Could Travis Hunter be on the board when the Raiders are on the clock with the sixth pick?
It isn’t likely, but according to Sports Illustrated insider Hondo Carpenter, there is some sentiment around the league that Hunter could slide down the board a few picks on draft day.
“Travis Hunter, a few people I [talked to] last night, they all think he’s a top five guy. But the way that people are hearing the draft may go, there is a shot he gets out of the top five. It’s a slim shot, so please, don’t somebody run off [and say] ‘Hondo says that Travis is out of the top five,'” Carpenter said on the Las Vegas Raiders Insider podcast.
“I asked multiple people, ‘What do you think is going to happen with Hunter?’ Several told me he’s a top five guy in this draft, but the way I think this draft is going, he could slip out of the top five.”
As for what might push Hunter down in the draft, it sounds like a few teams might have concerns around the expectation that he will play on offense and defense.
“One of the things that I found interesting about Travis is he is kind of the wild card in this, because he’s so talented on both sides of the ball. I think there is a sentiment that his insistence on playing both has scared some people,” Carpenter continued. “They don’t want to take the noise of what if he’s playing corner end and they lose the game and all of a sudden now here comes the criticism. ‘Why don’t you play him at wide receiver?'”
Deion Sanders has been adamant that Hunter should play both sides of the ball in the NFL and has already been critical of any team not willing to use him on offense and defense.
“He doesn’t know any other way,” Sanders said last month. “What else would he do, just sit there by the water cooler while the offense is getting their butts kicked, and you’ve got the best receiver probably on your team over there with the coach waiting for his turn to go back on the field? That doesn’t make sense to me. Just because a person hasn’t done this in the majority of the NFL, don’t say what another man can’t do.”
Given the platform that Sanders has, and his longstanding propensity to use it, it’s possible that Hunter could drop a little in the draft because of teams that don’t want to deal with Sanders and/or his influence on his former player.
Not every team will feel that way, but what matters is how the teams drafting ahead of the Raiders feel about his involvement.
As for Hunter’s best position in the NFL, ESPN’s Matt Miller believes he is best suited to play wide receiver but would like to see him sprinkled in on defense.
“I applaud the conditioning that he had to play as much as he did last year. A guy who clearly just loves football to play as much as he did. It speaks to his mental ability, his love of the game, his work ethic,” Millers said on Raider Nation Radio’s JT the Brick Show. “He’s fantastic. We’ve never seen someone try to do what he’s trying to do. So I hope we get the opportunity to see him try to play both.”
It might be a long shot that Hunter will fall to the Raiders at pick six in the draft, but it feels like the chances of it happening are better today than they were a few months ago.
At one time, the Colorado superstar was the favorite to be the first player taken in the draft. Now it seems like he might be drafted between picks three and five, with a slim chance he might be on the board when the Raiders are on the clock with the sixth pick.
x: @raidersbeat
I’d rather have Hunter more than anyone else in the draft. He plugs holes on both sides of the ball.
The QB pool this draft is lukewarm AT BEST. However, if it gets down to Hunter or Sanders, it has to be Hunter. Grab Dart, or Milroe later in the draft….even Howard. We have our QB for now, let’s give him some targets, let’s give him protection…Grabbing a milk toast QB just to say we did it, is not going to rebuild this team to greatness. Look at the NFL now, is Sanders the next Daniels, Mahomes, Jackson, Allen, Stroud or is he a Williams, or Fields, or Young? Regardless of how Geno can groom a rookie, they either have it or they don’t…my guess on Sanders is he’s a head case that’s been entitled all his life and he’ll be more like a Todd Marinovich.
Dillon Gabriel is superior to any other “developmental” QB – he is another Mahomes, just a bit shorter, not by much
Anyone with a rational mind knows there’s no way in hell. He falls to number six. And to insinuate he does shows just how ignorant the source is.
Starting to hope it’s Jalon Walker now.
The ONLY player I would move up for from 6 is Travis Hunter – Most Dynamic in this Class… Another Franchise Building Block like Bowers and Crosby…
Like Greg said, no way he drops to #6. Most assured, the Raiders will need to move up if they want him.