New Orleans Saints: Did the rest of the NFL overthink Paulson Adebo?

The New Orleans Saints‘ 2021 offseason focus has been mostly on the quarterback position, and understandably so. The Drew Brees era came to an end and the Saints had to focus on finding a way to not only re-sign Jameis Winston, but really to get out of salary cap hell altogether before they could do much to actually improve the roster, or even keep it intact.

It should come as no surprise, then, that the 2021 NFL Draft for the Saints was rather underrated as a whole, especially because rumors of a trade up the draft board didn’t come to fruition.

Still, the Saints made some very intriguing selections throughout the first two days of the 2021 Draft, all of them on the defensive side of the ball.

They opened things up by taking Houston pass rusher Payton Turner, one of the more surprising first-round picks based on “consensus” big boards which would have had Turner going closer to the end of the second, early third-round range.

In the second round, the Saints took Ohio State linebacker Pete Werner, a pretty underrated player for the Buckeyes who excelled on all three downs.

In the third round, the New Orleans Saints made one of the more fascinating picks of the entire class when they used the 76th overall selection on Stanford cornerback Paulson Adebo.

A year ago, Adebo was considered arguably the CB1 of the 2021 Draft class, so what in the world happened?

New Orleans Saints: Paulson Adebo a 2021 draft steal?

The New Orleans Saints took a slight risk on Paulson Adebo, even in the third round of the draft. Of course, it’s tough to take any player as high as they took Adebo when they didn’t play the prior season in college, but most of the time it’s because the player was injured, not because they opted out.

Adebo was one of many college athletes to opt-out of the 2020 college football season. This is quite different, but follow me for a minute. Like a player who skips a pro day workout after a strong Scouting Combine, Adebo decided — understandably so — to avoid risking major injury or exposure to COVID-19 and stand upon the numbers he had posted in his two seasons for the Cardinal.

And they were big numbers.

In just 22 games, Adebo racked up 97 total tackles, 3.5 tackles for loss, a whopping 38 passes defended, and eight interceptions.

Despite some imperfect technique at times, Adebo is a well-rounded corner who also got looks at wide receiver coming out of high school, but ultimately was a four-star cornerback prospect that ended up living up to the high expectations in a big way.

Athletically, Adebo is among the best we’ve seen in three decades coming out.

With outstanding size, speed, agility, and very good explosiveness, what in the world was the rest of the NFL doing regarding this particular player?

What’s not to like?

Any player in the NFL Draft is a projection, but the New Orleans Saints managed to get a guy whose productivity in two years at Stanford is better than most guys get in four years at other major programs.

It’s bizarre that Adebo was not selected higher than 76th overall, even considering his 2020 opt-out. That didn’t hurt his Stanford teammate Walker Little, who was picked 30 picks earlier by the Jacksonville Jaguars.

Sometimes the NFL just overthinks players. The New Orleans Saints managed to get three players with their top three picks that could very easily start for the team as early as the 2021 season.