2015 NFL Mock Draft: Cincinnati Bengals Select Shane Ray

We're now into the portion of our 2015 Daily Norseman Community Mock Draft where the selections being made are by teams that were in the playoffs in 2014 (with the exception of the New Orleans Saints, who are picking at #31 thanks to a trade they made with the Seattle Seahawks). To start this portion of the draft, we head to Mike Zimmer's former team, the Cincinnati Bengals, who hold the 21st overall pick. And though they made a pretty significant move at this position in free agency, Bengals' GM misterloveSKOL made another move to help them solidify their defensive front.

With the 21st pick in the 2015 Daily Norseman Community Mock Draft, the Cincinnati Bengals select. . .

Shane Ray, defensive end, University of Missouri

Here's what misterloveSKOL had to say about the selection:

Drafting 2 DE in the last 2 years of the NFL draft (Margus Hunt 2nd, Will Clarke 3rd) has not helped Cincinnati, only posting 20 quarterback sacks in 2014. Shane Ray is a different kind of player than the previous DE's taken by the Bengals. He's smaller which allows him to be a bit more elusive when coming off the edge en route to the QB. Also his production at Missouri leads me to believe that he can make an immediate impact on a Bengals defense that was once, and very recently, an elite NFL defense. It will be interesting to see how the Bengals use their 21st overall pick when the time comes but I do feel their main focus should be defense considering their drop to 22nd overall in Team Defense statistics.

My Thoughts

The Bengals brought back their former employee, defensive end Michael Johnson (who the Vikings also heavily pursued) in the hopes that he will pick things back up again after a rough year in Tampa Bay last year. It will be interesting to see if Johnson's off-year is the start of a trend, as he didn't have a great year in his final year with the Bengals, either. With the Bengals liking to rotate their defensive linemen like the Vikings do, I think that Shane Ray is a pretty solid pick here. As misterloveSKOL said, Ray is more of a speed guy than players like Margus Hunt or even Michael Johnson, and could play a pretty big role early on with the Cincy defensive line. I don't know if Ray will make it this far down the board on draft night, but if he does the Bengals would be wise to make this same selection.

What do you think of this selection, folks?