I know that we all like to talk draft in terms of the sure things and then late round sleepers. I get a lot of criticism because I don’t do full 7 round mock drafts, Hell I barely go past the 2 round for the most part. And there’s a good reason for that. If you look at the top players in the NFL, and my measure for this is the Pro Bowl, there are some alarming statistics that show just how much the first two rounds matter, and how the back 5 do not.
2000-35 Probowlers-13 were 1st round picks, 5 were 2nd round picks
2001-35 Probowlers-16 were 1st round picks, 10 were 2nd round picks
2002-21 Probowlers-10 were 1st round picks, 4 were 2nd round picks
2003-36 Probowlers-12 were 1st round picks, 5 were 2nd round picks
2004-30 Probowlers-14 were 1st round picks, 2 were 2nd round picks
2005-27 Probowlers-10 were 1st round picks, 4 were 2nd round picks
2006-25 Probowlers-11 were 1st round picks, 5 were 2nd round picks
2007-15 Probowlers-8 were 1st round picks, 4 were 2nd round picks
2008-9 Probowlers-5 were 1st round picks, 2 were 2nd round picks
2009-6 Probowlers-4 were 1st round picks, 1 was a 2nd round picks
We can pull a couple of very important things from this information. First is that it takes a few seasons for players to be able to perform at a level that is commensurate with the Pro Bowl. That was why I went back 10 drafts. This is obvious. But the more important information to me is that of the 244 players from these 10 drafts who have made a Pro Bowl, 103 of them, or 42% were selected in the first round. You figure in 42 second round picks, and you have almost 60% of all the Pro Bowl picks taken in the last 10 years from those 2 rounds. These numbers are astounding and to me illustrate just why I emphasize those first few rounds. This is where you get your players. Bottom line. And it is also the reason that I scratch my head at how teams can mess these picks up. You know how vital they are, and you can focus your attention on them, but they still don’t get them right
Regardless, if you want to see where your team is going to improve, the early part of the draft is where you see what your team is made of. Oh I know you hear that teams earn their money with their late picks, but that’s not really true at all. Yeah, it’s nice to find a starter or two later on, but you don’t win if you don’t have some elite talent on your roster to pair up with them, and those players are found in the first two rounds of the draft.