The Quinn Drafts - 2016-2018

[Lionized]

6 minutes ago, Karnage84 said:

Fair points. If we go with your line of reasoning, why did guys like Juju, Kareem and Kittle fall into the 2nd, 3rd and 5th rounds? Kareem Hunt led the league as a rookie that year. We certainly could have used a RB. The draft is a crapshoot. For every Tom Brady there's going to be a 50 or 100 guys that wind up bouncing around and are out of the league in 3 years or less. 

In 2017, we needed a LB in a bad way. It was either Reuben Foster or Jarrad Davis. When they took JD over Foster it was a surprise to most of us. Foster has been a headache with his legal issues and injury issues. Davis is/was the better pick at the time and to this day when you look at what they needed vs who was available. He probably has been given a bit of a longer leash than deserved based on being a 1st round pick. The only guy that might have been a better realistic option is Taco Charlton. Even then, we probably would be having this same conversation if he was the pick over Davis. 

Even Charlton was traded to Miami for nothing,m. I too was high on him come draft time. 

[Karnage84]

2 minutes ago, Lionized said:

Even Charlton was traded to Miami for nothing,m. I too was high on him come draft time. 

That's exactly what I am saying. For picks 21-32 there is a 47% hit rate. That means that you're looking at hitting on about 5/12 of these guys. That doesn't fully account for team need, off-field issues, injury issues, scheme fit, etc. Foster and Charlton are both on their second teams so it's possible they wouldn't even be on the roster right now. 

For where we were picking in 2017, JD just happened to be the best guy of the bunch that filled our biggest needs. Tre'Davius White could have been the guy and been a better pick. I don't recall him being in the rumour mill for us. I believe he was a surprise pick for a lot of people in Buffalo's spot. 

We still would have needed a LB, so we'd be looking at Raekwon McMillan and Zach Cunningham in rd 2. Hindsight is 20/20 but both guys dropped to the bottom tier of the 2nd round. 

I'm not arguing that JD has been a good player for us. TL isn't arguing that either. You have to deal with the cards that you are dealt and work within that. Quinn was drafting for a defense that was not his preferred defense and he didn't have a ton of great options to deal with based on the players available/team need. 

IMO, a bigger miss by Quinn is taking Michael Roberts over George Kittle. 

[Lionized]

52 minutes ago, Karnage84 said:

That's exactly what I am saying. For picks 21-32 there is a 47% hit rate. That means that you're looking at hitting on about 5/12 of these guys. That doesn't fully account for team need, off-field issues, injury issues, scheme fit, etc. Foster and Charlton are both on their second teams so it's possible they wouldn't even be on the roster right now. 

For where we were picking in 2017, JD just happened to be the best guy of the bunch that filled our biggest needs. Tre'Davius White could have been the guy and been a better pick. I don't recall him being in the rumour mill for us. I believe he was a surprise pick for a lot of people in Buffalo's spot. 

We still would have needed a LB, so we'd be looking at Raekwon McMillan and Zach Cunningham in rd 2. Hindsight is 20/20 but both guys dropped to the bottom tier of the 2nd round. 

I'm not arguing that JD has been a good player for us. TL isn't arguing that either. You have to deal with the cards that you are dealt and work within that. Quinn was drafting for a defense that was not his preferred defense and he didn't have a ton of great options to deal with based on the players available/team need. 

IMO, a bigger miss by Quinn is taking Michael Roberts over George Kittle. 

Exactly 

[TL-TwoWinsAway]

A series of great posts and points made.

[Nnivolcm]

6 hours ago, Karnage84 said:

Fair points. If we go with your line of reasoning, why did guys like Juju, Kareem and Kittle fall into the 2nd, 3rd and 5th rounds? Kareem Hunt led the league as a rookie that year. We certainly could have used a RB. The draft is a crapshoot. For every Tom Brady there's going to be a 50 or 100 guys that wind up bouncing around and are out of the league in 3 years or less. 

In 2017, we needed a LB in a bad way. It was either Reuben Foster or Jarrad Davis. When they took JD over Foster it was a surprise to most of us. Foster has been a headache with his legal issues and injury issues. Davis is/was the better pick at the time and to this day when you look at what they needed vs who was available. He probably has been given a bit of a longer leash than deserved based on being a 1st round pick. The only guy that might have been a better realistic option is Taco Charlton. Even then, we probably would be having this same conversation if he was the pick over Davis. 

Guys like Juju, Kareem, and Kittle fell to their prospected draft selections because the people making the decisions on where to draft them didn't see them becoming who they've become. If there was a draft re-do they would certainly go earlier. We can use the gift of hindsight when evaluating the return on the investment. 

The draft isn't a crapshoot, but it is an inexact science. There are attributes that indicate weather a player will be successful at the pro level or not. Sometimes a player with a lot of good attributes doesn't work out for a variety of reasons, and sometimes a player with few attributes becomes a top player. That's part of the excitement of the draft for me.

What we as fans expect is pretty irrelevant. We aren't the ones making the picks and we don't have access to nearly as much information as the people who are.