NFL Draft
4/25/25
6 min read
2025 NFL Draft: The Most Surprising Picks From Round 1
The first round of the 2025 NFL Draft did not disappoint. These are my thoughts on the most surprising picks from night one.
Tyler Booker
The first surprise of the night was the Cowboys selecting Tyler Booker with the 12th pick. While I would have personally gone with Matthew Golden here, I don’t think this was an egregious reach by any means. The year after Zack Martin’s retirement, Dallas’ interior offensive line still projects as one of the best units in the NFL, with Booker, Beebe, and Smith all on rookie contracts.
Booker is the most physically dominant offensive lineman in this class and had extremely clean tape against SEC competition. At 326-pounds, he has the best anchor I’ve ever seen for a college offensive lineman and is completely unfazed by power rushers. He has nearly 35-inch arms and strikes with heavy hands in pass protection, erasing the defender’s upfield momentum on contact. When he latches, he has elite grip strength to stay connected and tries to end every rep with his opponent on the ground.
As you would expect for a player of his size, Booker is a below average athlete. While he did run a 4.65 shuttle (68th percentile) at his pro day, his ten-yard split and broad jump were 7th and 3rd percentile, respectively. His athletic limitations show up on tape and create limitations in both phases.
He has heavy feet when trying to redirect or expand his set points. He can’t afford to be late reading a stunt or a blitz, because he lacks the burst to make urgent recoveries. He didn’t have many processing issues in college and he was good enough with his hands to contain SEC pass rushers, but dealing with NFL speed could be a challenge. As a run blocker, Booker has limited range and fluidity. He struggles to win the playside shoulder on reach blocks and connect to moving targets as a puller. He's a bulldozer at the point of attack who creates serious vertical displacement, but there are some assignments he won’t be able to execute.
Keep an eye on Minnesota guard Tyler Cooper as a potential day three pick, since the Cowboys seem to have a type.
James Pearce Jr.
After taking Jalon Walker at 15, Atlanta made an aggressive move back into the first round and selected Tennessee edge rusher James Pearce Jr. The actual pick wasn’t surprising in a vacuum and I’m a huge proponent on doubling up at glaring positions of need, but the trade up is hard to justify. The Falcons sent their 2026 first rounder and pick 46 in exchange for picks 26 and 101. I don’t think trading future first round picks for non-quarterbacks is good business, although Terry Fontenot won’t be in Atlanta to deal with the repercussions if Pearce Jr. doesn’t pan out.
On the field, there’s reason to be optimistic that Atlanta will finally have a formidable pass rush. James Pearce Jr. is an elite linear athlete with rare first step explosiveness and two years of high-level production in the SEC. His burst off the line of scrimmage is lethal, and sometimes all he needs to get a clean win, but the threat of his speed also puts blockers on their heels and forces them into oversets. He can punish tackles for selling out to protect the corner with a swift inside counter and has an effective bull rush. His run defense was a weakness in 2023, but he dramatically improved his anchor this year and almost never ended up on the ground.
Jaxson Dart
I thought there was a chance that Jaxson Dart’s draft hype was just a smokescreen, because his tape doesn’t warrant a top-50 pick, but it turns out the Giants were a lot higher on him than me. He’s a developmental quarterback prospect with good mobility, natural accuracy, and NFL-caliber arm talent. I strongly disagree with the idea that his physical traits are anything close to special, but his arm is adequate and won’t be something that holds him back. Dart is a very capable point-and-shoot passer, but he’s starting from square one from a mental standpoint and likely needs one or two redshirt years to develop.
The Ole Miss offense did very little to prepare him mentally for the pro game, rarely asking him to read the entire field, challenge tight windows, or account for multiple defenders at once. His college production is impressive, but most of it came from isolated vertical shots or throws into schemed-up open space. He also has a terrible habit of dropping his eyes in the face of pressure and hasn’t shown the ability to climb the pocket and continue his reads. He’s consistently a first read-to-scramble quarterback, which has to change in the NFL.
With time to grow as a pocket passer, Dart could develop into a quality starter, but there’s a lot of work to be done.
Tyleik Williams
I was a bit surprised that Tyleik Williams went in the first round, but I don’t hate the pick at all. My NFL comparison for Williams was actually Alim McNeill. This corrects the Brodric Martin mistake, one of the few blemishes on Brad Holmes’ draft record.
Williams is a top-tier run defender with a wide, sturdy frame to cloud interior gaps. His anchor was essentially unbreakable in 2024 and he’s capable of withstanding double teams in the A-gap. He has powerful hands to jolt blockers on initial contact and is quick enough to slip around zone cutoffs. His arm length is 11th percentile for defensive tackles and his lack of length makes it difficult for him to lock out his opponent and establish separation. But overall, he has an extremely high floor as an early down run-stopper.
While he doesn’t have much production, he flashes some juice as a pass rusher and has a fairly diverse moveset. He’s very quick and explosive for his size, and even though he doesn’t project as a 10 sack type of rusher, he can get after the quarterback in a complementary role.
