Article on trade downs vs trade ups - da clowns rejoice...

[AussieBear]

an older article...

yes pace.. do trade down this year if u can... and do it a lot..

http://www.vox.com/2015/4/30/8516007/nfl-draft-economics

The big mistake lots of NFL teams make in the draft, according to economists

In last year's NFL draft, the Buffalo Bills traded up from the eighth pick to the fourth to take receiver Sammy Watkins. To do so, they gave up their first pick this year, 19th overall.

Watkins has had a solid start to his career. But the receiver the Bills could've taken if they'd stayed put — Odell Beckham Jr. — was named Offensive Rookie of the Year and already looks to be a generational talent.

TEAMS SHOULD NEVER TRADE UP — AND SHOULD TRADE DOWN WHENEVER THEY GET AN OFFER

It's always easy to pick apart draft decisions in retrospect. But this mistake was utterly predictable — and it remains a mistake whether Watkins ends up a better player than Beckham or not.

A series of papers by economists Cade Massey and Richard Thaler has shown that at any given position, historically, the odds of the top player picked (Watkins) being better than the third player picked (Beckham) is just 55 percent or so.

"It's basically a coin flip," Massey, who serves as a draft consultant with several NFL teams, told me last year, "but teams are paying a great deal for the right to call which side of the coin."

read the rest hurr

 

[laputan]

Makes sense. Still very uncool to trade down, way sexier to trade up.

 

[Omeletpants]

 

[laputan]

Future Pro Bowl players picked in the first fifty picks (picks 1-10, 11-20, 21-30, 31-40, 41-50) from 2010-2014.

Picks 1-5: 15 players out of 25 (60%)

Picks 1-10: 25 players out of 50 (50%)

Picks 11-20: 20 players out of 50 (40%)

Picks 21-30: 18 players out of 50 (36%)

Picks 31-40: 8 players out of 50 (16%)

Picks 41-50: 9 players out of 50 (18%)

The draft value chart overvalues our one 60% hit chance top 5 pick as two 40% 11-20 or three 36% 21-30 picks. It would help to have number of pro bowl appearances per player but would take some digging.

 

[AussieBear]

revenge of the clown..

[video=youtube;SELbMj5OVhM]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SELbMj5OVhM[/video]

 

[AussieBear]

Future Pro Bowl players picked in the first fifty picks (picks 1-10, 11-20, 21-30, 31-40, 41-50) from 2010-2014.

Picks 1-5: 15 players out of 25 (60%)

Picks 1-10: 25 players out of 50 (50%)

Picks 11-20: 20 players out of 50 (40%)

Picks 21-30: 18 players out of 50 (36%)

Picks 31-40: 8 players out of 50 (16%)

Picks 41-50: 9 players out of 50 (18%)

The draft value chart overvalues our one 60% hit chance top 5 pick as two 40% 11-20 or three 36% 21-30 picks. It would help to have number of pro bowl appearances per player but would take some digging.

50 wouldnt be enough... but thats too much work...

 

[Chicago Staleys]

The Browns seem to trade down a lot. They stock pile picks (2017 is ridiculous) yet it seems to not work. You can say they draft horribly and that's the reason it doesn't work but are the Bears any better at drafting?

 

[Don't Care]

Future Pro Bowl players picked in the first fifty picks (picks 1-10, 11-20, 21-30, 31-40, 41-50) from 2010-2014.

Picks 1-5: 15 players out of 25 (60%)

Picks 1-10: 25 players out of 50 (50%)

Picks 11-20: 20 players out of 50 (40%)

Picks 21-30: 18 players out of 50 (36%)

Picks 31-40: 8 players out of 50 (16%)

Picks 41-50: 9 players out of 50 (18%)

The draft value chart overvalues our one 60% hit chance top 5 pick as two 40% 11-20 or three 36% 21-30 picks. It would help to have number of pro bowl appearances per player but would take some digging.

Interesting. So the example the article gives the Bills traded 8 and 19 to get 4. The odds of both 8 and 19 busting are 50% * 60% = 30%. This means that had the Bills stayed put they would have have a 70% chance of hitting vs. the 60% they traded into.

 

[Scooter27]

The Browns seem to trade down a lot. They stock pile picks (2017 is ridiculous) yet it seems to not work. You can say they draft horribly and that's the reason it doesn't work but are the Bears any better at drafting?

When you think about the browns drafting, all the picks theyve aquired.. Year after year, and yet they are a 1 win team.

Its honestly depressing..

That team is either like, cursed. Or just the worst run organization of all time

 

[vabearsfan15]

I don't get the point of this post. I thought it was common knowledge that trading down is a better if you have the chance to do so. The more picks in the top rounds the better. Most people don't like trade down threads because though it may sound easy to just draw up trade options that benefit us more, it is very unlikely that it or anything similar actually occurs.

 

[vabearsfan15]

The Browns seem to trade down a lot. They stock pile picks (2017 is ridiculous) yet it seems to not work. You can say they draft horribly and that's the reason it doesn't work but are the Bears any better at drafting?

When you think about the browns drafting, all the picks theyve aquired.. Year after year, and yet they are a 1 win team.

Its honestly depressing..

That team is either like, cursed. Or just the worst run organization of all time

Terrible drafting is an understatement. Even the draft is unexciting considering the Browns always find a way to screw up having multiple draft picks. The 2014 draft was an embarassment for them. They move down from the #4 spot passing on Derek Carr and Khalil Mack to move back to #9, then move forward to #8 to draft Just "BUST" Gilbert. Then they draft Manziel...

It would be hard for me to be loyal if I were in their position. I have no trust in any of their scouts to evaluate talent in the least and no trust in their coaches to develop and use the little. talent they have

 

[laputan]

Interesting. So the example the article gives the Bills traded 8 and 19 to get 4. The odds of both 8 and 19 busting are 50% * 60% = 30%. This means that had the Bills stayed put they would have have a 70% chance of hitting vs. the 60% they traded into.

70% chance of hitting and a 20% chance of hitting twice, instead of the 60%.

The numbers aren't perfect but it makes sense that there would be more parity between players #3-20 than the draft value chart gives, especially when the projected picks change so readily and often leading to the draft.

 

[laputan]

Future Pro Bowl players picked in the first fifty picks (picks 1-10, 11-20, 21-30, 31-40, 41-50) from 2010-2014.

Picks 1-5: 15 players out of 25 (60%)

Picks 1-10: 25 players out of 50 (50%)

Picks 11-20: 20 players out of 50 (40%)

Picks 21-30: 18 players out of 50 (36%)

Picks 31-40: 8 players out of 50 (16%)

Picks 41-50: 9 players out of 50 (18%)

The draft value chart overvalues our one 60% hit chance top 5 pick as two 40% 11-20 or three 36% 21-30 picks. It would help to have number of pro bowl appearances per player but would take some digging.

Counterpoint

Future Hall of Famers picked in the first 50 picks in the 1988-1997 drafts

Picks 1-5: 9 (18%)

Picks 1-10: 13 (13%)
Picks 11-20: 5 (5%)
Picks 21-30: 1 (1%)
Picks 31-40: 3 (3%)
Picks 41-50: 2 (2%)

A bit skewed by the ridiculous 1989 class (4 hall-of-famers in the entire class, all top 5 picks), but still impressive. Either the draft landscape has changed towards more parity than in the 90's -- or Omelet was right.

 

[TL1961]

When you think about the browns drafting, all the picks theyve aquired.. Year after year, and yet they are a 1 win team.

Its honestly depressing..

That team is either like, cursed. Or just the worst run organization of all time

I don't honestly recall the Browns trading down year after year. But their #1 error - repeated very often - is reaching for a QB with a high pick, because they don't have a good one.

Quinn
Weedon
Manziel

Using a 1st rounder on a QB that does not pan out kills them.

That's not to say the Bears haven't been killed by Round 1 lack of impact. But the Browns are hurt more by reaching than by trading down.

 

[Omeletpants]

I don't get the point of this post. I thought it was common knowledge that trading down is a better if you have the chance to do so. The more picks in the top rounds the better.

Quality trumps quantity every time. I would rather have a shot at a potential superstar rather than 2 shots at starters

 

[BringBackDitka54]

Very interesting read, but the idea that more picks always leads to a higher number of starting-caliber players has its limits.

For example, the Bears could theoretically keep trading down until we had every 7th round pick in the year 2027. Having 32 7th-round picks in the 2027 draft won't get more starters than if we just rolled the dice with the 7 picks we have every year. This is obviously the extreme case, but it proves that eventually trading down becomes a bad idea.

 

[TL1961]

Well, if you read the article, it is not suggesting that 32 7th rounders are better than a #3.

But they are saying a pick 4 or 5 spots lower is often as good as, or better than, the higher pick. So you not only get MORE, you are often as likely to get as good a player anyway.

So it isn't an argument of a star vs two mediocre starters.

 

[Starion]

The response to this article is actually proving it's point.

Still, here in the face of well-documented stats about risk to reward ratios & probability of hit & miss relative to draft stock, we are seeing opinions ring louder.


The Browns miss more often because they have been worse than average at talent evaluation (every team thinks they're better than average...fans are even worse with less inside info)

...but the Brownies have also failed to develop players. Same can be said for previous Bears admins & coaches. I'd like to see league & team data on this with phase change lines for GM & coaching changes.. Would be telling.


IF ONLY this was made more readable for the common non-data-science audience....we'd be more likely to trust our GMs and know when to fire them accordingly.


ex: Telling Pace he must both take a QB early (address that hole or he's fired) and can't miss (or he's fired) in a poor draft is seriously ignorant and ridiculous.

 

[BringBackDitka54]

Well, if you read the article, it is not suggesting that 32 7th rounders are better than a #3.

But they are saying a pick 4 or 5 spots lower is often as good as, or better than, the higher pick. So you not only get MORE, you are often as likely to get as good a player anyway.

So it isn't an argument of a star vs two mediocre starters.

Obviously. But I gave the extreme example, and showed that in the extreme, it's not worth trading down. Therefore, there's a certain point where trading down isn't worth it. The big question is where that point is.