OL and the Draft

Summary Stats, Analysis and Observations:

First Round Lineman percentage runs at about 19% of total drafted by round 6/32

Second Round Lineman percentage runs at about 15% of total drafted by round 4.9/32

Third Round runs at about 16.5% because of the extra compensatories it is 5.8/35

Rounds 1-3 together are 167/990 equaling about 17%

The average amount of lineman taken at or before pick 50 is 8.7 if you throw out the crazy year that was 2017 it is 9.33

There are a couple of things that surprised me. I always thought that the second round was a great place to pick-up line talent and that good value to be had there. I suppose it depends on how you look at it, but the fact that the least amount of picks on lineman come from that round suggests to me that much of the upper shelf has been picked clean.

I was surprised and I think others will be too (since first round value between tackles, guards and centers is an ongoing debate) that 37% of lineman from round 1 come from the interior. This does not account for the fact that some tackles are projected to guard, so even if it is 40% it suggests that takings a guard or center is not as uncommon of practice as many may think, 22/60 first round selections.

In the last five years the number of picks on lineman is trending up, even with the crazy 2017 year included, more picks were spent on lineman in 2014-2018 than 2009-2013.

Application to Draft:

One camp says you just have to take a lineman in the first because well it just such a strong need, the other says you have to take the best player, then nab one in the second. In an ideal world the best player would be a lineman. Neither side is right or wrong, but which side of the line you pitch your tent on is probably a combination of three factors, your tolerance for risk, how deep the line pool is on your draft board, and how willing you may or may not be to trade present or future picks to get a guy on your board that you perceive to be valuable. Let’s look at the potential ramifications.

So at pick 50 the data shows that in a normal year you can expect 8-9 lineman to be gone. We all probably have many of the same players in our lists of top 50 picks, but most likely some variation will exist. I am sure the Vikings also have many of the same players on their board, and probably have a couple unexpected guys that they are a little higher on and a few that they are lower on, just like we do.

Now if you have 12 lineman that are in your top 50, you should probably be fine taking the guy you can’t pass on in the first and rolling the dice in the second. Even if there is a pretty good run you should not have to trade up too much if at all to nab one of your guys.

However, if you only have 9-10 lineman in your top 50 we have a potential major problem. The draft history shows that about 9 guys are gone by 50. But when I was going through each draft, it became pretty evident that 50 was not a great place to be selecting lineman and the cupboard of top tier prospects historically was empty. Pick 50 was often in the middle of a large void where lineman were generally not being taken. I can’t put an exact number on it, but the magic number appeared to be about first round + 10-12 picks so roughly about 42-44 before the void often started. In other words regardless of the number of quality prospects they were gone by 44.

Simply put, according to the history you are going to have to come up to about 42-44 in order to snag that last of the high offensive line prospects. If you want to risk it and stand pat at 50 odds are you will get shut out. You better be prepared to come up 6-8 spots to nab your guy. This will cost the Vikings their fourth or a future 3rd. Now considering that the Vikes would not own a pick between 82-177 you better be damn sure that you just got a stud.

If you want two lineman in the first three rounds as many on here do, I think the most likely scenario is rounds 1 and 3, because of the problems mentioned above in the second round. You can probably get a prospect in the third who is regarded only slightly lower than the guy you would take at 50 and if you needed to trade up it is not as prohibitive.