Hawks "Reaching" to draft players. .NET Hot Topic

[James in PA]

And every year I see the “experts” slobbering all over the Cowboys’ draft. Yet, they are never in the Super Bowl. Pete and John are better at this than the so called gurus in the media, the fans, and Jerry Jones.


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[tersal]

I like to think of it this way, they invest a ton of time, resources and money to identify players that fit what they want. Skills, attitude and ceiling. Sometimes the hit, and no team hits everytime.

When they draft a guy 5 or 10 spots early, does it really matter? If you want a guy, go get him. If you try to get cute and maximize every trade down another team will jump up a few spots and swipe your guy. Plus, when you go get that guy by either trading up or taking him early the player feels wanted and wants to ball out.

One question. Do you think they are looking at whether the person has reached his ceiling or whether he is still on baseline and has a lot of room to reach his ceiling?

I believe they look at measureables and see if there is proof in his resume that he has potential to improve. His resume is his college effort and what he has done on the training and the field.

Just curious.

They look at all those things. Also, attitude is the player coachable, Will he listen, does he want to be great?
As I stated before the team had been able to screen Taylor when he visited. a luxury this year.

 

[nanomoz]

In my opinion part of this is due to how successfully the Hawks manage to hold their private information. Consider that just a month ago, well after the combine and every bit of tape had been collected, Robert Hunt was a 5th round pick on most mock draft sites. However, he started steadily rising every week. Why? Because the few mock drafters with connections had managed to talk to some scouts, and Hunt was mentioned as a player that they were underrating.

If the Hawks cared about what mock drafters thought, it would be easy to leak their interest in some of their guys so that they shot up the boards as well. If a Seahawks scout told Kiper that they had Darrell Taylor as their 20th best player then Kiper would have moved him way up as a result. Look at all the reports in the week leading up the draft about player X really rising due to anonymous interest. However, the Hawks have clearly done an excellent job preventing leaks from inside the FO (draft targets, McDowell situation, Harvin trade) and so the result is the mock drafters are often surprised by who we like. I don't see that as a negative.

I look at this like the stock market. Often times, the best stock pickers are no better than average, which led to the rise and continued prudent use of Index Funds.

The difference is information. The Seahawks have an enormous amount of inside information here compared to the typical mock consensus. Brooks was a player coming off a major injury who didn't test at the combine, but the Seahawks had the opportunity to have their own medical staff evaluate him twice. If I am making a mock draft as a member of the public I have no idea what those results are, so inherently I am at a major disadvantage. Taking 100 analyses with poor information and averaging them together is not better than using one with good inside information.

I'm split. Part of me thinks the Hawks brass should more utilize the consensu info, but then I think you end up ignoring the people you pay to be experts at this, have networks and access to intel, and use this info to form their own reasoned evaluation.

People whose opinion is firmly in the "reach" camp should read your post carefully. They seem to not consider the information angle that this so eloquently conveys.

There is also the semantic of scheme fit and more importantly a hierarchy of metrics. This club values grit, overcoming adversity, and being an alpha dog; and it also values certain physical and athletic traits. When those traits align, we can often predict pretty closely, a lot more so than general pundits who don't dedicate as much time to paying attention to these values of this team.

I think it is better to have a strategy or road map, an articulated map of your priorities and assumptions. Without that, you're just a group-thinker.

For instance, Rob Staton at Seahawks Draft Blog had a big board that named likely targets and ranges. He studies who the Hawks have drafted and finds commonalities very well.

Brooks was his only surprise in the entire draft. Trey Wingo also confirmed that Cincinnati was targeting Brooks at the top of the second. If you chose to value the info of major outlets it seems disingenuous to pick trusting only the one that confirms your opinion.

Rob at SDB also had more 1st round players mocked correctly than any other Huddle Report contestant. We are lucky to have one of the best around focusing on our team.

 

[CamanoIslandJQ]

NOTE: This post has been deleted 5/22/20, this comes after an unprovoked attack on me by acer1240. I will never post here again. This site has officially gone to hell & I'll never return.

 

[ivotuk]

Why do people ignore all the information out there when they post? "We could have gotten Jordyn Brooks later."

No, we could not have.

Mel Kiper said he was "considering moving Jordyn Brooks up to the 1st round on his final mock draft". After Seattle took Brooks, Kiper said "I expected him to last no later than the middle of the 2nd round."

People ignore players from Texas Tech all of the time. Take for example, Patrick Mahomes. Lance Zeirlein compared him to Jay Cutler for crying out loud!

What about our "worst ever draft"? Fs all around for 2012! Let's see..we got who?

Bruce Irvin
Bobby Wagner
Russell Wilson
Robert Turbin (Meh)
Jaye Howard Fla DT (Meh)
Round 5 pick traded for Marshawn Lynch
Korey Toomer who did a good job for a late round pick
Jeremy Lane, 6 foot DB with 4.3 Speed. Had he not broke his arm on his INT of Tom Brady, that ending could have been very different.
Winston Guy (did okay for a 6th rounder)
J.R. Sweezy
Greg Scruggs DE Louisville (he was a decent player for a 7th rounder)

So yeah, pay attention to what everyone else thinks, combine that with your knowledge, and tell Pete and John that they aren't doing their job properly.

The NFL draft is a crap shoot. Pete and John could always improve, and every year they work at it to get better.

Right now they are looking at players for the 2021 Draft.

I enjoy discussion as much as the next person, but to say "Player A was a reach."

The only way you could say that is if you know what all 32 teams are thinking. Puhlease.

 

[jammerhawk]

With all due respect, there is no master gauge or tool with which to compare front offices, media products / presentations or what individual fans visullize / model in their minds.

For me, it's not a hot topic so much as it is an annual exercise in second guessing. Second guessing that is driven by a confluence of a multitude of conflicted grading and ranking perspectives.

But, second guessing can be fun and entertaining. We just need to remember to keep conflicted perspectives civil.

Well said!

More simply put: Hawks "Reaching" to draft players? "Reaching" according to who, and who's opinion?

Is that opinion or those opinions properly informed about the team, the health of it's players, and the view of the coaches about the players the team already has under contract and their perceived value in relation to their contracts. In short are those value opinions right?

 

[seabowl]

Year in and year out the Hawks get mentioned for drafting players before they are projected to go. They are IMO the only team that consistently has this reputation.

NOBODY is saying the players they are picking is wrong. What we are saying is the fo could very well be playing the game better as to when they draft these players.

Fact- Hawks said that considered drafting Taylor with their first pick. They didn't but if Brooks was gone and they did draft Taylor at 27 he would have been there at least 21 picks later as the Hawks took him at 48. That is fact.

Yes nobody has a crystal ball but IMO they need to get a little more greedy and get more draft capital back for the players they are looking to pick as it seems the players they want are not as coveted by other teams.

 

[AgentDib]

Hawks said that considered drafting Taylor with their first pick. They didn't but if Brooks was gone and they did draft Taylor at 27 he would have been there at least 21 picks later as the Hawks took him at 48.

Isn't this exactly an example of how they got value for Taylor instead of drafting him too early? They originally tried to trade down, took another player when they couldn't, and the player they took was expected to go off the board in one of the next few picks. It seems weird to me that you are using them hypothetically over-drafting Taylor as a negative instead of looking at reality where they got him at a better value.

Year in and year out the Hawks get mentioned for drafting players before they are projected to go. They are IMO the only team that consistently has this reputation.

There are many dozens of selections decried as "reaches" every year. To the degree that the Seahawks are different it is that they care less about the public response than some, and clearly do a much better job of keeping their plans secret than most. To some extent that's because they have the luxury of job security and don't have to worry as much about managing the public PR component.

Just ask yourself where Mel Kiper would have ranked Taylor if somebody on the Hawks had told him that Taylor was being viewed as a top 25 player. Would being ranked higher on Mel Kiper's list have made Taylor a better value?

 

[seabowl]

Hawks said that considered drafting Taylor with their first pick. They didn't but if Brooks was gone and they did draft Taylor at 27 he would have been there at least 21 picks later as the Hawks took him at 48.

Isn't this exactly an example of how they got value for Taylor instead of drafting him too early? They originally tried to trade down, took another player when they couldn't, and the player they took was expected to go off the board in one of the next few picks. It seems weird to me that you are using them hypothetically over-drafting Taylor as a negative instead of looking at reality where they got him at a better value.

Year in and year out the Hawks get mentioned for drafting players before they are projected to go. They are IMO the only team that consistently has this reputation.

There are many dozens of selections decried as "reaches" every year. To the degree that the Seahawks are different it is that they care less about the public response than some, and clearly do a much better job of keeping their plans secret than most. To some extent that's because they have the luxury of job security and don't have to worry as much about managing the public PR component.

Just ask yourself where Mel Kiper would have ranked Taylor if somebody on the Hawks had told him that Taylor was being viewed as a top 25 player. Would being ranked higher on Mel Kiper's list have made Taylor a better value?

I
It's all about personal opinion. It appears that how the Hawks value players is quite different than other teams. It seems they are the only team that consistently surprise who they pick for where they are picking. That they admitted to truly considering taking Taylor at 27 means that they really valued him VERY differently then all other teams. They were basically admitting
that they seriously considered selected him at least 21 picks before anyone else, and it's possible not factual, that Taylor if it weren't the Hawks taking him at 48 would have remained on the board for some time after pick 48.

I pose this question. What if Brooks was off the board at 27, and the Hawks did as they say they considered doing, select Taylor at 27? Knowing now that if it weren't for the Hawks, Taylor would have lasted at least to pick 48. Would you be happy with the value they got selecting him at 27?

 

[Ad Hawk]

I pose this question. What if Brooks was off the board at 27, and the Hawks did as they say they considered doing, select Taylor at 27? Knowing now that if it weren't for the Hawks, Taylor would have lasted at least to pick 48. Would you be happy with the value they got selecting him at 27?

Is this a question you can answer now? How many years would it take to know what actual value of the player is to the team that drafts him?

This is the problem; everyone wants to know the value NOW, and you simply cannot. Opinions, yes; but you cannot know. that will take years of evaluation and observation.

 

[oldhawkfan]

There are 32 teams drafting (without considering trades), which means if you pick at #27, you don't get another pick normally until #59. So, how do we define a reach? Half way between 27 & 59 = pick 43? So, a "ranked" player taken at 27 but before 43 isn't a reach and after 43 is a reach?

IMO-The vast majority of guys that put out mock drafts get 100% of their information from each other and are very adept with the "cut and paste" function, leading to a whole bunch of "groupthink". In the real estate business, a property value is often considered "what a willing buyer is willing to pay" and that may not always be at the actual selling price.


:smilingalien:

Mock drafts. As fans we base our opinions on who “our team” should draft mainly off of mock drafts. Sure we have had the opportunity to watch certain players with their college teams. But, we have not had the opportunity to watch every play of a players college career. We haven’t had the opportunity to talk to their college coaches to get a little insight into a players work habits and comprehension of schemes. We as fans don’t get to sit in on interviews. So with all of that we are reduced to reading mock drafts.

Without a doubt, money and politics play a part in mock drafts. Guys that do mock drafts like Mel Kiper do them as their life’s career. It’s how they make money. When players are eligible for the draft, they hire an agent to handle things for them. An agent isn’t payed until the player signs a contract. An agent makes more money when a player makes more money. Therefore it is in the agents best interest to get the most money for their client. How do they maximize their clients value?

How do some players get noticed? Why are some guys that are initially “mocked” as a late round pick, suddenly start shooting up certain mocks? If “groupthink “ then becomes the norm, it’s not at all unreasonable to extrapolate that agents have a huge part in where their players might be mocked. I’m pretty sure that agents are not the most morally responsible people on the earth. Hey Mel, here’s a few thousand if you start talking up my guys.

This is why I don’t get butt hurt over Pete and John picking guys I might not have thought of. They have information that the rest of us aren’t privileged to see.

 

[AgentDib]

I pose this question. What if Brooks was off the board at 27, and the Hawks did as they say they considered doing, select Taylor at 27?

1) In the hypothetical case where they drafted him at a worse value then they would have gotten a worse value for him.
2) In the hypothetical case where they drafted him at a better value than they would have gotten a better value for him.
3) In reality, they took him at a good value.

Which of those three scenarios do you think should be the most meaningful when evaluating them based on value? Judging whether they were correct on the player analysis portion only makes sense a few years down the road.

It seems they are the only team that consistently surprise who they pick for where they are picking.

It may seem this way as a Seahawks fan, but there were a ton of surprises bigger than either Brooks or Taylor this year. Front offices with sustained success have the flexibility to flaunt public opinion.

 

[QuahHawk]

I am not going to pretend like I know more that the NFL pros who do this for their job.

My concerns are spending a first round pick on a LB. Year in and year out a mid round LBs seem to do just fine. Are we really getting a "Star" with ours. If you spend a high pick on a position like LB I expect they become elite. Will Brooks live up to the expectations. I mean Bobby was a 2nd rd and KJ a 4th.

Now on to Taylor. Looks like a 1st round athlete and mid round technique. Also coming off a significant injury. Do I think he can be a success, of course he could be. Will he outplay Green or Collier? Probably not. Will he out produce Irvin or Mayowa? Probably not.

So may major complaint is if we do not address RB or DT with future additions we made mistakes. I think we will add to those positions but i am sceptical of both positions going into this year.

 

[TreeRon]

IMO, it's reaching if they don't pan out but then again about 1/2 the drafted players don't pan out. I guess what reaching means is that if the TV pundits don't have the player listed in that position, it's reaching. We should rely on the "entertainers" more than the football professionals? I get it.

 

[Pandion Haliaetus]

Hawks said that considered drafting Taylor with their first pick. They didn't but if Brooks was gone and they did draft Taylor at 27 he would have been there at least 21 picks later as the Hawks took him at 48.

Isn't this exactly an example of how they got value for Taylor instead of drafting him too early? They originally tried to trade down, took another player when they couldn't, and the player they took was expected to go off the board in one of the next few picks. It seems weird to me that you are using them hypothetically over-drafting Taylor as a negative instead of looking at reality where they got him at a better value.

Year in and year out the Hawks get mentioned for drafting players before they are projected to go. They are IMO the only team that consistently has this reputation.

There are many dozens of selections decried as "reaches" every year. To the degree that the Seahawks are different it is that they care less about the public response than some, and clearly do a much better job of keeping their plans secret than most. To some extent that's because they have the luxury of job security and don't have to worry as much about managing the public PR component.

Just ask yourself where Mel Kiper would have ranked Taylor if somebody on the Hawks had told him that Taylor was being viewed as a top 25 player. Would being ranked higher on Mel Kiper's list have made Taylor a better value?

I
It's all about personal opinion. It appears that how the Hawks value players is quite different than other teams. It seems they are the only team that consistently surprise who they pick for where they are picking. That they admitted to truly considering taking Taylor at 27 means that they really valued him VERY differently then all other teams. They were basically admitting
that they seriously considered selected him at least 21 picks before anyone else, and it's possible not factual, that Taylor if it weren't the Hawks taking him at 48 would have remained on the board for some time after pick 48.

I pose this question. What if Brooks was off the board at 27, and the Hawks did as they say they considered doing, select Taylor at 27? Knowing now that if it weren't for the Hawks, Taylor would have lasted at least to pick 48. Would you be happy with the value they got selecting him at 27?

lol, it is in fact the NFL draft. You are arguing about like 100 different things that have to factor together but also really nothing, hindsight is fickle.

 

[KiwiHawk]

Here's the thing about the draft.

Teams rank their guys by position and overall. So they will have Position A1, A3, A3 Position B1, B2, B3, etc. and then values such as A1, B1, B2, A2, B3, A3, A4, B4.

They have X, Y, and Z draft picks, for the sake of argument. Now, does it matter where those picks occur if they turn those picks into A1, B1, and B2? Not really, unless by doing so they can also pick up a lower player, or maybe if they can get A2 and B4 for the cost of B2, etc.

Then you have to consider how other teams might rate your guys. If B1 is valued by more teams than A1, then you might take B1 first and hope that A1 is still there when you draft next.

But the bottom line is if you walk away from the draft with A1, B1, and B2 from your picks X, Y, and Z, then you got the top 3 guys on your board and are celebrating a smash-hit draft. It doesn't matter what Kiper or any other writer says, because they don't know your priorities and ranking.

The Seahawks had their sights on Brooks and Taylor and they walked away with both of them. Brooks may cause some to scratch their heads, but KJ Wright's shoulder surgery makes the pick make a lot more sense.

One thing I often hear in the wake of Seahawks' drafts are how the player we selected was the best at something we need. Dallas isn't the best running back in the draft, but he was rated the best blocking RB in the draft, which is something we need on 3rd downs, so his value to us is higher than his value to, say, the Giants.

The other notable thing I saw was the overall athleticism of our picks is #1 by a fair margin. We're selecting what we can't teach, and then teaching the rest.

 

[jammerhawk]

Reality is the team wanted to trade back but GB decided to trade with Miami instead of Seattle then perhaps the pick might have been Queen instead of Brooks. Perhaps in fact the team may have traded back again from 30. Then this whole "reach" theorizing wouldn't be happening. Perhaps however Brooks wouldn't be a Seahawks player either as it has been reported that the Ravens liked this player they picked Queen the pick after the Hawks

None of know the inside plan of the team though we often guess at it. Even before last season there were questions about KJ Wright and his knees. Re-signing Wags took the pressure off @ MLB but he's now 30 and finding the replacements is essential when our D is LB focused. Besides that if Wags gets hurt who does the team have who can play MLB at anything close to a high level?

The reports that the team liked both Brooks and Taylor early don't mean that the team "reached" for either player as the team selected Brooks @ pick #27 b/c they couldn't trade back and it would seem he was fair value at the pick given the Raven's next pick. They however picked Brooks first and not Taylor as they had valued Brooks slightly higher. The team waited until the mid- 2nd when they moved up from #59 as they wanted Taylor who upon fair assessment seems to be a fit @ Leo. Was Taylor a reach @ pick #48? I don't believe so as many consensus draft values had him as a 2nd to early 3rd rd. pick? This to me though the question remains the same any player being categorized as a "reach" raises a question of "by who's valuation" ??? Doesn't the proof, reach or not, depend upon what the player actually does playing in the NFL for at least 3 seasons? Can anyone fairly call any player a "reach" until they see the player play. Carson with a 7th rd. pick is a huge value pick, Delano Hill on the other hand appears to have been a "reach" as a 3rd rd. pick.

Every draft there is critical negative assessment of the team's draft picks. Thankfully the draft isn't the only way the team is buil,t but all in all the team has acquired lots of quality players and has remained a playoff team for all but one season of the time under this FO. I grumble like many others as I want certain players but then again PN'J know more about football then most all off us here collectively. You can argue about whether any pick is a "reach" but it isn't fair to make a decision on it until after seeing the player playas a NFL player.

 

[themunn]

Almost every year the day after the draft we come on this board to discuss and debate the Hawks reaching for a player they could have gotten later. Some defend the picks while others (like me) think the Hawks outsmart themselves by overdrafting a player they could have gotten later.

So now that the draft is over we hear the Hawks were contemplating taking Taylor (48 pick) with their first pick (27). If they had taken him at 27 the argument would have been as always but it's fact now that he lasted 21 picks later and likely more. My only hope is that the front office realizes that they value many of the players they select differently then most other organizations and they in many cases can get these same players later then they thought. Even with their annual trade down (other than this year) they IMO can move down even further to get their man.

They were contemplating taking Taylor because they didn't believe he would be available with their 2nd round pick, and given they traded UP to get him, they were probably correct in that assessment (or maybe not and they were even more wrong). Maybe they could have picked Brooks with the 35th or the 40th pick, but we didn't have the 35th or 40th pick and we did have the 27th pick, so ultimately that is where they have to take him.

 

[JGreen79]

To me, if the Hawks just took an Index Fund approach in the first round or so, and picked the best consensus player available, they'd probably have some superstars right now. I said in another thread my buddy and I selected TJ Watt and Nick Chubb the last two years, and here we are just two average joes and we could do that. Why did we take them? Well, because we're basically Indexing.

The biggest issue with this is that there is no way to know how those two players would pan out in Seattle. Just because a player is drafted and becomes a star, doesn't automatically mean he could have been a star somewhere else. There are so many variables after players are drafted. Coaches, scheme, locker room atmosphere, and teammates can all have an effect on the development of rookies. Certain players are just going to respond differently to different situations.

The people actually making the picks have to factor these things into the draft picks as well. Obviously some players will dominate regardless of all the variables, but that's most likely not as common as many think.

 

[chris98251]

Aaron Curry can't miss prospect. Tony Manderich can't miss prospect, Jeff George can't miss prospect, in fact there is a long lost of QB's in Cleveland, Ryan Leaf can't miss prospect.