The first five links will give you a nice NFL Draft buzz. We hype up Kenneth Dixon and four small-school Ravens. Then, Peter King and numbers will sober you up.
Round-by-round ranking of 2016’s best NFL RB prospects
Gordon McGuinness goes round-by-round at the running back position. He has Kenneth Dixon with a second-round grade and listed as the second best overall. McGuinness praises the yards he creates after contact. Dixon averaged 3.3 yards after contact and forced 54 missed tackles on 197 carries.
A Letter From Kenneth Dixon to LA Tech Fans
As his team approached the final game of his senior year at Louisiana Tech, Kenneth Dixon wrote a letter to their fans imploring them to show up in big numbers to the Superdome. He wanted to record the 31st win for his senior class before heading off to the NFL.
They did. Dixon’s stat line?
| Rushing | Receiving | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rk | Date | School | Opponent | Att | Yds | Avg | TD | Rec | Yds | Avg | TD | ||
| 11 | 2015-12-19 | Louisiana Tech | N | Arkansas State | W | 21 | 102 | 4.9 | 2 | 6 | 113 | 18.8 | 2 |
| 11 Games | 198 | 1073 | 5.4 | 19 | 33 | 464 | 14.1 | 7 | |||||
Preeeetty, preeetty good.
Kenneth Dixon to Baltimore: Is He a Buy-Low Fantasy Football Candidate?
In four consecutive years, the Ravens have picked a running back in the fourth round. This is the year that running back holds the most promise. Tyler Buecher of numberFire explains Kenneth Dixon’s value to the Ravens. On 94 fewer carries, Dixon forced the same number of missed tackles as Ezekiel Elliott. Ravens player can be tough to grab in fantasy locally; football fans tend to value their own more than the rest of the league, so be cautious. But in a crowded but unspectacular backfield, he could be the one who sticks out and grabs the biggest role.
Top NFL prospects by position outside of the Power-5
Most draft prospects come from the Power-5 conferences, but some stars are born from those from less distinguished campuses. Zoltán Buday of Pro Football Focus lists the best players at each position at those schools. Four out of the 20 players he lists ended up on the Ravens. How’s that for finding diamonds in the rough! Those players are Kenneth Dixon, Kamalei Correa, Bronson Kaufusi, and Tavon Young.
Here Are The ‘Madden’ Ratings For 2016 Top NFL Draft Picks
The Madden rankings have become a more talked about topic during the late offseason than the game itself. Harry Lyles Jr. of The Comeback gives the initial rankings for all the first-round rookies. They base it off where they were selected in the draft. Ronnie Stanley gets a current rating of 83 with a “Future Elite” rating of 94.
A Draft Sobriety Test
Now that I’ve got you all drunk off the draft with the first five links, it’s time to sober up. Peter King’s mailbag will be our glass of water and our good night’s sleep. He looks at all of the players who were NOT awarded their fifth year option this year and the player picked at the corresponding spot in the 2016 draft. As a side note, I’m pretty happy the Ravens picked 32nd in the draft receiving its options this year, 2013. What an awful, awful crop of prospects.
It’s Hard To Tell How Good Teams Are At The Draft
After the draft, we always say we won’t actually know how the draft has turned out until we see the prospects on the field. But will we really know then, either? Rob Arthur and Zach Binney FiveThirtyEight look at the connection between how early teams draft a player and how well that player’s career pans out. As FiveThirtyEight showed in an article I posted in links on Monday, the league does a better job than any individual team over time, but for certain positions, it’s difficult to measure. Sorry if this one makes your draft sobriety even worse.
