In virtually every year in the common draft era a team traded up into the top 10 of the NFL draft. Often, these trades are greeted with glee and delight from the TV broadcast crews which then trickles down to the fans of the team making the move. They’re getting a better player than they thought attainable and they’re getting (supposedly) a top 10 player in this year’s draft class.
Many of these teams who move up think far too much about the decision. They bypass their initial instinct which tells them its a dumb move. They don’t realize that 79% of the time a team moves up the board, they lose value. Moving into the first round costs (on avg) 1 additional high-fourth-round draft pick. They don’t understand the blueprint for success revolves around volume drafting, and selecting a larger number of prospects (of which a few will pan out) rather than lumping your eggs in one basket. And they don’t realize that the most consistent, best teams in the NFL simply emphasize the draft and do it right, and ensure that their starting roster will consist of players they selected in the draft, rather than players they had to obtain from other teams due to their own poor drafting.
Many of these bad teams, without sound drafting principles, begin to fall in love with prospects. A perfect (and recent) example was just 2 years ago when the Miami Dolphins moved up to the #3 overall pick to draft pass rusher Dion Jordan of Oregon. In interviews after the trade with Oakland and the selection of Jordan, General Manager Jeff Ireland said:
“We took a player we coveted quite a bit,”… and said Jordan has been on his radar for more than a year. Owner Stephen Ross agreed, saying Jordan was a favorite of the coaching staff in discussions before the draft. “Everybody thought, `Hey, we’ll never get him,” Ross said. “When the Raiders called back, I think everybody in the room was shocked. It’s a great move.”
Not surprisingly, the NFL Network crew reacted quite similarly to the trade up and the selection, spouting effusive praise and comparing Jordan to greats Jason Taylor, Aldon Smith and Demarcus Ware:
As we know, Dion Jordan was suspended by the NFL for the 2015 season for violating the league’s substance-abuse policy. In his two seasons with the Dolphins, he started in only one game. The pass rusher has just 3 total sacks in 26 games played and has already made $14 million in guaranteed money. And now won’t even play in his 3rd year.
If you think its rare that a team moves into the top 10, sacrifices value and extra draft picks in the process, only to draft a total bust, you may want to reconsider.
Below is a table listing all moves into the top 10 to draft players since division realignment in 2002 (13 years ago). I’ve included two advanced metrics for evaluating purposes: AV (Approximate Value, a Pro Football Reference analytic) and the most recent Pro Football Focus grade. In addition, I’ve highlighted how many starts the player has made as a pro (vs the max possible) and an interesting stat.
While there have been a couple of hits along the way, such as Julio Jones, the one thing this analysis does not take into account is what was given up (the picks) to acquire that top 10 selection. Likely in every case, the team who moved up lost value when making the trade (I focus on trades into the 1st round and value lost in this article).
But the intent is to focus only on the “bust potential” of these “highly coveted” players. As you can clearly see, its astonishing the number of times a team moved into the top 10 and selected players who did not even come close to realizing the potential the teams thought he had during the draft process.
This is not a “selection” of some of the notable or the worst trades into the top 10. This is the whole pile of them since 2002:
(click to enlarge)
So in the first round of the NFL draft, let’s see which team joins the club in 2015 and jumps into the top 10 to select a player they “covet” and have lusted over for months. Let’s see what the response is to the trade by the networks. Do they only rave about the move because it (obviously) fills a big need for the team? Do they mention that trading into the top 10 almost always loses value for the team moving up? Do they discuss the long history of moves into the top 10 which seem to have a frequent bust rate? Do they mention that these desperate teams making the move have lost focus of the right way to build a talented, winning roster, which is not to exchange 2, 3 or 4 draft picks for 1 player?
The fact is, these trades hurt their teams. Since 2010, the last 5 years of moves into the top 10 has left teams with the following records:
Due to the human elements and psychology involved in coveting a player enough to move into the top 10, weaknesses, holes or fatal flaws (as former Bucs front office employee Joe Bussell terms them) are often missed or simply glossed over in the passion and excitement of possibly landing the player. It seems to happen annually, with very few exceptions. What happens this year and what will the reaction be? We will find out soon enough.
ALSO DON’T MISS:
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- Some Colleges Produce Talent Seemingly Unfit for the NFL
- 2015 NFL Schedule Grid with Color Coding
- NFL Nation Still Hasn’t Learned and Sports Books Keep Printing Money
- In-Draft Trade Basics: Most Teams are Miserable at Executing the Draft-Pick Swap
- Why does the NFL Schedule consistently seem to favor the Falcons and Ravens?
- What Would it Cost To Trade with the Buccaneers for the #1 Overall Pick?
- Who Should Own the 2015 NFL Draft
- Titans Face Huge Decision at #2 Considering How Many Wins Their Pass Offense Cost Them in Recent Years
- Sam Bradford can Succeed in Philadelphia… Because Chip Kelly
2015 STRENGTH OF SCHEDULE SERIES:
- An Even More Accurate Strength of Schedule? Use Projected Regular Season Wins
- New Approach: Using Power Rankings to Calculate Strength of Schedule
- Ignore Virtually All 2015 NFL Strength of Schedule Information You See
- Mapping the Path to the Super Bowl will be Very Different for Some Teams in 2015
- The Linemaker’s Hate for the 49ers Appears Real, See Rex Ryan Bringing Hope to Buffalo
- 2015 NFL Season Win Totals at CG Technology
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