Ray_T

ok, This is part 1 of the post mortem analysis of the July mock. The first thing I'm going to say is this may have been one of the most interesting Mocks I've been a part of. in watching the results over the course of the year, there were actually a very large number of lead changes that happened and I think each of the top 4 or 5 teams had the lead in this draft at one point in the season or another. and the difference between the top 3-5 teams largely was good health and I would like to congratulate everyone for having a good draft. in this part, I'm only looking at the team that won (Hawkeye) and looking at what they did right. The first thing I noticed when looking at his draft: 1) his team remained mostly healthy all year long 2) not many of the early picks were spectacular. they were solid, mostly safe picks that performed close to their expected value 3) he did not miss on any of the early picks (other than for injury). 4) Late in the draft, he took a lot of high upside players who ended up breaking out. What won this draft for Hawkeye was the fact that he had drafted two QB who both finished in the top 5. and he drafted 3 WR who finished in the top 16. and 2 starting calibre WR very late in this draft. I'd honestly be surprised if anyone had a better draft at WR or QB. His RB's were mediocre, but given how good he drafted at WR and QB he didnt need anything more than this. As with last years draft, the person who drafted two top QB in this draft ended up winning the draft. Here is the team drafted by Hawkeye 1.06 #6 overall Amon Ra St Brown 3rd WR off the board #3 Ranked WR at end of year. comment: Solid pick. He went off the board. I dont think many had Amon Ra St Brown Ranked this high. I know I sure didnt. but he nailed the pick. I gotta give him an A on this one 2.07 #19 overall Kyren Williams 9th RB off the board #6 Ranked RB at end of the year. Comment: solid pick. This is around the spot where I expected he would be drafted, and he slightly outperformed his draft spot. Gotta give him an A for this one too. 3.06 #30 overall Travis Kelce. First TE off the board. #10 ranked TE at end of the year. I'd have to give this one a C. Comment: Not a complete miss, but when you take the first TE off the board you expect he should be top 3 at his position. I'll admit, I didnt think he should be taken as the first TE off the board, but I also didnt think hed finish outside of the top 4 or 5 TE. so the result of this one is mixed. Normally I'd give a D for this but given that nobody in the fantasy world expected him to finish outside of the top 5 TE I'll upgrade this to a C-. 4.07 #43 overall Josh Allen- 3rd QB off the board 4th ranked QB at the end of the year Comment: A. Well done. I always say if you take a QB early, you need to nail the pick. and that is exactly what happened here. Only reason this wasnt an A is because there were more than one QB on the board at the time this pick was made 5.06 #54 overall: Christian Kirk 28th WR off the board- did not finish in the top 50 Comment: this pick was a miss due to injury. he played 8 games, and got 379 total yards receiving. pro rated over a full season he likely would have been a WR3 so I'll give a C-. He got a half season out of him and noting that while healthy, he performed at the level he was drafted at. 6.07 #67overall: Tee Higgins 32nd WR off the board #16 ranked fantasy WR at the end of the year. comment: I gotta give him an A+ on this one and scold all the other fantasy owners (myself included) for passing on this guy prior to this point. a Great pick. Drafted as a low end WR3 based on rank and delivered high end WR2 production. 7.06 #78 overall David Montgomery 28th RB off the board finished #18 overall in only 14 games played due to injury comment: I gotta give an A- for this. Based purely on production hes a B but he performed like a low end RB1 or high end RB2 while healthy. so basically he got a RB2 for the price of a RB3. Well done! 8.07 #91 overall Austin Ekeler- 34th RB off the board finished #36 overall comment: average. C+/B- He drafted a guy who was expected to be a RB3 and an RB3 is what he got. Nothing exciting but a decent pick. 9.06 #102 overall Ladd McConkey 44th WR off the board 10th ranked fantasy WR comment: A+. it doesnt get much better than this. drafting a guy expected to rank as a WR4 who gives you WR1 numbers. this could be the draft winning pick here. 10.07 #115 overall Xavier Worthy 48th WR off the board which means he was drafted as a WR4/5 and he was the 33rd ranked fantasy WR. Comment: another very good pick. I'll give him an A. anytime you get a starting calibre player at this point in the draft, thats a win. after this I'm only speaking to outstanding picks. nothing taken after this point in the draft is expected to yield a fantasy relevant player (other than on Defense or possibly TE) key picks after this point: 12.07 #139 overall: Baker Mayfield. #22 QB off the board #3 fantasy QB- Grade A+ 14.07 #163 overall: Cade Otten #19 TE off the board, #13 ranked Fantasy TE Grade B+ Congrats to Hawkeye who drafted a very solid team top to bottom if there was one actual weak area I'd say it was the team Defense (Baltimore) who finished #12 overall and was the #2 defense taken off the board. All things considered, I actually drafted Baltimore in some of my drafts this year and I thought they would have a good year. so while this was a miss I feel like it was expected at the time to be a good pick. In my next post I will go through my draft process and give a critique of my own draft.

yeah, and whether you end up with decent coaching at the pro level. I honestly think this is as important as the talent around the young QB

from the sound of it he might also be a better QB

I did not win, nor was this the strategy I wanted to play. my path was mostly decided for me by the previous draftees and I zigged when the rest of the league zagged. As luck would have it, it turned out for me reasonably well in some respects, but reasonably poorly in others...... but I will get into that when I do my analysis. Likely to do it properly I'll do it in multiple parts. I'm a bit swamped at work right now but I am expecting work to slow down over the next week (two at most) so I'll get going on this when time permits. with luck I'll have part 1 done by the end of the weekend.

fixed.

Fixed.

yep. you gotta look after the football. cant really blame Jayden Daniels. it looks like he played a good game overall. but those fumbles really killed them. and they lost every fumble. but they are a young team. I'm pretty sure we will see them in the playoffs again. I think their offense is in good hands. I expect the team should be looking to acquire a playmaker on Defense.

agreed. you maybe gamble on the 2 point convert if its late in the 4th quarter and time is not on your side to gain the extra points. but I suspect this is a phase that is going to eventually (at least in part) fall away from the game. analyitics are something that is done with mathematics. and thats fine but the reality is the odds of making a 4th and 1 gamble is likely different against the chiefs than it is against a different NFL team. And the mathematics cannot take into account the flow of the game and momentum (if you will) so after getting that TD they go and shoot themselves in the foot by going for 2 and failing. giving the Chiefs a free momentum boost. The reality is, quite often being the good team that is favoured has a mental effect on the underdog sometimes and then the underdog just goes out and beats themselves by taking unnecessary risks. happens a lot in fantasy too.

no doubt this is shady. problem with this kind of thing is it is difficult to prove. If they can prove it, some form of penalty is warranted for the team spying. my best guess as to punishment..... they forfeit a draft pick. I'd probably make it a 3rd if it was just snooping. but if it was more than that and he went in and did roster moves, the guy should be either expelled or he forfeits his first round pick. To be clear, it is very difficult to prove someone was snooping in an email if the computer was left open like the first dude did. only way to bust him is if hes caught red handed in the process of snooping past emails. of course they are at work, so there may be additional penalties applied in the work place if busted doing that so this guy could be facing additional discipline in his place of work as well.

I'm just waiting for a religious person to try to sue god for the Weather. That would be both stupid and funny. but It wouldnt surprise me if some idiot tried it.

that is also stupid. dont get me started on those idiots

so now people are gonna sue the football team because they were too stupid to put on warm clothes when its cold outside? This is going beyond what is reasonable. Any person with half a brain dresses for the weather. whether it be hot or cold. How is this different from going outside for a long walk? if you get frostbite are you now going to sue the city? football is an outdoor sport, so if viewing the game you need to dress for the weather. failing to do so can result in frostbite and possible loss of limb due to frostbite.

and I would argue JJ might actually be a good fit in Seattle

I wasnt giving them much of a chance either. biggest threat is if KC under estimates their opponent. if its a tough team, KC seems to win by lots of points. if its not a tough team KC wins by a FG (often a late 4th quarter score seals it for them) they seem to play to the level of their competition for most of the game and then turn it on at the end. so playing a weaker team I'd actually say their chances of winning go down. it feels weird saying this, but that seems to be the way its been for KC this year. in the end I think they win, but its seriously questionable whether they cover that spread. I have to think because its a playoff game, they wont leave it to chance so they probably do cover it. but my confidence in this is not overly high.

They are a bad organization. they are always in a rebuild. They get good players and the team may improve for a while but then they get rid of those good players and blame them for not getting them to the superbowl. then they are unable to replace those good players with anyone decent and the process starts all over again. I think there may have been only 2 or 3 in the last 20 where the Raiders were not horrible. (maybe 4) I feel sorry for Raiders fans because there is no hope. the Rot comes from the top and filters down into the rest of the organization.

I think its a reasonable comparison. neither QB is considered to be elite but they are likely in that category that people would label as guys who can be Decent starters if they have the talent around them and a decent coach/scheme. you can poo poo the numbers but I think they are close enough to figure out the range of value there. I think a Mayfield type contract is likely close to where he should land. obviously if Darnold wants to chase the money, he might do better in free agency, but its also possible he might not. The team has a guy who could potentially be a replacement for him on the roster, so I dont see any reason for the vikings to overpay for Darnold. I wouldnt be inclined to tag him, thats for sure. but like I said in a prior post, this is an offense that Darnold seems to be able to perform in. I dont know why he would want to leave the situation. So a somewhat team friendly deal makes sense from both sides. obviously you still have to pay him in the range of what a starting QB in the NFL makes. but you do not need to max that out with a franchise tag. That makes no sense at all.

agreed. and I think Minny likely re signs him I seem to recall (someone correct me if I'm wrong as I am going from memory) that McCarthy wasnt particularly impressive in pre season and that Darnold was out playing him at that time. which people were freaking about, but given the kind of season Darnold had, maybe not so surprising. so from the sound of it Darnold was likely to be the day 1 starter either way. Thats not to say that JJ cant take the starting job from him, but I dont think his stock has gone up since draft day. (partly due to injury) so I think if he signs a reasonably team friendly 2 or 3 year deal (maybe 2 with a team option for year 3) Then if he gets beat out for the job they will be able to move him and that cap hit out. I also think there is a fair chance that he wont be able to perform in another offense as he had some pretty high end WR to throw to. Likely this and a better offensive scheme is the reason he was better. His previous stops didnt have anywhere near that level of talent at WR. but in the end what it comes down to is expectations. If Darnold expects to get PAID, he may struggle to get a contract. Personally I think a 2 -3year team friendly deal should be Darnolds priority. He is in an offense that he seems to be able to perform in. he likely knows the alternative is to go to a less talented team and he may go back to his old ways in that situation. I'd suggest year 1-2 should be team friendly. Year 3 could be a team option at a higher rate(player friendly) so they can walk from it if hes not performing or lock it in if he is.

well, you are also looking at a higher level of competition in those games. some of the blitzes the Rams did were an awfully creative way to blitz. in one case it looked like it was coming from one direction and the guy backed into coverage, but darnold didnt see the corner come from the other side until it was too late. the first thing I'll say is that less than half the defenses out there are capable of playing that style of defense. but I think it still showed some of his limitiations. Hes young enough to learn from this still. the jump from regular season football to playoff football is almost as large as the jump from college to the NFL. He is definitely not getting the money he thought he would get, but I think he showed he can play in this league in the right situation.

I think the best coaches can put together a system that caters to the skillset of the player. thats a fact. coaches who come in with a system they are unwilling to modify to account for the skillset they have on offense are inferior. They usually only pan out when the talent on the roster is good or ideal for that system. If the QB is good enough he can overcome that even if the system is not ideal for his skillset. but I'd say that doesnt happen that often. maybe 25-30% of the time. even then, if you are not utilizing the full skillset of the player, you are leaving some meat on the bone. the bottom line: you want a good fit between coach, OC and QB and you need a line capable of protecting the QB long enough for him to get the ball away. if any of those dont work out, you can have issues. and when the QB is a rookie, they likely struggle to fit a square peg into a round hole.

yeah, most RB-even HOF RB dont have seasons like that in back to back years. if they do it doesnt happen often and certainly not at the age of 30. I like that estimate as I do think hes likely somewhere between the #5 and #10 RB next year. Still very good. just not at the level he was at this year.

yes you are correct. I didnt know that was signed. and someone here was talking like it wasnt so I went with it. My bad. so without a doubt Monty is returning. (unless something unforseen comes to pass)

which places him at the end of round 1 or early in round 2.(probably early round 2)

do injured players count towards the cap in the NFL? if they dont, this could be a real blessing for the browns.

NFL News: Deshaun Watson, Browns Reportedly Agree to Contract Restructure to Help Cap | News, Scores, Highlights, Stats, and Rumors | Bleacher Report I would assume this means he stays on the team at least a little while longer. I dont think you can restructure a contract and then release the player that same year. though I guess if its fully guaranteed anyhow I'd think there shouldnt be much you can do with a contract like that in terms of lowering the cap. but I'm admittedly no expert on how the cap actually works in cases like this.

well, this is likely his best shot at it here. I'm not sure he gets a better one. (unless he stays to play another year in Detroit.... even then there are no guarantees. Injuries happen people have bad years. but It will sure be interesting to see how far they get.