Which player in the draft scares you ?

[Lewis_Chiefs]

Which mid - late 1st / early 2nd round prospect would you hate for us to take at 23 ?

I'm personally petrified that we'll go for Kelvin Benjamin if OBJ, Cooks & Lee are all gone by the time we pick. He is far too inconsistent, one spectacular catch will be followed up by 2 bad drops. We don't need another Jon Baldwin. If the 3 receivers mentioned are gone and Reid & Dorsey still want to go WR I'd much rather see us go for someone like Cody Latimer rather than Benjamin.

[spiman]

I just cross my fingers. The so called experts whiff all the time. The Chiefs in my mind do not draft all that great. They suck at free agency too. Spend the money b!@#$s .

[Seek]

I have a real problem with this strategy. First of all, how do you even determine who the Best Player Available is? Do you add up the cumulative rankings of 20 "expert" NFL analysts to come up with a score for each player? Is there a formula for adding combine 40 yd dash, bench press, standing broad jump, etc + Wonderlick test score to determine an overall score? And how do you rank players that didn't attend the combine? How do you rank players at very different positions? Does one sack = X catches, or is 100 yds rushing equal to X number of tackles? Is there a conversion chart online somewhere?

I doubt that you could get Phil Emery, John Dorsey and Scott Pioli to agree on who is the 23 best player in the draft, let alone get a consensus from all 32 GMs on who is the BPA for every pick in the draft. So the BPA is a myth to begin with. It is whoever any given GM thinks it is when it is his turn to pick. But let's assume, for the sake of argument, that you can assign a rank for all 274 (not including supplemental picks) players in the draft.

The Bears had the 2nd best offense and the 2nd worst defense in the NFL last year. Suppose every time it is their turn to pick, the BPA is an offensive player. Should the Bears take an offensive player with every pick and ignore the glaring needs on their horrid defense knowing that none of those picks are likely to start? Ignoring the needs on their aging defense is what got them into this position in the first place. Or let's take it to another extreme. Suppose, because the other 31 teams keep passing on them, every time it is the Chiefs turn to pick, the BPA is a QB. Would you seriously be happy going into training camp with 9 QBs on the roster having done nothing to improve the defense, O-line or WR positions?

If a player falls and he is clearly much better than any other player on the board then it makes sense to take him. But if the Chiefs are on the clock with the 23rd pick and the two best players are a QB you had ranked at 17 and a FS you had ranked at 19 you have to take the FS because he makes the team better. The FS would be likely to start from day one and the QB would only be a back-up.

What you are looking for with each draft pick is value. The BPA may have the most value to the team but the 3rd or 4th best may make a bigger impact on improving the team than the BPA in many cases. You don't want to "reach" on a player just because you are desperate to fill a position of need. That can be disastrous. But by the same token, you don't want to always take the BPA if that player does nothing to make your team better. That would be equally disastrous.

In the end it is Dorsey's call. If all three coaches value one player over the other, it is his choice, but I would think Dorsey is working closely enough with Andy to please his needs.

Dorsey has more than once said, he drafts the best player and that is the only way he knows how. I am sure they have mulitple Mock situations and I do think he would take the best player available, but only after looking at their biggest needs and depending on that need and availabiliy will try to trade up or back. If that fails, he will take the BPA at that spot. Now if you are looking at Mocked Players #21, 23, 25, still on the board 26 still on with #25 being a position of need, I think he evaluate the value from 21 VS 25 to see if there value warrants picking 21 ver 25. But if #15 on their Mock is still sitting there and is not a need he will be looking for a suitor to trade with and if nothing is there. He will take him.

Dorsey has average talent at every postion. There is no one specific Glaring need over another that we coudn't take the best player. Some don't make much sense for the immediate season, but could make a difference next year.

[TopekaRoy]

... I do think he would take the best player available, but only after looking at their biggest needs and depending on that need and availabiliy will try to trade up or back. If that fails, he will take the BPA at that spot. ...

Okay, so you wouldn't always just take the BPA. Sometimes it makes sense to trade back and get an extra pick. But doing that also carries some risks.

Suppose the Chiefs are on the clock with the 23rd pick and #15, a QB, is still available. Dorsey knows the team picking at 29 would give up a 2nd round pick (#61 overall) to get that player and Dorsey is targeting a WR who is projected to be an early 2nd round pick, so he trades back. Now the team picking at 27 takes the WR that he wanted. now you have lost out on the 15th best player in the draft AND the WR you wanted. The BPA at a position of need at this point is a free safety, but he is not expected to go until the middle of the 2nd round. Do you trade back again and risk missing out on another player you want, or do you take the FS which would essentially give you 48th pick value (+1 extra pick) for what was originally a 23rd?

I think the Chiefs need to make sure that their first and 3rd round picks can start right away. in the later rounds you can take the BPA because those players aren't likely to start anyway.

Dorsey has average talent at every postion. There is no one specific Glaring need over another that we coudn't take the best player. Some don't make much sense for the immediate season, but could make a difference next year.

I guess it depends on your definition of "glaring need," but in general I agree with you here. I see it more as that he has enough needs that he can pick from several different positions and still improve the team. WR, FS and o-line are pretty big needs, but LB, DE and even TE would also be useful picks. I'm just hoping we can get 3 starters out of this draft.

[Seek]

In that situation, assuming he couldn't work out a trade and the QB is really 15 on his list. You take the QB, and Cut bait with either Daniels or Bray, and see what happens with contract talks with Smith as a plan B. Worste case scenerio is that QB ends up being a starter, and either replaces Smith or we trade him two or three years later to a team who really needs a proven QB and get a first from them, which is what Andy Reid has historically done with QB's.