Grade the draft

[umphrey]

They clearly had a strategy and they executed it. I agree with the strategy and I don’t think they made any big mistake. I don’t think the draft gave them any slam dunk options though. 
 

LVN, top tier athlete in round 1, solid pick.

Musgrave, solid pick, solid value. I would have preferred an aggressive trade up for one of the TEs that went early 2nd because those are less risky players. 
Reed, felt like a reach, wanted a better athlete here. The trade down meant they probably didn’t love the value either and the extra picks at the end were pretty meh.

Was happy they double dipped on WR and TE but nothing too exciting.

I think they did well adding athletes in later rounds, especially Wooden looks promising. I’m hopeful Carlson sticks at K.

So overall plenty to like but not a top tier draft. I’m surprised they didn’t take any OL at all, and would have liked an ILB in there somewhere, maybe instead of QB RB or WR. With the extra picks I wish they had found a player they were willing to trade up for in the first 3 rounds instead of letting players come to them.

[Rainmaker90]

They did what they had to do. They reached for the sky on a lot of picks.

 

I love the TE combo and I’m more than happy gambling on LVN. 
 

Im not too enthused with Reed, but they get the benefit of the doubt with WRs. 
 

Im predicting at least two players will be significant players for us. 

[Mazrimiv]

If I had to guess, I would go with Reed as the guy we'll look back on as the best pick in this class.

Some "four years out" predictions

LVN: Will be viewed as a decent (but not great) pick and will earn a second contract.  Borderline pro-bowler, but not all-pro level.

Musgrave / Kraft: One of these two will approach what we want them to be, while the other probably won't pan out.  Take your pick as to which guy falls into which slot.

Reed: Will be an ideal compliment to Watson, as well as serving as the primary PR for several years.  His second contract with GB will be expensive.

Wooden / Brooks: See above for Musgrave / Kraft

 

If things play out this way, it's more than enough to say Gute had an excellent draft.

[Old Guy]

First of all, 13 picks are a lot of darts at the dartboard. 

Here are my thoughts on the draft. 

The premium rounds 1 - 3 we had 4 cracks at it. The day or two after the draft those of us who are optimists believe we hit on all four picks, not likely. The pessimists will find fault in all four picks and a reason all four will fail, also not likely. Odds are likely right in the middle where we hit on 2 and the other two are meh sort of players, maybe even one is a flat out bust. 

If we hit on 2 players in rounds 1 -3 that is a win in the draft. Also, history says 50% is a win.

Rounds 4 - 7 we had 9 darts to throw at the dart board. My thoughts on these picks are simple, if we come out with 3 really solid football players that probably deserve a second contract and hit on two of four premiums, we had a monster draft. 

Several posters here, who do a heck of a lot more research on the draft then I do, really like a whole lot of our day 3 picks. The quarterback seems universally hated and so does the kicker. I'll cede the quarterback although it seems he was brought in more for his big brain than his football skills. The kicker I'll push back on. He was regarded as the top picker for the '22 draft prior to tearing his ACL and going back to school last year. He didn't kick well coming off an ACL injury, I don't think that is too much of a shock. He's got a big leg and has a ton of ability. He's not a slam dunk, but he's not a sure-fire Brett Conway either. Blast from the past! 

Again, if we hit on 5 of our draft picks to include 2 premiums this draft gets an A+. I'd even say we will hit on 5 players (not kicker or quarterback), plus the kicker. Three years we could look back on this draft as the catalyst that allowed us to continue or reign over the North and brings us another Lombardi, or two. 

[R T]

I give this draft a Y. As in why the **** does the football world think they need to grade players before anything has even happened. No one has even been to a rookie minicamp yet and people want to judge them as good or bad already.  

[Mazrimiv]

Just now, R T said:

I give this draft a Y. As in why the **** does the football world think they need to grade players before anything has even happened. No one has even been to a rookie minicamp yet and people want to judge them as good or bad already.  

Better late than never for the obligatory "draft grades are dumb" post.

[Leader]

14 minutes ago, Old Guy said:

The quarterback seems universally hated and so does the kicker. I'll cede the quarterback although it seems he was brought in more for his big brain than his football skills.

Penn States not a shabby football operation and who's their all time leader in passing attempts, passing completions, completion %, passing yards, TDs, three (3) of the top 5 longest TDs?

Sean Clifford.

He's got some fundamentals to work out and arm strength to build up....thats what Tom Clements is for....but I think we can ease off trashing the guy. 

 

Edited April 30, 2023 by Leader

[Old Guy]

1 minute ago, Leader said:

Penn States not a shabby football operation and who's their all time leader in passing attempts, passing completions, completion %, passing yards, TDs, three (3) of the top 5 longest TDs?

Sean Clifford.

He's got some fundamentals to work out and arm strength to build up....thats what Tom Clements is for....but I think we can ease off trashing the guy. 

 

Dude also played 5 years. 

He's never going to have NFL arm strength. It's like baseball players who can bring heat and those who can't. You can work on it a little but at his age, 25, not happening. He's older than Jordan Love. 

[Leader]

1 minute ago, Old Guy said:

Dude also played 5 years. 

So that makes him a bum?

"You're good enough to hold down the job......but you actually suck"

Okay. Whatever. We're probably gonna bring in some Vet backup to hold down the fort and Clifford will doing nothing more than be a game day inactive while he learns his craft in the NFL.

[Old Guy]

2 minutes ago, Leader said:

So that makes him a bum?

"You're good enough to hold down the job......but you actually suck"

Okay. Whatever. We're probably gonna bring in some Vet backup to hold down the fort and Clifford will doing nothing more than be a game day inactive while he learns his craft in the NFL.

Nope, it just doesn't make him an NFL quarterback. 

[svp]

They drafted an outside rusher that  can play inside in the first round. In the UFDA round they drafted an inside player that can rush outside (forgot his name).

I think this is the first draft I ever watched. It was kinda long and boring because I don't know any names despite reading and watching draft people expound about potential. l for a month or two. I couldn't get excited until after I looked them up. I like the middle round WR. But no one talked about him. Why didn't they just draft him later? The first 3 rounds are what most discussion covered.

 

[Old Guy]

1 hour ago, R T said:

I give this draft a Y. As in why the **** does the football world think they need to grade players before anything has even happened. No one has even been to a rookie minicamp yet and people want to judge them as good or bad already.  

So, it is OK to spends months dissecting every player leading up to the draft but wrong to evaluate how teams did after the draft based on each person's own evaluations. 

You act like we are actually in NFL front offices. We're fans, we speculate, second guess and post of message boards. 

 

Edited April 30, 2023 by Old Guy

[skibrett15]

I think the important thing to remember in the post-draft glow is that every team had a draft, and on average, 16/32 teams got relatively better while 16/32 teams got relatively worse.

 

B grades mean you're ahead of that curve, D grades behind.  I give the Packers a solid B grade here, but they will need 1 TE, 1 WR and 1 DL to be a long term starter plus LVN to be a bona fide star to have an A grade.  I think that's possible although more likely that they miss out on one of those pieces. 

[Old Guy]

7 minutes ago, skibrett15 said:

I think the important thing to remember in the post-draft glow is that every team had a draft, and on average, 16/32 teams got relatively better while 16/32 teams got relatively worse.

 

B grades mean you're ahead of that curve, D grades behind.  I give the Packers a solid B grade here, but they will need 1 TE, 1 WR and 1 DL to be a long term starter plus LVN to be a bona fide star to have an A grade.  I think that's possible although more likely that they miss out on one of those pieces. 

If you are not putting Van Ness at DL, which makes sense, I'd put odds on the D-line, but I wouldn't count it out. Those guys have some skills, but need some training, NFL style. 

I'm excited to see what happens early. You normally get a buzz about guys prior to camp. I think Doubs was that guy last year. 

[Ragnarok]

I'll go a C+

LVN was my third favorite option at 13 after Paris and JSN and fills a need with a great athlete at a premium position.  That's never bad.

I've made my thoughts on Musgrave and Reed known as I greatly disliked both of those picks.  Our OL needs help and Mauch was right there at 42.  There were 5 WRs available at 50 that I would have rather taken over Reed who is a JAG with meh RAS imo.  Darnell was my favorite TE in the draft and I really wanted him.

I don't dislike the Kraft pick in a vacuum, but considering we took a similar TE the round before, I'm not a fan. 

After that, I like the draft much more, QB and K aside.  Wooden and Brooks in particular are two guys I think contribute on game day.  The rest are high upside, high RAS guys which is a great thing to target in the late rounds.

While we did restock the WR and TE rooms and add a lot of bodies to the front 7, I can't give a super high grade on a draft that took zero offensive linemen and didn't address safety until 242 overall.