In a very early redraft of the 2024 NFL redraft, Indianapolis Colts’ defensive end Laiatu Latu fell a few spots.

As we know, Latu was the 15th pick in this draft by the Colts and the first defender taken off the board. But in Daniel Flick’s redraft over at Sports Illustrated, the Colts went in a different direction at pick No. 15, taking defensive end Jared Verse, who originally went 19th to the Rams.

So with Verse off the board in this redraft, the Rams ended up picking Latu at 19th overall.

“With both of their productive rookie defensive linemen already off the board, the Rams are forced to pivot, but Latu is an excellent option,” wrote Flick. “Though he wasn’t as disruptive, Latu nearly matched Verse’s sack total with four, and he added 12 quarterback hits.” 

As mentioned by Flick, Latu’s overall production isn’t going to leap off the stat sheet. He finished his rookie season with four sacks, and he ranked 47th among all defensive ends in quarterback pressures with 38, which was also the second-most on the Colts.

However, a sign of what’s to come for Latu is that he was 27th in PFF’s pass rush win rate metric, and oftentimes, when a player is consistently winning their matchups–as Latu was–the production will follow.

Latu and the Colts’ defensive front as a whole should also benefit from Lou Anarumo’s more disguise-heavy and aggressive defensive scheme.

“He does it the right way,” Shane Steichen said of Latu via the team site at the NFL annual meeting. “The way he works, his work ethic is tremendous. I think you’ll see a big jump from Year 1 to Year 2. I think he had four (sacks) his rookie year, if we can get into double digits in Year 2, that’d be tremendous.”

This article originally appeared on Colts Wire: Colts pass on Laiatu Latu, who falls a few spots in 2024 NFL redraft