Every year we all do a million mock drafts and read through all the draft guides -- and yet every year BB manages to make picks that shock almost everybody. How is that possible? How can we still have WTF picks when for years now we've all been expecting the unexpected?
I went back and looked at all of BB's selections with the Pats and picked out some classic WTF picks, then tried to look at this year's draft and predict which players might be picked using that particular logic.
All of us think we can't be surprised again after what's happened in recent years, but we can be -- we're probably just not imagining the right players in the right rounds:
17 JARVIS JENKINS - One classically maddening Belichick trait (not to say that he's always wrong) is to trade up for or aggressively draft someone a good round or two or three above everyone else's projection. The most surprising thing about the Tyson Alualu pick was that it wasn't Belichick making the choice -- that was Jacksonville high on the BB spirit. For "BB overdrafts" think Sebastian Vollmer, Jermaine Cunningham, Terrence Wheatley, and Matt Slater (did BB really think someone else was a threat to pick Slater before round 7?). Even Jerod Mayo and Ty Warren were mocked in the late first/early 2nd; Mankins was mocked quite late as well, although it's subsequently come out that two other teams were after him in that late-1st range. Again, he's not always wrong to draft these players this high, just the opposite -- it's just that comes as a surprise to see these names picked this high.
With these picks you're looking for a good, solid player who's rated in the third-fourth-round range but starts buzzing upward as the draft approaches. Everybody thinks Muhammad Wilkerson is the Ty Warren analog, but watch the pre-draft buzz on Jenkins, another natural 5-technique from a big conference. It may not be 17, but at 28 or 33, Jarvis Jenkins could happen. BB probably wouldn't pick him lower than that, because that would make sense.
28 JAMES CARPENTER - BB has a history of aggressively drafting productive college tackles who are projected to play guard -- think George Bussey, Nick Kaczur, Logan Mankins. The Carpenter pick here fits also the BB tendency to grab a guy at a spot where every mock draft in the world has the Pats picking some other player at the same position, a la the Warren pick (when so many people had us picking William Joseph, Dewayne Robertson, or Jonathan Sullivan). Since so many people are projecting Pouncey, Watkins, or one of the tackles here, Carpenter seems like a classic WTF pick, especially since as a Nick Sabanite he also fits in the "coached in college by a Belichick pal" category of player.
33 QUAN STURDIVANT - In the Patrick Chung mold of a good, productive college player with strikingly average measurables, drafted with a premium pick, seemingly 15-20 spots too high, at a position of relative non-need.
55 RICARDO LOCKETTE - Homage to Bethel Johnson: combine standout nobody else is going to touch before round 5, aggressively chosen in round 2 by New England, which inexplicably trades up five spots to get him.
74 ANTHONY GAITOR - There are a dozen higher-rated corners on the board, all with better measurables, but we must have the short guy with so-so college production (Wheatley) whom you might never have heard of (Ellis Hobbs), isn't a candidate for safety conversion if he proves too slow outside (Asante Samuel), and probably won't give you a lot on special teams (Jonathan Wilhite).
92 ZACH PIANALTO - Because you can never have enough undersized, athletically-limited H-backs with no obvious role in your current offense (think Garrett Mills). Charles Clay is the pick I'm really afraid of, but even Belichick wouldn't take two underpowered, overachieving H-backs from Tulsa -- would he?
152 GREG LLOYD - Let's say this turned into a fifth-round pick; we had to swap the fourth-rounder and give up a future fifth to acquire Ricardo Lockette. Lloyd is the son of an NFL legend who had a really average college career and has no business going before the seventh round, so naturally he goes to the Pats in the fifth; the Matt Slater memorial selection. BB loves legacy picks in the middle rounds (see Klecko, Ruud, Slater).
159 ALEX LOUKAS - The fifth round is usually where the Patriots start picking guys who aren't in any draft guides, don't exist on video anywhere on the internet, etc. A lot of mocks have us going after Mitch Mustain late, but Loukas is the real Matt Cassel memorial pick: a career backup to a college standout (Andrew Luck) with great measurables (he's 6-4 and ran a 4.48 at his pro day). Like Cassell, Loukas was a good enough athlete that the coach switched him to another position briefly to try to get him on the field (in this case, Loukas briefly played safety for Harbaugh). He's also a legacy pick, which Belichick loves; his dad Angelo played for the Patriots.
192 PHILLIP SWANSON - The Corey Hilliard/Mike Elgin/George Bussey/Thomas Welch/Dan Stevenson "Who the f--k is that guy?" pick. For some reason, the Pats love them some totally unknown (and often undersized) offensive linemen late in the draft. You're saying to yourself: "Can picking LeGarrette Blount or Brandon Banks here really have less of a chance of succeeding than picking this guy?"
There are times with the Patriots where you just wish Belichick would let it go for a few hours and just make picks using the "McShay's top 5 available" as a guide for a round or two. The Pats do such a great job of acquiring extra selections that the only way they can really screw things up is to perform significantly worse than the average in terms of the actual selections. In other words, if you married Belichick's unique talent for getting extra picks to merely-average drafting methodology, you'd be way ahead of the game. That's why his outside-the-box thinking is so scary sometimes. Most of the time, it works out great -- but sometimes it doesn't.
