Marvin Harrison Jr.: The benchmark for Carolina Panthers 2024 WR scouting

Even if the Carolina Panthers don't have a first-round pick, is Marvin Harrison Jr. the best wide receiver prospect in the last decade?

Despite not having a first-round selection in the 2024 NFL Draft, Carolina Panthers fans should still get to know who the best prospects could be for next year's event, even if they won't be in the running for them. Still, having a benchmark for the potential 2024 wide receiver class will be helpful to have.

The 2023 NFL Draft is in the rearview mirror, especially for the Carolina Panthers. Draft class breakdowns are done for the most part, film reviews are coming and going, and grades on each draft selection or class are all but through.

While the most recent draft has been completed, the cycle continues. Fans need to get an idea of who to look out for in next year’s draft and throughout the upcoming season. This is why we have summer scouting; to evaluate and touch on the potential top prospects in next year’s draft - it's genuinely a 24/7/365 cycle.

To kick off my summer scouting, I took an in-depth dive into the film of Ohio State wide receiver Marvin Harrison Jr., the son of Pro Football Hall of Famer Marvin Harrison.

Harrison is the country's best wideout with the accolades and production to back it up. He’s a unanimous All-American, first-team All-Big 10, and averaged just over 16 yards per reception while racking up 14 touchdowns for Ohio State, according to ESPN.

Of course, not everything is about statistics and awards. Does the film back up the claim mentioned above? After digging into his tape, I believe Harrison is just that.

Here is my film review of the Buckeyes star receiver.

What does the film show of Marvin Harrison Jr.?

The first thing that I need to bring up is his size and athleticism. Marvin Harrison Jr. is undoubtedly bigger than his dad was in the pros at 6-foot-3 and 206 pounds. However, he offers some incredible athletic ability for his body type.

Harrison has a long wingspan, terrific short-area quickness, rare twitch for his size, and the vertical long speed to create big plays downfield. That alone makes him a tough task for any defensive back.

As a route runner, Harrison is as good as they come. He does an ample job being a salesman as it pertains to being manipulative with his routes and creating separation. He uses swift, subtle movements and pure head fakes to force defenders to commit their leverage inside or out, depending on the route.

The prospect displays that in the clip above. It’s important to note that he always works to make himself available to the quarterback in off-script situations. 

The former four-star high school recruit also hits his landmarks very well as a route runner. He knows when to cut his route off, break them in, or out. Some receivers will display choppy or wasted footwork when breaking at the stem of their routes, but not Harrison. There is very little to no wasted movement in this area.

One of the things that I love about Harrison is how much variance he brings at the line of scrimmage while displaying an incredible amount of suddenness against press-man alignments. There is no wasted movement when it comes to his footwork as he is very disciplined and deliberate with his releases. 

In Rob’s tweet above, you can see the body control and ball skills that are a part of who Harrison is as a receiver. It’s easy to see how soft and firm his hands are. In the five games I watched, he rarely double-catches or drops the football.

His tracking and concentration skills in contested situations are excellent thanks to his incredible toughness through the catch point and the wingspan to make grabs away from his frame.

One of the things I appreciate about Harrison is his football IQ. He understands how to manipulate defenders when working against press and off-man alignments and does a great job working into the soft spots of zone coverage to make himself available for the quarterback.

Harrison also offers a good knowledge of how to defeat the inside/outside leverage of defenders. I love his sideline awareness, which has given way to some spectacular catches on the boundary.

If you’re worried about Harrison and the competition he faced last season, don’t be. Here is a list of defensive backs he worked against in 2022 plus the Rose Bowl in his freshman season:

• Michigan’s D.J. Turner
• Maryland’s Deonte Banks
• Georgia’s Kelee Ringo
• Penn State’s Joey Porter Jr. and Kalen King
• Iowa Cooper DeJean
• Utah’s Clark Phillips III

Harrison faced defensive backs of different physical and athletic profiles. He fared very well against these players that have or are likely top 100 selections in their respective drafts, not to mention he has consistently practiced with teammate and potential top prospect, Denzel Burke.

If only the Carolina Panthers didn't have to sacrifice significant capital to finally solve their quarterback problem.

How Marvin Harrison Jr. compares to previous top WR prospects

This year’s draft was underwhelming at wide receiver. There weren’t any big-time prospects that are projected to be potential high-end WR1s in the NFL, at least from my perspective, even though the Carolina Panthers spent a second-round selection on Jonathan Mingo.

Before we start this section, I am going to list some of the top wide receiver prospects going back to my first year as a draft evaluator, which was in 2018.

• D.K. Metcalf (2019)
• A.J. Brown (2019)
• D.J. Moore (2018)
• Calvin Ridley (2018)
• Jaylen Waddle (2021)
• Ja’Marr Chase (2021)
• Chris Olave (2022)
• Garrett Wilson (2022)
• CeeDee Lamb (2020)
• Jerry Jeudy (2020)

I came into the summer evaluation of Marvin Harrison Jr. with the expectation that I was going to watch the best wide receiver in the country and a no-doubt top prospect for the 2024 NFL Draft. Not only did see both of those things, I think he might be the best prospect at the position I’ve ever watched since 2018.

Fans will argue that Ja'Marr Chase was a generational prospect, considering he was the No. 5 overall pick by the Cincinnati Bengals in 2021. However, he was my WR2 in a class where I saw Jaylen Waddle being the better prospect overall due to his rare explosiveness and dynamic ability as a receiver and returner on special teams.

Chase wasn’t an elite separator, didn’t have prototypical size, and had his fair share of drops.
Harrison is thoroughly a better prospect in those three areas and was the better player than the names I listed above. 

I looked through some of the names of the top receiver prospects from the six draft classes preceding the 2018 event. I can say with great confidence that Harrison would’ve been WR1 in 2015 (Amari Cooper, Kevin White, Breshad Perriman), 2016 (​​Josh Doctson, Corey Coleman, Michael Thomas), and 2017 (Mike Williams, Corey Davis, John Ross). 

The 2014 class is a little bit tougher considering how rare of a group it was and how many receivers went on to be high-level players at the position such as Odell Beckham Jr., Mike Evans, and Davante Adams. Going back on my memory, I don’t think there was a true consensus WR1 in that class during the pre-draft cycle.

I will give Harrison the edge in this group, including in the next two preceding drafts; 2012 (Justin Blackmon, Michael Floyd, Kendall Wright) and 2013 (DeAndre Hopkins, Keenan Allen, Tavon Austin).

This leads me to believe that Harrison is arguably the best wide receiver prospect since the historic 2011 NFL Draft that featured rare talents such as Alabama’s Julio Jones and Georgia’s A.J. Green. Both of them seemingly had decent careers in the NFL.

The bottom line on Marvin Harrison Jr.

Due to the blockbuster trade that led to the Carolina Panthers drafting Alabama quarterback Bryce Young, the lack of a first-round selection next offseason will keep the franchise out of the Marvin Harrison Jr. sweepstakes. However, this is a clear sign that next year's wide receiver group is likely to be a better one than the down year of the 2023 draft class.

It was very hard to find a significant flaw in Harrison’s game. This is an incredibly refined receiver who can win in multiple facets from creating separation, succeeding in contested catch situations, making grabs away from his frame, and winning downfield with vertical speed.

The only thing that I would like to see more from Harrison is demonstrating creativity in space, though I believe he can do that fairly well. The son of Marvin Harrison Sr. has the accolades, production, and film to back up potential arguments of whether or not he is a generational wide receiver prospect. 

While I don’t like making definitive remarks about draft prospects during summer scouting, considering that there will be much more information that will come out through film, more accolades, etc., this is a summer evaluation I feel very confident in.

At the moment, Harrison is the best receiver prospect I’ve ever evaluated. He’s the type of talent that you select in the first five to ten selections in the draft order, and certainly a can't-miss prospect during the 2023 college football season.