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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.
- 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.)
That's alot of work. Good job.
Two things do raise my brow over Rick's approach. 1st for the 2nd half of your time frame we were a more competitive team. That seems to be the time to adjust your philosophy. You don't need or have room for late picks on roster and practice squad players can be pillaged. So why keep bring in 10 picks every year. With many 3rd day picks. 2nd we trade back for late picks where a team like Green Bay are just given them. If it were more like them I'd be OK with his method. We are giving up quality potential for quantity that can't usual make the team. A team like Chicago that was bad every year in your time frame has more room on their roster for these guys. Therefore even though they do take fewer they had more make the team. Rick is doing a good job in my eyes. This part of it makes little sense to me.
even including gedeon is generous as he is not really a starter imo.
i will say that if you include starters for other teams, eg the G from appy state, it prolly improves.
Speilman has not done well with WR, QB, and Oline. He has made alot of good picks on D and has done very well with undrafted players
I don’t think it’s a correct assumption that teams are exclusively trying to find starters with
their late rounders. NFL teams in the
modern salary cap era have to build the bulk of their roster with rookies,
UDFAs and other low cost players. They
may not be the splashiest players, but teams can’t afford to fill out their rosters
with veteran starters.
For me, I think the Vikings like to draft a lot of players
because it helps then not have to compete with other teams for the UDFAs they
would normally sign. We draft more guys
and spend more on UDFAs so that we get our choice of the better roster filler
type guys, or at least that’s what I think they’re trying to do.
Quote: @"medaille" said:
I don’t think it’s a correct assumption that teams are exclusively trying to find starters with
their late rounders. NFL teams in the
modern salary cap era have to build the bulk of their roster with rookies,
UDFAs and other low cost players. They
may not be the splashiest players, but teams can’t afford to fill out their rosters
with veteran starters.
For me, I think the Vikings like to draft a lot of players
because it helps then not have to compete with other teams for the UDFAs they
would normally sign. We draft more guys
and spend more on UDFAs so that we get our choice of the better roster filler
type guys, or at least that’s what I think they’re trying to do.
Your first point, that teams are looking for more than starters, is certainly true. I chose to look at starters because it was feasible to assess. Also, I'm assuming (I know, dangerous) that starters and contributors on a team will be proportional to their success - unless that starter was just a rare lucky bounce.
How have the Vikings done in getting role players from all those late picks? - 55 picks after round 3
- 2 starters (Diggs, Gedeon)
- 9 roster players: Jalyn Holmes, Tyler Conklin, Devante Downs, Jaleel Johnson, Danny Isidora, David Morgan, Stephen Weatherly, Jayron Kearse, Kentrell Brothers (barely..)
Looks better, because IMO Morgan is a pretty significant contributor, and both Weatherly and Kearse became contributors in 2018 (though both seemed in danger of busting prior to this season). Total of 11 players for 55 picks is 1 for 5.
But I don't think it's "filling the roster". Diggs, Gedeon, Morgan, Weatherly, and Kearse are the only 5 that had real impact aside from special teams. Is Spielman collecting Day 3 picks just to find wedge busters for kick coverage?One more observation about these role players: they were all picked in the last 3 drafts. Of the 33 picks from 2011-15, only 1 (Diggs) is still with the team. None were worth keeping after their rookie contracts. We have a lot of key backup/role players - Tom Johnson, George Iloka, Brett Jones, Nick Easton, Rashod Hill, Aldrick Robinson - that were castoffs from other teams. Shouldn't most come from those late picks?
A lot of people defended this with UDFA success. I'm just not sure if that should be added to the draft score, or treated as a separate endeavor (my own opinion), or...is our poor record in later rounds of the draft a reason we keep a high number of UDFAs on the roster? Was Chad Beebe here because Rodney Adams and Stacy Coley were duds? Would Roc Thomas or Mike Boone have even made the team if we had used a late draft pick for someone like Justin Jackson? Did Eric Wilson make the team because Elijah Lee was a wasted pick? Sometimes, like with Lee/Wilson, it almost seems like there are different decision makers for the draft and for UDFAs...
So, what it all means, IMO:
- If the Vikings ever again trade down out of an early round (3 or higher), shoot your TV. We just spent genuine money on magic beans.
- When you hear anyone get excited about some guy we picked in the 5th-round - ignore it. Statistically, anyone picked on Day 3 by the Vikings is already 80% employed at Arby's...
- Seriously: I really think this is a key reason why the Vikings seem to have, according to many sources, a "great roster", but always fall apart when struck by injuries or any adversity - the roster is great in terms of a handful of players, but beyond that, our talent is poor.
Last item I noticed...if Anthony Barr leaves, the Vikings will have only 4 players on their roster that they drafted prior to 2015 - Everson Griffen, Kyle Rudolph, Harrison Smith, and Xavier Rhodes. Yeah, a young roster is nice, but I think you need a much larger core of drafted players to succeed.
Thanks for the hard work on looking at all this. One thing to consider is that good teams are less likely nurture late round talent than teams trying to build quality depth while in a perceived Super Bowl window (SunCoast makes a similar point). In such cases, a team may try to stash talent players on practice squad while electing to go with more experienced back-ups on the actual roster. I think a case in point is Colby Gossett who was picked up by Arizona off the Vikings practice squad this year and started a number of games for this year, his rookie year. You could probably add a couple more late round picks to this like Elijah Lee and Shamar Stephens. I also think that a player such as Brandon Fusco should qualify as a quality late round pick. That being said, here are some of my observations based upon your excellent research:
- When a team considers itself in a "window" the 10 draft pick philosophy should be scrapped for quality picks. If teams are going to rob your practice squad, why not use your later picks to move up for quality picks?
- Bulazin makes a point about what position the Vikes draft well in late rounds. I think there is some merits that the Vikes draft better on defense in the later rounds because they have had a single vision as to what characteristics to draft on defense while on the offensive side, philosophies have changed repeatedly due to the turnstile at various coaching levels.
- I do find it interesting that the Vikes seem to have better success at signing UDFA than with late round picks. I don't know whether coaches have more input in draft picks than signing UDFA -- that, in itself, could be revealing.
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