The Chargers selected Florida C Jake Slaughter in the second round of this year's draft. Normally in most mock drafts, they'd get a guard in round one or two. The most speculated fits before April's draft were guard names like Chase Bisontis, Keylan Rutledge, Emmanuel Pregnon, Gennings Dunker, etc. Instead, the Chargers got a little unconventional. They took a center of the future that they believe can play guard now.
Slaughter was announced as a guard when the Chargers turned the pick in. In his post-draft press conference, Joe Hortiz drove home the front office and coaching staff's confidence that the Florida product can play guard on draft night. Slaughter only played center in college and had a rough experience at guard during the Senior Bowl.
Jake Slaughter is ready for the guard challenge the Chargers are presenting him with.
Slaughter spoke with the media for the first time since draft night at Chargers' rookie minicamp. One of the first questions asked was about how his cross training at guard is going:
"My thing is I'm going to go out and compete and do everything I can to be the best version of myself," Slaughter said.
Slaughter said that he had been getting in work at guard during the draft process and that the cross training has increased since being drafted by Los Angeles.
"For me it's always the difference in space," Slaughter explained. "Spacing differences, footwork differences here and there. So it's a fun challenge."
OC Mike McDaniel talked up Slaughter at his media availability as well and called him one of the most accurate shotgun snappers he's ever seen.
McDaniel said that Slaughter's athleticism is something he's not given enough credit for outside of the Chargers' building. Interestingly, McDaniel specifically mentioned Slaughter more at center in regards to his tools than guard. At least in this specific press conference, the Chargers OC didn't play up the notion of guard quite as much as Hortiz.
But ultimately, Slaughter will compete for the left guard spot along with Trevor Penning and a group of other depth options behind them. But barring Slaughter looking completely out of sorts at guard during camp or in games, it seems like the Chargers are more than willing to take the dice roll of the guard conversion while letting him grow.
Free agent signing Cole Stange will likely start at right guard and Tyler Biadiasz is the teams' starting center. Slaughter can go a long way in proving some draft prognositcators wrong if he does excel at guard for the Bolts this season.
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