NFL.com has dropped a new analytics service for the 2025 NFL Draft: NFL Draft IQ. Ran by the Next Gen Stats team, the Amazon QuickSight product claims that it can ballpark every team’s most likely draft targets “based on pre-draft interest, team needs, and organizational philosophies.”
According to their process, the following players are the most likely prospects that the Green Bay Packers will take in the first round:
- Michigan CB Will Johnson
- Michigan DT Kenneth Grant
- Texas CB Jahdae Barron
- Boston College DE Donovan Ezeiruaku
- Oregon DT Derrick Harmon
- Marshall DE Mike Green
- Ohio State LT Josh Simmons
If all of these defensive linemen and cornerbacks are surprising to you, they shouldn’t be. NFL Draft IQ also claims that the Packers will select one of those two positions in the first round in about two-thirds of drafts.
While it’s not clearly explained how they calculate this process, Green Bay’s “trade up likelihood” is given three of five stars while their “trade down likelihood” is only two of five stars. So, they expect the Packers to actually trade up more than trade down in simulations.
For what it’s worth, Tampa Bay Buccaneers general manager Jason Licht said on Thursday that he doesn’t believe there’s much of a market for trade-ups in this class. As a reminder, there has yet to be a trade involving a first-round pick in the 2025 draft, which makes this the latest offseason where all teams hold their original first-round selections since 1993 — when the Kansas City Chiefs sent a first-round pick for then San Francisco 49ers quarterback Joe Montana just five days before the draft started.
