[The Athletic] Do teams pay attention to NFL media mock drafts? Maybe more than you’d expect

[Icege]

Joe Person co-wrote an article with another writer for The Athletic on whether or not teams use media mock drafts.

Link to article

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In polling front office members across the league, The Athletic found that 15 of 18 teams utilize mock drafts in varying degrees in their pre-draft process. One NFC general manager believes every team uses them to some extent — and speculated that teams that say they don’t are probably lying.

 

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According to several general managers, although teams don’t view media mock drafts as infallible, many use them as a tool to help them prepare for a wide range of scenarios that could unfold on draft night.

Several GMs — including Seattle’s John Schneider, the Los Angeles Rams’ Les Snead and Carolina’s Dan Morgan — said their analytics departments monitor media mock drafts, inputting them into in-depth databases that help with the monitoring of trends. The analytics officials — Snead good-naturedly referred to the Rams’ as “nerds” — then produce a report from those findings and relay them to the front office as another source of information.

 

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Morgan said Panthers VP of football analytics Eric Eager pulls from about 20 different media mock drafts, although many of those outlets will do several iterations of their mocks. Officials from two other teams said members of their analytics departments feed 100 different mocks into their databases.

 

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It’s also a common practice for multiple members of an NFL front office or scouting department to produce their own mock drafts, giving their teams a wide range of scenarios to prepare for, multiple talent evaluators said.

The Panthers use a draft simulator — similar to those available online — as a way for Morgan to work through the various scenarios that could unfold on draft night.

“Every time it gives me a different scenario. So I’m like, ‘OK, I’m on the clock. What am I doing?’ So I can practice it a little bit,” said Morgan, in his second year as Carolina’s GM. “I can trade back with another team. It gets really detailed. If I want to stop it and be Cleveland or someone like that, I can draft for them. You can do a lot of different things.”

 

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Like Licht, Panthers coach Dave Canales likes reading the mocks to see “what the buzz is.” But Canales tries not to get too wrapped up in them.

“You’ve gotta be really disciplined about watching the film and try not to let all those things affect the value and the fit for the Panthers. … ‘Yes, but how does this guy fit in our scheme? How does he fit on our roster?’ And just kind of continue to bring it back to that,” Canales said.

“It’s really fascinating but you can drive yourself nuts, though. Like missing out (in mocks) on guys you love, like, ‘Ohhh, he’s gone.’ It’s fun, though.”

 

[Basbear]

Ive heard teams cherry pick certain insider mocks. 

Josh Norris in 2021 got 16 picks right, anything over 8 is near impossible. 

 https://underdognetwork.com/football/other/josh-norris-final-2021-nfl-mock-draft

 

Huddle report shows the last five years- https://www.thehuddlereport.com/mock-draft-scores

 

Bunch of guys you never heard of are on top, check out the top big board too. Some guessers are able to get 85 out of 100 on the reg. 

Brandt and Dan should look into this, its free and somewhat insightful.

Edited April 17, 2025 by Basbear

[kungfoodude]

1 hour ago, Basbear said:

Ive heard teams cherry pick certain insider mocks. 

Josh Norris in 2021 got 16 picks right, anything over 8 is near impossible. 

 https://underdognetwork.com/football/other/josh-norris-final-2021-nfl-mock-draft

 

Huddle report shows the last five years- https://www.thehuddlereport.com/mock-draft-scores

 

Bunch of guys you never heard of are on top, check out the top big board too. Some guessers are able to get 85 out of 100 on the reg. 

Brandt and Dan should look into this, its free and somewhat insightful.

I remember this having a lot more traditional media outlets a long time ago. That list of sources is lacking.

[PootieNunu]

According to their list, the top guy hasn't put out a mock yet and the 2nd guy has us trading to 4 for Carter. 

[TD alt]

I mean, it's smart to use mock drafts, as the media should have some notion based upon varying degrees of insider info, who the teams are interested in. That way you can develop loose strategies based upon scenarios that could realistically happen during the draft. 

All that being said, it doesn't mean that teams are actually setting their big boards based upon media mock drafts, or that (God forbid) scouts are being influenced by mock drafts.

It's just business as usual to be honest. It's smart business.

[pantherclaw]

Mock drafts, regardless who created them are just opinions.  

So from a team standpoint, it can only give them an idea of what the creators of the mocks at thinking. 

[PanthersGTI]

It sounds like they use mock drafts ( maybe weighing some more then others ) rather then randomly generated drafts to simulate because they probably produce more accurate scenarios when analyzed as a whole. 

[CPcavedweller]

Then maybe I need to publish mine. Had the Panthers followed my mock two years ago we would have had three more Pro Bowl players in 2024. 

[jfra78]

22 minutes ago, CPcavedweller said:

Then maybe I need to publish mine. Had the Panthers followed my mock two years ago we would have had three more Pro Bowl players in 2024. 

No we good