Analysis & Review of 2017 Draft Prospects Visits to date

[Cpt slay a ho]

I'll be disappointed if lattimore isn't brought in before the draft


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[KB_fan]

Beyond just merely looking at the names & numbers of players by each position, I decided to do a bit of comparison across positions by "tier" of player we're showing interest in. 

The list at Black & Blue Maniac gives an approximate round projection for each prospect based on CBS Sports' ranking:

http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/draft/prospectrankings

I find those listings a bit vague (round 1;  round 3-4, etc.) especially given that we have such a high round 1 pick.  So, just to help rank players a bit more specifically, I used the order based on the grades on the NFL.com draft tracker page.  I pulled the names / ranks of the top 300 players.  For any later player (eg UDFA prospects), I listed 400 as the draft ranking.

That allowed me to quickly compare position by position:  how many top 25 players are we looking at?  26-50? 51-75, etc.  Of course some of the rankings are probably way too high or too low, (e.g McCaffrey may go much higher than 31..) but that's an unavoidable fact of life.  All rankings are subjective.

Here's that comparison:

 

A quick explanation.  The first row for each position (with the "+") shows the more "serious" prospect visits (private meetings and workouts).  The second row for each position shows ALL known contacts with players at this position (e.g. including E-W game; SR bowl, etc.)

The thing I most notice from these tables is that we're looking more deeply at prospects on offense - i.e. meeting with prospects from more rounds for three positions:  RB, OT & WR.   For each of those 3 positions we've had contact with 6 or 7 different "tiers" of players, i.e. those ranked around more of our draft picks.   The defensive contacts we've had are a bit more top & bottom heavy, i.e. on defense, we're looking for either elite players, or depth.  Fewer contacts in the middle rounds.

[KB_fan]

20 minutes ago, Marguide said:

Your re-formatted table cut off some of the wide receivers.

Thanks, sorry, I'll fix it.

[Panthero]

this is a great effort, thanks!

[KB_fan]

28 minutes ago, Marguide said:

Your re-formatted table cut off some of the wide receivers.

Here's the corrected version:

[j2sgam]

Nice change from the recent norm around here, top shelf as always KB Fan... Going to be interesting here in 2 weeks, do appreciate the different view of the speculation, good stuff.... 

 

i like the the focus on O, kind of feel like the D is set... Do want a TE, we'll see how it goes....

[stratopanther]

Great info from one of the best posters. Corey Davis also notably absent.

[KB_fan]

The last thing I'll post tonight is a list of all the players I consider our more "serious" contacts - those we've had private meetings with, or private workouts.   For the most part they are listed in order by their grade/rank on the NFL.com draft tracker.  In a few cases where I thought the ranking was really unrealistic (just my own opinion based on mock drafts I've seen, etc.) I've bumped some players up or down, while still showing their NFL.com ranking in red. 

Some of the players I've moved up or down include McCaffrey (Up); Obi (Up); Njoku (Down); Henderson (Up)...

This table allowed me to create groupings of the players we seem most serious about who are "ranked" close to our various draft pick positions...  See what you think:

I'm REALLY intrigued by the second grouping there.  (Players like John Ross, Obi, McKinley, and the THREE OTs: Bolles, Robinson, and Lamp.  You could of course include McCaffrey with this 2nd group too.  I'm just putting him up in the 1st group since there's so much talk of him possibly being in play at #8,,,,)

It very much looks like DG is thinking of maybe trying to trade back up into the late 1st?  (Of course a 1st round trade down could happen too, but I really find it hard to believe that Dave will trade DOWN from 8.)

Looking at these groupings of players, it wouldn't surprise me at all if we tried to work a trade giving up #40 and #98 to get a pick in the mid-late 20s. (or #40 #115 and another pick).  Any trade partners come to mind?

We've shown serious interest in approx 29 of the top 100 players.

By contrast, only about 8 players ranked 101 - 200.

Again, that suggests to me that Dave is going to be trading some lower picks to trade up as much as he can....

 

[KB_fan]

8 minutes ago, stratopanther said:

Corey Davis also notably absent.

Yes, I meant to mention this.  Looks to me that our strongest interest in WRs might be in round 2.  Players like Zay Jones; Godwin; Henderson....  I'm excited about both Godwin & Henderson.  Really don't want John Ross due to his knees.

[KB_fan]

Thanks for all the positive feedback on this.  I need to call it a night.  It's WAY too late in my time zone.  Need some sleep...

Once again, a huge shout out to Gene Ferrell at Black & Blue Maniac.  It was his presentation of all contacts & prospect visits that gave me the material to work with.

His site is here:  https://panthergf.wordpress.com/

If you follow the links on his posting of all the player contacts/visits, you'll see that he has a link to YouTube highlights for many of the prospects we've met with.

https://panthergf.wordpress.com/2017/03/02/panthers-draft-prospect-list-breakdown-videos/

Here's his twitter in case anyone wants to follow: https://twitter.com/BlackBlueManiac/

[yasuhara2241]

@KB_fan this is absolutely amazing!!! Great job!

[Cpt slay a ho]

Great job op

Yeah davis and the Wisconsin OT, I'd also like for us to bring in before the draft.


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[KB_fan]

Oh, forgot to mention:  It might be fun to work with the list of 50 players we've had private meetings / workouts with (2 comments above this one) and create mocks based soley on this list. 

I began to try to do that.

So far, I was working on two scenarios:

1.  Scenario 1 - Trade back up into bottom of 1st round (giving up #40 / #115 and maybe a 6th or 7th round pick too?)

In that scenario,, which might have the purpose of getting a high OT, I could see us going VERY offense heavy early on and picking (bold show my primary guess / preference)

• #8:   RB or TE - one of  Fournette / McCaffrey / Howard
• #27 :  OT or S - Bolles / Robinson / Lamp / Obi
• #40 (traded to get #27)
• #64:  WR - Godwin / Zay Jones / Henderson
• #98:  DE - Basham / Walker / Kpassagnon
• #115 (traded to get #27)

[hadn't yet figured out lower round picks.  Assume we might try to trade up to get higher in round 4....]

 

2. Scenario 2 - no trade up to get back into the 1st, no OT, more balanced on O & D.   So far I like:

• #8:   RB or TE - one of  Fournette / McCaffrey / Howard
• #40:  LB or S - Obi if he's there (doubtful).  Otherwise, TJ Watt or Josh Jones
• #64:  WR - Godwin / Zay Jones / Henderson
• #98:  DE - Basham / Walker / Kpassagnon
• #115:(no very obvious choice here among our visits.  Maybe a wildcard pick like one of the TEs (Legget? Butt? Kittle?)
• (later rounds I'm still researching...)

Note in this scenario without a high OT pick, I was really hoping we'd get Fournette just to help with the protection for Cam...  No OT?  How about a bruising RB to help with the blocking...

 

 

[KB_fan]

11 minutes ago, Cpt slay a ho said:

Yeah davis and the Wisconsin OT, I'd also like for us to bring in before the draft.

Yup, Ramcyzk is another one of the guys notably absent our visit list.  You could say that it's due to the fact that #8 is too high to draft him, but we've got guys like Bolles, Robinson & Lamp on our list, so why not Ramcyzk?