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The Best Case Scenario For New York Giants in NFL Draft 2026
Picking fifth overall is usually no man’s land, but the New York Giants are sitting pretty. With multiple great options, what’s their best cast scenario?
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The New York Giants have the fifth pick in the 2026 NFL Draft. There will be a bevy of talented players that fills needs to select at this position in the early going. That’s good! It seems way too easy for the Giants to accomplish this. That’s bad! When a team has so many holes to fill, is there even a bad option?
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The Giants are in an interesting spot. They are a bad team that does not need a quarterback, pass rusher, or offensive tackle. Those are the three most valuable positions in the sport, and New York has it’s starters for all of them already. We will discuss this more next week as we dive into the top-10 overall for the draft, but we wouldn’t at all be surprised to see the top four picks all be from those highlighted position groups. That leaves the team open to truly select who it thinks is the best fit at pick five. Let’s run through some of the contenders, as we did with the Jets.
Jeremiyah Love, RB – Perhaps the best player overall but at a low-value position
Caleb Downs, S – Perhaps the best player overall but at a low-value position
Sonny Styles, LB – Perhaps the most gifted player overall, combine standout
Carnell Tate, WR – The best wide receiver among a strong set
Mansoor Delane, CB – The best cornerback available
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I’m Not Falling For The Trap
Todd Salem: To most experts, the fifth pick will be one of those five players. If we were going by strict asset value, we would immediately eliminate the first three. None of running back, safety, or off-ball linebacker are valuable enough to pick that early. That would leave the best wide receiver or the best cornerback, and I don’t hate that outcome.
However, I don’t believe the Giants are necessarily going to draft like that. I think they will consider all five players, and as a fan of the team, I would be pretty pleased with any of them. The draft couldn’t have fallen better for New York at five if the top four picks end up being QB, DE, and OT.
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Love and Downs are easy to argue for. They are superb talents and immense upgrades for New York. Styles is more of a question mark just because his draft stock is built more on physical traits than game-in and game-out productivity, but even that is nitpicking. Styles is the biggest and fastest and best linebacker in the class, and the Giants only really have one starting-caliber LB on-roster.
As for Tate and Delane, again, it’s easy to make an argument in favor. The Giants badly need a wide receiver opposite Malik Nabers. The rest of the roster is third- and fourth-options on their best days. Tate is a ball-hawking, route-running master. He isn’t a physical freak and doesn’t need to be, especially if he was paired with Nabers.
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And Delane would fill perhaps the Giants’ biggest need on their entire roster. The secondary is a wasteland, and that’s true even if you give Paulson Adebo the benefit of the doubt as being a quality starter, which I’m not ready to do. But Delane is simply a great corner prospect, not a generational one. In fact, some scouts prefer Jermod McCoy as the best CB in the class. But if we’re harping on the black hole that is the secondary, that circles me back around to Downs.
The New York Giants should just take Caleb Downs.
He is a generational safety prospect; the Giants need major help at the position; the entire defense would benefit from his smarts and savvy. New York needs CB help, and Downs would make the corners better. New York needs LB help, and Downs would make the linebackers better. New York needs run defense help, and Downs would make the run defense better.
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As I said, I wouldn’t be upset if the Giants ended up with any of these five, but my choice is Downs. What’s yours?
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Roll The Dice On Offense
Dan Salem: My gut instinct says the Giants pick a pass rusher, which should be ridiculous, but isn’t considering their history. New York keeps selecting pass rushers high in the draft and certainly has what one would surmise to be a full set of starters at the position. And yet here they sit at five, with more alluring pass rushers to be had. Hopefully for everyone’s sake my gut instinct is wrong and they take the best player available at a position of need.
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Caleb Downs would be an excellent choice, but it also feels like the safe choice to make. Building the defense is safe, while going all in on the offense is riskier and more alluring. Nothing about Harbaugh feels safe to me, especially as he strives to prove he can do it again with another young and dynamic QB. What better weapon to add to his offense than Jeremiyah Love.
Just because the Giants got it right once before and chose Saquon Barkley with a very high draft pick doesn’t mean it will work out a second time. But they did get it right before, which usually proves to an organization that it works. Let’s do it again! Love is exactly the player this offense was missing last season. Sure, they have a bruising running back who performed quite well last year, but he’s coming off an injury and never felt like an every down player that defenses must gameplan around. The combination of Love and Malik Nabers feels unstoppable, especially with Jaxson Dart at quarterback.
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Maybe the Giants play it safe and build their defense, or maybe they roll the dice and try to build an unstoppable offense. It worked for Harbaugh once before in Baltimore, so why not now in New York? Gotta love me so Love.
Meet our Sports Writers:
Dan Salem is Lead Editor and Co-owner of BuzzChomp. He’s an award winning Actor, Director and Producer. Visit M Square Productions for his film work, or get lost in his old-school comedy on Pillow Talk TV. You can follow him on X, TikTok and Instagram. His latest film ‘Alone’ is now on Amazon.
Todd Salem is a Staff Writer and Contributing Editor at BuzzChomp. He’s also a champion of fantasy football and fantasy baseball, dominating leagues for over two decades. Comment below on his unfiltered opinions.
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