Jeremiyah Love makes a lot of sense for the New Orleans Saints in the first round. Unfortunately for New Orleans, Love also just ran a sub-4.4 40 yard dash at the NFL Scouting Combine. All of a sudden, the Notre Dame running back makes a lot of sense for a lot of teams.
Love isn't one of these shirts and shorts warriors who just show up on at the Combine and test well. He's one of the top prospects in the draft because of what he showed on tape. Running a 4.36 40 will get scouts attention though. Love only raised his already high profile with the run and could force more teams to consider discarding of the belief that you can't draft a running back that high.
The Saints draft eighth overall, and it's beginning to look like that might be too low to get Love. You could make an argument that about half of the top 10 has a reason to draft Love, and the Saints find themselves at the bottom of that group.
Giants are a surprise contender for Jeremiyah Love
One of those teams is the New York Giants. Despite drafting Cam Skattebo just last season, there is reported interest in Love in the Big Apple. Part of that could be the addition of John Harbaugh. Harbaugh wasn't the head coach when they drafted Skattebo. He won't hold that same loyalty to the rookie running back coming off a season ending injury.
The other, and more impactful, side of this conversation is you can't miss out on a potentially great player because of a solid player. Skattebo had a solid rookie campaign and averaged four yards a carry. There's reason to believe he can become a lead back in the years to come. There's reason to believe Love is a can't miss prospect as we approach the draft. It's a difference.
Additionally, the Giants can pair those two backs together. We've seen this same scenario in recent seasons. Tyler Allgeir ran for 1000 yards, and the Falcons drafted Bijan Robinson eighth overall the following year. The Lions selected Jahmyr Gibbs in the same draft 12th overall even though they signed David Montgomery in free agency that year. The premise is the same: Don't pass on great players. You can bet neither team regrets their decision.
Even if the Saints marked Love as a prospect worth getting aggressive for, there's a limit on how aggressive they'd be. The Saints aren't trading to fourth overall for Love. Maybe they'd trade up two spots to grab him, but if the Giants Love, the Saints can't reasonably do anything about it.