We are entering one of the most fun and yet at the same time, one of the most annoying seasons in sports. The season I am referring to is, of course, the NFL draft that is coming up April 26th. An event that has become so huge that it really has become its own entity. I love draft season because I, like so many other fans, live under the assumption that the right pick will catapult my team to the elite catergory, whilst the wrong pick will doom them to the basement for another long football season. We will sit there for hours (or like 2 seconds if you are a colts/skins fan) awaiting that one moment when the commisioner walks to the podium and says, with the 19th pick in the 2012 NFL draft the Chicago Bears select Luke Kuechly, linebacker from Boston College.
We do this because we are convinced that this pick or that pick will make all the difference to our team. This is the year that we turn it all around, and it always starts with the draft!! This is why we love it. It's the excitement of the unknown and the possibility that our team will snag our own Tom Brady in the 6th round. So why do I find this season annoying?
The endless mock drafts, workouts and opinions that flood the airwaves disecting every player available create such a convoluted picture that by the time the draft rolls around you will be dissappointed with whatever player your team selects. Why will you be dissappointed? Simple, because your player has weaknesses. Who knew? He has short arms, or small hands, or poor hip rotation, or a low wonderlic test, or poor choice in girls, or he "only" benched 225lbs 26 times, or he has 15% less quick twitch fiber in his right thigh than all others with comparative body structure to others in position class. Tell me it hasn't gotten out of hand? What ever happened to, hey that guy is a good football player and the on the field success proves it, we should take him! Somehow 400 tackles is not as indicative of ability as a vertical jump.
We have endless amounts of data, and what has all of this gotten us? Well honestly I dont think the draft results are any less of a crap shoot than they used to be when you just watched tape. Look I know that running in a straight line without pads is a strong indicator of how a guy will run in pads, whilst being chased and never in a straight line on a football field. So that being said, lets take look at a draft from a few years ago. I am a firm believer in the idea that you can't judge a draft until three years later. So lets take a look at all the success we derive from this mountain of data collection and hand measuring when we look at the first 10 picks of the 2009 draft. I mean you really have to be a lousy scout to screw up a top ten pick with all this data right? All these guys should be great and big time contributors to their teams... so here goes:
1) Matthew Stafford QB- after last season we can say well done Detroit
2) Jason Smith OT - oops...according to Todd McShay of Espn, "Smith has the best feet in the draft"...yep... best feet! Too bad he cant block eh?
3)Tyson Jackson DE- ummm eh... always hard to gauge the value of a DE in a 3-4 defense, but 2 sacks in his career is a little light.
4)Aaron Curry LB-oops...already on his second team, and that team being the raiders wont help
5)Mark Sanchez QB- ok pick. Nothing great, nothing horrible. Exactly what you hope from the fifth pick in the draft right?
6)Andre Smith OT- Same assessment as Sanchez.
7) Darius Heyward-Bay WR- HAHAHAHAHAHAHA... ok that was mean. Here is my honest assessment... HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
8)Eugene Monroe OT-Solid football player, and next to Stafford the best pick of the top 8
9) B.J. Raji DT- Once he figured it out he has become a dominant inside force. And, well he can dance in Insurance commercials in a really creepy way.
10) Michael Crabtree WR-oops... total me-first guy. Slow, bad work ethic and underachiever. And thats me being nice about him.
Those are the top ten guys in the draft. The NFL batted 3 for 10 and thats barely enough to be an allstar in baseball. And picking in the top ten is like taking swings in batting practice. By the way, picks 11 and 12 were total flops in the NFL. Guys they could have had include, Brian Cushing, Clay Matthews, Lesean McCoy, Mike Wallace, Ledarious Webb and finally undrafted future nfl rushing champ Arian Foster, just to name a few. Its hard for me to believe that knowing the size of prospects hands, his arm length and his cone drill time doesn't stop these kinds of drafts from happening.
Ok so it's rant time for me. I agree there is way too much attention being payed to the draft because, well let's face it even if you draft an amazing player or 3 they will not single handedly turn around your franchise.
ReplyDeleteYou can draft the greatest anything of their time and still need to wait 2-3 years till the rest of the team improves to the point that the great pick can really make an impact. Good players on good teams make the team better. Great players on crappy teams.... are great players on crappy teams (I see you Cam Newton).
I get that the NFL is big business, but honestly right now if I turn on ESPN half the show if not more is pre-draft hype or NFL offseason news. Not highlights of the 14 baseball games or 12 basketball games or even the NHL PLAYOFFS happening every night.
Yes please ESPN show me Shawn Payton talking into his headset in slow motion again or speculating about someone may or may not be a good football player in 3 years because of what they did in college. In basketball one player can change the team (LeBron). In baseball one player can change how a team plays every night but not lift them to another level no matter how amazing they are (Big headded Bonds). In football even if you have three number one picks on your team (Johnson, Stafford, Shu) you still may not make the playoffs!
Football in general get's too much attention but the draft is so irrelevant that it's annoying to an extreme. I don't give a crap about Jon Gruden, who was your QB when you won the superbowl? TRENT DILFER??? WHY IS THIS GUY ON TV?
April-June is probably my favorite time for sports because there is so much going on and so much drama and excitement in 4 major sports in the world, it pisses me off that we're spending any time talking about the only one that's not even in season.
novel over