Bengals Draft 'Freak' Defensive End In First Round

The Cincinnati Bengals have used their first round selection on Texas A&M defensive end Shemar Stewart. Stewart provides a partner to play opposite Trey Hendrickson this season.

He also provides insurance in case they cannot agree to terms with Hendrickson on an extension.

Stewart had 65 tackles in his career at TAMU. He only had 4.5 sacks during his time at College Station.

The South Florida product is 6-foot-5 and 267 pounds. He ran the 40-yard dash at the NFL combine in February in 4.59 seconds to go along with a 40-inch vertical jump and a 10-foot, 11-inch broad jump.

He is compared to Chop Robinson who was drafted by the Miami Dolphins. Robinson did not have a lot of sacks at Penn State, but he was always applying pressure on the quarterback and setting the edge. That is Stewart.

By statistical comparison, Abdul Carter, who went No. 3 to the New York Giants had 12 sacks on his own last season. Stewart will have to improve his pass rush technique once he new defensive coordinator Al Golden gets his hands on him.

NFL Network's Daniel Jeremiah said Stewart is "easily the most polarizing pass rusher." He creates a lot of havoc in the backfield, but does not sack the quarterback all that often. That is something he can work on once he gets to camp.

"He is the ultimate example of traits versus production," Jeremiah said on a conference call this week. "He has got all kinds of twitch, he’s explosive, he’s disruptive. He just hasn’t been able to finish, to compile sacks."

NBC Sports draft analyst Connor Rogers said the coaches and scouts had to evaluate whether his lack of finishing on plays would have created his stock to drop. 

It obviously did not as he still went in the first round.

"It opens the door for a really interesting conversation about a guy that disrupts plays but doesn’t finish plays and has the size and athleticism that you want at the NFL level,” Rogers said. “How high do coaches and evaluators value that?"