Something Rhule said during the press conf today was that he wants supreme athletes who can put it on tape. Fitt also said their criteria for trading down was if the value didn't match the player that was at the top of their board at the time (or something to that extent). They weren't afraid to miss out on a player if they felt the value of trading down got them a net positive.
That said, if you look at our draft history for the past 20 years.. It's pretty obvious which drafts got people fired.
https://www.panthers.com/history/draft
There's a few drafts in there that look straight embarrassing in retrospect. From 2011, only Cam made it past year 2. 2011 draft screwed us hard in 2014 where normally a lot of those players would be on a contract year. We stumbled but luckily other teams in our division stumbled worse. We lucked out. What this says is if you're picking players that are not even good for depth, then you're not going to run a successful team in the long term. A once in a generation player can pull your team higher but not as high if the base talent level of the team isn't that great.
Rhule wants guys who already have powerful self-motivation and drive to be better and great. All these guys have something to prove and have a chip on their shoulder and want to beast on people. These aren't quiet guys who fade away like many of those draft picks of the past that disappear after 3 years. (We Hope)
All in all, so far I think we're getting players to set the tone for the team. We may not be addressing needs aggressively or protecting the Darnold at all costs.. but we're getting guys who will buy in because they want to succeed too. Whether or not that actually works out is yet to be seen. We won't know until their Rookie contracts are up or they get cut in year 2.