Several days ago, Drexel gave us the updated info on who the Titans selected in the first round of ten recent mock drafts. I thought I’d follow up on this with some interesting info from a couple of other draft sites.
The first of these sites, which some of you may already be familiar with, is DraftTek. What makes them interesting, and different, is a mock draft which is computer generated. They also have an Online Draft Simulator where you can tweak some things and generate your own mock draft. Here’s what they say:
“At Drafttek, each NFL team has an analyst who assigns positional needs, then a proprietary computer model is employed to generate a 7-round Consensus Mock Draft.” (italics mine)
The problem I have with their latest (#23) mock draft, which has the Titans selecting DE Cameron Jordan in the first round, is the assignment of team needs. According to DraftTek’s Team Needs page, the Titans’ #1 priority is cornerback. Seriously? The top two corners in their mock were already off the board at #8 and it was too far of a reach for another CB, which is why Jordan was selected at #8 as a Priority 2 need.
Priority 2 for the Titans are the quarterback and defensive end positions. Priority 2 reflects a great need which a team will reach for if necessary.
Priority 3 (a need which the team will not reach for) positions for the Titans are outside LB and middle LB.
Priority 4 (depth) positions are WR, G, C, DT, FS and SS. Defensive tackle is obviously a greater need than that and I’d like to see the SS position upgraded as well.
DraftTek Priority 6 (low priority) was the need assigned to the Titans’ tight ends.
Priority 9 (zero need) was assigned to RB, LT and RT. The P9 assignments are ones I can’t argue with.
I decided to use their Online Draft Simulator to see what results I’d get after tweaking the team needs by upgrading DT and OLB to Priority 2 and SS to P3. CB was downgraded from P1 to P4.
Here’s what we get after those tweaks:
Rd1, #8 – DT Marcell Dareus, Auburn, Value: +2
Rd2, #39 – QB Jake Locker, Washington, Value: +4
Rd3, #77 – OLB Dontay Moch, Nevada, Reach: -16
Rd4, #108 – DE Pierre Allen, Nebraska, Reach: -12
Rd5, #138 – ILB Josh Bynes, Auburn, Reach: -6
Rd6, #169 – SS Tejay Johnson, TCU, Reach: -8
Rd7, #200 – TE Jordan Cameron, USC, Value: +11
Note that Dareus has a value of +2, which indicates he was ranked #6 on their big board, but fell to the Titans at #8. Similarly, Locker’s value of +4 indicates he was ranked as #35 but was still available at #39.
I’m not sure that Mike Reinfeldt would reach 16 spots for an outside backer in round 3 (assuming the Titans have assigned similar grades to the players), so I re-prioritized the OLB and DE positions from P2 (team will reach) to P3 (little or no reach) and re-ran the simulation, getting the following results.
Rd1, #8 – DT Marcell Dareus, Auburn, Value: +2
Rd2, #39 – QB Jake Locker, Washington, Value: +4
Rd3, #77 – SS Robert Sands, West Virginia, Value: +2
Rd4, #108 – ILB Casey Matthews, Oregon, Reach: -5
Rd5, #138 – OLB K.J. Wright, Mississippi St., Value: 0
Rd6, #169 – TE Rob Housler, Florida Atlantic, Value: +15
Rd7, #200 – DE Eddie Jones, Texas, Value: +1
Not sure that we need a SS in the third round over a LB or DE, but that’s what we get with the new priorities assigned. Look at round 4! It’s becoming a Matthews family reunion! Anyway, it’s a fun tool to play around with. If you run this, please share your tweaks and results with us.
A couple of notes: The team needs for the Texans, Jaguars and Colts are misidentified by DraftTek’s “experts” about as badly as the Titans’ needs were botched. For example, they claim the Texans don’t need any new starters on defense and only need to draft for depth. I suspect there are similar problems on that site with most other teams as well.
It would be more interesting if someone knowledgeable, or some group, reassigned some more accurate values to each team’s needs and then re-ran the simulation.
Also note this mock does not reflect compensatory picks but I imagine it will, once those are announced.
Here’s the other interesting thing I promised you. It’s a Consensus Big Board, composed by Walter Football. Walter has combined the big boards from the following experts to get his consensus: Mel Kiper (ESPN), Todd McShay (ESPN), Rob Rang (CBS), Scott Wright (DraftCountdown.com), Tony Pauline (Sports Illustrated) and Wes Bunting (NFP). Mike Mayock’s big board will be added when he releases it.
This is their composite top ten:
1. Patrick Peterson, CB, LSU High: 1 (Multi); Low: 4 (Pauline)
2. A.J. Green, WR, Georgia High: 1 (Multi); Low: 6 (Multi)
3. Da’Quan Bowers, DE, Clemson High: 1 (McShay); Low: 10 (Bunting)
4. Nick Fairley, DT, Auburn High: 2 (Kiper); Low: 6 (Multi)
5. Marcell Dareus, DT, Alabama High: 2 (McShay); Low: 16 (Bunting)
6. Von Miller, OLB, Texas A&M High: 5 (Multi); Low: 9 (Pauline)
7. Robert Quinn, DE, North Carolina High: 3 (Wright); Low: 11 (Bunting)
8. Julio Jones, WR, Alabama High: 3 (Bunting); Low: 17 (Pauline)
9. Prince Amukamara, CB, Nebraska High: 7 (Multi); Low: 27 (Bunting)
10. Cameron Jordan, DE, California High: 6 (Pauline); Low: 15 (McShay)
QB Blaine Gabbert is 13th and Cam Newton is 16th.
It looks like Walter updates this weekly, so it’ll be a good thing to keep an eye on periodically.
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