Another Theory on Patriot Draft Performance

[livinginthe past]

1.) The Context is the draft and the players. History, not what other teams do, eventually supplies the answers, as examples of late round greats show over and over.

If I had to pick a guy on this forum for his ability to generate pure content-free waffle it would be you, Deus.

2.) If I'm failing to get things done, it doesn't matter what percentage of my peers are also failing. The bottom line is that I'm not getting it done. What you're missing here is the question of reasonableness, not the issue of comparison. Comparison is only a potential part of the equation, as opposed to being some required component.

Again, how can you justify the claim that Belichick isn't getting it done?

By comparing him to someone who is getting it done, thats how.

Winning games, winning Superbowls.

Sounds like Bill is getting is done, after all.

No, it's not. Again, you fail to understand the issue. My team can suck or excel, independent of what other teams do. If 31 teams pass up on Peyton Manning in the draft, that doesn't make the 32nd team ok for doing it too. A combination of factors (need being a great one) enter into play, and you're ignoring them.

No they can't Deus, they really can't.

You don't seem to be able to grasp the actual basis of the term 'excel' or even 'suck' - do you not see the words as comparators?

Again, how you say someone 'excels' when you aren't comparing to anyone or anything else.

You can't.

Your illogic is surpassed only by your stubborness

Quantification wasn't needed. If you need a QB and you choose Leaf over Manning, you screwed up your draft. That's about as basic as it gets. If you can't even admit to something that obvious, you really shouldn't be posting on this topic.

Its was a dumb example.

Its sucked.

Apparently I can make that statement because I don't have to quantify what a good example, or even an excellent example might be.

It was in 'isolation', you see.

Wait, so you completely misunderstanding my post, and then following that up with a botched analogy, is supposed to be "Game, set match."?

Good comedy.

The reality is that this is a message board. If you don't care to discuss the issues of the team, you should feel free to avoid threads that do discuss them. After all, your comments are every bit as worthless as other posters' comments.

Again, we can look back at a draft and determine success or failure with some arguable degree of accuracy. That doesn't require looking at other teams. It doesn't require an MBA, or a Harvard degree, or anything but access to the data.

Au contraire.

I enjoy making your stance look every bit as foolish as it is.

You think you can criticise without reference to any type of standard- and you can.

It is, as I said before, totally without merit.

 

[Deus Irae]

True but I also think BB is much prouder of the performance of his teams 05-present than this board seems to be.

I doubt that. This board is split on the extent of happiness given the successes and failures of the team post '04. I'm sure that's exactly how BB feels about it.

I might be wrong but I dont think BB looks at those draft classes and says if I had got player X or player Y we would be all set now. regardless of how bad those classes were he had 80 players each year and took the 53 he felt gave him the best chance to win regardless of how they were accuired and I am sure he could come up with much better tangible reasons than just screaming about draft classes. He would probably point to player X, Y, and Z and say these were their diffencencies and they got exposed in games P and Q and that is why we blew it. I highly doubt he would ever sit there and say man if we just had player A,B and C we would have won because that is pointless.

I imagine that BB is capable of looking back and admitting where he's blown picks, and I think his moves subsequent to those blown picks have often demonstrated that. If you think otherwise, you're welcome to that opinion.

If you think he'd still pick O'Connell again, or Butler, or Tate, more power to you.

 

[Deus Irae]

If I had to pick a guy on this forum for his ability to generate pure content-free waffle it would be you, Deus.

Interesting assertion, given that I'm not waffling at all. You don't need to evaluate all the teams in the draft in order to evaluate one team. It's a basic position, and I'm not changing it. You're confusing evaluation with comparison. That's your problem, not mine.

Again, how can you justify the claim that Belichick isn't getting it done?

By noting the failures and comparing them to the successes, within his own choices, obviously.

By comparing him to someone who is getting it done, thats how.

This is not necessary, which is the point. You don't say "You can't judge Matt Millen's drafts without looking at every other team's draft". You say "Matt Millen's drafts were bad".

Winning games, winning Superbowls.

Sounds like Bill is getting is done, after all.

First of all, this is a red herring and you know it. Second, he hasn't been winning Super Bowls, so your own argument falls anyway.

No they can't Deus, they really can't.

You don't seem to be able to grasp the actual basis of the term 'excel' or even 'suck' - do you not see the words as comparators?

Again, how you say someone 'excels' when you aren't comparing to anyone or anything else.

You can't.

Your illogic is surpassed only by your stubborness

Yes, they can. I'm sorry you're too far in the team's pocket to be honest about this. On does not need to compare with others to determine if one can do something, or do it well. That's been true for all of recorded history. If you can climb a tree, you can climb a tree. It doesn't matter how many others can do it.

Its was a dumb example.

Its sucked.

Apparently I can make that statement because I don't have to quantify what a good example, or even an excellent example might be.

It was in 'isolation', you see.

The example was fine. You don't like it because it kills your argument. That's not really a surprise.

Au contraire.

I enjoy making your stance look every bit as foolish as it is.

You think you can criticise without reference to any type of standard- and you can.

It is, as I said before, totally without merit.

Your inability to grasp the basics is astounding.

 

[signbabybrady]

I'm not sure how that's intriguing, but history plays it out pretty well, actually. The Colts chose correctly with the Manning pick and went on to long term success. The Chargers got stuck with the leavings, a head case who couldn't get it done and led them to bad years. They then hit on Brees (and either hit on Rivers or got lucky when Manning didn't want to play for them, depending upon how the background really went down) and became a powerhouse.

I find it intriguing because you are bringing a different variable into the equation.

When grading a draft you might do it on a scale of 1-10 10 being the best but what happens when a player is so good he should grade higher than the 10.

Of course the numbers were used to make a point. That was the whole intent of the response. No matter how well the Colts hit in the rest of that draft, that draft's success or failure was going to rest on the choice of Manning v. Leaf.

I knew what you were doing and all I was pointing out is that it would mean more if you didnt just make the numbers up. which is also why I made it point to mention I thought your analsys was intribuing.

But bottom line is without the true numbers you can truly verfy it as a fact. you say it doesnt matter how well they the rest of the draft because they got Peyton but without true numbers for all we know the Colts went on to get a player of Peytons capability at every position with every other pick they took while the chargers may have gone onto hit one out every ten. Clearly this would make enough of a difference that it matters.

Had the chargers got probowlers out of all other picks they would consider it a succesful draft despite getting leaf instead of Manning and then by going on to get two great QBs in subsequent drafts they would have in theory been the better team.

Almost no debate on Patsfans.com means a lot. It's not as if Belichick and company are waiting upon our discussions to determine the moves of the team. What's fascinating, though, is watching the homers consistently retreating into this non-defense defense when they know they've lost the discussion, yet they preen about the theoretical successes without blinking an eye to their hypocrisy.

Reality: If you can't debate the bad draft, you can't debate the good draft. It's all off limits, because it's all the same except the final grade.

So, since pretty much all the debates are meaningless in the end, should we shut down all of Patsfans.com, or just shut down any threads with disagreements and make the place a nice, safe echo chamber?

Your twisting what I was saying. I think there is no problem with debating drafts but debating the success of a draft and trying to equate to success of a team over the course of years is very pointless as teams can make up for bad drafting and subsquently teams can draft great and still not be great as there is way to much more that goes into it.

 

[patsfan13]

The Patriots were an 11 game winner, with their backup QB, in 2008. Despite that, the team put a bunch of players from the 2009 draft on the team. The problem is talent, not numbers. Numbers have only been a true bar with the 2007 team, and a good part of that was because the 2007 draft had so little talent.

Keeping all other things even: had the team just drafted Sean Smith (my binkie) instead of Darius Butler, and Mike Wallace instead of Tate (I was ok with Tate as a flyer pick, but that's a huge swing with just one pick), the team would be much better off, and it has nothing to do with the difficulty of making the roster in any particular year.

.

The 2007 team was an old team that needed to be rebuilt.


I guess BB should have fired Pioli and brought you in to run the draft

 

[Rusty Coupe]

I don't have any stats on this, but it has always seemed as though there are as many players out of schools like Pacific Lutheran, Troy State, East Carolina, Fresno State, Moorehead State, Chadron St, etc... than are out of the traditional schools that are regularly in the Top 25.

While traditional powers have the recruiting edge and presumably have the pick of the best players, that somehow doesn't translate to the NFL. Which leads me to wonder if the traditional powers don't just use their athletic advantage in a dumbed down scheme to simply out run and out jump lesser opponents. Players from smaller schools relying more on their smarts and gamesmanship to gain an advantage, and better suited to play in a Belichick scheme which requires some football IQ.

 

[Shelterdog]

Just for reference...

I remember -- according to, I believe, Education of a Coach, possibly Patriot Reign -- that it is a rule within the Pats organization when evaluating drafts that they only grade according to who they selected, and not who they could've selected. Again, they DO NOT grade according to who they could have had, because it is wholly unclear as to what that player would've done in NE, as opposed to on the other team.

So, in trying to access the draft by pointing out that they could've had Clay Matthews is invalid by the Patriots internal standards.

The discussion was in Patriot Reign, and while I know that's what they say I wouldn't be shocked if BB was kicking himself a bit over the Matthews pick.

Here's your theory on Pats' drafting in a nutshell:

* The pats draft reasonably well relative to other teams but not exceptionally well. They drafted fairly poorly in 2006-2008.

* Drafting is overrated if you are willing to build a team with free agents, waiver wire pickups, undrafted free agents, and the like.

* BB has historically been really good at the non-draft parts of player acquisition so he's made up for any drafting shortfalls

* The talent of draft picks are grossly overrated. Fourth round picks usually never do a thing and second round picks get cut all the time. You have a good draft if three of your seven draft picks become signficant contributors. A second round pick has about a fifty fifty chance of becoming a starter, a third round pick one in three, fourth round about one in four, and after that about one in ten.

*The Pats drafts look slightly worse than they are because many other teams are afraid to cut a draft pick; most teams won't dump a guy like Butler for a nobody like Molden or keep Love over Weston because getting rid or draft picks makes the GM look stupid.

 

[livinginthe past]

This is not necessary, which is the point. You don't say "You can't judge Matt Millen's drafts without looking at every other team's draft". You say "Matt Millen's drafts were bad".

Ha ha.

Putting Matt Millens name in yet another example doesn't make your position any less ludicrous.

Anyone with an iota of common sense knows that Matt Millens are drafts are bad because they are comparitively bad when compared to the drafts of other GM's.

Again, you are suggesting the term 'bad' can be used in total isolation of any type of governing standard?

Funny stuff.

First of all, this is a red herring and you know it. Second, he hasn't been winning Super Bowls, so your own argument falls anyway.

Yes he ahs been winning Superbowls.

He has more SB's this decade than any other HC.

Yes, they can. I'm sorry you're too far in the team's pocket to be honest about this. On does not need to compare with others to determine if one can do something, or do it well. That's been true for all of recorded history. If you can climb a tree, you can climb a tree. It doesn't matter how many others can do it.

The inane stubbornness you are showing is amazing.

Let me spell it out for you, using your own example.

Bill Belichick can climb a tree = Bill Belichick can draft.

Bill Belichick climbs a tree badly = Bill Belichick climbs a tree worse than you would expect.

I've finished making my point anyway - I certainly don't doubt your stamina even if your acumen is in question.

FWIW, I don't make these arguments to try and win you over, I do it to display, to those who read, the absurdity of your position.

Have a nice day, Deus.

 

[Deus Irae]

I find it intriguing because you are bringing a different variable into the equation.

When grading a draft you might do it on a scale of 1-10 10 being the best but what happens when a player is so good he should grade higher than the 10.

If you're grading on a scale of 1-10, no player will be so good that he's higher than a 10. Your scale insures that.

I knew what you were doing and all I was pointing out is that it would mean more if you didnt just make the numbers up. which is also why I made it point to mention I thought your analsys was intribuing.

But bottom line is without the true numbers you can truly verfy it as a fact. you say it doesnt matter how well they the rest of the draft because they got Peyton but without true numbers for all we know the Colts went on to get a player of Peytons capability at every position with every other pick they took while the chargers may have gone onto hit one out every ten. Clearly this would make enough of a difference that it matters.

Had the chargers got probowlers out of all other picks they would consider it a succesful draft despite getting leaf instead of Manning and then by going on to get two great QBs in subsequent drafts they would have in theory been the better team.

This is not true. Well, more accurately, you are assigning a specific requirement that's not necessary, which is the same thing that livinginthepast is doing. You can choose to have the grading parameters that you are insisting are needed, but they are not actually needed. It's just one method of grading, nothing more.

Your twisting what I was saying. I think there is no problem with debating drafts but debating the success of a draft and trying to equate to success of a team over the course of years is very pointless as teams can make up for bad drafting and subsquently teams can draft great and still not be great as there is way to much more that goes into it.

I wasn't twisting anything, Sign. Be fair now, because I'm already dealing with one poster who can't keep his points straight. We were talking specifically about the draft. I don't know why you keep saying the same thing with a different cover on it, but let me address every permutation at once:


Other than for entertainment/time passing purposes, it is pointless to have any debate about anything on a sports message board. Such debates accomplish nothing of worldly significance and, even when debates are clearly won (such as the one here where I've clearly destroyed Inthepast's argument), sides are going to insist they're correct or admit they are wrong only to go back to posting the same erroneous stuff in the future.

We're not here to solve the great questions of our time. We're here to talk football, in various ways. One of them, every single year, is through analyzing the draft, both past and present. It's done as a standalone. It's done as a comparison. It's done as a revision. It's done as part of an overall evaluation of an off season.

It's done a lot of ways, but it's done, and there's more than one way to do it and come up with some level of accurate, albeit imperfect, grade, even if people disagree with that given grade. People don't need to take into account the greatness of the free agents, or the awesomeness of UDFAs, or the brilliance of trades, if they don't want to. Those aren't requirements of grading a draft.

 

[Deus Irae]

The 2007 team was an old team that needed to be rebuilt.


I guess BB should have fired Pioli and brought you in to run the draft

Given that I've defended the 2007 draft, largely on the basis of the Welker and Moss trades, and given that I'm not here specifically bagging on the Patriots drafts but am talking more generally about people grading it, perhaps you'd have been better off aiming your snark somewhere else instead of showing your intolerance of divergence from the requirements of homerism.

 

[Deus Irae]

Ha ha.

Putting Matt Millens name in yet another example doesn't make your position any less ludicrous.

Anyone with an iota of common sense knows that Matt Millens are drafts are bad because they are comparitively bad when compared to the drafts of other GM's.

Again, you are suggesting the term 'bad' can be used in total isolation of any type of governing standard?

Funny stuff.






Yes he ahs been winning Superbowls.

He has more SB's this decade than any other HC.





The inane stubbornness you are showing is amazing.

Let me spell it out for you, using your own example.

Bill Belichick can climb a tree = Bill Belichick can draft.

Bill Belichick climbs a tree badly = Bill Belichick climbs a tree worse than you would expect.

I've finished making my point anyway - I certainly don't doubt your stamina even if your acumen is in question.

FWIW, I don't make these arguments to try and win you over, I do it to display, to those who read, the absurdity of your position.

Have a nice day, Deus.

It comes down to this, and it's as basic as I was saying. One need not grade on a curve. One can grade individually. Your failure to grasp that is a failure on your part, not stubbornness on my part.

 

[Shockt327]

It comes down to this, and it's as basic as I was saying. One need not grade on a curve. One can grade individually. Your failure to grasp that is a failure on your part, not stubbornness on my part.

So then would every draft be a failure? There will almost always be more busts than hits.

 

[IcyPatriot]

If Belichick was banned from the draft we would still have an excellent team. The draft is part of the process and the reality of it is that it is one way to save money.

Why everyone is spending so much time on this issue I do not understand. You draft for one team and when your team changes philosophy you change players. The major cuts have come on the defensive side - the side that is changing ... what is there to not understand here.

The cut players were utilized to the best of their meager abilities in the old scheme and now their meager ability's tank is empty to utilize in the new scheme.

 

[Deus Irae]

So then would every draft be a failure? There will almost always be more busts than hits.

A person grades against the known. You know the right answers, at least in theory. Now, in math, that means that the teacher knows 2+2=4, while in NFL draft evaluation, it will mean that the 'teacher' knows who's been a successful NFL draft pick, what hit percentages he's shooting for in order to give out his grades, what level of talent he expects from a pick at each graded spot, etc... It's not an automatic, and it's not possible to do it completely without bias and margin for error, but it's an avenue for grading.

Just as an example, some will say that grabbing Brady in round 6 alone is enough to make that year's draft a great one for the Patriots, while others will say that it's just one pick and doesn't make up for the amount of suck that most of the other picks produced. Both can make a reasonable argument, regardless of which one you or I may prefer, and neither argument needs to have a comparison to every other team's draft that year.

 

[Dimitri_0515]

Pats have been stockpiling draft picks for years now. Some haven't been hitting as of late, but rest assure Pats will hit on the draft and will hit hard. Pats are going to get an all-pro or two eventually, whether the trade down in the draft or keep their picks.

 

[Frick]

Threads like this always become, do you think you can draft better than Bill, how much experience have you got as head coach, look how many rings Bill has. This invariably tuns into personal attacks, STOP IT, we're all fans and if we win it all it doesn't matter who is right or wrong.

Overall we draft better than most, but if we can improve it why not. If we win with a 3-4 or 4-3 who cares. There isn't anyone here who could have drafted as well as Noll or Shula in their prime and almost anybody could have outdrafted them at the end and that's true of every coach.

There are teams out there that consistently draft WRS & OLBS that are top line players let's find out how they do it & copy them. Look how many teams have copied Bill and raided his coaching ranks. The best doctors in the country are the ones that keep up on the lastest procedures and not living on their past accomplishments. So yes, Bill can make history with super bowl wins but he must make history by constantly improving and yes that starts with draft evaluation. If for example Bill isn't thrilled with picks 5-7 or UDFAS let someone else do it. Heaven knows he has enough on his plate already & before someone writes in saying what makes you think Bill doesn't care about rounds 5-7 and the UDFAS, I AM NOT SAYING THAT I WAS USING IT AS AN EXAMPLE. ( I'll still hear about it, SIGH! )

 

[ivanvamp]

Threads like this always become, do you think you can draft better than Bill, how much experience have you got as head coach, look how many rings Bill has.

Part of the equation is talent evaluation. Part of it is draft position. Part of it is: does player X fit your system? (i.e., just he's a great 4-3 OLB in college doesn't mean that he would be a great 3-4 OLB in the pros) Part of it is what a coach does with a player. It's totally possible that a guy like Tom Brady ends up getting absolutely buried on a team that has a "franchise QB" (like the Pats supposedly did with Bledsoe), and a different coach sticks with that franchise QB over Brady, and Brady doesn't see the field for the first 6-7 years of his career, and he never becomes *TOM BRADY*.

There are so many factors involved in a player "making it" in the NFL...that isn't to say that a team can't be better at drafting than it is presently (like in every other area, I hope the Pats are always looking to improve here), but it is just to recognize that there is a LOT more that goes into "good drafting" than drafting good players.

 

[supafly]

He's obviously going to miss on a lot of players too, it's just the nature of the drafting game. It is certainly always a gamble.

That said, I think Belichick of all people certainly realizes and admits this with no problem.

In a way, he has even overcome the "gamble" of draft players not coming through by continuing the stockpile picks and playing with house money. In other words, Belichick knows that he will often miss, but he has taken a major part of that risk out of the equation, b/c we don't really lose much of anything--especially compared to other teams. If we don't hit on a 2nd rounder it doesn't even really matter, b/c the pick itself wasn't even wasted. Belichick has made a science of continuing to replace the pick anyway, therefore increasing his chances automatically.

We never really totally 'lose' anyway, b/c he replenishes the pick immediately. Many of the picks that everyone complains about is simply a bonus pick anyway. Like I said, it's like losing house money. You know that you are going to lose a lot gambling, sometime more than you win. But if you are simply losing house money, while the rest of the NFL is losing money from their own pockets--you are already outsmarting everyone no matter what.

By increasing the actual number of picks, he also increases the chance at picking a player who will perform well. People can complain about the risk of Cunningham not working out etc, but he never really 'lost' the pick anyway, did he??? He re-gained it immediately. THAT is how he is staying on top of the crapshoot known as the draft.

 

[bagwell368]

Let's try just one change.

Seymour. Most teams wouldn't have the hair to deal him when BB did. If we kept him, we do not have some of the FA's we have now - 2,3,4 maybe 5 less because of the cash.

So, we just might have Meri, Tate, Butler, Smith on the roster. So those picking at BB for poor drafting would have less of an argument, and we would have a weaker roster. Hmmm.

 

[Wretch]

Interesting debate. BB has a degree in economics and I think he approaches the draft as if were similar to a stock or commodity market. He understands the statistical risk of professionally untested players not performing up to their draft status so he hedges his draft investments by spreading his risk among multiple picks and by utilizing alternate markets, like free agency or trades.