Mason Rudolph goes to Chargers in latest mock draft

It won’t be long and the mock drafts will be turned into the real thing as the NFL draft is just over one week away.

In his latest mock draft, Chris Trapasso of CBS Sports has the Los Angeles Chargers using their first-round pick on a quarterback, but it’s not on Louisville’s Lamar Jackson.

Instead, Trapasso has the Chargers selecting Mason Rudolph out of Oklahoma State, a guy who is ranked as the No. 5 or No. 6 quarterback in the class by most analysts. What’s interesting about this pick is the players that Trapasso has the Chargers passing up on in favor of Rudolph.

He has Maurice Hurst going No. 22, Rashaan Evans No. 25 and perhaps most surprising, Vita Vea at No. 26. Following that pick, he has the New Orleans Saints grabbing Jackson at No. 27.

Hurst, Evans and Vea would all fill a need and be seemingly better picks than Rudolph, so it would be interesting to see how Chargers fans would react to a scenario such as this becoming a reality.

Though the Chargers’ main focus heading into this draft should be shoring up the run defense, many draft analysts out there still feel this is the year for the team to draft a quarterback, something that doesn’t seem to bother Philip Rivers and he said as much as he addressed the media on Monday, according to Ricky Henne of the team’s official website.

Perhaps there is a quarterback that the Chargers just can’t pass up on, but for me, that would only be if a guy such as Josh Rosen or Baker Mayfield experienced an Aaron Rodgers-like slide and was on the board at No. 17. Guys like Rudolph and Jackson, while quite talented, are players the team could pass on in order to bring in a valuable run stopper such as Vea.

The idea of picking Rudolph ahead of Vea, should both be on the board, is crazy, at least to me. Would the Chargers even pick Rudolph over Jackson, if given the choice between the two quarterbacks?

Draft tidbits:

-Mayfield isnt going later than three.-Chubb is either going two or four.-Chargers have "legitimate significant interest in Lamar Jackson."-Josh Allen wont fall further than Arizona.

— Benjamin Allbright (@AllbrightNFL) April 11, 2018

Rudolph is coming off a senior season in which he completed 65 percent of his passes for 4,904 yards with 37 touchdowns to just nine interceptions. During his four years at the school, he went 3-1 in bowl games.

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Those are solid numbers, but if he’s going to sit behind Rivers for a handful of years, it might be a better plan to use the first-round pick on a player that can help this team reach the postseason for the first time since 2013.

Now, if the Chargers could find a way to get Rudolph in the second round, fans would probably be much more receptive to that, after the team chose a player such as Vea or Evans in the first round.

Though Trapasso’s mock up until pick No. 17 is quite respectable, it goes off the rails with that choice. If Tom Telesco actually picked Rudolph with all of that great defensive talent available, those are the kinds of decisions that cost people jobs .

So I pose this question. If you’re Telesco and Evans, Vea, Hurst, Jackson and Rudolph are all still on the board at No. 17, is there any scenario in which you could sell picking Rudolph as a good move to the fan base?

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