Picture Credit: Twitter
The 2023 NFL Draft kicked off on Thursday night with Carolina Panthers selecting Bryce Young in the first round. The player on being picked up by the Panthers, expressed joy and called it a surreal moment of his life. This year’s NFL drafts will be held at Union Station in Kansas City, Missouri. Scheduled in several different rounds, the first round of the drafts was held on Thursday. Speaking of the other rounds, round 2 and 3 will be held on Friday, whereas Round 4 to 7 will be held on Saturday.
Young, who got picked by the Panthers, interacted with the media and said, “It’s surreal. It’s a dream come true. As amazing of a moment this is, I’m going to try to live in this moment. I can’t wait to get to work and start building off of it.” Panthers owner David Tepper later at a news conference shared his thoughts behind picking Young, and said, "When we went through the process with these quarterbacks, we asked ourselves, 'Which one of these guys will be a guy that can take us?'. Not to talk about all the different guys, but we thought this guy had the highest probability of winning Super Bowls."
Notably, the NFL draft order is determined by the teams’ records in previous seasons, with the worst performing teams getting higher picks in the first round. The teams that made the post-season are sorted in the rounds they get eliminated, and later by record among teams that got eliminated in the same round. Speaking of this season, there are 259 players drafted over seven rounds. After the round one, here are the results of the first draft picks:
1. Carolina Panthers (via trade): Bryce Young (QB)
2. Houston Texans: C.J. Stroud (QB)
3. Houston Texans (via trade): Will Anderson Jr. (Edge)
4. Indianapolis Colts: Anthony Richardson (QB)
5. Seattle Seahawks (via trade): Devon Witherspoon (CB)
6. Arizona Cardinals (via trade): Paris Johnson Jr. (OT)
7. Las Vegas Raiders: Tyree Wilson (Edge)
8. Atlanta Falcons: Bijan Robinson (RB)
9. Philadelphia Eagles (via trade): Jalen Carter (DT)
10. Chicago Bears (via trade): Darnell Wright (OT)
11. Tennessee Titans: Peter Skoronski (OT)
12. Detroit Lions (via trade): Jahmyr Gibbs (RB)
13. Green Bay Packers (via trade): Lukas Van Ness (Edge)
14. Pittsburgh Steelers (via trade): Broderick Jones (OT)
15. New York Jets (via trade): Will McDonald IV (Edge)
16. Washington Commanders: Emmanuel Forbes (CB)
17. New England Patriots (via trade): Christian Gonzalez (CB)
18. Detroit Lions: Jack Campbell (LB)
19. Tampa Bay Buccaneers: Calijah Kancey (DT)
20. Seattle Seahawks: Jaxon Smith-Njigba (WR)
21. Los Angeles Chargers: Quentin Johnston (WR)
22. Baltimore Ravens: Zay Flowers (WR)
23. Minnesota Vikings: Jordan Addison (WR)
24. New York Giants (via trade): Deonte Banks (CB)
25. Buffalo Bills (via trade): Dalton Kincaid (TE)
26. Dallas Cowboys: Mazi Smith (DT)
27. Jacksonville Jaguars (via trade): Anton Harrison (OT)
28. Cincinnati Bengals: Myles Murphy (Edge)
29. New Orleans Saints (via trade): Bryan Bresee (DT)
30. Philadelphia Eagles: Nolan Smith (Edge)
31. Kansas City Chiefs: Felix Anudike-Uzomah (Edge)