Browns pick they will regret: Siaki Ika, DT, Baylor
Out of all the picks the Browns made over the weekend, none has been debated as much as their decision to take Siaki Ika at No. 98 overall. While it's true he plays a position of great need, there's a debate as to whether or not they reached for that position.
Ika, who came into the Combine at 335 pounds, played closer to 355 pounds during the season. He proved while at Baylor to be a run stuffer who was hard to move. But in the NFL, you need to be more than a body to have success, you have to show some athleticism as well.
Throughout his career, Ika has been praised as a nose tackle with athletic traits but that wasn't the case at the Scouting Combine. In Indy, he finished near the bottom of every drill for defensive tackles and that was even after dropping the weight to be more nimble.
Once all was said and done, he had a 2.75 Relative Athletic Score, which comes in incredibly low. Like historically low.
Siaki Ika was drafted with pick 98 of round 3 in the 2023 draft class. He scored a 2.75 #RAS out of a possible 10.00. This ranked 1176 out of 1620 DT from 1987 to 2023. https://t.co/uoqmF3yyU5 pic.twitter.com/V1aYu7zBpO
— Kent Lee Platte (@MathBomb) April 29, 2023
Even with that being the case, there's a belief Ika will be a huge hit because Jim Schwartz likes him. He also said Ika is no longer a dump truck but will be a Ferrari.
Well, he needs to be a dump truck because that's what run-stuffing nose tackles do. And they could have gotten one much later to do that job.