Print Page - Grading the Draft

Check out this doofus from CBS sportsline on MIA's draft

http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/blog/rob-rang/18883125/grading-the-draft----afc-teams (http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/blog/rob-rang/18883125/grading-the-draft----afc-teams)

his is Rob Rang, as in rhymes with Wang, which he must suck.

Miami Dolphins: C-

General manager Jeff Ireland has made a career of patiently looking for singles and doubles in the first round while waiting until the second to land quarterbacks, but by investing in Ryan Tannehill at No. 8 overall, the Dolphins swung for the fences. Clearly Tannehill is a gamble; he has limited experience, but his 19 career starts at quarterback came in new Miami offensive coordinator Mike Sherman's offense. Not even Andrew Luck can boast that familiarity with his NFL team's scheme. I do like the pick, but Tannehill had better be good, because the Dolphins didn't help he or incumbent starter Matt Moore much the rest of the way through the draft. Athletic front seven defenders Olivier Vernon and Josh Kaddu have upside but are raw. Stanford offensive tackle Jonathan Martin was a solid value selection in the second, as was Miami running back Lamar Miller in the fourth but for a team that traded away the only game-breaking receiver they had in Brandon Marshall, not enough was done to improve the Dolphins' receiving corps.

So you bust the Phins for taking Tannehill at No. 8, but you like the pick?!?! Vernon and Josh Kaddu have upside but are raw (it's called building for the future, idiot). You agreed that Martin was solid value in the 2nd and you liked Miller's speed and yet you gave the Dolphins a C-????

Wow, with expert analysis and writing like that, I guess I could get a job with CBS Sportline.

This guy's a clown. I thought MIA did well and gave them solid B+

Read one draft guru's mock draft from a week ago (Profootballweekly or something like that, can't remember). He had Tannehill, Martin and Miller all going in Rd 1. With Miller going to the Giants with the final pick of Rd 1.

Miami lands all 3 guys and he gave the Dolphins a "C" as well. Makes no sense, in YOUR mock you had all 3 guys going in Rd 1 and raved how they are great 1st round talents. Miami gets all 3 guys who YOU think are first round guys and its a "C"?

It's just silly, it really is!

It's because they are not great fits, nor did they fill the needs that Miami had. Drafting a starting Pro-Bowl caliber QB doesn't give you the same draft grade if you have Brady or Rodgers already but have other needs, as opposed to having Henne or Moore. Yes, Martin was a great "value" pick, as was Miller. The fact that they were taken ahead of safety and WR, when the pass coverage was near the bottom of the league last year, and Miami traded away their only legitimate receiving threat for some magic beans, is problematic. I've said that in several other threads. Nice to see I'm not the only one who sees this. Safety and WR should have been priorities over LB, RB, and TE, but they were not. Consequently, when Brady passes for 500+ yards on Miami again this year, or when the Phins shut down Houston's two headed running game, but Schaub and Johnson put up career stats against the weak secondary, and Miami STILL can't score to keep up with either team, I will be serving crow.

FWIW, Kiper gave Miami a C, as did the Palm Beach Post, Fox Sports.com. SportsNet.com gave them a C+, and SI.com gave them a B-. The only person I saw who gave them a truly "favorable" grade on the draft was Pete Prisco, who gave them a B+. The primary reason there were so many C's? Lack of addressing a WR until the 6th round, drafting Egnew in the third, and not getting anyone to replace Bell. This board may believe it was a great draft. The rest of the sports world appears not to. I think, personally, it was a "B"/"B-." Some issues were addressed in a great way, but I think the two things I've mentioned here are going to come back to bite the Phins in a bigger way than some of you guys realize. -EK

Excuse me? Have you not been watching the scoring explosions the past few seasons? In this league, if you don't score, you don't win...period!

Miami upgrade their offense with the best possible players available....while we might not have picked a wideout early, the value was simply not there.....passing on a Miller or Egnew, would have been reckless and shortsighted. This offense is being built for optimum production in 2 or 3 seasons.

Definitely a strong draft class with ALOT of upside....Miller could be a CJ type back and Egnew a Jimmy Graham..."...here's hoping that Tannehill pans out and becomes a star!

Quote from: miamid45 on April 29, 2012, 09:55:40 pm

Yep and those that are upset with the draft are just haters and as I said earlier, haters hate and are never happy! They cried for months about Tannehill, now that Tannehill is in Miami they need to cry about the next thing. Never happy!

[quote author=EKnight link=topic= The primary reason there were so many C's? Lack of addressing a WR until the 6th round, drafting Egnew in the third, and not getting anyone to replace Bell. This board may believe it was a great draft. The rest of the sports world appears not to. I think, personally, it was a "B"/"B-." Some issues were addressed in a great way, but I think the two things I've mentioned here are going to come back to bite the Phins in a bigger way than some of you guys realize. -EK
[/quote]
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First, let me say it is a crap shoot to try and grade a draft for at least 2 yrs. As far as getting lower grades because of getting a WR in the late rounds, IMO, WR was not as big of a need as many people seem to think. There is plenty of talent on the roster.

At Safety the Fins will be counting on Jimmy Wilson, but the depth could be better. Keep in mind the DE's were flying of the board and it forced the Fins to grab one possibly earlier than they would have liked. I even thought they might have took a DE in rd. 2.

Sunstroke- the entire point of this thread, as I interpreted it from the statements "You agreed that Martin was solid value in the 2nd and you liked Miller's speed and yet you gave the Dolphins a C-? This guy's a clown. I thought MIA did well and gave them solid B+" and "Miami gets all 3 guys who YOU think are first round guys and its a "C"? It's just silly, it really is!"- was that giving Miami the grade that the CBS SPorts guy did was too harsh and it was a "solid B+" draft, not that it is too early to grade them at all. It wasn't until I pointed out that they probably deserved somewhere in that range, that people started in with the "it's too early" stuff. -EK

^^^^Actually, I mentioned in other threads, even before the draft was over that grading the draft before we see the players play for 2-3 is stupid.

That perspective was blasted.

Quote

You can't grade a draft in 3 years.

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All this can't grade a draft stuff is silly.

When the premise of the thread that Miami had a great draft or a rival had a bad draft, but seems to be an okay perspective when the premise that Miami had a less than spectular draft.

I will be giving out my 2012 draft grades in Feb 2014/15

I saw that and didn't blast you. It's naive to think that the media and fans are not going to rate/rank/grade a draft immediately after it is done. A team has just added 3-7 new members. Of course people are going to have an opinion about how good/bad those additions will make the team. I actually happen to agree that the best way to rate a draft is to wait and see how the players perform, but I also think that there's nothing wrong with making an assessment based on initial impressions. And that's my point- I, and most of the sporting world, don't believe the draft is nearly as good as some people do. No one in this thread pointed out that ranking a draft this soon is dumb when the direction of the thread was, "look how great we drafted! Boy Howdee!" It only took that turn when I said what everyone else is saying- Not great, not Boy Howdee! Good draft at best, average at worst. A draft that only gets you one or two immediate starters when your team won 6 games the previous year is not a great draft. -EK

Quote from: EKnight on April 30, 2012, 03:22:33 pm

A draft that only gets you one or two immediate starters when your team won 6 games the previous year is not a great draft. -EK

That seems to be one aspect almost everyone overlooks. Either in the prelimary or later grading.

A team that won less than half their games, thus obviously has multiple positions that are in need of upgrade and whose picks are towards the start of the draft round ought draft more starters than a team that went deep in the playoffs thus obviously are either a complete team or close to it and are drafting at the bottom of the round.

Some fans are hilarious.

A week ago this time some Dolphins fans here were crying that Miami has so many holes so many spots to fill. (which was true and realistically there is no way to fill them all in 1 offseason/draft, yet I guess some expected that to happen) and under no circumstance should they draft Tannehill ( I guess they didn't view QB as a hole, but whatever). Too many holes was the chant from a few fans on this site.

Then after the draft these same fans are complaining that Ireland and the front office didn't fill every hole on the roster.

It didn't matter who Miami drafted this past weekend a few fans were coming here looking to bitch about something.

Also I find it hilarious that last week when the "experts" had Tannehill a Top 10 pick, according to some fans, those experts were dumb, clueless, buying into the media hype. NOW, when these SAME experts give Miami a "C" grade the same fans who were trashing the experts last week are saying they (the experts) are genius, smart, know what they are talking about, do it for a living. SO, when the experts DON'T agree with your opinion they are stupid. When they back up your opinion they are smart. ha ha ha. You can't make this stuff up!

P.S...if you go to MiamiDolphins.com and WATCH the Ireland's post draft press conference (the video is up there, free to watch) he said they had no plans on drafting a safety this year because it was a very weak safety draft. It wasn't an option for them.

Mike don't change what people are saying to fit your argument- the issue is not that they didn't fill every hole, it's that they filled holes that weren't there or weren't prominant (TE and RB as the former, LB as the latter), and ignored holes that were clearly problem areas- safety and WR. Drafting a WR in the 6th round is ignoring it, IMO. I don't care how "weak" the draft was at safety, there were still some safeties and corners left after round 2 that graded higher and would have been better picks than anyone Miami took. You really expect Lamar Miller, after all the man crush you seem to have on him, to see anything but special teams play? He'll be buried 3-4 deep on the RB depth chart because of his hands, size, inability to block, and injury questions. That's a lot of red flags for a guy who is such a "steal." And while Miami was drafting him, with 5 RBs already on the roster, they were passing on guys like Al Dennard, Trevin Wade, or George Iloka, all of whom would have had a shot at starting. So...you believe drafting a special teamer and bench warming RB when the team already has a 1000 yard rusher is smarter than drafting someone who can start and help the 25th WORST secondary in the league? Again- I don't care that they didn't fill every hole; I didn't expect them to. But I did expect them not to draft positions already manned while ignoring the ones Miami needs help at. Secondary is like the QB of defense for Miami in terms of need. In fact, Miami's QB performed BETTER than their pass coverage last year. -EK

^^I'm gonna have to agree with MikeO on this one. The very same argument was being used as a reason NOT to draft Tannehill just a week ago. That Tannehill wasn't value at #8, that it didn't matter that he was a position of need, if there were better players on the board they should be picked over a position of need. Isn't that what Miami did for guys like Miller, Kaddu and Kheeston, took them because they were better players rather than basing it completely on need?

The rating that OURLADS scouting service had for Lamar Miller was 8.75. That was third best among RB's and 48th overall when he was taken with the 97th pick. Kaddu had a score of 6.79 which was 109th overall when he was taken with the 155th pick. Randall Kheeston was taken with the 215th pick and he was graded out as 6.75 the 112th best player. Heck Jeff Fuller was brought in as an undrafted FA and he was the 140th best player according to OURLADS. Not only that but he already knows the offense and has caught hundreds of passes from Tannehill already. I wouldn't be surprised to see him make the team or at least the practice squad. I really wouldn't. I figured they would take him in the draft and when I saw he fell completely out of it, I was certain that he'd be a UDFA and bingo!

Quote from: Pappy13 on April 30, 2012, 06:49:07 pm

Exactly. People want to have it both ways. It's silly.

Either you buy into the "experts analysis" or you don't buy into what they are saying. You can't throw there analysis under the bus one day and say they are clowns and then the very next day say they are genius and know more than anyone because they do it for a living so their word is gospel. That's politician caliber double-talk right there.

I don't care what our "draft grade" is. My entire only point was that it is foolish for a so called "Expert" to do a mock draft for months and have 3 specific guys go in Rd 1. Then when one team (doesn't matter what team, insert team name here) gets 3 of those guys who you have going in Rd 1 between rounds 1-4 and you give them a "C" its silly. I was using that as an example of how silly draft grades are. Because the so called "expert" isn't consistent in his own analysis!! His own projections!

Just call it a preliminary draft grade and stop all this sillyness.

It is absolutely valid to evaluate a draft immediately if it is in proper context.

1- Is it a fan or paid analyst perspective.
2 - Is it grading the handling of the draft picks (not evaluation).
3 - Does it correlate well with information from multiple, credible sources.

As long as you don't express that the evaluation of players was certain, I see no problem with offering a preliminary draft grade. As we know, it is impossible to be certain about a player. Even great players don't make it for various reasons and bad ones get over-rated all the time. As soon as the player is picked, circumstances influence the outcome. We aren't evaluating the outcome, we are evaluating the use of the draft from an outside perspective.

My grade for Ireland/Philbin's handling of the draft is a high B or low A. If I had to pick one, I would go with high B. In 5 years, I could retroactively evaluate the draft which would give me better information but it would also be difficult to account for all the circumstances that played a role in the success of that pick.

Quote from: MikeO on April 30, 2012, 05:30:05 pm

MikeO is right on target with this post. Additionally, it is shortsighted to look at the draft as the only means of improving the team. Trades and Free agency are used to fill vital roles all the time. I realize some on here think they are Junior GM's, but you reaaly don't have a clue as to what the internal plan of the organization is, nor what discussions have occurred.

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