On this new edition of league articles, we invite a man have been able to recruit the best assassins during centuries, creator of the league of shadows he’s one of the most memorable scouts ever. Been mentor and found diamonds as Bruce Wayne, Slade Wilson and Bane.
For this series of articles he’ll give us comments about positions on the draft, the players he consider more valuable, the depth on the positions, how the positions compare to market, etc.
At 1st articles he’ll review QB and HB position, let’s start!
Quarterbacks:
The quarterback class has multiple interesting names, in terms of quantity is a very deep one, somehow remind me to the one of 2014 draft with the exception this year doesn’t have a top prospect as (Derek Carr). The top prospect gotta be QB Jared Goff, he does have the best combination of awr – thp – tha, but the reality is that a positive or negative skew here could change a lot the perspective and value of the player. Goff is the safest pick. Dak Prescott is a player that if receive a positive skew, and it’s well developed could become into the best QB of this class and a stud by 25 yo. Talking about age this class is dangerous as the most notable Quarterbacks will start careers at 23 yo, and injuries happens (Mark Sanchez, Sam Bradford, Jameis Winston) are perfect examples of QB missed most of their rookie progression with an injury. Considering this aspect, a prospect as Nate Sudfeld could be a good option, as the risk is minimal. Developing a QB that is 21 yo offers a big advantage in terms of time and durability. For have success the players on this draft class will require a mentor, the market for them is overpriced and is important to consider at the moment to value the players here listed. Talking about value I’m predicting 4 or 5 QB taken on the 1st round, with 2-3 more being taken on the 2nd round or early 3rd round. I see this as a F1 race, the cars will start with an estimated “tires stint” of pick a QB on the mid 2nd round and maximize the value of the pick, but as soon as someone picks one the rest will follow, even without mentor multiple teams needs to grab a QB. Last draft taught us that when Mariota and Mannion went on the 1st round. There’s better prospects in comparison of those 2, so there’s no reason of why they’ll fall to mid rounds. QB is a premium position find a franchise QB is not easy and to acquire it via trade expensive. Having top backups have become a luxury just few franchises have. Value on the pick is subjective, someone will draft one of these prospects on the late 2nd – early 3rd and develop a future starter, but that doesn’t mean the teams picked one on the 1st round made a mistake. It happens with all positions.
There’s 2 important factors that will decide the fate of this players, and could set the future on the position, first one is that many GM’s are on the hot seat so need to focus on play to win, and many of those teams are some of the teams with a mentor QB. The smart idea is to draft a QB, and passive develop him with a mentor behind, as the final goal is not only to keep the team but also have a team worth to be in, but this strategy is good for the future but not for the present. So the hot seat teams are going to be key on setting the market. The other factor is the gametime, I don’t think there’s many teams in a comfortable position for think to start a rookie QB. We have a group of GM’s on hot seat, they wont. We have a group of teams on win-now mode, so the group of teams could allow it is minimal. I can see someone trying strategies as Brent with Ainge and Neal with Wilson
1st round projection: Jared Goff – Dak Prescott – Nate Sudfeld – Carson Wentz – Paxton Lynch
Best value pick : Cody Kessler
Running backs:
The running backs are one of the strongest positions of this draft, and not only for this season but this could be one of the strongest classes on the position ever. HB is known as a position of “cheap value”, can technically draft any HB give him the ball and will do something but the tendency of the league is going upwards on the position, specially as classes often had 1 or 2 key prospects and the rest mid tier players, the goal of a GM is to have the best talent possible on a team, and that includes HB, so I believe we’ve let the philosophy of HB not a valuable position behind. Last draft we saw an HB going 1.2 (Gurley) and this year we’ll see one going 1.1 (Henry), what is impressive is that leaving aside the 1 year younger and the size, HB Elliot and HB Howard are very similar, and positive or negative skews could incline the side one way or another. Value wise the big 3 group should go 99.99% top 10, I can see a weird scenario where teams try another position but I would place a big amount of AP in a bet they go top 10.
On terms of physical attributes rookies HB’s will immediately rank on the top of the chart, and the success obtained by last season 1st round rookies only incentive this kind of decisions. The top 3 prospects need to work on their progressables, but have enough time and it’s just matter of start them since day 1.
Outside this group I see another HB going at some point of 1st round, HB Ham is hard not to be seeing with the same body as Eddie Lacy, comes with a good set of attributes, I see him sliding into the late 10’s early 20’s before someone decides to acquire a man with the size of a fridge
For the rest of the class, I find it interesting, I do see a lot of HB’s that offers solid value for the pick if are taken late 2nd, 3rd or even at late draft pick, I doubt any of this HB becomes an starter 3 downs HB, but the depth abilities and 3rd down situational catching is there specially with a group that has very good hands.
1st round projection: Derrick Henry - Ezekiel Elliott – Jordan Howard – CJ Ham
Best value pick: Tyler Irvin
Next article will feature: WR and TE
