I had to read this twice because I couldn’t believe it. If this doesn’t scream BB can’t draft I don’t know what does.
If the two sides could work out an extension, the 2020 second-rounder out of Lenoir-Rhyne would be the first draft pick to get a second contract in Foxboro since 2019 fifth-round punter Jake Bailey. He'd be the first top-three-round choice to re-up with the Patriots since 2013 third-rounder Duron Harmon.
https://www.nbcsportsboston.com/nfl/new-england-patriots/patriots-prioritize-kyle-dugger-contract-extension-all-in/563059/
not sure that tells us all that much and certainly doesn’t “scream” anything
the first point, about being the first to re-sign since Bailey is obvious and worthless. Dugger was drafted in 2020 and Bailey in 2019. The 2020 class is just coming due now. There would be literally no drafted players between Bailey and Dugger who could have re-upped to this point
the second point sounds damning but first let’s acknowledge that the majority of 2nd and 3rd rounders do not stay beyond their original contract. It’s under 40% for 2nd rounders league wide and less for 3rd rounders. Now let’s look at those olayers
Easley - dud/injury bust
Jimmy G - traded, retaining didnt make sense
Malcom Brown - solid starter on Super Bowl winning defenses
Richards - awful
Grissom - injuries and bad
Cyrus Jones - bad
Thuney - great, should have been retained
Brissett - good value in the 3rd, traded, retaining didn’t make sense
Rivers - injury bust although still in the league
Garcia - medical, never able to play
Wynn - not worth retaining
Michel - traded not worth retaining
Dawson - awful traded
Harry - awful
Williams - awful
Winovich - traded in a good deal for a current contribution (Wilson)
Cajuste - injured and useless
Harris - good probably should have been retained
2014-2019 their lack of success in the 1st round specifically is the problem. Wynn, Michel and Brown all contributed to a Super Bowl winner in key roles so it’s hard for me to call them total flops but certainly they needed one or two long term pieces in that group.
The misses in the 1st round is the big difference between the 2014-2019 drafts and earlier drafts where almost every other year they were getting a long term player (although most of those guys were drafted higher in the round). Luckily Gonzalez seems like he might break that trend
now, do the same exercise for a “good” drafting team like Philadelphia 2014-2019.
Marcus Smith - bad, not retained
Jordan Matthews - bad, not retained
Josh Huff - dud
Nelson Agoholor - not retained
Eric Rowe - not retained
Jordan Hicks - not retained
Carson Wentz - traded
Isaac Seumalo - retained good player
Derek Barnett - retained but not great for a 1st
Sidney Jones - not retained
Rasul Douglas - re-signed then cut same year
Dallas Goedert - retained good player
Andre Dillard - cut
Miles Sanders - not retained
JJ Arcega Whiteside - cut
in that same stretch, the Eagles - a “good” drafting team had a pretty similar looking group of hits, the difference is they kept Goedert, Barnett and Seumalo and the Pats didn’t keep their equivalents (Thuney, M.Brown and Garoppolo).The heralded Howie Roseman also whiffed on almost all his top 2 round picks and failed to get a single long time starter out of those picks. And then in 2020 took Jaelen Reagor over Justin Jefferson before hitting on Hurts.
My point isn’t that Roseman is overrated or BB has had great draft success, simply that “not re-signing” round 1-3 round picks, especially outside of the top 15 guys taken, isn’t a common occurrence.
not going to go through each one, but the Ravens are probably the best in that period, keeping Andrews, Humphrey, Jackson. So they landed 3 cornerstone pieces in a 6 year period which feels like it should be the expected hit rate. They drafted 21 guys rounds 1-3 in that period, with a few hits they didn’t keep (Mosley, Orlando Brown, maybe Hollywood Brown depending on if you view him as a hit)
KC has kept Mahomes, Chris Jones and Derrick Nnadi (3 out of 17)
So Baltimore and KC nailed their QB picks, Philly did not.The Pats didn’t retain their best picks (Jimmy G, Thuney, Brown) and were a bit worse than the Ravens and Chiefs in rounds 1-3 but I don’t know that it’s a good argument that BB is significantly worse than other teams at drafting. They certainly had plenty of awful picks in round 1, nobody can deny that but the overall “big hit” rate in the late 1st round is low enough where it’s hard to separate small sample variance from “BB can’t draft”. Cherry pick a different set of data and include Uche, Dugger and Gonzalez and all of a sudden the early round “hits” look better.
Interestingly, the Pats have more guys still in the league drafted (regardless of round) in that period than the other 3 teams mentioned. Not really relevant to this discussion but found it noteworthy. They’ve re-upped Wise, Mason, Bentley, E.Roberts, Bailey, J.White and Cardona in that period for what it’s worth.
I think it’s fair to say the Pats haven’t gotten as much out of their drafts as they should have. But the overall number of guys they’re hitting on isn’t really the issue to me as much as the lack of 1st round guys who are long term players. That said retaining players isn’t the best sign of whether or not a pick is “good”. Trey Flowers was a great 4th round pick, Nate Solder was a good 1st rounder, Karras was excellent for a 6th etc and sometimes retaining those guys doesn’t make sense or isn’t possible.