I started what I thought was "deep diving" into the NFL draft in '89 because the Rams had traded my favorite player (#29) and were sitting flush that spring with a windfall of picks. It was the first year I ordered the "Scout's Handbook" from Joel Buschbaum, and I recall clearly opening its magical orange cover and digesting what at that time was one of very few options to attain an inside line on the evaluation of the players.
So enter draft day and I'm feeling that excitement we're all so familiar with, the hope that our team will load up and this will be the draft that starts a dynasty with our young QB Jim Everett at the helm. Rams' picks start rolling in...
Good times. Honestly I should have divested myself of this habit after that, or at the least in the first few years of the early 90s, but a funny thing happened.... After a fantastic playoff run in '89 the draft became my Super Bowl because the Rams were dogshit for the first 9 years of the decade. The fact that they drafted like a fucking dumpster fire was beside the point, because it took a few years to really know for sure. Well, ok, to be fair it didn't take that long given how bad we drafted but you get the idea.
Over the years I've encountered fans who want to agree with every pick the team makes. Fans who find reasons to hate almost every pick. And then the biggest group which is the fans who have their favorites because they saw more of their games and were more familiar with the prospects. Most of us are in that last group tbh. Because the truth is the NFL teams know more about these guys than we do, they get to sit down with not only the player but his coaching staff, teachers/professors, people around the team, etc, as well as nearly unlimited tape of even the small school kids. And they know what they're looking for, what skills they want to prioritize.
So basically the team does know better than we do. But that doesn't mean they're always right and in fact history has shown the draft is a fucking crap shoot. And I'll add this... Fans, for all our bluster and insanity, put more emphasis on the game film because it's all we have. And sometimes the game film is right.
Bottom line here is I have realized the fun part is the journey (you can do this all year) not the actual destination of whether the team has an epic draft. And so, frustrating though it is to have the WR you want (Rison) go off the board to the Colts one pick after your team took a bust DE named Bill Hawkins, even though you might snap your tv controller in half over it and then be cursed to watch him go on to a fine career in another team's colors, I think the key is trying to sit back and enjoy the moment. Or maybe that's my age speaking idk.
