Browns select Donovan Peoples-Jones

The Cleveland Browns completed their draft early as their sixth-round choice would be their final one of the 2020 NFL Draft after the Browns included their seventh-rounder in their second-day trade with the Saints that brought a 2021 third-rounder to the Browns from New Orleans.

And Cleveland drafted a player with that pick that I would have been pleased with had they taken him in the third or fourth round in selecting Michigan wide receiver Donovan Peoples-Jones.
Former Ohio State head coach Urban Meyer had quickly answered in an interview earlier in the week that Donovan Peoples-Jones was the most underrated player in the entire draft.
While Meyer heavily recruited Peoples-Jones to Ohio State, he mentioned Peoples-Jones before any of the Ohio State receivers in the draft and that says a lot to me.

Donovan Peoples-Jones has been the one player that when Ohio State played Michigan that I would be concerned about and that's despite a career that saw him never reach 100 yards receiving in a game.
The former five-star recruit finished 2019 with 34 catches for 438 yards in eleven games with six catches ending in touchdowns.
At just under 6'2, Peoples-Jones doesn't have a rap for bad hands and he can make the leaping catch with the extra "wow" factor and DPJ tested extremely well at the NFL combine.

So, why did a player with his talent slide to the sixth round?
Michigan didn't feature a quarterback that showed any consistency and they did have problems getting the football to him.
Plus Peoples-Jones was coming out a year early, which didn't help him in a year that has arguably the deepest WR class in draft history and caused him to fade into the crowd a bit with a knock as an underachiever.
Dan Shonka of Ourlads liked Peoples-Jones more than most as he rated him as a third or fourth-round player with "number one receiver potential" while Dane Brugler of The Athletic was less bullish on him with the main knock on his speed taking time to reach its top-level.
Brugler described Peoples-Jones as "needing a runway" to get started and could have trouble on the short routes with the cuts and agility with his problems at getting to full speed off the ball.

Peoples-Jones doesn't have a bad attitude and hasn't been in trouble, so his slide wasn't due to off the field issues and his goal after football is to be an orthopedic surgeon like his father.
It appears to me that the issues with the quarterbacking and the offense at Michigan combined with the deep class at his position caused the drop beyond his talent, so his decision to leave a year early doesn't look like a good one at this time.

Donovan Peoples-Jones was described as high-risk high reward entering the draft but in the sixth round?
Well, I'd refer to him as low-risk high reward after the sixth round and while he might make his biggest impact in his rookie season as a kick returner, I'm very comfortable with a player of his talent without character issues with the Browns final pick.

I'll likely be back next time with a look at the entire draft and maybe how it ranks against the other AFC North opponents.