Thread: In Depth Analysis of Elway's Drafts

I posted this on the official forum in response to a Charger's poster's claim that last year's class is a horrible class because half the class is off the roster (Which is incorrect because many are now on the practice squad). He was trashing Elway's abilities so I wanted to do a comparison. I compared the chargers and broncos as well as one team that historically drafts well (New England) and one that does not (Browns) to see how many players drafted by each team were still in the NFL or on the team that drafted them's roster. I'm pretty much copy/pasting my thoughts from that thread so some of the analysis is specific to that discussion.

For the purposes of this thread, "Still in the league" means that as of today, they are on a current NFL roster.

Code:

Team	Still on the team   Still in the League   Out of the NFL   Total Drafted
2011				
Broncos   	1	2	7	9
Chargers	1	3	5	8
Patriots	0	4	5	9
Browns	        0	4	4	8

We tie with the Chargers as the only team to still retain any picks from 2012. Roughly 11% of our picks are still on the team. 22% still in the league. Chargers are 12% and 37% respectively. New England 0% and 44%, browns are 0% and 50%.

Code:

Team	Still on the team	Still in the League	Out of the NFL	Total Drafted
2012				
Broncos	        1	4	3	7
Chargers	1	2	5	7
Patriots	2	4	3	7
Browns	        0	4	7	11

Year two. This was actually a really strong draft class for the Broncos. We still only retained one, but that's pretty much the average. For us, from this class 14% are still on the team 57% are still in the league. For the Chargers 14% are still on the team 28% still in the league. Patriots have 28% still on their team and 57% still in the league.

Code:

Team	Still on the team	Still in the League	Out of the NFL	Total Drafted
2013				
Broncos	        0	4	3	7
Chargers	1	3	4	7
Patriots	1	3	4	7
Browns	        0	2	3	5

2013 was another year with some players that managed to stick around the league for Denver. 0% still on the team, but 57% still on an NFL roster. For Chargers 14% still on the team, 42% still in the league. Patriots 14% still on the team, 42% still in the league. The browns have 0 on the team 40% still on the team.

cont....

Part 2

Code:

Team	Still on the team	Still in the League	Out of the NFL	Total Drafted
2014				
Broncos	        2	4	2	6
Chargers	1	2	4	6
Patriots	1	6	3	9
Browns	        2	4	2	6

This was an odd rarity, a good draft for the Browns. For the Browns and Broncos 33% of the players are still on the team, 66% still in the league. For the chargers, 16% are still on the team 33% still in the NFL. For the patriots 11% still on the team 66% still in the league.

Code:

Team	Still on the team	Still in the League	Out of the NFL	Total Drafted
2015
Broncos	        3	8	1	9
Chargers	5	5	0	5
Patriots	6	8	3	11
Browns	        2	9	3	12

I'll leave it at here for now because I have to get back to work. I'll pick up with 2016 and 2017 this afternoon. 33% of this class is still on the roster. 88% still in the league. I will actually commend the Chargers on this draft with a 100% stick rate. Not a bad draft. The patriots kept 54% of this draft class and 75% are still in the league. The browns kept 16% of this draft class and 75% still in the league.

For that period,

Code:

Team	Still on the team	Still in the League	Out of the NFL	Total Drafted
Broncos	        7	22	16	38
Chargers	9	15	18	33
Patriots	9	25	18	43
Browns	        4	23	19	42

The Broncos had 18% of their prospects stay with the team 57% are still in the league. The Chargers had 27% stick with the team and 45% still in the NFL. The patriots kept 20% of their players and 58% are still in the league. Finally, the browns kept 9% of their players (abysmal) 54% are still in the league.

What this tells me. We need to get better at retaining our picks. We draft just as well as the average (and we'll revisit these numbers once they are complete over the full period from 2011-2017 draft classes) On average from those 4 teams, about 50% of all players are out of the NFL over that period of time. We're in the same range as everyone, we need to retain more talent that we draft. The drafting talent isn't the issue.

At the same time, we've been really good in FA. So if you have a talented FA player, you don't just cut him in favor of a lesser draft pick because you drafted one and not the other. You keep the better player.

Part 3

Code:

Team	Still on the Team	Still in the League	Out of the NFL	Total Drafted
2016				
Broncos	        6	8	0	8
Chargers	5	5	3	8
Patriots 	6	8	1	9
Browns	        6	9	5	14

Of the Broncos 8 2016 picks, 75% stuck around. All are still on a roster. For the chargers (I'll grant you, of the 3, some might be on IR, had a hard time finding right info) 62% still on the roster and in the league. The other 3 have not played a down in preseason or regular since since 2016. Patriots 66% still on the roster 88% still in the league. The browns 42% still on the roster 64% in the league.

Code:

Team	Still on the Team	Still in the League	Out of the NFL	Total Drafted
2017				
Broncos	        7	8	0	8
Chargers	7	7	0	7
Patriots 	2	4	0	4
Browns	        6	7	3	10

Now onto the topic of the thread. It's hard to judge a class one year out. My method I used is If they are on the practice squad for the team, they are still on the team as they still have a chance to get promoted within this year. If they are not on an active roster or practice squad, they will fall under the out of the league category, but they still can make an NFL comeback so it's not truly "out of the league"


To finish it up. Since Elway's been here

Code:

Team	Still on the Team	Still in the League	Out of the NFL	Total Drafted
Broncos	        18	38	16	54
Chargers	21	27	21	48
Patriots	18	33	15	56
Browns	        16	39	27	66

33% of our picks are still on the roster. 70% are still in the NFL. The chargers still have 43% on their roster, but only 56% are still in the NFL. The patriots have 32% of the players on their roster, 59% still in the NFL. The browns have 24% on their roster and 59% are still in the NFL.

So again. We're doing fine. We do struggle keeping players on the Roster, but it's not due to making the wrong pick. If 70% of Elway's picks are still on an NFL team, he's not doing terrible. The chargers do a lot better job of keeping their players on their team, but a larger percentage of their draft picks don't make it.

Sorry for the difficulties reading the sections wrapped in Code text...the site's color schemes make it difficult (You can highlight the text to read it...) I'd take it out of code, but it breaks the formatting and I don't have time to reformat it today.

Some additional information that also adds to the conversation of why we aren't retaining drafting picks from year to year. Some of our players like Jackson, Thomas, ect... played well, but ultimately played well enough to price them out of our range and left elsewhere. Some of that is on Elway, some of it is beyond his control.

There is also UDFA players to think about. We are really good at finding UDFA talent every single year.

Lindsey, Patrick, LaCosse, Barrett, Johnson, Harris Jr., Thomas (CB), Carter (IR) are all currently on the roster (other than Carter, but he has a shot when he comes back) That's 7 players that are UDFA and a lot of those UDFA players are from 2018. So when you've got that many guys that are playing so well they make the team...You are going to have some draft picks that you either have to cut outright or stash on your practice squad.

Having success with UDFA is NOT a knock on Elway, it's a praiseworthy attribute. This team excels at finding diamonds in the rough. 13% of our roster is UDFA

I haven't read all of your post(s) yet, but you can change the color of the text inside the code blocks to make it more readable (see below). I would probably say that code blocks probably aren't the best for this presentation though. Tables would probably be better.

Originally Posted by Freyaka

Part 3

Code:

Team    Still on the Team    Still in the League    Out of the NFL    Total Drafted
2016                
Broncos            6    8    0    8
Chargers    5    5    3    8
Patriots     6    8    1    9
Browns            6    9    5    14

Originally Posted by wayninja

I haven't read all of your post(s) yet, but you can change the color of the text inside the code blocks to make it more readable (see below). I would probably say that code blocks probably aren't the best for this presentation though. Tables would probably be better.

I don't know why I didn't think of that. Brilliant! Thanks Way, I'll edit it. And, you are correct, Tables would be the way to go, however, This was all posted over on the official boards, they don't have tables built in so code is the best way to go over there. I'd have to recreate the info in excel to easily copy in that format here and I don't have time for that today.