Don’t forget about the year they drafted Ruggs and Arnette…
who may both be in prison right now.
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Immediate Post draft grades or report cards are useless.
It is just the grader judging how far the team drafted outside of consensus or their personal evaluation.
From the outside the evaluator may deem it dumb to not take Mike Green in the 2nd rd when they see an obvious need for edge rushers, not knowing that he was never on the Lions board.
Even we, as close followers of the Lions don’t have access to detailed inside info on background or interviews to really judge the character decisions made by the team.
The true test is team results and secondarily, individual player results after 3 seasons.
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Ravens seem to crush the draft every year. Mike Green was interesting to say the least. But he could be the steal of the entire draft. Allegations pending of course.
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Teams selected players without regard to character in the past and were successful, but I think it is harder today with the large contracts.
The Oakland Raiders had a roster full of suspect character players and were very successful under Al Davis and John Madden.
The players didn’t make as much, there was no social media and the league wasn’t as concerned with it’s image so it was easier for management to control the locker room.
If you put a bunch of those ruffians on one team today it would be in the news every week and would be a nightmare to manage.
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Also helps when you have a consistent winner and an established culture like the Ravens have under John Harbaugh. Green to the Browns for example would be a nightmare.
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Unlike superman …the sun is not my source of power → definitely something I run from!
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He may not play this year. At all. Its why he was off the lions board completely.
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I see it as the opposite. Matt Millen and Mike Mayock know ball in a way no one here does, and they failed for a myriad of reasons…its misguided to think most guys on this board could draft better and an example of why some people complain and challenge Brad’s pick.
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I have said before and maintain, I think Millen’s biggest problem was he actually drafted like a common NFL fan. His first draft was actually pretty solid, all things considered. The drafts afterwards were all differnet forms of stupidity.
Millen got obsessed with trying to take the sizzle, and also got caught up in the “help Joey no matter what” sunk cost fallacy. He also became obsessed with “systems” and then kept drafting and dumping guys to fit said system. Started with a high pressure defensive system and changed to Tampa 2. Went from power running scheme, drafted a downfield thrower at QB, then switched to West Coast offense. Later went full Mike Martz offense.
It was always one thing after another with that guy, and it’s why none of our drafts made any sense. We were so busy changing systems, then changing players to fit those systems, then changing our mind again. Bad days man…
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If Millen could have taken a role like Spielman, probably would have succeeded. But we just threw him from the broadcast booth to in charge overnight. He had zero front office experience.
History almost repeated itself cause Sheila wanted to make Spielman GM… Thank god he was humble enough to say I’m not qualified but will help you search for someone who is. It could have turned out far differently.
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Mike Mayock is a perfect example of why I think you are wrong. I think over 90 percent of this board confuse their passion and fandom for actual knowledge of running a team on a day-to-day basis. We don’t have any idea what comes with the day-to-day operations. I seriously do not think that our fantasies would translate to success like Howie Roseman. Some of yall believe that you can be as good as Roseman (or Brad Holmes) because you think you can put together a draft board. That’s just small portion of what it takes to be a successful team. And when Mayock was “just a talking head” he thought just like you and many others here. He looked at a GM like Matt Millen and said “I can do better than that” and guess what….he was just as bad! Mel Kiper the same. He thinks he can do better than the GMs. Kiper has no clue how to operate a team on a daily
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And please allow me to correct myself. Mayock wasn’t almost as bad as Millen. He was actually 25-24 for his three year tenure and actually was fired after making the playoffs in 2021. So I definitely put my foot in my mouth there…
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And drafting a running back in the first round is good value again too. Brad be singing:
Don’t you wish your GM were a freak like me? Don’t you?
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Some will come for ya. But this was a hell of a post.
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Hang on, one big disclaimer here. I never said anyone on the board could be better than a current NFL GM. I said I would bet anyone on the board would be a better at drafting than the ESPN/NFL network fanboys. I know there is a lot more that goes into a GM, and none of us even know a fraction of it. We may know fractions of part of the job, hell we’ve got drafters and cap guys and all, but we only know parts and none of us could put it all together to actually run a team.
Now I did say we could beat Mayock, but that was because I was thought he was responsible for some of the terrible first rounders the Raiders took. That’s2 corrected me and said those picks were Gruden’s, the later draft picks were Mayock’s, so apologies to Mayock on that one. I am sure he will be thrilled and sleep better tonight when he finds out he has moved back up my GM draft board. :rofl
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I know they will….and I was way off on the Mayock/Millen thing, but seriously, WE ARE FANS. I don’t think anyone on this board has ever even been an equipment manager, let alone a scout, but we can run a team better than someone like Mayock??
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I respect what you are saying my friend and thank you for this follow up! It would be nice dream though to have a passions come true, i;e running a draft war room wouldn’t it?? I will agree with this….some of us would have fun being a part of something like that.
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I totally get that one. They won’t ever do it, but we have our fun fantasy draft game where we pick players going to teams. I would absolutely love to see fans draft boards vs the NFL “draft analysts” on NFL Network and ESPN. Kiper especially. How that absolute ass clown has kept a job for so long is beyond me. His picks are always wrong, and not by a little. Then he goes on rants and insults any team that dares to not go by his “big board”, even though he supposedly knows more than everyone due to his supposed “contacts”.
Mel’s “contacts” are really nothing more than agents that pay him well and send him free cans of hair spray to prop up their clients, and basically try to create artifical demand hoping it bullies teams into taking guys higher in the draft so the agents can make more money off of that commission.
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