Potential Surprise Draft Pick for Cardinals Revealed

The Cardinals could surprise the football world with this pick.

Mar 19, 2025; Tuscaloosa AL, USA; Offensive lineman Tyler Booker rusn a drill for scouts at the University of Alabama Pro Day as several Crimson Tide players worked out for NFL teams in the Hank Crisp Indoor Practice Facility. | Gary Cosby Jr.-Tuscaloosa News / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

The Arizona Cardinals aren't necessarily locked into the defensive side of the football in the 2025 NFL Draft.

It's been trendy for much of this Draft season to project a variety of defensive linemen to the Cardinals. Even recently, CB Will Johnson has been the mainstream thought at 16 overall. There is, of course, also the option of a trade down.

But Pro Football Focus took an unconventional look at all 32 teams, and posted one "surprise" pick for each.

For the Arizona Cardinals, it came down to a big man along the trenches – but not on the defensive side of things.

Tyler Booker - an interior OL out of the vaunted University of Alabama - was Arizona's noted "surprise" pick at No. 16.

The reasoning is as follows:

"Booker’s pre-draft momentum has cooled following underwhelming athletic testing, but his tape still tells a strong story. He ranked fourth among qualified FBS guards in true pass-blocking grade last season at Alabama, showing the kind of reliability the Cardinals could use. Arizona currently projects to start Isaiah Adams — who posted just a 50.3 pass-blocking grade in 2024 — at right guard."

At its core, this is actually a somewhat logical pick for Arizona, if Booker does fall that far. He played the majority of his career snaps at left guard, a position that hasn't been solidified until Evan Brown asserted himself as an above-average player for this franchise.

Brown is coming back for the 2025 season, but there's little depth behind him, and there isn't a clear-cut starter of the future along the Cardinals' interior. Isaiah Adams is a developmental piece, and is much more proficient in run-blocking than pass-blocking.

Arizona likely sees Adams as a part of their future plans, and he did display some development as 2024 progressed, but they'll need an interior OL to carry the torch from Brown, and provide a somewhat higher level of pass protection.

Booker is just that — posting an 86.5 pass blocking grade in 2024 — but he does have some flaws that will need to be ironed out.

He doesn't project as the "likely" pick for Arizona in the first round, but it's a far stretch to say Booker wouldn't fit a need, or develop into a potentially excellent starting-caliber OL down the road.

It would be a "surprise" pick, but it likely wouldn't be the wrong one. With a draft this deep, GM Monti Ossenfort has his options wide open, and isn't locked into specific positions, even if DL remains the Cardinals' biggest need.