Grading a Draft?
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As you know, as soon as the first round is complete, and certainly after the end of it, pundits will come off with their "Draft Grades" of each team, and saying who did the best and who did the worst. But, then they will come up with the proviso: "Well, you really can't judge a draft until 3-5 years later" Right?
Well....lets do that. Let's look back and try to assess some kind of evaluation to any particular teams draft. The one way that I will look at and try to evaluate a draft is by looking at the PFR's Career Production Avg. I have simply added up and combined all the CA numbers for all the players drafted by a particular team for the year 2015, to see which teams came out on top, and on the bottom. These are pure raw accumulative numbers for each team's draftees of that year. It is highly possible/probable that some of these players did not do the "producing" for the team that traded them.
But, herewith is that data:
2015 Team Draftees Accumulated Career Production Average:
Top Ten .....teams with "best drafts of 2015
#1 Minnesota.....163 pts
#2. Tampa Bay.....155
#3 Kansas City.....151
#4 New England 134 pts
#5. Washington 124 pts
#6. Rams (then in St. L) 118 pts
#7. Arizona 107 pts
#8. Atlanta 106 pts
#9. Cleveland 104 pts
#10. San Francisco 96 pts
Bottom Dwellers, teams with worst drafts of 2015
32. Cincinnati 32 pts
31. NY Jets 49 pts
30. Pittsburgh 53 pts.
29. Buffalo 54 pts
28. Denver 58 pts.
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Notes:
A. Top contributors to the #1 Vikings were Stefon Diggs, Danielle Hunter, Eric Kendricks
B. Top contributors to Browns #9 spot were: Danny Shelton, Duke Johnson, Cam Erving, Nate Orchard....NONE still with the team.
C. Top overall performers from that draft... per this stat were: 1. Jameis Winston 2. Marcus Peters 3. Todd Gurley 4. Marcus Mariota 5. Kendricks 6. Hunter, 7. Bernardick McKinney 8. Diggs.
D. Using another measurement top players were: Amari Cooper...4 Pro Bowls;
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Herewith is the Data for the Grading of the 2016 NFL Draft.
Teams that did the "Best": Top 10
1. Dallas Cowboys 169 pts (Zeke/Dak top producers)
2 . Tenn Titans 122 pts (top contributor was Jack Conklin.....now a Brown
3. Baltimore 115 pts
4. New England 114 pts
5. Cleveland Browns 110 pts Schobert, Ogbah, Nassib top producers....NONE any longer with the team.
6. Chicago Bears 109 pts
7. Jacksonville 107 pts
8. T Atlanta 104 pts
8.T Detroit 104
10. Philadelphia 103 pts
Bottom Dwellers "Worst Drafts of 2016":
32. Arizona 26 pts
31. Minnesota 31 pts
30. Buffalo 40 pts
29. Washington 41 pts
28. Tampa Bay 42 pts.
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Top Performers per PFR CA to come out of 2016 draft (in order):
1. Dak Prescott
2. Michael Thomas
3. Zeke Elliott
4. Tyreek Hill
5. Carson Wentz
6. Jared Goff
7. Ronnie Stanley
8. Jalen Ramsey
9. DeForest Buckner
10. Joe Thuney
And, note this: Players from 2016 with most Pro Bowl appearances:
Hill: 4; Ramsey/Thomas/Zeke 3; Dak/Goff 2.....plus 2 for Joey Bosa....and 2 for....Austin Hooper!
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Here are the numbers for the Final Year that I will do: 3 years ago....2017 draft.
The Top Ten "Best" Drafts of 2017:
1. New Orleans (by far) 132 pts.
2. Buffalo 86 pts
3. Houston 83 pts (led by Watson)
4. LA Chargers 82 pts
5. San Francisco 81 pts
6. Chicago 78 pts
7.T Kansas City 77 pts
7T. Minnesota 77 pts
9T. Cleveland 76 pts (Garrett)
9T Pittsburgh 76 pts.
Worst Drafts of 2017:
32. New England 14 pts
31T. Denver 31 pts
31T. Oakland 31 pts
29. Atlanta 36 pts
28. Arizona 39 pts.
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Top Individual Producers from 2017 Draft:
1. Alvin Kamara N.O.
2. Patrick Mahomes KC
3. Ryan Ramczyk N.O.
4. Christian McCaffrey Carolina
5. Deshaun Watson Hou.
6. TJ Ward Pitt
7. TreDavious White Buffalo
8. Eddie Jackson Chicago
9. Jamal Adams NY Jets
10. Kareem Hunt KC
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One Final Metric:
Here are the Top 5 teams with the most player Production over the course of the three years documented here: 2015/16/17:
1. Kansas City 330 pts (and it has paid off apparently.....defending Super Bowl champs)
2. New Orleans Saints 318 pts with 3 playoff appearances, including Conf title game.
3. Cleveland Browns 290 pts. and not a sniff at the playoff......includes a 1-31 run in there.
4. Dallas Cowboys 281 pts. 2 playoffs, 1 win
5. Minnesota Vikings 271 pts. 3 playoff appearances including one Conf. title game
So.....What is wrong with this picture?
And here are the teams with the worst draft record over that 3 year period:
32. Oakland Raiders 157 pts
31. Cincinnati Bengals 170 pts
30. Arizona Cardinals 172 pts
29. Denver Broncos 175 pts
28. NY Jets 176 pts
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A draft is also an opinion.... I have seen players in some drafts mocked in the 2nd round that others rank in the 6th....its like FA, The Browns Hooper move got an A grade from one grader I seen and a C- from another
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A draft is also an opinion.... I have seen players in some drafts mocked in the 2nd round that others rank in the 6th....its like FA, The Browns Hooper move got an A grade from one grader I seen and a C- from another
A draft is also an opinion.... I have seen players in some drafts mocked in the 2nd round that others rank in the 6th....its like FA, The Browns Hooper move got an A grade from one grader I seen and a C- from another
But what I have given here is not about mock drafts or projections, but is a history of performance....if you put any credence into the PFR CA stat.
If one is not down with this method of attempting to "grade a draft"...then by all means show an alternate method.
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I guess I will ask this again, or formulate the question better: Giving some credibility to this metric which concludes that the Cleveland Browns over that 3 year period acquired players in those 3 drafts that have show, as a group, to be the third best/most productive players in the NFL, how has this team been such a shitshow over that period compared to the likes of the Saints/Vikings/Chief/Cowboys who all have had multiple playoff appearances?
Is it because, in fact, they have gotten rid of EVERY player they took in two of those drafts? Was getting rid of a lot of those guys a mistake? If the production numbers are fair, we can't say that it was poor talent evaluation, theoretically.
Absolute piss poor coaching.....Hue/Freddie, is, I believe a major, major part of it. Can it be just that?
Can another major factor be that while those players at those positions produced fairly well....the one position that did not was QB, as we did not really have one. (QBs drafted: Kizer/Kessler)
Does it boil down to just that: bad coach/bad QB.....but decent other players?
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