NFL Draft Picks in the 2000's by Conference

[BigJim]

I always look to the NFL draft as the most unbiased way to see how "experts" evaluate top end college talent. It's not perfect for a number of reasons ("8th rounders" are big contributors i.e. Boone and are not measured here, good in college doesn't always translate to a high draft pick, character issues, etc.) but it's a pretty good estimation.

I wanted to see how conferences compared (the way they are currently made up) in getting their players drafted over the last ten years so I used the following formula: (Should I give more weight to higher rounds?)

1st round pick is worth 7 pts.
2nd round pick is worth 6 pts.
...
7th round pick is worth 1 pt.


Dividing total pts. by the number of years and the number of teams in the conference results in the following average annual "draft points" per team in each conference:

...........2000's........2006-2009...........# of Picks per year
SEC......13.3.............12.5.................... ......3.3............
ACC......12.8.............13.0.................... ......3.0...........
B10......12.7.............12.2.................... ......3.2............
P10......11.8.............12.0.................... ......3.0............
B12.......9.4...............9.2................... ........2.4...........
BE.........6.5...............7.9.................. ........1.8............
MW.......4.1...............3.7.................... .......1.3............
WAC......3.3...............3.6.................... .......0.9...........
CUSA.....2.0...............2.6.................... .......0.9...........
MAC......1.8...............2.5.................... .......0.5............
Sun.......1.1...............1.0................... ........0.3............

As you can see, the SEC just dominates these rankings (sarcasm). I don't want this to be a what conference is better discussion and I don't mean it to support that. But I think a lot of people in the media, and fans in general, would be really surprised at how close the conferences actually are when it comes to top end football players. I added a column for the last 4 years so that you could see it's not something that has changed a lot in recent years either.

I'll list the top teams using this point system probably tomorrow. Any guesses on the top 5 both for the 2000's and for 2006-2009?

[jmorbitz]

Originally Posted by BigJim

I'll list the top teams using this point system probably tomorrow. Any guesses on the top 5 both for the 2000's and for 2006-2009?

vBet challenge?

[Muck]

How about a handicap that takes into account the number of teams in a conference?

[BB73]

Originally Posted by Muck

How about a handicap that takes into account the number of teams in a conference?

With the wink, I don't know if you're serious, but I read this in his post:

Dividing total pts. by the number of years and the number of teams in the conference results in the following average annual "draft points" per team in each conference:

But I'm not sure if the changing number of teams per conference around 2004/05 was factored in.

[Bill Lucas]

I'd say that Miami, Ohio State and USC are pretty sure to be in that list and probably comprise the top 3.

[BigJim]

Originally Posted by BB73

But I'm not sure if the changing number of teams per conference around 2004/05 was factored in.

The way I did it, all Miami draft picks for example are allocated to the ACC. I looked at it more like a snap shot view of the conferences, how strong their teams have been the last ten years. And yes, the ACC is divided by 12, B10 is divided by 11, etc.

[BigJim]

Top teams (forgot about this)...


..........Team............2000's......2006-2009 (rank)
1.....Miami (Fla.)........31.7............23.8 (5)
2.....Ohio State.........30.1............33.3 (2)
3.....USC..................28.8............45.0 (1)
4.....Florida State......26.6............21.3 (6)
5.....Georgia.............23.6............19.8 (7)
6.....Tennessee.........23.3............17.8 (12)
7.....Florida...............20.9............16.8 (13)
8.....Texas................19.4............26.0 (3)
9.....Michigan............19.3............18.0 (11)
10...Oklahoma...........19.2............19.0 (9)
11...LSU...................19.1............25.3 (4)
12...Penn State.........17.5............19.8 (7)
13...Virginia Tech.......17.2............18.5 (10)
......Wisconsin...........17.2............14.0 (20)
15...Auburn...............15.1............16.5 (14)
16...Nebraska............15.0............11.8 (27)
17...Notre Dame.........14.9............15.3 (15)
18...Alabama.............13.8............12.8 (24)
19...California............13.2............14.3 (19)
......Iowa..................13.2............12.3 (26)

USC has been amazing the last four years in getting players drafted. Frankly, OSU has been amazing the last four years too, especially considering 2008 produced only 9 points.

The highest draft class of any team using these draft points is 60 by OSU in 2004. Next closest is several with 53. 14 total picks, 3 first rounders, 4 thirds, 2 fourths, 3 fifths and 2 sevenths. Every position group is represented except RB. I know I'm bringing up old news that has been beaten to death, but you can't tell me OSU wasn't a Clarett away from back-to-back...