There is always apprehension when Panthers' fans hear the team has conducted a draft day trade. Some trades have worked out such as those bringing us Jonathan Stewart and Ryan Kail; others like Jeff Otah not so much. This year the Panthers again traded up taking Frank Alexander in the fourth round. One quarter into the season I thought we should look at how this trade has impacted the Panthers. This isn't an in depth overview, so much as, a general stats outline for the latest Panthers' trade against his drafted peers. All stats were taken from sports.yahoo.com/nfl and if a player didn't have stats on his page I just left him off assuming he was on the practice squad.

You can see the Panthers have appeared to have made a great selection with Alexander. He is tied for second in sacks and tackles behind only New England's Chandler Jones and leads in passes defended. Although this overview doesn't take into account schemes or starting status; I do want to note that there is considerable difference between a 4-3 DE like Alexander and a 3-4 DE like Quinton Coples.

None the less Alexander is having a stellar statical year thus far keeping up with or out performing several first round draft picks and blowing away second round and beyond draftees. Extrapolation is fairly pointless but Alexander is on pace for 28 tackles, 10 sacks, and 12 PD pretty great numbers for what will become a third round selection in 2013. So far the trade for Alexander is paying great dividends may result in him becoming a starter sooner rather than later as Greg Hardy has posted 12 tackles and 1 sack thus far and has failed to play well against the run during his time with the Panthers.

Until next time.