Oakland Raiders: Re-Drafting the 2017 class using the power of hindsight

Round 2 (56) – Obi Melifonwu

With the fifty-sixth overall pick, the Raiders took a freakishly athletic guy in Obi Melifonwu. At six-foot-four, 224 pounds, Melifonwu has size, speed, length, and power. He can do a lot of different things and the thinking when he was drafted, was that he would be a hybrid safety/linebacker tasked with helping Oakland tighten up against the tight end – a bugaboo for this team for years.

However, former HC Jack Del Rio and his staff never seemed able to figure out how to best use Melifonwu, even starting him at corner for a game against the Patriots – a move that turned out to be an absolute disaster.

Add to that, the fact that Melifonwu was hampered by injuries all season, appearing in just five games – playing just 34 defensive snaps in total. The hope is that he is healthy and ready to contribute in 2018.

We have no clue how new HC Jon Gruden plans to deploy Melifonwu. He’s got options.

However, given that we’re re-drafting the 2017 class, given the fact that Melifonwu doesn’t seem to have a natural position – and that missing most all of 2017 means he’s going to essentially be a rookie with plenty of growing pains ahead – it’s as easy to swap out this pick as it was to swap out Oakland’s first round pick.

And, in this re-draft, we would use the fifty-sixth overall pick on the offensive side of the ball.

Alvin Kamara (Rd. 3, sixty-seventh overall, New Orleans)  burst onto the scene down in the Big Easy, rushing for 728 yards on just 120 carries – a very healthy average of 6.1 yards per carry – and racked up eight touchdowns. He also had 81 receptions for another 826 yards – 10.2 yards per reception if you’re scoring at home – and added another five touchdowns.

Kamara also had 11 kick returns for 347 yards – and average of 31.5 yards per return – and added a 106 yard return for a touchdown.

Kamara did it all and nabbed offensive rookie of the year honors as a result.

Even with Marshawn Lynch in the fold, the Raiders could have used a guy like Kamara. Lynch is not the long-term answer for the team in the rushing department, and although he had a good run over the final five games of the year, Lynch was largely ineffective for the first 11.

Having a back like Kamara waiting in the wings would have made it easier for this team to part ways with Lynch this offseason, given that the only other backs on the roster at the moment are Jalen Richard and DeAndre Washington – neither of whom has proven capable of being the team’s bellcow back.

Some might scoff at using a second round pick on a running back, but Kamara’s productivity and what he could have brought to the team’s offense renders those arguments totally invalid.