PATSNUTme

He does raise a point in that you do have to draft players that improve your team.

What he misses is that the Patriots did just that with one of their best drafts in recent years.

ausbacker

Why? That Patriots have gone 16-0, 11-5 and 10-6 in the past 3 seasons whilst drafting with the same approach and the same free agent veteran approach.

The 2009 and 2010 Drafts are the best the Patriots have done in a while on face value and I look forward to the next 3-4 years to see the players evolve.

Tunescribe

I think Aristotle, Shakespeare and Hemingway would take issue with this.

eom

what could aristotle do?

moosekill

And for all you Dez Bryant fans, anyone remember what position the Lions drafted over and over again? How did that work out for them?

Tunescribe

Teach. Point being, where would we be without teachers and writers?

BSR

No. This article's criticism is flawed. It tries to make the argument that BB hasn't drafted many playmakers in the last four years and blames it on the trade down strategy. Yet, that really doesn't make sense unless he is trying to make the claim that you can't possibly select playmakers after a certain point. That of course is false because playmakers can be found in every round of a draft although they become harder and harder to find as the draft goes on.

So at what point have you traded down so far that you have significantly impaired your ability to pick a playmaker? If the argument is that only first round draft picks are likely playmakers then BB is doing right about average or better. First round picks tend to have a 50% success rate. Even according to this article BB has found 2 playmakers out of the first round of the last four years for a 50% success rate. So the argument isn't valid that he traded down too much out of the first round as his success rate is at least average over the past four years.

So what if we expand the rounds where the likelyhood of selecting playmakers is the first two rounds? His argument makes even less sense as BB has had 11 picks as compared to the typical 8 a team is awarded. That is 3 more shots at playmakers compared to the average team.

Expanding it to the third round is even worse, as BB has enjoyed 4 more picks then the typical team in this range.

So no, questioning the trade down strategy isn't really a legitamate thing to do. In fact it is really quite the opposite. This strategy has resulted in the team having more then the typical number of picks in the top end of the draft where there is a greater chance of selecting a playmaker. What I think IS a valid criticism is who BB selects with those picks. Now that would be a VALID criticism.

Joker

all alone at the bottom of the sea with 5 million lawyers

Deus Irae

Belichick's draft history results with the Patriots would seem to go against you. Taking Brady (6th round, obvious 'luck' pick as opposed to the comprehensive strategies we're discussing) out of the equation, who are the best 5 draft picks of the BB era?

Seymour
Wilfork
Warren
Mankins
Light


The trade down strategy really wasn't being implemented there. Then, adding Meriweather and Mayo to the mix, you get a trade down for Mayo, but the pick was still in the top ten of the entire draft.

__________________
"The object in life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane."
- Marcus Aurelius

mcmurtry86

And he got that top 10 pick by trading out of the 2007 first round