very instinctive player. Another guy who’s going to come in with a chip on his shoulder because I’m pretty sure he feels like he should’ve been picked a lot higher than where he got picked. He’ll come in here with something to prove as well, along with Marvin Austin.

My take:

Greg Jones is a natural leader and was the unquestioned leader of the Spartans defense. Jones is also a very productive college football player with tons of experience. Jones started 46 career college games, and the last 40 games he played in college. He’s also insanely durable, not missing a single game due to injury. Jones was very productive in college, amassing over 100 tackles in three straight year. Jones had a down year last in year in the stats going from 153 tackles and 9 sacks the year before to 105 tackles and 1 sack in 2010 (though he did have 3 more forced fumbles and 2 more interceptions this past season). In 2009, he had no less than 8 tackles in any one game. In 2010, he had 3 games with 4 or less tackles.

Jones is a very instinctive linebacker who is a leader on defense. He’s also an excellent blitzer from the Mike position, and will play at middle linebacker for the Giants and should at the very least be a productive special teams player.

The Bad

Jones lacks elite measurables. He’s shorter than teams prefer by a little more than in inch.

Bill Parcells ideal measurables for defensive players:

Category

Position:

Linebacker

Greg Jones measurables:

Height: 6001,

Weight: 239

40 yard: 4.75

Hand: 10 inches

Arm Length: 32 inches

Jones doesn’t have terrible measurables , he’s a tick slower than teams prefer and an more than an inch shorter, but does have larger arms and hands than teams look for (which is a good thing). The other thing teams were probably worried about is why Jones production dropped so much from his junior to senior season. If you follow the draft, you realize that teams get nervous when players productions drop from one year to the next (for two examples from one school check out Micah Johnson and Trevard Lindley prior to last year’s draft). There are many cases where this is true. Now top players can often get away with that (Jake Locker and Adrian Clayborn) but anytime players regress it’s a sign of trouble.

But in general, the word on Jones was that he’s not fast enough or strong enough to be a great N.F.L. player.

The Grade

A+

Seriously, how did Jones fall this far? How often have we seen a player with great production in college, especially at a position like linebacker and running back succeed in the N.F.L. Jerry Reese says it best, “one of the things that the late Tom Boisture taught me is when you scout guys, you respect production”. You  have to respect production. Jones might not fit well in all systems, but in the 6th round getting a player with a desire to succeed off the charts, a well respected leader in the locker room and well-respected work ethic is a steal. If you factor in that said player also plays two positions of significant need (for the Giants linebacker and Special teams player) it’s a great pick.  If you take a quick glance at the draft tracker at nfl.com/draft, you can see that Greg Jones was graded as a 5.1, and the only players drafted at that point with higher grades were Ross Homan, Virgil Green, Andrew Jackson, Cliff Matthews, Lawrence Guy, Lee Ziemba, Jeremy Beal, and Eric Hagg, Tyler Sash. That’s only 9 players out of another 74 players drafted at that point.

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