Jaguars' GM Trent Baalke Explains the Importance of Pre-Draft Visits
The Jacksonville Jaguars have a defined culture they're looking to establish after a successful 2022 season.
As a result, the homework they do each offseason on which players they bring into that culture is as important as ever. And perhaps the pinnacle of this pre-draft process is the visits each team conducts each draft cycle.
"I think they’re very important," Jaguars general manager Trent Baalke said about pre-draft visits on Thursday.
"Any time you get a chance to sit down with a prospect, especially at that length of time, get a chance to meet with everyone in the building at different levels, for the coaches to sit down and talk ball with them, watch ball with them, for us as evaluators to ask the questions that we may have from all the information that we’ve gathered, I think it’s priceless."
Each NFL team is allotted 30 pre-draft visits up until a week before the draft, along with local visits that are permitted to players from nearby colleges or players who trew up near the franchise.
For some teams, visits are a key indicator of who they may have interest in. For others, visits are a way to throw curveballs at other teams in the draft, feigning interest in specific prospects.
So far, the Jaguars have had 25 of their 30 visits reported. This isn't to say they are going to have every player high on their board brought into the building; last year, the Jaguars drafted Devin Lloyd without having him in for a visit, for example, though they did host first-round edge rusher Travon Walker and third-round linebacker Chad Muma.
"It’s a chance to also get physicals on guys that weren’t invited to the Combine, so there’s a lot of good things that come from it," Baalke said.
"You get to know the local guys that grew up in this area that may be free agents or draft picks that really want to be back here. We had, I believe right around 30 guys here yesterday, got a chance to talk to a lot of these guys and the excitement of what’s going on here, their familiarity with the organization and just wanting to be a Jaguar. So that was encouraging."
The Jaguars have a set standard for the type of players they are looking to add in next week's draft. From pick No. 24 all the way down to their final selection in the seventh round, the Jaguars are trusting their homework and pre-draft process to lead them to success.
“Again, it goes back to what I was saying earlier, this is what I appreciate about how Trent (General Manager Trent Baalke) handles this process with us; he involves us," Jaguars head coach Doug Pederson said on Thursday.
"He definitely wants everybody’s input, and you’re right, we’re the ones coaching the players, and he wants us to have that input on guys. I think that’s, it just holds us as coaches more accountable to the guys in that locker room. Now we’re all on the same page. It’s just a valuable part of the process, and the more eyes and the more information we can get on the players, the better we can make selections."