CINCINNATI -- Jalen Ramsey impressed Adam Jones two weeks ago when Jones, the veteran Cincinnati Bengals cornerback, pulled up his college game tape ahead of the NFL draft.

By comparison though, William Jackson III's game tape was so scintillating to Jones that he would practically jump up every time he saw the Houston Cougars cornerback bat away a pass. Once he saw the frequency with which Jackson was around the football, Jones became convinced of this: Jackson was the best cornerback in this NFL draft class.

"He's really good," Jones said. "He's one of the best I've seen. I actually liked him better than the kid from Florida [State]."

The kid from Florida State was Ramsey, the consensus All-America Seminoles cornerback who was selected fifth overall by Jacksonville in last Thursday's opening round of the draft. It wasn't until the Bengals' pick at 24th overall when Jackson came off the board, sending him to the same secondary Jones has helped anchor since 2010.

"I can learn a lot from Adam Jones, just by being around him and seeing what he did to stay in the league," Jackson said Thursday about his new 32-year-old teammate. "Hopefully I can stay in the league a while as well."

Credited with a nation-leading 28 passes defensed in 2015, it was no fluke that Jackson always appeared to be around the football on the tape that Jones watched. Some of Jackson's best display of his presence around the ball came against Ramsey's Seminoles. Jackson's Peach Bowl performance might have helped convince Jones to sway the balance of 2016 rookie cornerback supremacy into Jackson's favor. Against a young and injured group of Seminoles quarterbacks that day, Jackson intercepted two passes, broke up two more and recorded a career-high 10 tackles. Ramsey didn't have any breakups in the game, but finished with nine tackles.

Each year, Jones puts on his scout's hat just to see who the upcoming cornerback talent is. This year, he even compared notes on receivers with Bengals director of player personnel Duke Tobin, the man who coordinates much of Cincinnati's scouting efforts.

Here is Jones' brief explanation to reporters on why he liked Jackson better than Ramsey:

"A lot of plays Ramsey made, he was already beaten. He made a lot of plays because he was long. This kid [Jackson] is around the ball a lot. I only saw like two plays where he was beaten on the deep ball, where size made up for it. But besides that, he's in a great spot every time."

Here is Jones' scouting report on Bengals second-round pick, receiver Tyler Boyd (Pitt):

"He reminds me a lot of [Larry] Fitzgerald with his hands. I wasn't too impressed about the routes, but his hands are unbelievable. But he'll learn the routes once we get him here and get him behind the system. We've got one of the best guys in the league [receivers coach James Urban] that's going to be teaching him, so he'll learn.

And who were Jones' other favorite receivers?