I love the NFL draft. It truly is one of the great equalizers in sports fandom. Like the NCAA tournament bracket contest, when an 11-year-old kid has about as solid a shot at picking a game as any expert, fans today will wildly speculate and irrationally judge their team’s process with the same success rate as the folks who actually receive a paycheck to do so. It’s fantastic!
Before going forward, I want to make clear that I am not one of those who believes himself equally as smart as (or smarter) than the experts. It’s only in my ability to guess and occasionally hit that puts me on their level, for not only do none of us, none of us, experts included, have a clue as to how the draft board will unfold tonight, we do not know the value assigned by a respective GM to a given position or player. And to believe that any GM is really giving the insiders and media coverage teams anything with legitimate teeth is laughable. In addition, none of us knows how well any of these men will transition to the next level.
Tonight, enjoy the fact that everybody’s guess is as good as anybody’s. And don’t get sucked into grades! People like grades and definitive conclusions. It’s comforting. That’s why you not only see team grades, but individual grades for the incoming rookie class. I’d like to know what the formula is for determining a team (or individual) grade BEFORE THE DUDE EVER PLAYS A DOWN IN THE NFL!
It’s not that I dislike this type of hypothetical banter. Possibilities and predictions and rumors are what make this stuff a blast. I enjoy making lists and comparing/contrasting, ranking, etc. And heck, who doesn’t like to be right? Everybody likes to play the “I told you so” card…it feels good. But I think it’s hilarious that anyone passes himself off as an expert on a complete hypothetical like an NFL draft pick.
Access to film and insider info only makes the expert more educated than most. Translation: his pick is a more educated guess…but it’s still a guess. Until the guys hit the field, no one knows.
Like I said, tonight everybody’s guess is as good as anybody’s.
You want to know how your team did with its first pick (or any pick)? Check back in 2025, for until the guys hit the field, no one knows…not the expert and certainly not the Facebook fanatic. Let’s all just agree to agree on this hard truth: we know virtually nothing, and what we do know is fed to us by folks who are often purposely misled by the content provider.
