The New York Giants selected Penn State All-American edge rusher Abdul Carter, widely considered the premier defensive player in this class.
Carter, 6-foot-3 and 250 pounds, is one of the most consistently disruptive and dominant players in the entire draft and the kind of player that offensive coordinators must account for on every snap.
“He’s the best player in the Draft,” an NFC personnel executive told me recently, of Carter. “Just go and watch the Notre Dame game … He was a one-man wrecking crew with just 1 arm. There are no real weak points to his game.”
During the 2024 season, Carter made the full-time position switch to defensive end for the first time in his career, which brought out the best in his game. Carter posted a career-high 12 sacks while adding 24 tackles for loss as a disruptive force in the backfield.
Abdul Carter Scouting Report
Carter’s ability to wreak havoc in the backfield and his explosive bend off the edge to get there makes it easy to see why he was the first full-time defensive player chosen in this year’s draft.
“Carter has the urgency and athletic talent to bombard the stat sheet,” NFL Media’s Lance Zierlein writes. “He’s always first out and first into contact after the snap but can dart into gaps or around blocks as a penetrator. He’s willing to scrap at the point of attack; additional time in the weight room might be in order for his move up in class. Carter rushes with a rabid, all-game intensity that’s hard for opponents to match. He explodes out of the blocks and can force tackles to abandon their technique to go catch him.”
Carter follows in a storied lineage of linebackers wearing No. 11 at Penn State, and now looks to follow in the footsteps of Lavar Arrington and Micah Parsons as dominant NFL players. The Philadelphia native might have a higher ceiling than both.
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