After about a dozen years of closely following and understanding the NFL draft, it has become apparent that the nomenclature draft expert is the most absurd job title in all things sports.
Here is a job in which 363 days are spent studying, scrutinizing and speculating on two days of pure chaos and unadulterated randomness. A draft expert is supposed to be a person who comprehends the NFL Draft to the point where this person can predict, to a reasonable degree, the outcome of 32 selections (not counting the other six rounds). Or at least better than the average person.
This is ridiculous. Not only is a draft expert
or draft analyst or draft specialist - whatever euphemism you prefer - wrong more often than right, what they usually get right could have been called by any casual sports fan.
This particular case study is on the most recognizable master of draft sophistry: Mel Kiper Jr. Kiper makes a living off these two days. He's become an institution in his own right. He's the go-to draft guy, hair and all.
But a close examination of Kiper's expertise reveals he doesn't really perform his job better than the local weather man. In fact, he's a lot worse.
This year, Kiper was on the money for all of eight selections. That means he scored a 25 percent on this year's draft. That's well below failing, and even if this were baseball, he's a mediocre utility player at best.
On top of that, seven of his predictions came in the top ten. Any NFL Scout, NFL writer or NFL fan abides by the axiom that the first 10 picks are basically locks, and the rest are where the uncertainty is.
Even with those seven, I'm being generous. He said Mark Sanchez would get drafted by the Browns, not the Jets. I guess draft-day trades are not the province of the draft expert. That means he really got six right in the top 10: Matthew Stafford, Detroit; Jason Smith, St. Louis; Tyson Jackson, Kansas City; Aaron Curry, Seattle; Andre Smith, Cincinnati; B.J. Raji, Green Bay.
Mathew Stafford had already signed with the Lions prior to the draft, so that means the NFL Nostradamus is down to five in the top 10. The pick outside of the top 10 was Malcom Jenkins going to the New Orleans Saints, in case you were wondering.
So of his actual guesses, he got six out of 31 (I won't count Stafford against him). That's good for 19.4 percent.
I'm not trying to say Kiper is bad at his job. Well, maybe I am. But the real point is that anyone would suck at that job. Why does it even exist? Well obviously because the NFL Draft has become a huge phenomenon and can be milked for cash and nothing makes money like a talking head on ESPN.
Most of my friends who watch the NCAA and NFL while sipping on brews could have done as well if not better than Kiper.
If he really knew what he was doing, he still wouldn't have been able to predict Ohio's Mike Mitchell being the second of Raiders owner Al Davis' bizarre choices, but he would have realized that Mitchell was being blown up by media all over the country - including ESPNChicago.com, who actually wrote a feature on Mitchell! Kiper's colleagues at ESPN had heard of Mitchell, but Kiper was shell shocked.
And this brings us to the worst, most arrogant element of the draft expert. When a team does make a pick that doesn't coincide with the expert's opinion, he acts like the team is just plain dumb. They have the audacity to actually grade each team's draft.
Someone should grade Kiper, it would take about two seconds and would most assuredly be an F.
- Joe Ragazzo is a junior studying journalism and a staff writer for The Post. Shoot him an e-mail at jr471106@ohiou.edu or follow him on Twitter at JRagazzo. 2
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Joe Ragazzo
