How teams are built, revisited
Posted by Doug on April 27, 2009
About a year and a half ago, I posted this batch of data on how teams are built. In it, I looked at where teams' 22 starters come from. But that's sub-optimal, because some starters are more important than others and also because backups have value too.
That post was written in the pre-AV era here at p-f-r. This weekend's draft inspired me to revisit it using the entire roster (weighted by AV) instead of just the starters.
I've broken things down by decade and by team quality (bad = 6 or fewer wins, mediocre = 7--9 wins, good = 10+ wins). The numbers in each category represent the aggregate percentage of the teams' AV that came from that category:
1980 -- 1989, bad teams ============================== First round picks 23.6 Second round picks 14.9 Third/fourth round picks 19.3 Fifth round and later 28.7 Undrafted 13.5 Drafted by team 80.5 Acquired via other means 19.5 Age 24 and younger 28.9 Age 25 to 27 37.8 Age 28 to 30 26.2 Age 31 and older 7.2
1980 -- 1989, mediocre teams ============================== First round picks 25.2 Second round picks 14.7 Third/fourth round picks 18.3 Fifth round and later 28.5 Undrafted 13.3 Drafted by team 82.1 Acquired via other means 17.9 Age 24 and younger 25.4 Age 25 to 27 37.1 Age 28 to 30 28.4 Age 31 and older 9.1 1980 -- 1989, good teams ============================== First round picks 24.7 Second round picks 17.1 Third/fourth round picks 18.2 Fifth round and later 27.5 Undrafted 12.5 Drafted by team 82.7 Acquired via other means 17.3 Age 24 and younger 21.9 Age 25 to 27 37.5 Age 28 to 30 30.2 Age 31 and older 10.4 1990 -- 1999, bad teams ============================== First round picks 25.4 Second round picks 16.3 Third/fourth round picks 20.1 Fifth round and later 25.3 Undrafted 13.0 Drafted by team 69.5 Acquired via other means 30.5 Age 24 and younger 25.2 Age 25 to 27 35.4 Age 28 to 30 30.3 Age 31 and older 9.1 1990 -- 1999, mediocre teams ============================== First round picks 25.9 Second round picks 16.4 Third/fourth round picks 18.7 Fifth round and later 25.4 Undrafted 13.6 Drafted by team 68.8 Acquired via other means 31.2 Age 24 and younger 19.9 Age 25 to 27 34.8 Age 28 to 30 32.5 Age 31 and older 12.8 1990 -- 1999, good teams ============================== First round picks 26.6 Second round picks 16.8 Third/fourth round picks 19.0 Fifth round and later 25.0 Undrafted 12.7 Drafted by team 72.9 Acquired via other means 27.1 Age 24 and younger 17.6 Age 25 to 27 35.0 Age 28 to 30 32.8 Age 31 and older 14.6 2000 -- 2007, bad teams ============================== First round picks 24.6 Second round picks 18.0 Third/fourth round picks 22.3 Fifth round and later 18.8 Undrafted 16.2 Drafted by team 68.5 Acquired via other means 31.5 Age 24 and younger 23.4 Age 25 to 27 34.5 Age 28 to 30 30.3 Age 31 and older 11.8 2000 -- 2007, mediocre teams ============================== First round picks 28.0 Second round picks 18.4 Third/fourth round picks 21.1 Fifth round and later 17.8 Undrafted 14.7 Drafted by team 68.8 Acquired via other means 31.2 Age 24 and younger 22.9 Age 25 to 27 32.1 Age 28 to 30 33.2 Age 31 and older 11.8 2000 -- 2007, good teams ============================== First round picks 29.2 Second round picks 16.8 Third/fourth round picks 21.9 Fifth round and later 17.6 Undrafted 14.5 Drafted by team 72.4 Acquired via other means 27.6 Age 24 and younger 20.4 Age 25 to 27 35.1 Age 28 to 30 32.8 Age 31 and older 11.6
April 27th, 2009 at 8:28 am
It looks like bad teams are slightly more willing to play kids, but if you look at the total AV per team, instead of percentages, are they really just getting less from the old guys?
April 27th, 2009 at 12:50 pm
Very good analysis, Doug. It would be interesting to include also 2008, since many drafted players don't appear as drafted yet in the site.
April 27th, 2009 at 4:07 pm
They used to have alot more draft rounds, so free agents today may have been 9th round picks in 1985. I find it interesting that the percentage of production coming from guys drafted 5th round and beyond + undrafted is decreasing over time. Within each time period, the good teams had less production coming from later rounds than bad teams. But the good teams in the 80's got 40% of their value from late round guys, while the bad teams today are getting 35% and the good teams 32.1%.
Are teams getting a little better at drafting the guys with potential by round 4? Relatively speaking, are there fewer Richard Dents than there used to be?
April 27th, 2009 at 4:14 pm
Interesting post, Doug.
One thing that jumped out immediately is the good teams in the post-1990 era get more contribution from their own drafted players, and in particular their first round picks (though this latter trend is present in all 3 periods).
Another trend-in the 1980's and 1990's, good teams had more contributions from veteran (31+) players than mediocre teams, which had more contributions from veterans than bad teams. In the 2000's, though, it's flat among all three types.
April 27th, 2009 at 8:59 pm
So better teams are using more first round picks, more guys in their prime, more veterans, and they hold on to their draft picks better. Makes sense...
It'd be interesting to see if this sort of information helps predict record in year+1... Using year N record or Pythagorean record , then see if any of this has any significant impact on predicting future success/failure.
May 1st, 2009 at 4:00 pm
JKL,
There are fewer rounds now, but there are more teams. That also means that more players go in the first three rounds than did 30 years ago.
Of course, we still see the occasional Tom Brady or James Harrison.
May 14th, 2009 at 3:54 pm
To me, the important thing appears to be that winning teams keep the guys they draft and losing teams look more for outside help. The other stuff, like the ages and the pick stats don't look statistically significant to me.