I remember both 2007 and 2009 as being horrible that way, and I did an article on my old CBS blog outlining how bad 2005 turned out to be after a five-year lookback. But for the last 10 years or so, yeah, this one already looks like the worst. Having the quality curve drop off through rounds 3-4 like this is pretty extreme.
I mean it is the documentary of what happened after the lingerie football league got removed from ESPN. It just looks like porn... lol
No matter how late i stay up, Im awake at 4am. Last night I went to bed after midnight and auto-woke up at 4 am. Sleep has been illusive to me, maybe its overrated? Catches up to me once in a while tho.
I picked at 27 + 41 this round. I had actually considered going back to back with Atonio Mafi and Jordan McFadden. We have interviewed both guys and I happen to like both their tape regardless. I like McFadden more as a G transition but I wonder if the RL team views him sticking at T. Another thing I’m curious about; I heard a rumor somewhere that Mafi has some off-putting character traits. But I haven’t heard it consistently nor do I know what exactly that means. But it’s possibly a reason for the disparity in draft ranking that piques my curiosity. And that is the big difference between Atonio Mafi and Steve Avila. When I first watched both, and that was pretty early on, I had them ranked very closely together. But almost instantly I would hear projections with Avila in the top 60 and Mafi well below 100. Personally I don’t get it. Feel free to dive down that tape rabbit hole if you have the time
Charley Casserly used to get a lot of flak (for looking like such a doofus on NFL-N as much as anything else), but he said something in one of the broadcasts in 2007 that clicked for me, and he repeated it in an article right after that draft when he reviewed each team's draft class. He said on the TV spot that when he was a GM, he had done a study (more likely had an intern do it) of previous drafts over a 10-year period and looked at what percentages of players were starters four years later. Here's how he put it in the article after the draft: I did a 10-year study on the draft to judge the success rate of players selected in each round. I defined a successful player as one who is starting four years after being drafted. Four years gives him a chance to prove himself, and if you are not starting after four years you will probably be replaced on the roster. The results were as follows: Round 1 -- 75 percent Round 2 -- 50 percent Round 3 -- 30 percent Round 4 -- 25 percent Round 5 -- 20 percent Round 6 -- 9 percent Round 7 -- 9 percent Average -- 31 percent It hit me right away that something along those lines would be a great way to assess a draft year as a whole and also a way to track a GM's performance over time. Of course, the devil is in the details... how do you define if a guy is a starter? For example, if he was a full time starter in year three but missed year four to injury, or if he was a starter in years two and three but only a part time starter in year four? Or if he never started for Team A, got traded or released, and then became a true starter for Team B. Or if he started every single game he played but got hurt so often he only played 30 games in four seasons? And do you count kickers, punters, nickel corners and slot receivers as "starters" ? I figured out a method and eventually did a review of the 2004, 2005 and 2006 draft classes based on five years rather than four and using 40+ starts (half of 80 regular season games over the five seasons) as the criteria. I don't think I have the spreadsheets anymore (they'd certainly be very hard to find) and CBS wiped out the blog posts. But if I remember correctly, 2005 turned out to be significantly weaker overall than the other years. I also remember that the 2011 CBA made me think I needed to scrap the methodology and come up with something different, so I never did the 2007, 2008 and 2009 draft classes that way. The weakness we're seeing at the bottom of this draft class makes me think I need to get back on it and work out some kind of methodology that makes sense.
This is really interesting. And it's easy to forget guys like Casserly were major NFL players for a long time. But when they retire and lose touch with the modern game and say things like "Lamar Jackson is a WR" (That one was Polian...) we just laugh at the old fuddy duddy's.
Thats very interesting... Here is that 2005 Draft Class First Round. Out of the 32 teams, I remember just 10 names off that list of first rounders, not exactly the worlds greatest memory here, but I was kinda surprised I didnt know many more.
He also got a lot of heat - and was pressured to resign from his role as Texans GM, which he did - after the 2006 draft. He had the #1 overall pick and totally blew it by passing up both the can't-miss mega-stud franchise QB and the phenomenal game-changing running back. He took the top defensive end instead. That made him the butt of jokes from every hack writer and TV talking head, sealing his fate as far as costing him his job. The silly fool actually believed that Mario Williams would be a better NFL player than Vince Young or Reggie Bush...
I'm a little worried for you. 2/3 of that 1st round had at least a marginally positive impact if I'm not mistaken. Maybe not for 4/5 years but they were some names.
Reading that list I couldn't help but think of all the potential careers that got side tracked by injury. This really is a brutal sport for human bodies.
I see Torgo and Matt wanted in. I'd like to see at least 6 not counting myself and my family. It'd start at 2 or 3 pm if we have the numbers.
For a while I wondered how the Falcons could possibly be as snake-bit as they seemed to be, such as with nearly the entire 2010 draft class. But there are so many injuries like that all across the league that they are bound to stack up on some teams at some points in time. But I still can't help but wonder if some teams have subpar strength and conditioning staffs that compounds the problem. I also cringe when I hear about the quality of the field being such an issue, such as Detroit's game at Carolina this past season. The league has safety tests, and that field failed before that game. But they played the game on it anyway. It blew my mind when I first read that - by NFL standards, the field was KNOWN to be subpar and unsafe. Gotta do better than that. If I'm a free agent, there's no way I'm even considering playing for the Panthers.
In my spreadsheet, I think the first round turned out subpar, but it was really the second and third rounds where the big drop happened. Something like maybe 18% and 12% starters for rounds 3 and 4 that year, compared to Casserly's estimates of 30% and 25% on average. 2007 jumps out at me as another weak one because that was when Belichick had said well before the draft that he didn't like the draft class and would do what he could to get out of it. And he certainly made good on that statement. He had an extra first rounder that year (from trading Deion Branch to the Seahawks), which he used (taking Brandon Meriwether). But he traded his own 1st, 2nd, 3rd, one of two 4ths, 5th (had already traded that one) and 7th. That's a pretty effective job of getting out of that draft.
