Joe Douglas’ tendencies suggest Jets will target these prospects in 2022 draft

Pinpointing the 2022 NFL draft prospects who fit the athletic criteria of Joe Douglas and the New York Jets

Over the past couple of days, I have spent plenty of time breaking down the drafting tendencies of New York Jets general manager Joe Douglas in terms of how much he tends to value prospects’ athletic profiles. I first broke down Douglas’ most notable trends before identifying 2022 draft prospects that might be avoided by Douglas based on those trends.

Today we’ll look at the other side of the coin. Which 2022 draft prospects should we expect Douglas to favor based on his previous drafting tendencies?

Here’s the most notable athleticism-based tendency that Douglas showcased between the 2020 and 2021 drafts: his propensity for drafting prospects with a Relative Athletic Score (RAS)* above 9.0.

Douglas selected seven players with a RAS of 9.0-plus from 2020 to 2021, tied with Denver and Washington for the most of any team over that span.

*RAS is a 0-to-10 rating that takes into account a player’s performance in various testing drills relative to their height, weight, and position.

What does it mean when a player has a RAS of 9.0? Well, a player’s RAS correlates closely with their percentile ranking among all players at their position in the history of athletic testing data, so a RAS of 9.0 means the player owns better testing numbers than about 90% of players at their position. A RAS of 9.5 places them around the 95th percentile, and so on.

The bottom line is that any player with a RAS above 9.0 is a truly incredible athlete. Joe Douglas and the New York Jets have strongly favored players with such a high level of athleticism, so any prospect who hits this benchmark is worth monitoring as a potential Jets target.

Let’s go position-by-position and identify the 2022 draft prospects who registered a RAS of 9.0 or better.

Cornerback (16 players)

Throughout this article, each prospect will be listed alongside their current overall ranking among all prospects on the consensus big board at NFL Mock Draft Database (as of April 13, 2022), which is calculated through the combination of 63 big boards from draft analysts around the internet. This gives us an approximate idea of where in the draft each prospect could realistically be targeted.

Beneath each list, I will also note if there are any highly-regarded prospects who did not qualify for a Relative Athletic Score due to their insufficient number of completed drills during the lead-up to the draft.

Without further ado, let’s take a look at all of the prospects who registered a 9.0-plus RAS. We begin with the cornerback position.

Name	Pos	College	RAS	Big Board Rank
Zyon McCollum	CB	Sam Houston State	10	120
Tony Adams	CB	Illinois	9.75	516
Tariq Castro-Fields	CB	Penn State	9.74	139
Damarri Mathis	CB	Pittsburgh	9.72	160
Tariq Woolen	CB	UTSA	9.71	72
Kyler Gordon	CB	Washington	9.69	40
Akayleb Evans	CB	Missouri	9.56	130
Josh Thompson	CB	Texas	9.55	251
Dallis Flowers	CB	Pittsburg State	9.53	266
Trent McDuffie	CB	Washington	9.49	21
Joshua Williams	CB	Fayetteville State	9.44	155
Sam Webb	CB	Missouri Western	9.41	363
Jaylen Watson	CB	Washington State	9.2	187
Darrell Baker	CB	Georgia Southern	9.11	523
Christian Holmes	CB	Oklahoma State	9.1	542
Alontae Taylor	CB	Tennessee	9.07	109

Notable prospects who did not complete enough testing to qualify for RAS: Ahmad Gardner (#4), Andrew Booth (#24)

Defensive end (17 players)

Name	Pos	College	RAS	Big Board Rank
Travon Walker	DE	Georgia	9.99	5
Boye Mafe	DE	Minnesota	9.92	33
Aidan Hutchinson	DE	Michigan	9.88	1
Jeffrey Gunter	DE	Coastal Carolina	9.75	191
Dominique Robinson	DE	Miami OH	9.74	131
Sam Williams	DE	Mississippi	9.72	93
Josh Paschal	DE	Kentucky	9.7	99
Kayvon Thibodeaux	DE	Oregon	9.63	2
David Ojabo	DE	Michigan	9.4	32
Nik Bonitto	DE	Oklahoma	9.37	61
Jermaine Johnson	DE	Florida State	9.23	12
George Karlaftis	DE	Purdue	9.21	19
Amare Barno	DE	Virginia Tech	9.18	172
Isaiah Thomas	DE	Oklahoma	9.15	155
Arnold Ebiketie	DE	Penn State	9.14	42
Scott Patchan	DE	Colorado State	9.12	519
DeAngelo Malone	DE	Western Kentucky	9.04	128

Defensive tackle (11 players)

Name	Pos	College	RAS	Big Board Rank
Jordan Davis	DT	Georgia	10	14
Thomas Booker	DT	Stanford	9.88	175
Devonte Wyatt	DT	Georgia	9.59	25
Curtis Brooks	DT	Cincinnati	9.52	437
Travis Jones	DT	Connecticut	9.4	43
Logan Hall	DT	Houston	9.39	40
Ben Stille	DT	Nebraska	9.34	585
Matt Henningsen	DT	Wisconsin	9.33	269
Eric Johnson II	DT	Missouri State	9.16	215
Jordan Jackson	DT	Air Force	9.14	503
Mika Tafua	DT	Utah	9.03	470

Notable prospects who did not complete enough testing to qualify for RAS: Perrion Winfrey (#50)

Fullback (3 players)

Name	Pos	College	RAS	Big Board Rank
Garrett Owens	FB	Duquesne	9.58	Unranked
Clint Ratkovicth	FB	Northern Illinois	9.39	528
John Chenal	FB	Wisconsin	9.34	Unranked

Linebacker (20 players)

Name	Pos	College	RAS	Big Board Rank
Troy Andersen	LB	Montana State	10	76
Leo Chenal	LB	Wisconsin	9.99	62
Brandon Smith	LB	Penn State	9.97	94
Damone Clark	LB	Louisiana State	9.87	100
Chad Muma	LB	Wyoming	9.77	65
Chance Campbell	LB	Mississippi	9.69	270
Channing Tindall	LB	Georgia	9.68	87
Quay Walker	LB	Georgia	9.63	48
Darrian Beavers	LB	Cincinnati	9.6	107
Devin Lloyd	LB	Utah	9.59	20
Devin Harper	LB	Oklahoma State	9.51	422
Jake Hummel	LB	Iowa State	9.47	456
Micah McFadden	LB	Indiana	9.46	250
Cameron Goode	LB	California	9.46	343
Adam Anderson	LB	Georgia	9.37	276
Malcolm Rodriguez	LB	Oklahoma State	9.27	209
Jeremiah Moon	LB	Florida	9.21	297
Baylon Spector	LB	Clemson	9.13	333
Mike Rose	LB	Iowa State	9.07	206
Christian Harris	LB	Alabama	9.06	51

Notable prospects who did not complete enough testing to qualify for RAS: Nakobe Dean (#26)

Interior offensive line (10 players)

Name	Pos	College	RAS	Big Board Rank
Cole Strange	OG	Chattanooga	9.95	86
Cameron Jurgens	OC	Nebraska	9.94	118
Blaise Andries	OG	Minnesota	9.81	444
Zion Johnson	OG	Boston College	9.74	28
Dawson Deaton	OC	Texas Tech	9.7	245
Luke Wattenberg	OC	Washington	9.59	288
Jack Snyder	OG	San Jose State	9.5	389
Jason Poe	OG	Mercer	9.46	492
Chris Paul	OG	Tulsa	9.45	170

Notable prospects who did not complete enough testing to qualify for RAS: Tyler Linderbaum (#23)

Offensive tackle (8 players)

Name	Pos	College	RAS	Big Board Rank
Trevor Penning	OT	Northern Iowa	9.96	18
Matt Waletzko	OT	North Dakota	9.95	183
Bernhard Raimann	OT	Central Michigan	9.87	39
Nick Zakelj	OT	Fordham	9.83	234
Kellen Diesch	OT	Arizona State	9.75	119
Abraham Lucas	OT	Washington State	9.73	84
Zach Tom	OT	Wake Forest	9.59	143
Ryan Van Demark	OT	Connecticut	9.45	334
Devin Cochran	OT	Georgia Tech	9.17	281

Notable prospects who did not complete enough testing to qualify for RAS: Evan Neal (#3)

Quarterback (3 players)

Obviously, I doubt the Jets will target a quarterback in this year’s draft, but I figured this info was worth including anyway. Perhaps one of these names could generate enough interest to prompt a team into trading up for one of the Jets’ picks.

Name	Pos	College	RAS	Big Board Rank
Desmond Ridder	QB	Cincinnati	9.62	37
Kenny Pickett	QB	Pittsburgh	9.55	16
EJ Perry IV	QB	Brown	9.43	213

Notable prospects who did not complete enough testing to qualify for RAS: Malik Willis (#11), Matt Corral (#35)

Running back (9 players)

Name	Pos	College	RAS	Big Board Rank
Breece Hall	RB	Iowa State	9.96	36
Rachaad White	RB	Arizona State	9.88	105
Master Teague III	RB	Ohio State	9.84	319
Zander Horvath	RB	Purdue	9.83	367
Zamir White	RB	Georgia	9.82	120
Bryant Koback	RB	Toledo	9.72	411
Tyler Goodson	RB	Iowa	9.54	193
Pierre Strong Jr.	RB	South Dakota State	9.34	142
Kenneth Walker III	RB	Michigan State	9.26	46

Safety (14 players)

Name	Pos	College	RAS	Big Board Rank
Lewis Cine	FS	Georgia	9.92	34
Nick Cross	FS	Maryland	9.87	109
Scott Nelson	SS	Wisconsin	9.67	504
Joey Blount	FS	Virginia	9.62	231
Isaac Taylor-Stuart	FS	Southern California	9.61	291
Tycen Anderson	FS	Toledo	9.49	161
JT Woods	SS	Baylor	9.43	165
Dane Belton	SS	Iowa	9.42	230
Kyle Hamilton	FS	Notre Dame	9.33	7
Jack Koerner	SS	Iowa	9.19	459
Jaquan Brisker	SS	Penn State	9.14	52
Drew Hartlaub	FS	Penn State	9.09	495
Daxton Hill	FS	Michigan	9.06	31
Marcelino McCrary-Ball	SS	Indiana	9.03	421

Tight end (6 players)

Name	Pos	College	RAS	Big Board Rank
Jelani Woods	TE	Virginia	10	106
Daniel Bellinger	TE	San Diego State	9.65	174
Andrew Ogletree	TE	Youngstown State	9.35	369
Charlie Kolar	TE	Iowa State	9.12	137
Armani Rogers	TE	Ohio	9.1	350
Lucas Krull	TE	Pittsburgh	9.06	219

Wide receiver (11 players)

Name	Pos	College	RAS	Big Board Rank
Christian Watson	WR	North Dakota State	9.96	49
Kevin Austin	WR	Notre Dame	9.94	212
Alec Pierce	WR	Cincinnati	9.82	75
Brenden Schooler	WR	Texas	9.79	501
Isaiah Weston	WR	Northern Iowa	9.62	232
Tyshaun James	WR	Central Connecticut State	9.54	414
George Pickens	WR	Georgia	9.37	54
Bo Melton	WR	Rutgers	9.24	156
Jalen Virgil	WR	Appalachian State	9.16	591
Calvin Austin III	WR	Memphis	9.08	74
Jaquarii Roberson	WR	Wake Forest	9.01	347

Notable prospects who did not complete enough testing to qualify for RAS: Drake London (#13), Jameson Williams (#15)

Based on what we saw from Joe Douglas and the New York scouting staff over the last two years, I would expect the Jets to draft at least three or four of the players listed in this article.