01-18-2019, 07:54 PM
I burned some time looking at all teams' draft picks, because I have had a sense that we have picked an unusually high number of players on the draft's 3rd day (rounds 4-7) in recent years. So I added up picks for every team from 2011-18. I chose this range because Rick Spielman took draft responsibility for the Vikings in 2011 after Brad Childress left.
The Vikings have made 55 selections in those 8 drafts, which is #1 in the NFL over that period. The next runner-up was Seattle with 53, San Francisco with 52, and Green Bay with 50. League average was 38.7 picks, so we chose 16 more players than average (41% extra). The team with the fewest 3rd-day picks was New Orleans with 24.
Then I tried to evaluate the effectiveness of those picks, comparatively. I chose to look at the number of players listed as positional (not special teams) starters on depth charts at the end of 2018 for the team that drafted them. (See my notes about this below.)
The Vikings have acquired 2 starting players with 55 Day 3 draft picks since 2011: Stefon Diggs and Ben Gedeon. That translates to 1 in every 27.5 selections, a rate of 3.6%.
The team with the most value from Day 3 was the Chicago Bears, who had a league-leading 6 starters from the same pool at the end of their 12-4 season. Most impressively, the Bears acquired those with only 30 picks from 2011-18: 20% of their Day 3 picks became starters. Three teams had 5 starters from this pool: Detroit (5 with 38 picks), Green Bay (5 with 50 picks), and Houston (5 with 37 picks). The league average is 2.93 starters using 38.75 selections.
The worst Day 3 teams in the NFL over this period were the Steelers (1 starter with 38 picks, 2.6%), the Bills (1 starter with 36 picks, 2.8%), and...the Minnesota Vikings (2 starters with 55 picks, 3.6%).
Someone on this board recently defended Spielman's late draft picks by telling me, "A lot of teams have picked worse." Well, barely, if "a lot" is 2 teams. But can anyone deny Spielman has collected more Day 3 picks than any other team - sometimes by trading out of higher rounds - and generated fewer productive players for it?
Thanks for reading.
The Vikings have made 55 selections in those 8 drafts, which is #1 in the NFL over that period. The next runner-up was Seattle with 53, San Francisco with 52, and Green Bay with 50. League average was 38.7 picks, so we chose 16 more players than average (41% extra). The team with the fewest 3rd-day picks was New Orleans with 24.
Then I tried to evaluate the effectiveness of those picks, comparatively. I chose to look at the number of players listed as positional (not special teams) starters on depth charts at the end of 2018 for the team that drafted them. (See my notes about this below.)
The Vikings have acquired 2 starting players with 55 Day 3 draft picks since 2011: Stefon Diggs and Ben Gedeon. That translates to 1 in every 27.5 selections, a rate of 3.6%.
The team with the most value from Day 3 was the Chicago Bears, who had a league-leading 6 starters from the same pool at the end of their 12-4 season. Most impressively, the Bears acquired those with only 30 picks from 2011-18: 20% of their Day 3 picks became starters. Three teams had 5 starters from this pool: Detroit (5 with 38 picks), Green Bay (5 with 50 picks), and Houston (5 with 37 picks). The league average is 2.93 starters using 38.75 selections.
The worst Day 3 teams in the NFL over this period were the Steelers (1 starter with 38 picks, 2.6%), the Bills (1 starter with 36 picks, 2.8%), and...the Minnesota Vikings (2 starters with 55 picks, 3.6%).
Someone on this board recently defended Spielman's late draft picks by telling me, "A lot of teams have picked worse." Well, barely, if "a lot" is 2 teams. But can anyone deny Spielman has collected more Day 3 picks than any other team - sometimes by trading out of higher rounds - and generated fewer productive players for it?
Thanks for reading.
- There will be arguments this measure is incomplete, citing that someone like Stephen Weatherly has started, or might become a starter, or that Shamar Stephen sometimes started. Fine: but EVERY team has a few cases of might-be or used-to-be players, and I can't track them all. Besides, I counted Ben Gedeon despite him playing under 30% of defensive snaps the last two seasons.
- I excluded ST players, in part because they are not always considered "starters", but primarily because it's rare to pick a kicker before day 3, so they aren't exactly "late picks" for kickers. (If I had included them, the Vikings' results would be worse, as we spent 3 picks on kickers who are gone, while a number of teams have "starting" kickers selected on day 3.)