Cover 1 article: Brandon Beane’s Draft tendencies

[Thurman#1]

18 hours ago, Shaw66 said:

The reality of running an NFL team is that you always have holes and you always have needs.     If you drive your personnel decisions by need, you're always chasing needs, and the overall team talent suffers.   And you still have needs, because you always have needs.  

 

Whaley chased needs, and the result was that he filled the team with mediocre talent.   He gave big contracts to Taylor and Hughes and Glenn - he boasted about having the six high-compensation players that a team needs and can afford, but all his high compensation players were mediocre.   That's what happens when you chase needs.   

 

If you draft for talent and plug holes with free agency, over time you've filled the team with talent.   If you draft for need, you're always chasing talent, and your roster is never as strong as the best teams.   

 

Except for quarterback, it doesn't matter what positions your talent plays.    If you've got four or five non-QB stars, it doesn't matter if they're olinemen or dlinemen or dbs, or receivers.   You're still going to have needs, and fill those needs in free agency.   That's exactly what Beane is doing.   

 

Diggs was the BPA at #18, and Beane had the 22nd pick.   That's what Beane told us.  He also had a need at receiver.   When the BPA ahead of him in the draft is a player at a position of need, he will consider trading up.   That's exactly what he did.   He had the 22nd pick, Diggs was the BPA at 18, so Beane went and got him.   If he couldn't make the deal for Diggs, he was NOT going to use the 22nd pick on a receiver unless a receiver was #1 on his board.    He'd go BPA and find a receiver in the third or fourth round, which is where he starts filling needs.  

 

 

 

Nice post.

 

I have a slight quibble, in that I don't think he looked at the Diggs move as a draft move. It was a trade, and trades for players can certainly be about filling a need, as this one was. He did say that he thought the trade could be justified by looking at it as to how equivalent was the value between Diggs and the picks he was trading away. But this wasn't a draft move; he isn't getting a rookie.

 

I wouldn't have made this trade myself, as I love Diggs and his contract but I thought the compensation was too high. But I'm fully aware that Beane is a lot better at this than me. I hope he's right and to me this was a move that improves our short-term chances with what Diggs brings without hurting our long-term chances. This says he wants them competitive with anyone in the league starting this year. Which was thrilling to see. I wouldn't have done it. But Beane is so good at this.

 

 

[Dont Stop Billeiving]

Trading some Day 3 picks to get an extra 3rd round pick seems like a smart move this year. We won't have many available roster spots and Rounds 2-3 seem like the sweet spot of the draft for many positions such as CB, RB, and WR to an extent. Getting three players in this range (say Jonathan Taylor, Bryce Hall, and Chase Claypool) would give us the higher-end talent we need.

[Shaw66]

2 hours ago, Thurman#1 said:

this was a move that improves our short-term chances with what Diggs brings without hurting our long-term chances. This says he wants them competitive with anyone in the league starting this year. Which was thrilling to see. 

 

 

Yeah, absolutely.  It is a short-term and long-term move, both.  It shocked me in what it said about present.  It said the Bills aren't done building, but they aren't waiting to win. 

[Don Otreply]

4 hours ago, Thurman#1 said:

 

 

We like that DT was a need. But it is also extremely clear that Ed Oliver was the BPA. He probably had been for a couple of picks. When BPA meets need, that's heaven.

 

And the board isn't a list of team needs. Singletary wasn't a need last year when we still had McCoy and Gore, with Yeldon on top of that. They wanted to make that group younger and add competition, but it wasn't a need. Yeah, they may drop a guy down a little bit if they don't have a need, but it's still a list of their opinion on BPA. Realistically, there are some positions that teams will not draft, especially in the first few rounds. If the BPA when we pick is clearly QB on their board, they shouldn't draft a guy who would be seen as competition for Allen, but at that point, you can trade back a bit to a QB-hungry team and go BPA when your pick comes up again a few spots later. Picking a "developmental" QB, on the other hand, could easily make sense.

 

You're right that no team picks a player that "does not fill a need, as a starter, depth or developmentally." That's because if you throw your net that wide open, every team has a need at every position. If you're throwing in depth or development on top of starters and competition, there are no non-needs. Even if you're thrilled with every single player you have at one position, two or three years down the road you have no idea what will have happened, whether you'll have to let a guy go for contract reasons or injury reasons. You're likely to be thrilled you took a development guy even when you had no need. Every position is a need if you include depth and development wants.

 

That's why BPA matters. It doesn't force you to pick someone you don't want; you can trade to avoid that. But it stops you from reaching for need. And reaching is a very human mistake. That's why they work like dogs bringing in FAs at positions of need to eliminate the hunger for drafting for need.

Nicely presented, and I would never say that a position of need excludes BPA, but it is none the less a need.(Oliver).  
 

Those positions of “need” brought in through FA were determined by talent level/ BPA. It’s all need, no matter how one slices it. The mix of acquisitions via FA & draft are all based on talent available.  which is a need.
 

Reaching is merely an example of bad decision making by a GM and or his staff. The past Bills FO were rife with those bad choices, when other options that were far better and greater talent was available. BPA is also “better player available” , those previous Bills FOs were bereft of quality player assessment and valued the wrong players, they thought they were choosing BPA, and they would tell you as much themselves.

Different teams will have different players at the same position as their BPA need, even if they essentially run the same scheme, so those picks are subjective, as is all BPA assessments. And it all comes back to team needs. 
 

Beane does a very good job in his assessments, but if he gets a choice wrong, it doesn’t make it a reach, but merely the wrong choice. 
 

Go Bills!!! 

[TigerJ]

It is true that Beane has made clear his intention to fill holes as much as possible via free agency.  He's been very open about that.  I question any notion, however that Beane has been GM of the Bills long enough to be able to define his tendencies that closely (basically predicting he won't draft a running back high because he didn't sign one in free agency) is kind of silly.  Actually, he did sign Taiwan Jones, though admittedly it will be a total shock if he lines up at running back more than 5 times in the whole season.