It’s time for the experts to weigh in with their draft grades. Thank goodness. Because how can we be happy with the Ravens’ selections of Michael Oher on down through Cedric Peerman until we know what Todd and Mel think?
Soon their report cards will be in and the fans can voice their opinions, which usually comes in three flavors:
1. Ozzie is a genius
2. Ozzie is an idiot
3. Screw Len Pasquarelli
Afterall, there is nothing more polarizing than the NFL draft…with the possible exception of a good, old-fashioned quarterback controversy.
Why? Because none of us can agree on how to properly measure the draft. Whenever I hear the question, ‘what grade do you give them?’ I immediately wonder, what yardstick do you want me to use?
I wrote Report Card stories after each of 20 Ravens games last year. And while you and I may have differed on the exact letter grades, at least we both knew what we saw and could decide if it was good or bad.
Not so with the draft. It is very difficult for us to know if Lardarius Webb’s transition from small college corner to NFL corner will mirror the career of David Pittman…or Darrell Green.
Great Expectations
One of the most common grading methods starts with the questions, “Did they pick the players everyone had linked to the Ravens beforehand?” and “Did the picks meet our expectations?”
This criterion almost always results in a poor grade because the draft seldom goes as planned. The best prognosticators only get one out of four picks right. In the first round.
Brandon Pettigrew; Kenny Britt; Darius Heyward Bey; Phil Loadholt; those were some of the names linked to the team leading into the draft and yet the Ravens picked none of them.
They even passed on a couple of these players to take other players none of us anticipated. The draft did not proceed as you or I had expected and on that basis, you may be quick to tag a “D” on the Ravens’ draft.
Sound about right?
Shooting for the Stars
Another possible measure is whether the team selected high profile players with gaudy numbers. These are often the workout warriors who made a name for themselves at the NFL Combine. Or they are the players who racked up all of their college team’s points. Or they won the Heisman Trophy.
By that measure, the team will automatically get a poor grade from us when they select an abundance of non-skill positions. Ben Grubbs in the first round is about as boring as you can get in terms of college or combine star power, so when you start your draft with Ben, you’ve already flunked the final.
When you pass on Lawrence Phillips to take Jon Odgen, you’re going to hear it from the fans. I’ve heard of Charles Rogers, so Detroit gets a better grade from me than Arizona and their pick of Anquan Boldin in the second round.
So if you are looking for star power this year, the names Krueger and Phillips and Webb are not going to put the Ravens at the head of anyone’s class.
Expect another “D” from graders who want to see the press clippings.
Value Shoppers
Then there are the more analytical types among us who like to compare the draft position of each player taken with their pre-draft rankings. When Scout.com told us he was a second rounder and we got him in the fifth, you’re well on your way to giving out an “A” grade, right?
So if that’s your grading method, you were pretty happy to see the Ravens take Michael Oher, who was projected as high as ninth, come down to the Ravens at 23.
From there, however, you were probably disappointed by the lack of bargain acquisitions. And you were probably screaming at your television as you witnessed Florida tight end Cornelius Ingram slip, slip away to the Eagles, as your Ravens took East Carolina tight end Devon Drew instead, a couple rounds earlier than most experts imagined.
“What is Ozzie thinking?”
Give ‘em a “C!”
Plugging Holes
Another popular grading method is to evaluate how well a team addressed their perceived needs. The theory here often centers upon the impression that your team is just one player or two players away from Super Bowl glory, so when they fill those positions in the draft, poof – let’s fit them for rings!
If that’s the way you see it, then you’re absolutely tearing your hair out over the lack of a wide receiver selected by Ozzie Newsome this year, aren’t you? First he teases us with Anquan Boldin trade talks, and now this! And then, to top things off, the team chooses a running back with their final pick. Outrageous!
Subscribe to this grading method? Give them a “D” for delirious!
Of course, if this is your philosophy you may not wish to consider the Kyle Boller pick when the team just had to have a quarterback, or trading up to get Travis Taylor when wide receiver was the glaring need. Those acquisitions earned the Ravens “A” grades from many of the experts who liked to talk about addressing needs.
So do you really want to go there?
Wheeler Dealer
Then there is the Bill Belichick School of Drafting. Just keep trading back and acquiring picks. Turn seven picks into twelve. Move up. Move back. Store picks for next year like a squirrel buries nuts.
If that approach is what you want, the Ravens did pretty well. They started the weekend with six picks, having lost only a seventh rounder to Tampa Bay in the Marques Douglas acquisition last year.
If you track Ozzie’s dance through this draft you’ll see he improved the team’s position in first round (3 spots), the fifth (13 spots), and the sixth (13 spots), and the cost for these moves was merely moving back from bottom of the fourth to the top of the fifth (14 spots). Net it out and it’s not bad, Ozzie. Three moves up in exchange for one move back.
On that basis you have to give the Ravens a “B” on this draft, don’t you?
Finding Ravens
There is one last way of judging the Ravens draft. And that is to ask the question, “Did they find quality players who fit their philosophy?” You’ll often hear John Harbaugh remark, ‘that player is a Raven.’
If you think the team found six Ravens in Michael Oher, Paul Kruger, Lardarius Webb, Jason Phillips, Davon Drew, and Cedric Peerman, then you have to them an “A” grade.
But that brings us back to the measuring stick conundrum. How exactly do you measure what makes a Raven?
As you listen to the life stories of these players, and as you hear John Harbaugh and Ozzie Newsome and Eric DeCosta describe why they chose each of the six, you’ll begin to construct a feeling for what being a Raven is all about:
Are they committed to a team concept? Are they aggressive and tough? Do they overcome and over-achieve? Do they possess motors that refuse to quit? Are they a student of the game? Are they passionate? Smart? Do they have faith in themselves and the men they step onto the field with? Are they, simply, football players?
When a player possesses all this, and he excels on the field, the Ravens scouts give him a red star.
I can read their forty times and count their collegiate touchdowns and sacks and pancake blocks, but I cannot know what drives them.
I can’t measure this haul of six new Ravens because I cannot look into their hearts and minds.
