Cat Scratch Reader
Carolina picks up some secondary help
The Carolina Panthers have selected cornerback Chau Smith-Wade with the 157th overall pick in the 2024 NFL Draft. The Washington State product and Colorado native has experience playing both corner and safety across 33 college games since his freshman year.
Smith-Wade is a slightly undersized corner at 5’11” with a limited athletic profile. He also has only three interceptions to his name, with zero in his senior season. That said, his senior season, and potentially some of his athletic testing, was cut short by a shoulder injury.
He did show up to the Senior Bowl and show out with two interceptions after a week of practices that impressed coaches and scouts in attendance. His positive stats from college include 17 pass breaks up (eight in his junior year and six in his shortened senior year) and three forced fumbles in his junior year. He earned Honorable Mention All-Pac-12 honors his junior year.
This is a classic 5th round pick: a flier on a guy that somebody believes in. The Panthers were never going to get a Kool-Aid McKinstry here and their late round favorites, as often as not, do not match up with fan favorites.
We’ll have to wait and see what value he can provide in training camp, but the reality here is simple and two-fold. First, this is a gamble on finding another Captain Munnerlyn and the odds are not in the Panthers favor. Second, the star of his selection was the pretzel Chandler Zavala was holding when announcing the pick:
EDGE, DB, C, DL
