Aside From Tom Brady, Patriots 6th Round Has Been Unimpressive Since 2000

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Aside From Tom Brady, Patriots 6th Round Has Been Unimpressive Since 2000

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Other than Tom Brady, going back through the list of 6th round draft choices during the Belichick era, there haven't exactly been a lot of gems coming out of that round.

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[Oswlek]

It is interesting that NE hasn't gotten another upper echelon player, particularly when you consider how many 7th rounders and UDFAs have had good success. That said, it isn't exactly a barren wasteland. Mincey and Larsen didn't crack their respective rookie rosters, but they've gone on to being multi-year starters elsewhere. LeKevin and Justin Rogers were part-time starters. And then there are a few who went on to being multi-year contributors, like Ebner and Pryor (I still think Pryor was going to be a very good player if injuries hadn't knocked him out of the game).

It also should be noted that 7 of the selections - a littler over 30% - were either in 2007 or 2014. This is important because you are dealing with a historically bad draft (4 selections) or it being far too soon to pass judgement (3 selections), respectively.

Fun topic!

 

[hwc]

They don't call it the sixth round for nothing. It's filled with players who weren't attractive enough to take in Round 1, Round 2, Round 3, Round 4, or Round 5.

6th round, 7th round, UDFA. It's all pretty much the same.

 

[everlong]

Even if you want to say their batting average is .067 their slugging percent is infinite.

 

[oldrover]

Also: in the past 15 years...

Pats never made the playoffs.











...other than the years Tom Brady played. True story!

 

[RayClay]

Antwan Harris had a decent career for a sixth rounder and took the lateral and scored on Brown's huge field goal block against Pitt.

 

[IcyPatriot]

If it were up to me all 6th and 7th round picks would be from small schools - division II and division III.

For selfish reasons of course ... love to watch these kids try to make the big jump.

The highlight for many is just getting drafted ... as we know most don't get the thrill.

There must be stats on NFL 6th vs 7th vs UDFA's and how they fared.

 

[Fencer]

Antwan Harris had a decent career for a sixth rounder and took the lateral and scored on Brown's huge field goal block against Pitt.

Didn't he also force a fumble against Ricky Proehl? I recall him as having a second big play that postseason.

I don't recall him accomplishing much EXCEPT those two plays, but that's still a lot.

 

[meatface]

Damn why couldn't they make brilliant picks every time? This is why the Pats never win

 

[convertedpatsfan]

I think you have to consider that not every 6th rounder will be a future first-ballot HOFer, but that doesn't mean they're a disappointment either.

Using Chase Stuart's adjusted draft value chart which relies on average career AV, you can expect anywhere from 1 to 1.9 career AV, with most of those picks falling closer to the 1-1.5 range.

By those criteria, you see guys like Le Kevin Smith (3 AV with NE, 5 AV career), Antwan Harris (7 AV), and Myron Pryor (3 AV) actually exceeded the average outputs. Even a guy like Jake Ingram gets credit with 1 AV as a specialist for a year and a half.

It is kind of strange that we seem to have much better success in the 7th round (Dennard, Deaderick, Edelman, Cassel, Banta-Cain, Givens, and Pass).

 

[DarrylS]

Fine to look at it this way, but how did every other team compare to the Pats??

If you google late round draft picks who made an impact in the NFL, they are few and far between..

Imagine if the draft still had 15 rounds????

 

[notex]

hasn't Jeremy Mincey gone on to have a decent career? I believe I remember him being referred to as a "key" player in the cowboys defense.. Don't watch many of their games.

Just a theory, but maybe our UDFA / 7th round success is because we tend to use those picks by taking "high risk/high reward" type mentality: Dennard (legal problems), Edelmen (position change) Cassel (played like one snap in college), Neal (wrestler) ... you get the point.

In contrast, it seems like we go for "low ceiling/special teams consideration" with 6th? maybe I am over generalizing here.

 

[Oswlek]

Didn't he also force a fumble against Ricky Proehl? I recall him as having a second big play that postseason.

I don't recall him accomplishing much EXCEPT those two plays, but that's still a lot.

You are correct. Despite that, I left him off the list above because he was pretty much a non-entity after a terrible showing against Buffalo in 2003. Still pretty much average for a 6th rounder, though.

 

[Oswlek]

hasn't Jeremy Mincey gone on to have a decent career? I believe I remember him being referred to as a "key" player in the cowboys defense.. Don't watch many of their games.

Just a theory, but maybe our UDFA / 7th round success is because we tend to use those picks by taking "high risk/high reward" type mentality: Dennard (legal problems), Edelmen (position change) Cassel (played like one snap in college), Neal (wrestler) ... you get the point.

In contrast, it seems like we go for "low ceiling/special teams consideration" with 6th? maybe I am over generalizing here.

It's an interesting theory, but I'd say you are over generalizing. As hwc said above, 6th and 7th rounders are all pretty much the same.

 

[Rob0729]

The Pats have some good sixth rounders including Nate Ebner, Myron Pryor, and it looks like Zach Moore. If you get anything out of a sixth round pick, they are a good pick. Most sixth and seventh rounders are out of the league in a year or two.

 

[patriot1136]

Don't get too excited about Mincey. He is definitely overrated

 

[rookBoston]

I think as Pats fans we are disallowed from ever *****ing about poor drafting in the 6th round. In the game of "let's take a long odds flier on a guy that might pay off big time" we've already cashed in on as much upside as any team can reasonably expect.

 

[tasmlab]

I think as Pats fans we are disallowed from ever *****ing about poor drafting in the 6th round. In the game of "let's take a long odds flier on a guy that might pay off big time" we've already cashed in on as much upside as any team can reasonably expect.

As Pats fans, we've won the f**ing Powerball lottery in the sixth round. It was 15 years ago, but the payoff was incredible.

 

[PatsFanSince74]

I think as Pats fans we are disallowed from ever *****ing about poor drafting in the 6th round. In the game of "let's take a long odds flier on a guy that might pay off big time" we've already cashed in on as much upside as any team can reasonably expect.

It's sort of like exposure to X-Ray Radiation.
I think that the Pats of this generation have probably used up their Lifetime Limit of what one can expect from a Sixth Round pick. Maybe it will be possible to reset the Dosimeter in, oh, another 20 years or so.

 

[hambone1818]

This has the makings of a good article but it's missing one key component: the control group (i.e. the rest of the league). How did the average team do in the 6th round over that timespan? Break down by number of players per team, number of starts per player per team, number of players still on team after 1 year, 3 years, 5 years.

The 5th, 6th and 7th rounds are generally a barren wasteland of practice squad filler and future ex-football players. On a roster that's generally as stacked, 1 to 53, as the Patriots what are they looking for? The one-in-a-million home runs (Brady, Edelman) and the one-in-a-thousand depth/special teamers (Slater, Ebner, Dennard). So there's been some decent late-round return for the Pats, but without controlling for the rest of the league it's impossible to say how they've done.