The Las Vegas Raiders are a team on the rise after trading and extending quarterback Geno Smith and adding some solid pieces in free agency. The team is just a few perimeter players on both sides of the ball away from being a dangerous playoff team.
One way the team could fill two needs with one is by trading up and selecting top two-way prospect and Heisman trophy winner Travis Hunter. Hunter would fill two needs for the team with his potential to play both wide receiver and cornerback.
That is exactly what the team does in a mock draft from Rhett Lewis of NFL.com. He has the team trading up from sixth overall to second overall with the Cleveland Browns to take Hunter.
“I’ve never made a mock trade before this one, but we’ve never seen a player like Hunter, who registers as the draft’s top prospect at both receiver and cornerback. It just so happens that those two positions are two of the Raiders’ biggest needs, so they aggressively move up to secure a two-for-one with this pick,” Lewis said on the pick.
The Browns then select Ashton Jeanty, the top running back prospect and Heisman runner-up, with the sixth pick. If the Browns were to trade down, selecting quarterback Shedeur Sanders seems like it would make the most sense, but they don’t do that in this mock.
Sanders instead falls to the Saints at ninth overall, which seems to be the top landing spot for Sanders currently.
This trade would be a fascinating storyline, as just with the Heisman trophy race and last year’s college football season, Travis Hunter and Ashton Jeanty would be intertwined with each other.
Both teams are also in the AFC, so the two teams would certainly face each other at some point in the near future.
From the Raiders’ perspective, this move would be a home run, as two of the team’s biggest needs as of now are at wide receiver and cornerback. Hunter may not quite be the explicit answer to both, but he would certainly help.
The Browns have plenty of needs, with one being at running back, so drafting Jeanty would make sense, but the Browns face may be a bit upset the team is selecting a running back before drastically improving the rest of their broken roster.
While it is unlikely this kind of draft night trade will happen, it would make things vastly more interesting for the rest of the first round.