Colts select Texas Tech tackle Le’Raven Clark in 3rd round
By Evan Reller
The Indianapolis Colts returned their focus to the offensive line with their third pick in the NFL Draft.
The Colts selected Texas Tech offensive tackle Le’Raven Clark with the 82nd pick in the draft Friday night. Clark played at left tackle in college, and will surely move to the right side of the line if he’s going to make a run at the starting spot.
Clark is a talented player who is better in pass protection than run blocking. He also has the ability to play guard, which would give the Colts some measure of flexibility. Clark was a 51 game starter at Tech and has all the physical tools to be a standout lineman in the NFL.
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GM Ryan Grigson took the message from Jim Irsay to heart and doubled down on protecting the team’s soon to be most expensive player, Andrew Luck. The Colts have used two of their top three picks on offensive linemen and hope to keep Luck healthy for the entire year in 2016.
The only issue with this pick is that Grigson is just one for six on linemen that he’s drafted. These are the same people doing the scouting and making evaluations as before, do you trust them more now than the past few years? Has anything in the process changed? The Colts brass talked a lot about taking the best player available, but they’ve drafted for a clear need twice in the draft so far.
Shoring up the protection is certainly an issue, but the Colts problem in big losses hasn’t been protecting Luck. It’s that they haven’t been able to get to the opposing quarterback. Hopefully the Colts will be able to address the pass rush in some capacity on Saturday, but unfortunately this isn’t a very deep draft for those EDGE rushers the Colts need.
Make sure to check back in tomorrow for more on the Colts draft.