Drafting for Value

[brick]

As some of you know I have a blog (yeah that link in my sig) as one of you bastichs knows, I have been working on quantifying my belief that you do not draft BPA or based strictly on need, but must Maximize the Value of your team's draft in order to be successful.

Well, Part One of explaining things is up. There are plenty of pretty charts to look at. But be warned, it is kinda long.

http://brickinthebox.blogspot.com/2009/04/drafting-for-value-different-way-of.html

If you have the time to take a look and give some feedback I would appreciate it. I figure if you guys can point out where my explanation is lacking, I can better the next installment with some Q&A to go along with looking at trading with the new chart.

Thanks

[007]

Nice read.

I read the whole thing, and liked it, although I disagree with parts of it. (As me and Rupert have 'discussed' in previous threads).

I wonder if teams really quantify that much information when making draft picks?

I mean, the Cowboys partial draft board was leaked on a camera phone last year, and it was a bunch of names written down from 1 to whatever. I know it was a couple weeks before the draft, but it still is relevant.

Another issue with the article is, how do we know what Al Davis and his braintrust perceive our needs to be? It could be hypothesized that Davis might be comfortable with Warren-Sands-Kelly at DT, and worried about Chris Johnson and Stanford Routt backing him up? Or maybe he likes the duo of Eugene and Branch enough to pass on a safety? Who knows, other than the big guy himself...

Lastly, what if a player the team ranks extremely high falls to the second or third round pick, but doesnt fit in the formula very well? Perhaps Maualuga falling to the 40th pick, or Max Unger dropping to round three?

Interesting though, for sure and great work.

I might have to read it again though, LOL.

[NIPS]

Nice read Brick

Might I suggest "Another Brick in the wall" over the "Brick in a box" theme

Have your people call my people and lets do lunch sometime

[Madturk]

Good stuff Brick but had my head spinning:D Looks like you really spent some time with it.

I echo 007's sentiments about what do we really perceive teams needs to be especially when it comes to the Raiders. Al Davis can easily reach for a db as he has in the past and turn everything upside down.

Your model has some merit though.

[Rupert]

Exactly what I was talking about Brick. There's no way in hell an organization that expects to make the most of their draft doesn't plan as many moves in advance as they can.

To take 007's example of a surprise player falling. We've seen how ALL teams deal with it. They let that player continue to fall if he wasn't a target.

Don't believe me? Run your brains back through the draft coverage as a player the talking heads and draft gurus love unexpectedly starts to fall. Team after team ignores him, even the teams the talking heads say "He'd be a great pick for so and so here." Ooops, the drop continues.

Why? Simple, that player/position combination is not on those teams' plans, even though all the "experts" think he should be.

In my suggested approach (and Brick's follows the same kind of thinking), like a chess grand master you are prepared for unexpected strategies. You've already prepared a scenario for Maualuga falling to #40. You know how you'd change your entire draft by selecting him.

If those things are not thought out in advance you can easily get thrown off your game by an unexpected jump or drop.

Simply drafting Maualuga as the BPA if you don't need and didn't plan for a LB in your draft makes every other draft and roster move after it a panic one. For example, if you had intended to draft a starting capable OL/DL in the 2nd because you're terribly thin at that position and don't think there is a starting capable OL/DL later in the draft, you've just fucked your whole off-season roster plan by drafting the unexpected "BPA". Doing that is sensless, and why you see teams passing on great players in the draft that were not in their plans.

Fail to plan, plan to fail. It gets no simpler than that.

It's why you always see the Raiders signing a bunch of no-name FA's prior to the draft in positions of "need". They're preparing for the unexpected in the draft. They're preparing to NOT draft a player at that position if a player they like at another position becomes available.

Just looking at the Raiders off season moves suggests they will draft a DB, DL, and WR at some point in the draft. Because if they don't, they've done little to improve those positions in the off-season. And none of us can believe they'd be happy with the defensive roster and WR's as they are.

The fact they've acquired a lot of young starting OL's suggests they're not planning on using any draft picks on the OL.

Both of those observations cannot address the Raiders' satisfaction with the quality of those acquisitions, but that's why the OL were acquired in time for OTA's. The coaches get to evaluate them prior to the draft.

The Raiders are obviosuly satisfied with adding defensive players and WR(s) from the draft, or (GULP) adding none at all.

[Raider Bill]

And that's why we suck.

Straining a shoulder reaching for the Stanford Routt's of the world, allows quality front offices to select guys they didn't need like Justin Tuck.

[Sleet]

Brick: The bones of your analysis is solid.

Of course, there will be gripes about your application. You're speculating as to a team's needs. You're also valuing players at their stated positions (Jenkins at CB), when a team might project a player at a differnt position (S).

To me, who cares? Everyone can adjust the analysis based on their own evaluation. Your analysis makes you more informed, period. It allows you to evaluate the so-called "experts" and gives you an insight to the actual choices made by the teams on draft day, and ability to give informed takes (and identify teams picking by emotion or perceived need or ranking).

Rep. :beerbang:

My substantive comment is this: Weighting a position according to its depth is a tricky thing; it skews the analysis. It is something I do in drafting a fantasy football team each year to project value, but I'm not sure I would do it (as much) if I were a NFL GM; the NFL is a "keeper" league.

I want the BAP and I want to fill needs -- those guys are the most likely to (a) make the team and (b) make the team better. Reaching for a guy becuase there's a big drop off in talent doesn't work for me.

The relevance of depth is whether I can satisfy a need in a later round. Given that I have already accounted for my own needs, I'm wondering whether you're sort of doubling counting here. Would adjusting for depth be better done through a weighted average in a value formula, or just by eye balling the graded "value" of the players at particular positions, how many picks I have and in what rounds, my ability to trade up or down, and my research into the likely needs of other teams?

Some of these factors can't be worked into a formula. Thus, I'm leaning to leaving depth to an at-the-moment factor -- one that may be better handled when I'm actually near or down to making a selection. Teams can then make an on-the-spot decision (i.e., adjustment) to select a guy with a lower "value" given the extrinsic factors, such as depth. I'm not sure I would front load for depth.

Rupert's (and 007's) point about guy's falling in the draft is a good one. I would agree that teams plan for need more than BAP, thus when quality players drop, teams are unprepared to make a move. Teams that have prepared, are able to make such moves and have a better draft. I think that is why between Day 1 and Day 2, you see trade being made, as people adjust their boards/draft strategies.

[brick]

Going to try and hit as many of the items that were brought up in one spot as I can. Some will be further hashed out in the follow-up column(s).



I wonder if teams really quantify that much information when making draft picks?

My belief is that the teams that are successful year after year in the draft go above and beyond this. Teams like NE, Pitt, Balt and of late the Giants move up and down grabbing guys who may not fill the perceived imidiate needs, but when you look a year or down the line using things like contract status, the moves make all kinds of sense. To truely make this tool useful, it would have to be expanded to include the needs of other teams in order to help with projecting picks, and identifying trade partners, but I'll be expanding on this later.


I mean, the Cowboys partial draft board was leaked on a camera phone last year, and it was a bunch of names written down from 1 to whatever. I know it was a couple weeks before the draft, but it still is relevant.

Not sure how relevant it is. Sure it was touted as the cowboys draft board, but it could have just as easily been a mock that the boys had been running. And using the Cowboys as an example of NFL draft prep most likely is a bad idea, as they have been notoriously bad in the Jones era when there wasn't a Johnson or Parcells there to take the reigns.


Another issue with the article is, how do we know what Al Davis and his braintrust perceive our needs to be? It could be hypothesized that Davis might be comfortable with Warren-Sands-Kelly at DT, and worried about Chris Johnson and Stanford Routt backing him up? Or maybe he likes the duo of Eugene and Branch enough to pass on a safety? Who knows, other than the big guy himself...


This is a popular one, and shows something I should have spent more time explaining. The Raider team need factor is my opinion only, based on roster and contract analysis. There is alot of information that the team has, that none of us have. Hell, the initial player rankings and grades would be different for every team and scouting department. Pretty much this is the downfall of any mock draft. We don't know for sure what is going on in the war room of each team.


Lastly, what if a player the team ranks extremely high falls to the second or third round pick, but doesnt fit in the formula very well? Perhaps Maualuga falling to the 40th pick, or Max Unger dropping to round three?


How this helps with falling players will be covered in another column.


Might I suggest "Another Brick in the wall" over the "Brick in a box" theme

Have your people call my people and lets do lunch sometime

Brick in the box comes from where the whole blog started from, which was looking at a different Raider player in the box each game, and evaluating them on a play by play basis (stuck with players in the box since you lose so many of the other players due to camera angle on most plays). This was long before the "dick in a box" song which people seem to think the blog was named after.

I'm always up for lunch.


Straining a shoulder reaching for the Stanford Routt's of the world, allows quality front offices to select guys they didn't need like Justin Tuck.

One thing that I am hoping to get a change to address are "reaches". Every year you hear a half dozen players names come off the board a round or two before Kiper has projected them, and then he spends a minute talking about how this player would have been there for them next round.

But Kiper's board does not take into account the individual team's needs, their scouting, or what they have mocked out not to mention the scarcity of possition.

As for the Giants not needing Tuck, Osi hadn't proven himself yet, Strahan was coming up on the end of his contract, and the end of his career. Sure if you looked at their starters, DE wasn't a huge need, but when you looked a little deaper, and take into account the value of a pass rusher in the NFL, there was a need. Now, by planning ahead more than 1 season, that DLine is a huge strength.


My substantive comment is this: Weighting a position according to its depth is a tricky thing; it skews the analysis. It is something I do in drafting a fantasy football team each year to project value, but I'm not sure I would do it (as much) if I were a NFL GM; the NFL is a "keeper" league.

I want the BAP and I want to fill needs -- those guys are the most likely to (a) make the team and (b) make the team better. Reaching for a guy becuase there's a big drop off in talent doesn't work for me.

The drop off in tallent is a very small part of the equation that comes into play. There are only 7 players who have an adjustment of over 100 points, with Freeman being the outlier at 997. But when the next QB is rated 112 spots behind him, the scarcity demands that the drop in talent be taken into account.

[007]

Brick: If you can find a way to address picking up the real value players (IE, the Michael Bush's of the world who plummet a couple rounds too far and represent enormous value no matter what our need is)

Then I can accept the article a little easier.

You take the highest ranked players when they come to your pick. You don't reach on Stanford Routt and John Bowie's because you have a need somewhere.

Like I posted in another thread, Indy drafting 3 centers last year is a perfect example (Justice, Pollak, Jamey Richard) Do you really think a 'need factor' can acount for something like that? Some people shoook their heads at that, but the interior of their line is now set up for a decade because of good foresight. Move one to guard, keep one as a backup and the other replaces Jeff Saturday in a couple years. Smart drafting, plain and simple.

Or the Giants drafting Tuck and Kiwi when they had Strahan and Osi. They made a team strength into an elite unit at the top of the NFL, and propelled that into helping them win a super bowl. They had needs at other positions, but drafting a guy who might not have had a high 'position factor' on the team still paid huge dividends.

Ruperts plain old, black and white approach is too far stuck in the 70's though. His line of thinking is why we continue to be one of the worst drafting teams in the league, while teams I've mentioned are perennial playoff contenders.

[Rupert]

Ruperts plain old, black and white approach is too far stuck in the 70's though. His line of thinking is why we continue to be one of the worst drafting teams in the league, while teams I've mentioned are perennial playoff contenders.
WTF are you talking about? Please don't characterize my thinking. You haven't even begun to demonstrate that you have comprehended it yet.

[007]

Of course Rupert.

I mean, your so deep and eloquent that there is no way I could grasp your advance concepts about football.

LOL.

Im not going to clutter Bricks awesome thread up with more nonsense, so I'll let you have the last word on the subject.

[Birdwell]

brick,

Read the whole way through, but will go back more carefully later. I particularly appreciated the blog post because it is pretty much alien to my way of thinking. (I rely much more on impressionistic analysis than most people, and am extremely wary of numbers-based analysis because it's so easy to get either the fundamental formula wrong and/or data coding errors (data-entry or initial decision to code as x instead of y.)

Consequently, I tend to undervalue numerical analyses. Trying not to do that here, as so much you wrote makes sense. I think Rupert, Sleet, and 007 make some good points in terms of possibly tweaking the model, and also using it to explain why certain things happen.

Just a little perspective, then, from the more impressionistic side.

One of the very hard things to evaluate is a guy who played against lesser competition that most of his peers. Andre Reed, for example, played for Tiny Kutztown (PA), a D-III school, but obviously was a hella pro. A few guys are in that situation this year, though not to the same extreme. (The guys from really small programs who are very good but not tearing it up at that level might make decent pros, but they're on very few -- if any -- radars.) Three guys from Abilene Christian -- Johnny Knox, the RB and the QB -- all not only showed well in the Lonestar Conference (I-A), but both looked good at the combine, pro day, and the Texas vs. USA game. How to grade them, versus guys like Brian Robiskie and Chris Wells? That's a sizable data coding problem, but not in theory insurmountable.

Where the model becomes less relevant, I think, comes we get to the later rounds. The odds of a player down there actually making a roster are lower and lower as the picks pass. Sticking strictly to a chart, even a guy who represents good value may be someone you doubt is gonna make your roster -- for whatever reason.

So what do you do? Tough to say.

Teams that have few roster holes are more likely to take guys with high upside but super-raw technique, or guys who sat behind good starters with little opportunity to show what they could do. Good teams have the luxury of letting these guys mature as players, refine their technique, and grow into who they can become. In the mean time, they are bodies for practice and special teams.

Teams in a position like the Raiders are now, I think tend to go in a different direction. You still look at guys like above (Chaz Schilens is an example, I think), but here is where you take chances on guys who for whatever reason grade out lower than you think they should. Oren O'Neal played FB at a smaller school, no telling exactly how he would transition to the NFL, but since your sixth rounder is unlikely to make the roster anyway, give it a shot. Or maybe, a WR or RB with moderate speed but a frame that could take 250 pounds-plus, you think about turning into a TE. (John Madsen, Marcel Reese are two recent examples of this). Or take a guy who might have had a third round grade but lost much of the season to injury.

Looking at Al Davis, he tends to go WR, DB and DT late in the draft, looking for guys who for whatever reason are going to be far better pros than they were collegians. You take the guys who have things you can't teach (massive size in the case of DTs, speed and reasonable size in the case of the others), and see if with your coaching staff you can make something of them.

I don't know how you could rate potential in comparison with likely continued production curve.

The Raiders do okay when they think they see something in a guy no one else does and draft him late. They fair very poorly when they see something in a guy no one else does, and they draft him high -- e.g., Marinovich, Buczowski.

the one area where I think you might be able to stretch your model into territory that few understand, is the grey area after round 7 is over. A number of teams had Chris Carr on speed dial after the draft four years ago; and he had done his own homework for what happened if he went undrafted -- figuring that he had the best chance to crack the Raider roster. This would be where upside/potential is very important. You still have needs you'd like to address after the draft, so you compile a list of maybe a dozen players likely to go undrafted, and have people standing by to get in touch with them ASAP before some other team does.

Again, thanks for the read.

[007]

Great post, Birdwell.

I didnt think about how tough it would be to fit small school guys in the model, or how team draft tendencies might affect picks in certain rounds...

[brick]

Brick: If you can find a way to address picking up the real value players (IE, the Michael Bush's of the world who plummet a couple rounds too far and represent enormous value no matter what our need is)

Then I can accept the article a little easier.

You take the highest ranked players when they come to your pick. You don't reach on Stanford Routt and John Bowie's because you have a need somewhere.

Like I posted in another thread, Indy drafting 3 centers last year is a perfect example (Justice, Pollak, Jamey Richard) Do you really think a 'need factor' can acount for something like that? Some people shoook their heads at that, but the interior of their line is now set up for a decade because of good foresight. Move one to guard, keep one as a backup and the other replaces Jeff Saturday in a couple years. Smart drafting, plain and simple.

Or the Giants drafting Tuck and Kiwi when they had Strahan and Osi. They made a team strength into an elite unit at the top of the NFL, and propelled that into helping them win a super bowl. They had needs at other positions, but drafting a guy who might not have had a high 'position factor' on the team still paid huge dividends.

Ruperts plain old, black and white approach is too far stuck in the 70's though. His line of thinking is why we continue to be one of the worst drafting teams in the league, while teams I've mentioned are perennial playoff contenders.

I think we have a misscomunication on the team need factor.

1st lets use your Colts example, sure they had Saturday, so center wasn't even listed on most sites when listing the team's needs. But there was nothing behind him, he was going into the last year of his contract and he is getting up there in age. If you asigned the need factor the way I did, then center would be just behind their primary needs.

A possition that lines up well to the Colts at Center last season for the Raiders in my need factor would be linebacker for the Raiders.

Every starter is in the last year of his contract, as are most of the back ups. Unless they are advocating drafting a MLB and moving Morrison to Sam, most places have LB far down the chart. Due to the above factors I have it just behind WR, OT, DT, DE and S. It is not a primary need, but on the sliding scale, the possition is hardly downgraded in terms of value. I start with WR having a 1.2 modifier, LB has a .8, just because there are allot of bodies there, doesn't mean I have it as a valueless possition for the Raiders like I do RB.

As for sliding players, that will be addressed.

[007]

Good stuff.

But 3 centers?

I would tend to think that NONE of the experts would acount for that, but they may well have 3 very good starters on the interior OL next season, with the 7th rounder looking like the best of the bunch.

Its such a crapshoot that no analysis will ever come out looking perfect, but you've definitely piqued my interest bro.

And to finish on your point, If LB is a .8 modifier, what if Mack or Unger slides to the #40 pick? Or even Sean Smith?

In your 'Raider value' column for round two, you have them sitting nearly 1000 pts less than some other targets, but I tend to think history proves we've ALWAYS valued centers and CB's more highly than some other positions...Adding to that, we also value measurables and you would think there could be some type of adjustment based on those factors?

Neither of those guys should surprise anyone on draft day, but the chart suggests it would be considered a long shot, no?

[hawaiianboy]

Holy Quantum Physics Batman...


You guys wanna dumb it down a little for us smucks in here that are a little farther down the intelligence food chain...

[BigTron]

My draft rule is take the guy who you think is the most likely to stick in the NFL and play for your team at a high level for a long time. I would always take the player who has the least chance of being a bust. I would pass a risky guy with a high ceiling for a player who is safer at a position of less need.

[brick]

Good stuff.

But 3 centers?

I would tend to think that NONE of the experts would acount for that, but they may well have 3 very good starters on the interior OL next season, with the 7th rounder looking like the best of the bunch.

Its such a crapshoot that no analysis will ever come out looking perfect, but you've definitely piqued my interest bro.

And to finish on your point, If LB is a .8 modifier, what if Mack or Unger slides to the #40 pick? Or even Sean Smith?

In your 'Raider value' column for round two, you have them sitting nearly 1000 pts less than some other targets, but I tend to think history proves we've ALWAYS valued centers and CB's more highly than some other positions...Adding to that, we also value measurables and you would think there could be some type of adjustment based on those factors?

Neither of those guys should surprise anyone on draft day, but the chart suggests it would be considered a long shot, no?

If you are trying to use the chart to predict who will be picked, I think it will fall well short of those who predict using Al's history. So, no they wouldn't be a long shot, but the value of those picks would be lessened.

What I am trying to do with the chart is show who should be picked, not predict who will be picked. And that in order to figure out who you should pick, you need to look at the draft as a whole, not as a serier of unrelated events.

As for the value of Mack or Unger, there are two factors here.

1 is an admitted weakness of the chart, in that I have players locked in at one possition, and that possition does alot toward determining their value. If I changed either of them to guard, they would get about a 400 point boost for the Raiders.

The other is that the Raiders have already spent a draft pick this year on center when aquiring Samson. They now have both youth and depth at the possition, making it less of a need.

[brick]

One other thing, does anyone know of a site that ranks the players by average position taken in mock drafts?

[007]

I've stumbled across something that weighed the averages before, I'll see if I can find it...

[massraider]

One other thing, does anyone know of a site that ranks the players by average position taken in mock drafts?

Do a search for mock draft muncher.

[007]

http://www.theobr.com/public/mdm/

That should do the trick.

[Sleet]

Brick: I do think depth should be accounted for. And I don't have a problem making an adjustment (moving players up in value if there is less depth at his position, and down if there's a lot of depth at the position).

The questions is, when and how to make that adjustment. You look at depth in the draft, and make an adjustment upfront, as part of your formula determining a player's value. You then adjust that number further by factoring in a team's need -- comparing the two numbers to suggest value to a team.

My point is, depth might be a factor that should be broken out, too. While there might not be much depth in a particular draft class, there might not be much need in the league, as a whole, either, cancelling out the factor. I think, here, you are taking a snap shot (one draft class) and making an adjustment that doesn't reflect all the things relevant to depth (depth in league at position, changing offensive and defenses schemes, available FA to fill need, next year's class).

Thus, I would take depth of draft class out of the equation and adjust for it seperately, closer to the time of selection, which would enable me to consider other things, such as a run at a particular position, when having to make the call as to whether to draft a player lower in value, given the lack of depth at the position, and/or possible greater need at that position of other teams.

[Birdwell]

My draft rule is take the guy who you think is the most likely to stick in the NFL and play for your team at a high level for a long time. I would always take the player who has the least chance of being a bust. I would pass a risky guy with a high ceiling for a player who is safer at a position of less need.

Not a bad basic rule, BT, but does that apply in the sixth and seventh rounds as well? Guys down there better have a high ceiling, 'cause if they perform as graded (no bust), they are off the roster real fast.

[Raider Bill]

You take the highest ranked players when they come to your pick. You don't reach on Stanford Routt and John Bowie's because you have a need somewhere.

That type of conventional wisdom is what got us Napoleon Harris instead of Ed Reed.

We need a Linebacker!

You don't take safties that high!

[Raider Bill]

I used to have a connection with the Eagles orginization, who has since moved on to Baltimore... anyhow he wouldn't tell me a damn thing pre draft, but told me after the draft that they had Routt as a 2nd day guy.

Even if you disagree that he was a reach, it was easy to forsee that with the constant state of flux this organization is in, Andrew Walter was a waste of a first day pick that also could have been used on Tuck IIRC.

[CrossBones]

I would like to join in and throw Andrew Walter under the bus. FUCK that guy. I've never seen a player come onto the field and zap the team's energy like that clown. Talk about bad Karma. In case you missed it -- fuck Walter. Let me know go into the corner and hang my head.

[Birdwell]

I would like to join in and throw Andrew Walter under the bus. FUCK that guy. I've never seen a player come onto the field and zap the team's energy like that clown. Talk about bad Karma. In case you missed it -- fuck Walter. Let me know go into the corner and hang my head.


Au contraire, mon fraire.

I was at M&T Satdium when Walter came in after Brooks went out. Walter showed something that dayk, in a hostile stadium, with no running game. He may be a servicable QB some day, but not here. His speaking out against the Shell/Walsh fiasco is something that Brooks and Culpepper (too eager for a big paycheck elsewhere to seem like a malcontent) didn't have the balls to say. Bully for him.

Walter was a Norv guy, and Norv's gone. I would not be surprised if Walter ends up across the Bay, and does well. God bless him, he paid his dues.

[paranoidmoonduck]

Hmmm.

I really like the effort. I really do. The amount of effort put in is evident.

Two issues though. One is with your method and one is with the whole process. Let's start with the process you followed.

I appreciate that you took from sources not yourself as much as possible. But this ubiquitous term "value" is a tricky thing, and Scouts Inc. might not be the place to start. I know they place a numeric value on their prospects, but simplicity shouldn't replace accuracy. I agree with Sleet on the positional depth matter (although for a different reason). So long as you are calculating for individual teams, depth only plays a role in as much as the value distance between a players available at two picks (say, at #7 and #40), not with players that figure to be taken in between. It doesn't really matter that Aaron Curry is in a draft with Rey Maualuga, Brian Cushing, and Clay Matthews. If the only linebacker who figures to be a recommended value when the Raiders pick next is Clint Sintim, then that's all that really matters to Oakland (so long as we are disregarding trading up or down, which seems totally necessary, otherwise the variables might as well be infinite). There are a few other nitpicks, but they aren't very important in light of my other point.

Value is such a subjective term, assessing it in any sort of objective way, why an admirable desire, is totally pointless. Scouts Inc.'s opinion is one in a sea of opinions. Moreover, Scouts Inc.'s opinion has nothing to do with whichever team your using to judge value opportunity. If we had the Raiders big board (and I mean, BIG BOARD; like 100 players deep), then this would at least be consistently subjective in regards to Oakland. As it is, it's a mismash of opinion posing as objective analysis because it attaches digit values to players.

And even further than that, the whole idea is erased by the fact that this...

The higher the player’s grade, the better the chance that they produce at the next level, in theory anyway.

..simply isn't true by any measurement. The truth is that value is a term that is thrown around a lot before, on, and after draft day, but the idea of value is only asserted once the player has actually had a shot to establish himself on the NFL level. Value only reaches any sort of concreteness a good while after the fact (I'd say about 3 years is a decent bet). Not to suggest that some players slip down further than their talent warrants due simply to the way teams stacked up in the order and the needs or drafting habits of those teams, but you don't need a chart to recognize when that happens (considering it's only really of any note when the conventional value attained is drastically noticeable).

Like I said, I love the energy. But what you've done doesn't really say anything beyond the fact that your threw together a bunch of random assessments. the most important of which we can't value as "good" or "bad" at this time and place.

[brick]

My point is, depth might be a factor that should be broken out, too. While there might not be much depth in a particular draft class, there might not be much need in the league, as a whole, either, cancelling out the factor. I think, here, you are taking a snap shot (one draft class) and making an adjustment that doesn't reflect all the things relevant to depth (depth in league at position, changing offensive and defenses schemes, available FA to fill need, next year's class).

Thus, I would take depth of draft class out of the equation and adjust for it seperately, closer to the time of selection, which would enable me to consider other things, such as a run at a particular position, when having to make the call as to whether to draft a player lower in value, given the lack of depth at the position, and/or possible greater need at that position of other teams.


The league wide need does get factored into the Adjusted NFL value with the multiplier based on the Franchise Tag number and adjusted for available FA's. And that does cancel out lack of depth at possitions like FB, where the league has devalued the possition, while boosting the value of QB's (which matches what happens in the draft).

Now there is an inherent flaw in the multiplier based on Franchise tag number, as, for example, the Franchise tag lumps all offensive lineman together, so I had to make some judgement calls for OT, G and C. Then you add that LT's are more valued by the league that RT's, and there is a hole there. But I haven't claimed that this is a finished product.

To your 2nd point, this is intended to be a tool used in conjunction with mock drafts in the weeks leading up to the drafts, where you can look at how a run would affect a teams picks, and then durring the draft as a tool to project what may be there when you pick next. To help maximize the move at the time. The chart is not a stand alone item, it has to be used in conjunction with other draft prep.

[Sleet]

PMD: Your point on depth I was having trouble stating. The problem is, where to draw the line. If you don't consider each player's number, but skip a few who won't realistically be available when the team drafts next, while more accurate in theory, it adds more opinions into the analysis, which may skew the results when comparing positiosn to positions, which, to me, is the value of analysis. That is why I considered to just take depth out of the initial analysis to be utilized later, separately.

Your point about the entire endeavor is well taken. That said, Brick's point is that the analysis is a tool. The process, itself, will shed light on a GM's or HC's own evaluations, which are subjective anyway. GM's and HC's will start with their own scouting departments' ratings (not Scouts, Inc.) or some compilation of other people's ratings.

So, while not a "true" indicator of value, the analysis will show a GM or HC, in plain terms, how and why they value one player more than another relative to other players at other positions. Or, it may cause them to rethink their strategy or change their opinions based on something they learned when comparing players and positions through this process.

Let me put it this way, instead of a Big Board based solely on subjective input and opinions, this list takes those subjective inputs and opinions -- which the team is going to rely upon anyway -- into an objective format that a GM or HC can utilize to make more informed (but nonetheless subjective) decisions. So, yes, take the analysis for what it is worth -- a way to compare different players at different positions. To me, it was useful. If I were a GM or HC, I would have something do this.

[Rupert]

There is another HUGE value to an analysis tool like this.

It allows you to record the determining factors and produce a result in a repeatable way.

The problem with doing a mock (or even the draft itself) is that unless you've got something written down, you're going to forget it at a critical decision point. Ever try doing one mock a month? Ever notice the change in where you put players? Ever wonder why they changed? Were you ever able to pin down exactly why each change happened? This kind of tool will show you why

Why did you rank one player higher than another? Was it a character issue? Maybe the combine numbers? An interview? Have a run-in with the local PD? Has anything changed to make you adjust his grade? You can do all of those things with lists, but when you have a single tool that compiles all of your thinking in one place, you've got everything you need at your fingertips.

Read Cable's interview. He says he'll be getting into draft mode this week. One week before the draft are you serious? Yeah, they've got a hell of a lot of other things to consider from day to day, like training and free agents and a roster of 80 +/- players to guide and shape and lead.

This kind of tool helps you project what your opponents are likely to do, so that when you decide who to pick at #7, you've got a good idea who'll be available at #40. And you'll know which players bring the most bang for the buck for your roster, so you don't wind up like Detroit drafting WR after WR after WR, year after year after year.