Draft History by Position

by Brian (DaBolts) on Feb 23, 2009 8:15 AM PST

The 3-4 defense is getting more popular; I wondered if there were many changes in how many of each position gets taken during the draft. I went back to the year 2001 and while perhaps there are some patterns; it's hard to tell if it just represents a 'bumper crop' at a particular position versus a philosophical view from the teams drafting.

	QB	RB	TE	WR	Oline	DE
2008	2	5	1		8	4
2007	2	2	1	6	4	5
2006	3	4	2	1	3	4
2005	4	3	1	6	4	1
2004	4	3	2	7	3	3
2003	4	2	1	3	4	6
2002	3	3	3	3	5	4
2001	1	3	1	6	4	3

2008	LB	CB	S	DT
2007	3	5	1	3
2006	3	3	4	2
2005	5	4	3	3
2004	5	5		3
2003	2	4	1	3
2002	1	5	1	5
2001	2	4	1	4

One interesting change is that earlier years had virtually nobody drafted in the first round at center or gaurd; most currently there are almost one or two. It is hard to know if last years draft represents a big shift with eight offensive lineman drafted or just a good year for lineman. It looks like as many as five tackles could go in the first round this year along with one guard and one center. I think if you get seven going this year you can definitely see a trend there. The other interesting position is linebackers, back in 2001 only a single LB was taken. Since 2005 a minimum of three LBs have been taken in every draft; that looks certain to continue this year.

On the down side there seems to be less emphasis on defensive tackles with 4-6 going in 2001-2003, but three or less in every draft year after that. Wide receiver seems to fluctuate randomly and widely, but I don't see any pattern there. Cornerbacks seem quite steady; there does seem to have been a big taking of safeties in 2006 & 2007; but at least for the moment I don't think there is a first round safety choice. There you have it; we will have to wait and see if the trend for offensive lineman and linebackers conitnues; up front it would appear to.

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Tweener DEs

I wonder how many of those DEs were the undersized variety the ends up getting converted to a 3-4 OLB. A guy like Terrell Suggs who was a DE at ASU, but plays OLB in the ravens base defense.

by Stephen (shaynes41) on Feb 23, 2009 9:03 AM PST reply actions

Interesting spike last year

with the OL drafted. I think this could develop into a trend. There have been a fair amount of OL drafted in the 2nd round in the past that produced like 1st round OL. I’m wondering if teams are realizing this and drafting guys that were once considered 1st round reaches at OL. Last year there were definitely a couple of guys that looked to me, based on past experience, were ticketed for the 2nd round. But then again, it could have been a side effect of the lack of WRs drafted (which I think was a talent issue, not a drafting trend). Teams that need offensive upgrades will tend to draft WR and OL (its a numbers game, there are 7-8 starting offensive positions for those two positions out of 11 total offensive starters), so maybe teams that wanted offensive improvements saw the OLs as more 1st round worthy than the WRs (this could also be why there was a slight spike RBs, although that had to do with talent as well).

1-10-DEN 18 (9:52) (Shotgun) 6-J.Cutler pass short right intended for 19-E.Royal INTERCEPTED by 93-L.Castillo (95-S.Phillips) at DEN 18. 93-L.Castillo to DEN 14 for 4 yards (62-C.Wiegmann). 6-J.Cutler pouts ob to DEN 25 for 11 yards.

by Wonko on Feb 23, 2009 10:50 AM PST reply actions

Are the OL

picks less risky maybe? Just subjectively wide receivers and QB’s seem to go bust more often. A Ryan Leaf has to be really difficult to explain to an owner.

"Football is a physical sport, sometimes you have a disagreement on what's going on, and you have a discussion about it." Kris Dielman

by Brian (DaBolts) on Feb 23, 2009 5:36 PM PST up reply actions

QBs are a different animal

Because if you don’t pick a franchise QB, you have to explain to the owner why we are stuck with Journeyman-QB when we could have had Franchise-QB. I don’t think anyone blames the Chargers for trying to replace Craig Whelihan with Ryan Leaf.

You don’t have that same franchise-changing effect with WRs. Calvin and Andre Johnson aren’t carrying their teams to Super Bowls and Fitzgerald wasn’t either until Warner came to town and stayed healthy. And if you combine that with a high bust factor with WRs (which I’m pretty sure exists) and it starts to make sense why would want a 1st round OL even if they seem less likely to be starts, but more likely to be good additions to the offense. Plus, you can always move a LT to RT or an RT to RG. But this is only the case with the most physically gifted OLs and they come in the first round.

So I still wonder if teams were in a mindset for a while that they needed to make a splash with their 1st round picks and only went after OL if they were convinced that they were going to be franchise LTs. It may be that in the second half of the first round, teams are starting to think that they need to make sure they get some production out of their 1st round picks, even if that means the guy is an OG or RT. Then they can go for some flashy WR with question marks in the 2nd round if they still want that. That being said, there a couple of WRs in this draft that should only fall behind the “future LT types”, so I don’t think you’ll see a complete repeat of 2008, but I still think you may see up to 7 OL picked in the first round. This would mean that guys like Jamon Meredith, Eben Britton, Phil Loadholt and William Beatty would be 1st round picks where a few years ago they would be sure-fire 2nd rounders.

by Wonko on Feb 24, 2009 10:48 AM PST up reply actions