Best player available VS. Team needs. As a young draft lover, I didn't care for the best player available argument. I fell in love with skill position players and hoped the Dolphins would draft them. As I got older, I began to appreciate the BPA argument since teams would routinely draft busts at need positions, only to over look the drafts true studs because they weren't at a need position. Though his year, I'm a little more on the fence. The argument for BPA is that if you have the chance to draft a stud who may lock up a position for 5-10 years you do it because over that time period every position will be a need position as players retire and contracts expire. On the flip side is the fact that in hindsight no GM has a perfect board. The guy you guess could be a stud is just as likely to be a bust as the player you drafted for need. The "Best" player available is an educated guess, not a fact. But you KNOW what your team needs are. That is a fact. The other factor is the debate over "reaching." At what point is a GM reaching? If you are drafting at the 10th spot, and the BPA is at a non-need position, is it a reach to select the player who you have pegged as your 4th BPA but at a need position? I'm interested in where people fall in this argument. Are you BPA or NEED? How much does it change based on the round? How many spots down on your BPA list is too far to draft a need?
Well, to me a "reach" is simply a player who did not work out, and the term itself is overused. For example, think of all of the 3rd rd picks who have had all pro careers, if they had been taken in the first rd they'd have been a "reach" at the time, when in fact they outplayed the 1st rd picks of their draft class. As for BPA vs Need, imo front offices and staffs are a bit to cautious, why can a #1 pick be a "plug and play" guy when a 4th rd pick is likely to do as good a job if offered similar opportunities? How the NFL works is the first rd guy is of course worthy of playing time, the 4th rd pick for whatever reason..is not.
I agree that "reaching" is an over used draft term. It only seems relevant around draft time. People speak less about players drafted 5 years ago being reaches. They are either good or busts. The only context I'm concerned about when it comes to reaching is when, as a GM, you don't draft the player at the top of your board. The question is how far down is too far down?
There aren't enough good players in a draft to reliably be able to fulfill your exact needs. The reality of the draft is frequently that at any given pick you will be unable to get an appropriate result for your pick at a specific position. Picking someone because it's an immediate need and it'll let you sleep better at night(at least through the off-season) is not really a winning solution. It would be better for the Dolphins this off-season to get a Pro Bowl defensive tackle than a solid wide receiver.
I think the trick is to find someone that fits both like Stringer said...Best player available at a position of need. So if I go in to the draft needing a WR, G, DT, CB and TE in that order of priority and the best player available at a position Im looking to address is a TE Im taking the TE. Even though its not the highest priority eventually Ill be able to trade or cut the player in front of the player I just drafted thereby ideally allowing me to save salary (since vets typically make more then rookies if theyre decent) while still improving the team. Next time around I go through the same process and hopefully address once of the other positions I need in a similar manner.
No, don't think it would be, as it would leave to many offensive questions unanswered. Now finding an all pro player is always a good thing, however the cost should be examined as well as draft resources are finite It would be better to fill a hole in whatever rd of course, however the likelihood of finding someone is better in earlier rds as the way the league works, high draft picks will play, coaches pretty much have to put them on the field in most cases.
Yes, that is true. And I may agree 100% with you if you are talking free agency. However, what I argue is that since you have no way of knowing with certainty whether your drafted DT will be a Pro Bowl DT, what is wrong with drafting the needed WR, who you don't know is nothing more than a solid WR. Who would be your priority to re - sign, Hartline (a solid WR) or Starks (a Pro Bowl DT)?
Draft strategy is changing thanks to the rookie scale. BPA is not as important because the penalty for missing in the first round won't set your franchise back years. Teams are going to evolve and start grabbing players they want. Some GM is going to do it regularly and that will start other GMs doing it. EXAMPLE: (the following is an example it does not reflect my or the site's opinions, I pulled a name out of a hat.) If you think a Travis Kelce is the best TE prospect since Gronk, you take him at 12 if you feel he's more of a sure thing than others. TE at 12 shouldn't be a factor.
I think Boik said it perfectly. Unless you have one of the top 3 picks, ONe thing you don't want to do is to have tunnel vision.
The entire goal of drafting a player in the first round should be trying to nail the < 20% of the guys in the draft who are "worth" a first round pick. The guys who end up being long-term, elite players and whom will get re-signed to second contracts with the team that drafted them.
You've got no way of knowing, which is one of the major reasons for doing what I'm advocating. There are only so many good players in a draft, so you pick what looks like the best one above other considerations. That's going to result in you being more successful in the draft. In terms of Hartline and Starks there are a lot of other considerations. You're analyzing the cost relative to their value. If all things were equal Starks, but I'm not sure they are.
I don't think that's really changed all that much because it's still your best mechanism at making your team better. It's the decision that has the highest upside and highest efficiency.
It hasn't changed all that much yet, but it will. GM's will start to go rogue once they get away from traditions. The first 15 picks will treated as one round. 16 through round 2 will be considered the same round. from there 3 & 4 as one and 5 & 6 as one. 7 & UFDA.
I don't really see much of a difference. Teams that miss on early picks don't really have any other avenue for cheap production.
This opinion is rubbish on this board. Everyone knows all of our ills (pass rush, lack of defensive playmaking, pass protection, lack of speed) will be solved by signing Jennings and Wallace and then using our first rounder and both 2nd's on receivers.
Its bizarre that you don't see the difference between missing on pick that costs: four years, $22.1 million vs. 5 years, $57.5 million ($30M guaranteed).
I see the difference. A bad player that costs a lot, versus a bad player that costs less. The problem is that you can't afford bad players with those picks. You need them to be starters.
No one is saying that, but cost very clearly changes the risk. You might feel like a guy is a guaranteed starter but the cost of signing him high before the cap altered where you're willing to take him. Look at Ryan vs Long. If the potential contract wasn't as huge that might have made it easier to gamble a little bigger and go with Ryan instead of sure thing Long. (I was in favor of Long's signing and still see it as the right move at the time.) Again, you still may not see it. But when enough GMs do, it will force a shift in the thought process.
I see your point Fin D, but there is still enough pressure on getting a top 15 pick right that I don't think we'll see the dramatic shift you suggest. Were GMs more radical in the draft in all the decades before rookie contracts got out of control?
The Hartline/Starks debate in reality will come down to a host of other factors, obviously. But hypothetically who is more valuable for 2013? Who was more valuable to the team in 2012 given that Hartline was the #1 WR, and the Dolphins had a lot of other talent along the D line. I think the 2012 Dolphins would have been a lot worse without Hartline than they would have been without Starks.
The BPA is very very clearly Chance Warmack if he makes it to 12. Then there's everyone else. I'm very much in favor of the BPA strategy and it worked with Jake Long (in my opinion) and Mike Pouncey. If we had done that all along, we would also have Jason Pierre-Paul and James Laurinaitis. If only the world listened to Poco......
The debate also comes down to whether you believe an NFL roster is analogous to a race car. If you already have good tires, but your brakes are the biggest need, how can you justify getting great tires and hoping to get better brakes later? In a league that is all about mismatches and exploiting weaknesses, is any team stronger than their weakest link? Should that dictate drafting need over best available within reason?
True, but 2 things: 1. I think that pressure will decline a bit in time. 2. I said earlier that picks 1-15 will be viewed as the first round value wise, and 16 through the last pick in the second round will be considered the same round value wise.
Maybe if it is a glaring life or death need like car brakes. But when people often talk about mismatches, they really mean wide receivers and tight ends. Receivers, in particular, are themselves a function pass blocking and QB ability. Except for rare talents (and Brandon Marshall was one), they are largely consequences rather than causes. So if you can get that rare talent, then yeah, but if you evaluate them that highly then they are likely the BPA anyway. I find it hard to understand Jeff Ireland, but I do suspect he has a top 3 grade on Chance. Or at least a higher grade on him than any receiver in the draft.
Fin D I don't see what will lessen the pressure to hit on a top 15 pick. The draft is more popular every year, and fans and owners won't become less critical and more forgiving. It'll get worse if anything. I also don't see how you would argue that pick 17 will come to have close to the same relative value as the 64th pick. That would still fluctuate from draft class to draft class even if it were remotely true.
I think it is a life and death situation that if Ireland doesn't find a huge upgrade at WR and drafts a pulling guard at 12, some nutcase Fins fan will cut the breaks on his car.
I agree there. The revolt will be well underway. But Miami fans (none here, of course) are among the dumbest in the country. Then the 4/5s of our offensive line will be in the Pro Bowl and Lamar Miller will run for 1300 yards and Tannehill will thrown more TDs and less INTs and they might calm down.
Thing is, outside of maybe 5-7 players in each first round, a first rd pick is no guarantee of finding talent that performs at a high level. It is something of a jedi mind trick. The key to the kingdom in the NFL is playing time, coaches are simply far to cautious to play guys taken in the later rounds unless there is a dire need to put them on the field, that is the only 'magic" found in the upper rounds, not talent, but playing time. As for the all pro DT, they are great to have, as is an all pro center, but they don't score game winning td's so you wind up with a team very much like the Ireland Dolphins, built to "win upfront", but they don't win b/c the skill TD/TO creating positions have been ignored. BPA v Need, imo, is sort of a false argument, it should be "Potential Impact Player vs Blue Collar Likely Starter"
Hopefully by the time a team with $45M in cap room is drafting there are no holes as big as Bess and Marlon Moore as your starting receivers, but if your needs are that big, I say you reach in the draft.
Easily, the 17th pick vs the 64th pick all comes down to playing time and what they do with it, if you take a G 17th and FS at 64th, and the FS turns into Jarious Byrd in his rookie year, guess who has more of a direct impact on winning ball games?
I don't think you're talking about the same thing. Yes the 64th pick could eventually prove to be better than the 17th pick. The same thing applies to an UDFA being better than the number one overall pick. Fin D is arguing that GMs will see the potential talent as virtually equal in those 2 picks, and therefore be as loose in picking at 17 as they would be at 64. I disagree. That would suggest that GMs would have a big board of players ranking 1-16, and then the next 48 players virtually tied at 17.
Dirty little secret is His'n..gm's are just as clueless about who will succeed and who won't as the above avg informed fan. And a GM could see it that way, sort of "every round has a pro bowler in it and there are UDFA's who will be pro bowlers" That is how it works out, but I'd doubt a GM would REALLY see it that way.
I don't think that's even close to true. The average fan is only informed because of the information they get through draft entertainment people, whom are in turn getting it from actual professionals. You remove that pipeline and 98% of the fans would be clueless.
I suggested in my first post that the GMs don't know everything, which makes their selections of BPA suspect. However I still don't think you and I are talking about the same thing at all here, since you keep going into tangents about about my tangents while ignoring my main points. You are making valid points, but way off the main point.
Probably not His'n, my fundamental assumption is most GM's operate not to lose rather than to win. This makes their decision making highly suspect in general, and that is across the league. Thus BPA v Need to me is the wrong argument to make and that has a lot to do with how the league is structured around franchise Qb's. A GM with a franchise Qb has their hands untied to take more risks, w/o one the GM is forced to be risk adverse to cover up for the weakness at Qb. That sort of variable changes the whole approach.
Think of it from this angle, before the rookie scale, there were 3 major factors to making a draft pick: talent, need & cost. Those three things dictated everything every GM not named Ditka or Davis did. Reducing one of the major indicators would have to change the strategy....wouldn't it?
At this point in this draft the best available players are identified on the OL and DL in the first round. As many of you will recall Miami attempted to build first under Parcells with focus on OL and DL. There were some hits (Long, to some degree) and misses (Merling) there. The idea of drafting best available players is a tough proposition when the best position guys available are not necessarily what you need. I think you have to add the comment "value" and "rounds". Miami needs wrs, but the real value is not in the first round, same for cb as well. I have always gotten the impression that Ireland looks at value in specific rounds, and would not reach to get a wr or cb above the rounds where real value is noted. While I would not be surprised to see Patterson drafted by Miami, the value for wrs this year appears to be in rounds 2 through 4. Ireland was a little more of a risk taker last year. Not sure what he will do this year.
