Found this lovely chart and article that basically says teams are still undervaluing Day 3 picks.
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Trading down is awesome
What makes it hard though, you go through the process and identify three guys you absolutely love. 1-2 of them get drafted before your time comes and now you have to let go of a 10, for two 7ās
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That study is fundamentally flawed.
Any value system simply must asymptote to zero. This is because the value of a draft pick - the odds and quantification of āsuccessā - must be in relation to that of UDFAs.
The fact that some of their metrics retain more than 1-2% of their value at the end of the draft renders any conclusions drawn moot.
They also make flawed measurement decisions like taking a playerās career performance into consideration rather than just his contribution to the team that drafted him.
I know Iām being a party pooper to Team Always Trade Down, but Iāll need to see a lot more convincing data than this to be convinced that teams arenāt āabout rightā in their valuation of picks.
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Jeff Risdon of the Detroit Lions Podcast did a breakdown of all the past trades involving pick 17.
He stated almost every trade involving any first round pick, the team trading UP payed about 10% over what the value charts have the pick calculated at. Ie 2023 when the Lions traded down the cardinals paid about 10% over the value.
But yes. Thats always been my problem with Brad lately throwing away highly valuable 3rd & 4th round picks to move up.
Are you likely to get a star player? No. But a good depth player? Absolutely!
The 2-4th rounds is where you fill your roster.
Not take massive risks on D2 prospects
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I would say 3-4. The 2nd is full of 1st round talent. When you only have 32 teams, someone is going to get left out. You donāt find 1st round prospects in the 3rd.
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I can only state that trade value is dependent on many factors. To cast a blanket statement (even if I tend to agree with it in general) isnāt taking in situational nuances that are relevant.
Consider: A couple of years ago, we had a roster that was going to allow a few players to realistically compete for a roster spot. So trading up to get perceived better players made sense. I might contend mileage varied on our perceptions, but in that scenario it made sense to have fewer, but higher draft picks.
When the roster has many opportunities, the equation flips over. I would contend that there are still many opportunities to complete for roster spots this year. But, we do have multiple one-year, low dollar free agent signings that are currently plugging holes (of this I am quite thankful) but still keep the opportunity open for picks to compete.
I would also suggest that Brad has forever proclaimed that he is a BPA drafter. This topic has been beaten well beyond death, but in general I believe him and acknowledge that position does become part of the BPA equation. I believe he has his tiers and will always pick a top tier over a position but will pick position if in the same tierā¦ mostly.
So there is a time and place for all actions. Trade up/Trade down/Pickā¦ they all have their place. And the perverial, it takes two to play the trade game.
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1st round = high end starter
2nd round = solid average starter/ Very good rotational player
3-5th round = solid rotational player
6-UDFA = Special teams
Brad has sacrificed all the 3-5th picks last few years. Has so far gotten 0 rotational/ depth players since 2023.
Thats the key to drafting.
Best team to draft in the middle rounds was Seattle.
Equivalent of having
The 24th pick in the 3,4,5th rounds for 3 years.
Lions in that same span
The 7th pick in the 3,4,5th rounds.
Lions got 9 players
Only 1 has played over 10% of O/D snaps.
Seattle got 14 players
8! Players played over 10% of snaps
5 players played lver 20%!
2 over 60%
Thats how you fill out a roster.
Not by drafting High risk prospects from small schools that have only played football for 2 years. (Sorsdal, Manu, Hassanin)
And not by signing washed up off injured vets
(turner, Wonnum, Mays)
Brad had to make those moves because hes blown the middle of the draft.
He has to hit this year
I donāt see how this even got published. Everyone knows that the JJ model overvalues first rounders, and these guys spent wasted computer time saying the same thing. Why they didnāt use the RH model is beyond me. Their peer reviewers were clueless, I would have recommended a hard ārejectā after looking at the paper for all of 90 seconds.
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I think this is a symptom of āeducational inflationā - too many jobs requiring advanced degrees, so now you have far more people in graduate programs that require publication, so this kind of crap just proliferates.
Iāve got lots of issues with this trend, but the one that Iāll complain about here is how this is promoting and rewarding shoddy thinking and reasoning.
As an example from this paper:
Our refined model suggested that the value of a pick 200 is about 30 times more than what [the Jimmy Johnson point system] projects.
So, letās be clear on this thought process. These college students came up with a model that is a factor of two hundred different than what professionals in the space ostensibly use, and their immediate conclusion is that the professionals must be wrong?
This paper should have been eviscerated by the peer reviewers, and the students sent back to reformulate their study. Instead, itās published, and these kids now think theyāre authorities on this subject, confirmed by their publication in a peer-reviewed journal.
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On the Jimmy Johnson trade chartā¦ pick #200 is equal to 11 points.
30 x 11 = 330 points.
They apparently believe a mid-6th round pick is just as valuable as the #57 overall pick.
The 6th and 7th round picks can be very valuable until you spend them on a player that likely wonāt make your roster. These picks can carry a lot of value when you have them to trade for veteran players at the deadline. You get the vet for a half season and then recoup what can be a much higher comp pick the following year.
They can also be used to acquire a player that is about to be released by a team in a roster crunch at the cut down deadline. They can also be used in a package to move up to get a better player earlier in the draft. They have the least value when you are left holding them and using them to select players in the 7th round.
I kidā¦.. I actually agree that I like trading them at the deadline to get vets.
Plus, there are over 2000 new open access journals ā¦per YEAR! You get a paper rejected, no problem try another journal. And another. Until you have one so far down the list that theyāll take anything.
Plus, the quality of peer review is in the toilet. You obviously had clueless people read the paper above. Sure people do it for free, but the shoddy reviews on my own work are pretty scary. Iāve had reviewers say - well he didnāt address this, and Iāve had to give page and line numbers pointing out where it was addressed. That used to never happen. Iām betting some reviewers read and write a review in about 20 minutes.
Plus , donāt get me started ā¦ Some journals (even ones with high impact factors) are now askingā¦name three good persons that would be qualified to review your work. (Geesh - yeah, Iāll get my colleagues and like-minded friends)ā¦even worse: name three persons that you would prefer NOT review your work. I mean really? Or is this a trap? Needless to say, I passed on that journal.
There are so many things wrong with the system. I think it started with open access journals in the late 90ās. A peer reviewed publication just doesnāt mean what it used to mean.
Brad has sacrificed all the 3-5th picks last few years. Has so far gotten 0 rotational/ depth players since 2023.
True. But heās also shown that heās very good at finding cheap rotational vets later in free agency.
Also worth noting that a fourth-round pick makes $4.35M to $4.6M on a four-year contract. You can find veteran guys that donāt need a year to adjust to the league for the same price.
Third-rounders are $5.3M to $5.7M, so even more expensive than a veteran.
Even Mr. Irrelevant makes close to $1M a year on their rookie contract. Again, you can get a vet for around that amount of cap space when you figure in the veteran cap discount.
Vet Minimum for a player with 3 years experience. $1.145m
4th round draft pick first year cap hit
$1.170m with only the first year guaranteed.
Same exact cap hit.
Vet - Only 1 year deal. 0 guaranteed. Cut any time
4th rounder - 4 year contract. Only 1st year guaranteed. Cheap for 4 years, cut any time after year 1.
Exactly. So why not sign the vet and swing for the fences with the mid-round pick?
Give yourself a floor with the vet and shoot for ceiling with the pick.
I think Brad has already done that this year. That is why I would package those later picks and move up for better players.
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Right. He does both. Uses the picks to trade up for his guys, then uses others to take swings that sometimes donāt pay off (Manu, Martin, Hooker), but other times do (ARSB, Kerby). All because he knows he can find cheap, productive vets later in free agency (Stuard, Cunningham, Ya-Sin, Dortch, Turner, D. Clark, C. Clark, Maddox, McCreary, Conklin, etc.) to give him a decently high floor at a bunch of backup spots.
I think we signed 3 or 4 guys just because of the uncertainty of Kerby and Branch. Itās almost a bonus if either of them can come back with a full recovery.