Best Drafting the Past 5 / 10 Years?
 

Saw this, was pretty interesting.

http://www.nationalfootballpost.com/...-drafting.html

That 2008 draft for the Chiefs was pretty beastly: Branden Albert, Brandon Flowers, Jamaal Charles, Brandon Carr.

2007 was gold for the niners. Patrick Willis, Joe Staley, Ray McDonald, Dashon Goldson and Tarrell Brown.

The Pats have sustained success over the past decade but we have had some pretty piss poor drafts. We have definitely hit a few home runs, but there have been a crazy amount of misses. Many of these bed-wetting picks have been premium picks too. It looks like we have improved over the last three drafts, but there we really just whiffed on a frightening amount of picks.

2006, 2007, and 2008 might be the worst three year string of drafts for any team ever. Jerod Mayo is pretty much the only player worth a **** from those 3 drafts. We also got Matt Slater and Gostkowski. Those are far and away the two next best players from those 3 drafts and a total of 26 picks.

2009 we had 13 picks, including 4 second rounders. We got Vollmer and Edelman out of that draft. Chung was like the first pick in the second round, he looked promising but has fallen off. Myron Pryor was a decent pick but another **** class.

2008 was brutal for Pittsburgh, my god what a train wreck. I loved the draft when it happened, but by now there's nothing left.

1. RB Rashard Mendenhall, Illinois
2. WR Limas Sweed, Texas
3. DE/OLB Bruce Davis, UCLA
4. OT Tony Hills, Texas
5. QB Dennis Dixon, Oregon
6. LB Mike Humpal, Iowa
6. S Ryan Mundy, WV

Humpal didn't make it out of training camp. Sweed, Davis, Hills, and Dixon never amounted to anything and are now either out of the league or bouncing around practice squads. Mendenhall is set to leave as a FA, and Mundy might leave too, even though he's nothing to write home about.

The Bears were 25th in 2008. They should have listened to me. I really wanted Albert and Charles.

The problem with the analysis is that "starts" aren't necessarily a great metric for drafting success on the short term, since it is biased towards weak rosters (where a player has an easy time becoming a starter) and against strong rosters (where a player has a hard time becoming a starter.) In the long term roster churn is going to mitigate this, but I don't know how long that time frame will be.

I mean, lest we forget, Aldon Smith recorded 0 starts as a rookie. There are plenty of guys drafted in 2011 who recorded at least one start that year, and started every game in 2012. Were they really better picks than Aldon Smith though? I mean, Blaine Gabbert has 9 more starts over two years than Aldon Smith.

Carolina is pretty good in the first round, has been for a decade.

- Luke Kuechley
- Cam Newton
- Jeff Otah
- Jonathan Stewart
- DeAngelo Williams
- Thomas Davis
- Chris Gamble
- Jordan Gross
- Julius Peppers
- Dan Morgan

Otah was the only bad pick, and even he played pretty well his rookie year before injuries and laziness derailed his career.

Sadly, there are more rounds than the first...

BF51 was riding the Jamaal Charles bandwagon that year iirc

Good points. I'm not familiar with Draftmetrics.com or their previous work, but I question the methodology of any system that spits out teams like the Cardinals, Browns, Chiefs, and Dolphins as being some of the best drafting teams.

This doesn't pass the laugh test.

I think the real testament to "which teams are the best drafters" are the teams that get significant contributions from picks in the rounds that aren't expected to yield stars or starters.

I mean, drafting Mike Iupati in the first round is easy. Everybody was pretty sure he's going to be good, and the teams who didn't draft him just thought somebody else would help them more. Drafting Josh Sitton in the fourth round is not easy. Every team passed on him at least three times (preferring household names on the OL like David Hale and Tony Hills), and the fact that you get a 5-year starter and multiple-time pro bowler out of a fourth round pick is a testament to your scouts (as well as your coaches.)

It would be interesting to do an analysis that weights "starts" inversely proportional to the the round a guy was selected in (so a 7th round pick who starts counts for more than a first round pick who starts.)

Alternatively (though this would be much more labor intensive) compare the median percentage of eligible snaps (i.e. what percentage of defensive snaps does a defender actually play) for each position and round (e.g. fourth round DTs, second round WRs, etc.) to players of those positions drafted by those teams. That would probably give a much better picture of who the best drafting teams are, but would require a lot of work.

The Texans 2006 draft was really good..

1. Mario
2. DeMeco Ryans
3. Charles Spencer (Started first two games at LT in rookie season before brutally breaking his leg in 3rd game. Career was never the same)
4. Eric Winston
5. Owen Daniels
6. Wali Lundy
7. David Anderson

That was a really, really big draft for them.

Haha, Cowboys 31st. What a surprise. And I'm not going out on a limb here, but can any team say they had a draft worse then this in the past 10 years:


3rd: Jason Williams - We were looking for our Bruce Carter. All he was was a fast LB who never did anything but play special teams.

3rd: Robert Brewster - Missed his whole rookie season due to injury, never played a game.

4th: Stephen McGee - He did beat the Eagles in a meaningless game one time lol. Sucked. He got spot duty but he was always garbage.

4th: Victor Butler - Reserve player. Showed some flashes, but he's a career back-up.

4th: Brandon Williams - Another career back-up and special teamer.

5th: DeAngelo Smith - Cut in '09 training camp.

5th: Michael Hamlin - Cut before his 2nd season, never did a thing but play special teams.

5th: David Buehler - Yep. We spent a 5th round pick on a kicker who only came out for kickoffs. Lol.

6th: Stephen Hodge - Never played.

6th: John Phillips - He was an ok back-up to Witten but nothing more.

7th: Mike Mickens - Cut in '09 traning camp.

7th: Manny Johnson - Cut.



Oh yea, how can we forget this is the draft that we used a 1st and a 3rd for Roy Williams:facepalm: So basically we used our entire 2009 draft class on Roy Williams and a bunch of special teamers. Awesome. Victor Butler is the only guy still even on the team at this point.


Now it has gotten somewhat better, Dez and Sean Lee in 2010 in the first 2 rounds, Tyron Smith and Bruce Carter in 2011 in the first 2, Claiborne last year. Our problem is depth, and when you have a draft as ****** as 2009 it sets your team back really far.

Damn what a sick class. So many of us here wanted Charles or Chris Johnson over Felix Jones. Ugh.

I still love me some Chris Johnson, tons of titans fans were calling that months before the draft.

Personally, I wanted us to look elsewhere round 1 and take Charles round 2

Kind of funny that those stats show that good drafting teams don't necessarily mean they draft good teams, just that the players they draft end up sticking.

I think this is what really is what indicates that their methodology is flawed.

I mean, what is the purpose of drafting well? To make your team better. If you have not effectively made your team better via the draft, then you haven't drafted well no matter how much those guys play.

I mean, if you draft a quarterback high and he can't play at all but you insist on starting him every week anyway, then you're just making a second mistake to compound your initial mistake in the draft. It's not like this doesn't happen.

I mean, we're judging teams for picking players who play (specifically start), not for teams that pick players who play well. It's not like a linebacker who starts, but comes off the field in passing situations is a better pick than a pass rusher who comes off the bench and gets double-digit sacks for you.

The 2012 Rams draft has been the Best complete draft the Rams have had in a long time. Gets me excited for what Snead and Coach Fisher can do in their 2nd year.

All of these teams have one thing in common: piss poor QB play. It doesn't mean the talent on the team was bad, it just means that they don't have a complete team. I don't think anyone can argue that.

Are any of these guys on the team still?

Owen Daniels

So Phil Emery was with the Chiefs for 3 of those years...



Mah GM

With as many picks as you had that shouldn't have been that hard. But you still have some pretty high picks that have had no production(Quick & Pead) who may or may not be complete bust. They'll have a few players out of this draft but they absolutely should have with the haul they had.

You could also say though, that New England drafted Brady, Ridley, Gronkowski, Hernandez, Solder, Mankins, and Vollmer on offense, with Wendell as a UDFA.

On defense, Wilfork, Jones, Mayo, Spikes, Hightower, Dennard, and McCourty were all draft picks, with Love as a UDFA.

Welker and Talib were also acquired with draft picks, leaving only Lloyd, Connolly, Ninkovich, Arrington, and Gregory as free agents, meaning that almost all of New England's starters were acquired through the draft or through trades involving draft picks.

Seattle's '10 class netted Russell Okung, Earl Thomas, Golden Tate and Kam Chancellor. Anthony McCoy also started getting quite a bit of regular playing time this year. That's three Pro Bowlers already, and Golden Tate could get on that level depending how the offense continues to evolve under Russell Wilson, who's helping to make the '12 draft look pretty epic as well.

Here's the 2004 Bucs draft:

1st: Michael Clayton WR - At least he was productive during his rookie season. Then... ugh, I don,t want to even think about it. I remember that Bucs fans wanted Steven Jackson. But I guess Jon Gruden knew better... right ? :facepalm:

3rd: Marquis Cooper LB - Played two seasons with the Bucs... as a special teamer.

4th: Will Allen FS - Allen stays around 6 seasons with the Bucs, but was nothing more than a special teamer.

5th Jeb Terry OG - Was a backup for like 30 games with us.

6th: Nate Lawrie TE - Cut after his 1st training camp.

7th: Mark Jones WR - Cut after his 1st training camp. Had a second stint with the team some years after that to be an average kicks returner.

7th: Casey Cramer RB - Cut after his 1st training camp.

7th: Lenny Williams DB - Cut after his 1st training camp. Now in the CFL.

Basically, a good year out of Michael Clayton and a couple of special teamers. Not sure if it's worst than that 2009 Cowboys draft, but still. Here are Jon Gruden's other drafts with us:

2002
3rd. Marquis Walker WR.
4th. Travis Stephens RB.
5th. Jermaine Phillips DB.
6th. John Stamper DE.
7th. Tim Wansley DB.
7th. Tracey Wistrom TE.
7th. Aaron Lockett WR.
7th. Zac Quaccia OC.

:facepalm: The only reason I can explain that draft is the lack of 1st and 2nd round picks. Jemaine Phillips was decent for a few years.

2003
2nd. Dewayne White DE.
3rd. Chris Simms QB.
4th. Lance Nimmo OT.
4th. Austin King OT.
5th. Sean Mahan OG.
6th. Torrie Cox DB.

Another miss.

2004
See higher.

2005.
1st. Cadillac Williams RB.
2nd. Barret Ruud LB.
3rd. Alex Smith TE.
3rd. Chris Colmer OT.
4th. Dan Buenning OG.
5th. Donte Nicholson DB.
5th. Larry Brackins WR.
6th. Anthony Bryant DT.
7th Rick Razzano RB.
7th. Paris Warren WR.
7th Hamza Abdullah DB.
7th. JR Russell WR.

Cadillac had the "injuriezzz excuses" while Ruud was good for two seasons. After that, :facepalm: . What's the point of having a ton of late picks when you're always drafting camp bodies with these.

2006
1st. Davin Joseph OG.
2nd. Jeremy Trueblood OT.
3rd. Maurice Stovall WR.
4th. Alan Zemaitis DB.
5th. Julian Jenkins DE.
6th. Bruce Gradkowski QB.
6th. TJ Williams TE.
7th. Justin Phinisee DB.
7th. Charles Bennett LB.
7th. Tim Massaquoi TE.

Davin Joseph is the best Bucs player drafted by Gruden. After that, it's still awful. Bruce Gradkowski is Gruden's "best late round pick" (yep, that's right).

2007.
1st. Gaines Adams DE.
2nd. Arron Sears OG.
2nd. Sabby Piscitelli FS.
3rd. Quincy Black LB.
4th. Tanard Jackson DB.
5th. Greg Peterson DE.
6th. Adam Hayward LB.
6th. Chris Denman OT.
7th. Marcus Hamilton DB
7th. Kenneth Darby RB.

Sabby :facepalm:

2008
1. Aqib Talib DB.
2. Dexter Jackson WR. :facepalm: :facepalm: :facepalm: :facepalm:
3. Jeremy Zuttah OL.
4. Dre Moore DT.
5. Josh Johnson QB.
6. Geno Hayes LB.
7. Cory Boyd RB.

Another miss... but this might be the best draft he had with us!