How Conflicted Are You In Winning or Getting a Better Draft Pick

guidomerkinsrules said
isn't the hit rate for drafts about 50% overall?

but yes, more picks = more chances to get lucky
i also wonder if trading out of the 1st and accumulating picks would help with our cap if we didn't have to pay a top 10 1st rd salary (but i don't know how rookie salaries apply to the cap)

I think I've seen that 50% is the hit rate in the first round, around 33% in the 2nd round, 15% in the third round, 8% in the fourth. It gets progressively much lower after that down to like 1% in the 7th. That's part of why I think there is more skill involved in the 1st and 2nd round because the hit percentage is higher. But that could just be that teams have more information about those guys than later round picks.

Trading down would likely help the cap some, but I'm not sure how much and there will likely be a point in the draft's first round where you no longer have guys on the board that are worth a 1st round pick. That is to the extent teams are right about that sort of thing since, of course, some guys drafted after the first or who didn't have 1st round grades end up being better players than guys drafted high in the 1st.

I think that is more or less the strategy Belichick used. He often traded way down even when they had a reasonably high pick and even when they had lower picks. He often traded out of the 1st IIRC. That helped his cap situation but I think mostly because he has so many picks that he had quality talent to replace guys instead of having to give them a big second contract. That's something the Saints seldom have or do. Although they did seem to do it with Lattimore at least near the end of his 2nd contract.