Georgia football: 3 reasons Travon Walker is the best No.1 pick for the Jaguars

Georgia football will have one of the best drafts in program history, and it all starts with edge rusher Travon Walker.

After climbing the draft boards for the last few months, Walker is now the odds favorite to be the No.1 overall pick for the Jacksonville Jaguars.

Some rumors suggest the front office people in Jacksonville are split between him and Aiden Hutchinson, but the Jaguars need to know that Walker is by far the best selection.

Georgia football edge rusher Travon Walker is Jacksonville’s best No.1 option.

Dawg fans know how impressive this guy is, but a lot of draft experts still aren’t sold on him. However, it’s his potential and his ceiling that makes him more intriguing.

He doesn’t have to have the most impressive stats to be considered a top choice. Walker just needs to be himself because that alone is something NFL teams drool over and want.

At 6-5 and 272-pounds, the Thomaston, Ga., native is the ideal size for an edge rusher in the NFL. He has the speed and the versatility to line up in different places — more on that later.

Not to mention he is one great person. He is a high-character kid who understands what it means to be a professional athlete and the grind it takes.

Walker wasn’t the biggest star on Georgia’s defense, but he didn’t need to be either. He had a solid junior year, but before that, the Dawgs had a lot of NFL talent in front of him. The Dawgs have a defense that reloads yearly, so Walker had to fight for his playing time, and he did.

From the time he stepped on campus, he was a force.

He didn’t need to be like Hutchinson and be the defense star — Walker just needed to do his job. Jacksonville needs a leader like him on their defense, and while Hutchinson is an incredible athlete and leader, Walker makes more sense.

Someone get this man to Las Vegas because it’s about to happen. With the draft fastly approaching, here are three reasons Walker makes the most sense to go No.1 overall in the 2022 NFL Draft.

Travon Walker led the Georgia football dominance at the NFL Combine

The first thing that Georgia football edge rusher Travon Walker did to impress NFL scouts was his incredible NFL Combine performance.

Some experts called it the best Combine performance in 10 years from an edge rusher standpoint. There are people who don’t consider a strong Combine a good enough reason to be No.1 overall, but what Walker did in Indianapolis then at Georgia’s Pro Day is.

At 6-5 and 272-pounds, Walker ran the 40-yard dash in 4.51 at the NFL Combine. No one that large should be that quick, but he is. It wasn’t a lucky time for Walker. Nope, if you watch his tape, it shows just how fast he is on the field.

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Walker ran down opponents at times, and his horizontal speed is incredible. He jumped 35.5 in the vertical jump and 123 in the broad, ran the three-cone drill in 6.89 seconds, and the 20-yard shuttle in 4.32 seconds.

Then Walker turned around a put together a similar performance in Athens for the Dawgs’ Pro Day. He showed the scouts what he had to offer and why taking a risk on him early in the draft would be the best decision.

However, to get noticed as a junior declaring for the 2022 NFL Draft, he needed a big Combine performance, and he delivered. Since that week in Indy, Walker has shot up the mock draft boards and shown how much raw talent weighs to some NFL teams.

Travon Walker is versatile but knows how to do his job

Versatile is one of the easiest ways to define Georgia football edge rusher Travon Walker’s game. He is quick off the snap, but he also can get through offensive linemen and make plays.

Last year during the Dawgs’ national championship run, he played in all 15 games recording 37 tackles, 7.5 tackles for loss, 6.0 sacks, two pass deflections, a fumble recovery and 32 quarterback hurries.

Those quarterback pressures led the Dawgs in 2021, which is a big stat because that shows how much Walker got near the quarterback. So many people are like his production doesn’t match Aiden Hutchinson’s, and while that is true, breaking down Walker’s stats shows that he was able to put some pressure on quarterbacks often.

Throughout his three years at Georgia, Walker played in 36 games. He recorded 65 tackles, 13 tackles for loss, 9.5 sacks, four pass deflections and 55 quarterback pressures.

Walker can put his hand in the dirt like a traditional edge rusher, but he can stand up with his speed. The possibilities with him are unlimited because Walker got great coaching.

Hutchinson had one other defensive player that helped him, but Walker had four or five. The former 5-star didn’t need astronomical stats to be considered a top draft pick.

Walker knows he doesn’t need 25 sacks to be considered one of the best edge rushers. He does his job by being there to pressure quarterbacks for the linebackers or another defensive lineman to grab. Sometimes putting the pressure on a quarterback is enough to cause a mistake.

He had seven quarterback pressures in the national championship game, which helped the Dawgs force enough mistakes out of Bryce Young to win. He had four pressures and a sack in the semifinal game against Michigan.

So some want to know if Walker can handle the lead role — the answer is yes. However, the NFL isn’t about one superstar defender either because they are full of the best talent out of college football.

These defenses work together to make plays, and Walker knows how to do that. He is a team player who can help when needed and step up to make a big play himself too.

That ability is why he should be No.1 overall. Regardless of Hutchinsons’ sack numbers, the way Walker presents himself on the field is far more impressive.

Travon Walker has the highest ceiling among other edge rushers

Georgia football edge rusher Travon Walker has a high ceiling that shows how talented he is and that he is willing to put in the work to improve.

He has long arms, which help him at the point of attack. Walker can transfer power from his hips to his hands to lift offensive linemen’s pads. He has some tremendous edge-rushing moves and violent hands. That length helps him get to quarterbacks who are quicker than others. He has great balance to stay on his feet and make those plays.

Walker isn’t perfect, he can improve on some things, but that is where NFL coaching comes into play. His ceiling is extremely high, and his three years at Georgia show that.

He improved tremendously from his sophomore to junior year and still doesn’t realize how talented he is. Walker is a natural edge rusher, and his work with Dan Lanning, Tray Scott, and even Kirby Smart has helped him become the player he is.

However, they also gave him the tools to take that work ethic to the next level and remain coachable. If these NFL teams get anything out of Georgia players, it’s that they are coachable and willing to keep growing their craft.

Walker is the risk to take at No.1 for Jacksonville because they need someone with his skillset to lead the defense.

Sure Aiden Hutchinson can do that too, but Walker’s ceiling is higher. With one less season than Hutchinson, one could argue that he isn’t quite experienced enough, but his film shows otherwise.

Plus, the competition in the SEC is a bit tougher than the Big 10, at least in our opinion, so Walker went up against better offensive lines and when he went up against the best one in the country — seven quarterback pressures and a sack came from him.

Walker is who you can build a defense around because he understands the power of a team and how coming together as one is crucial.

Hutchinson has excellent potential, but how do we know that he hasn’t already hit his ceiling? He struggled against Georgia’s offensive line, so how would that correlate to the NFL?

I’m not diminishing Hutchinson by any means, but Walker is the better overall choice and long-term investment.

Georgia football will make history this weekend at the NFL Draft, and it could start with Walker becoming the fifth Dawg to get selected as the No.1 overall pick. The Jaguars could screw this up, but hopefully, they won’t because Walker is the right choice.