This project began three years ago and now includes the first ten draft classes (from 2011 through 2020) under the new CBA. All player outcomes have been normalized to their first five years (and only their first five years). This is long enough to determine whether or not at least one NFL team “reinvested” in them by either the fifth-year option or a second contract, but short enough that it allows me to include 2,500 players once specialists like punters, placekickers, and long snappers are excluded.
This series is divided into seven parts.
Part 1 will look at a global overview and Day 1 Players
Part 2 will look at Day 2 Players
Part 3 will look at Day 3 Players
Part 4 will break offensive linemen and some of the nuances surrounding these selections
Part 5 will focus on offensive skills players, exclusive of quarterbacks, with a look at measurable production.
Part 6 will do the same with defensive players
Part 7 will summarize finds and draw additional conclusions.
At the moment, the intent is to roll out more information after this as I have time and energy for it, but the database has just under 48,000 primary items in it (e.g. number of games played by the 119th pick in 2014), to say nothing of derived data points (but more about that later).
The Global Overview
Various truisms surround the draft, ranging from the belief that there’s a minimum number of starters who should be found by GMs in a class or that players have a specific “average career.” The purpose of this overview is not to disagree with those truisms. Instead, it is to present facts with a transparent methodology.
Teams might designate someone as a starter for the season only for him not to play due to injury. Meanwhile, a database might report someone as not having had any seasons as a starter because when he made 6, 7, and 7 starts in his first three years (totalling 20 games), he never crossed the 50% threshold for any one season. Thus, this report breaks things down to the game level.
The “average” player drafted played in 42.5 games in his first five years, or roughly half of the games that would have been available to him. However, he only averaged 22.5 starts in five years (or a little under 1.5 seasons).
Using a cutoff of 60 games played (or around three-quarters of the available games) as the measure of being a reliable contributor, 911 players were found via the draft who did at least this much for teams. That means that in each draft the average team finds only 2.85 players who would be classified as reliable contributors.
Likewise, placing a cutoff of 40 starts (half of the available games) in order to determine reliable starters, only 648 such players were found via the draft. That means that a typical draft only has 65 starters in it, or just barely more than two per team. There is obviously variation. 2013 had only 55 regular starters in it (with only 22 of those reliable starters being Pro Bowlers, or true “star” players); 2018, on the other hand, had 72 reliable starters, with 24 reliable starters also making at least one Pro Bowl. The Draft of 2016 might have been the best year to have a large number of picks, as 69 reliable starters were found with 28 of those making at least one Pro Bowl. As a whole, only 11% of regular starters would go on to earn a Pro Bowl distinction in their first five years, while 5% would earn a first-team All-Pro distinction.
Of the 263 total Pro Bowlers found in this time (8.2 per team, or less than one per year), the Baltimore Ravens and Dallas Cowboys lead the way at 14 each. The New England Patriots are last with 3, which might seem odd until it sets in that many of the players who formed the core of those Super Bowl runs were drafted prior to 2011 or by other teams.
It is possible to create a distinct category of players who are either reliable contributors or regular starters who also earn at least one Pro Bowl or one first-team All-Pro in their first five years–call them Stars.
Stars includes all players who would be designated as either regular starters or reliable contributors who also earned either a Pro Bowl or first-team All-Pro designation in their first five years. Regular starters includes all players who are not stars but did at least start 40 games. Reliable contributors includes all players with at least 60 games played who are not included in one of the prior two categories. The “other honories” category is for players who did not meet the minimum thresholds to be regular or reliable but who still earned a distinction. Injury and suspension are the two most common causes for this state. Finally, the majority of drafted players do not fit into any of these categories.
Finally, some good news. Despite all of the above, most of the players (1,454) drafted in this time had their careers last at least five years. That’s 58% of the players “succeed” in earning reinvestment from an NFL front office. The idea that “average” NFL players have careers under three years might be true when including all undrafted free agents. However, only 31% of drafted players (787) failed to play for the length of their first contracts–less than a third were out of the league in three years or less.
The First Round
If you want to build a team through the draft, you have to keep your first-round picks, use them well, and acquire more if possible. The average first-round player will play in 62 games in his first five years, and he will start in 58 games. The median is actually 66 games played and 57 games started. More than 88% of these players will earn a fifth year in the league, and barely 6% will fail to see year four.
There is obviously going to be a major confounding variable here. Do teams invest the resources of a first-round pick in a player because he will make a good starter, or do they keep starting a player because he is a first-round pick? As the series continues, we will dive into that question more deeply in terms of performance. For now, though, it is worth establishing that 39% of these players will earn at least one Pro Bowl in the first five years, and that 48% of all Pro Bowlers were found in the first 13% of the draft with 34% of the regular starters coming from this same small pool.
It is worth pointing out, however, that there are actually two layers to the first round.
The Top 11: Players drafted in the Top 11 play in 65 games and see 58 starts. More than half (55%) will make a Pro Bowl in the first five years. Nearly a quarter of them (24.5%) will be a first-team All-Pro in the first five years. Missing on a Top 10/Top 11 pick is like throwing away a golden ticket. Only 18 of these players could not make it to 40 starts, and four of those (all Edge rushers, by the way) did at least play in 60 or more games while starting at least 20 of them. Under 4% of these players fail to see at least four years in the league.
The Main First Round: Players drafted 12-32 play in 62 games with 47 starts. Only 31% will make a Pro Bowl in the first five years and only 10% will be named a first-team All-Pro. 79 of these players did not make it to 40 starts, with 26 of those contributing to at least 60 games. They fail at a rate of 8%. In many ways, players drafted from 12-32 are closer in outcomes to second-round players than they are to players drafted in the top eleven spots.
The bottom third of the T11 players have a median games played of 63, with a median number of starts at 55. Meanwhile, the second part of the first round sees a median “games played” of 65 with 50 games started. In very simple terms, a “bad” player from the top eleven draft spot spots is an “average” player from the rest of the first round. And, with apologies to those who would prefer rounded numbers, it really is the “top eleven” and not “top ten” in most ways.
Implications
The reality is that there are three drafts. The first draft involves the top eleven picks, and it is largely a chance for managers to change the direction of their franchises. The second draft is the conclusion of the first round, and perhaps some of the second round. However, after that, there is a desperate attempt not to find stars and not even to find starters, but instead simply to find players who will reliably contribute.
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