Jacksonville, Fla. -- The 2014 NFL Draft is in the books for the Jaguars. The team made a big splash early on by selecting quarterback Blake Bortles with the third overall pick. The former UCF signal caller leads a very talented draft class with six offensive and three defensive players.
"Priority all along was to get playmakers on both offensive and defense. We feel like we've done that. We feel like we've upgraded team speed but we've upgraded with 9 guys that fit what we're looking for from a cultural standpoint," said Jaguars General Manager David Caldwell.
The Jaguars brass had its eyes set on selecting defensive players in rounds four and five. Cornerback Aaron Colvin of Oklahoma was selected as the 114th overall pick. The Jags used pick 144 on Telvin Smith, a linebacker from FSU. They followed that up by selecting defensive end from Arkansas, Chris Smith with the 159th overall pick.
"No matter what, you're always looking to raise the level of speed on defense especially, and I feel like we're doing that," Gus Bradley said. "It's not so much 40-time too. While that's important, I think it's play speed and how fast do they play?"
The Jaguars made significant improvements to the roster with guys that Gus Bradley and his staff were very familiar with.
"There's not one of these guys that popped up on our list that was a surprise to us or we didn't prepare for," Bradley explained. "There are other guys that, for me personally, that went off the board and went to another team and I didn't really know a lot about them, but all of these guys we knew a lot about."
Here's a full list of the Jaguars' 2014 NFL draft class.
Round No. Pos. Player Ht. Wt. Age College
1 3 QB Blake Bortles 6-5 232 22 Central Florida
2 39 WR Marqise Lee 6-0 192 22 Southern California
2* 61 WR Allen Robinson 6-3 220 20 Penn State
3* 93 G Brandon Linder 6-6 311 21 Miami (Fla.)
4* 114 CB Aaron Colvin 6-0 186 21 Oklahoma
5 144 LB Telvin Smith 6-3 218 22 Florida State
5* 159 DE Chris Smith 6-1 266 22 Arkansas
6* 205 C Luke Bowanko 6-6 300 22 Virginia
7 222 RB Storm Johnson 6-0 216 21 Central Florida
*Robinson selected with choice obtained from San Francisco for Jaguars' 3rd (70) and 5th (150)-round picks; Linder selected with choice obtained from New England for Jaguars' 4th (105) and 6th (179)-round picks; Colvin and Chris Smith selected with choices obtained from Baltimore for OT Eugene Monroe; Bowanko selected with choice obtained from San Francisco for QB Blaine Gabbert.
