Garbage piece from ESPN analytics writer on why Eagles should not have traded up for Davis

[Procus]

ESPN draft coverage was garbage.  Not learning their lesson from MNF, ESPN decided to feature Booger McFarland front and center as one of its lead analysts.  ESPN also has a writer who focuses on analytics - Seth Walder.  Check out this piece on why he thinks the trade up to get Jordan Davis was bad.  Based on his charts and much less with the actual players involved.  Just lazy writing and reporting - pretty much what we see from ESPN these days.  We seriously need to keep tabs on the players drafted with the picks the Eagles traded - 3 day three picks.

https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/33861237/nfl-draft-2022-ranking-best-draft-trades-why-eagles-not-traded-no-13

NFL draft 2022: Ranking the best in-draft trades and why the Eagles should not have traded up to No. 13

• Seth WalderESPN Analytics

•  

Trading down in the NFL draft remains one of the most obvious and fruitful edges in the game.

Teams routinely seem to rely on the outdated Jimmy Johnson chart to make these trades instead of charts that are actually based on how players perform out of each draft slot in the NFL. While we can quibble about the perfect composition of a draft value chart, virtually every empirically-based draft chart reliant on actual player performance -- including our own -- comes to the same conclusion: teams overpay to move up early in the draft.

NFL general managers with an itch to move up the board are basically Tobias Funke in this Arrested Development scene.

To be fair, it's not that trading up early in the draft never works. But it never works on average. And so those GMs that consistently trade up (or consistently turn down offers for trading down) are hurting their team's chances to win.

Another corollary: Basic strategy in blackjack tells us to stand on 13 against the dealer's 5. It's not that hitting on 13 in that scenario will never work, but it will never help your chances.

Our draft pick value chart is based on Pro-Football-Reference.com's Approximate Value and is similar to work done by others, including Chase Stuart's AV-based chart from 2013.

Today we'll be using that chart to determine the five best pick-for-pick in-draft trades that occurred this year. Note the "pick-for-pick" part, so no A.J. Brown or Marquise Brown deal here, and the "in-draft" part, meaning no Saints-Eagles pre-draft deal (though I will say that was an absolute heist by Howie Roseman). The trades are graded by how much surplus value they created for the winning side.

Here are the top value trades from the 2022 draft:

T-1. Houston Texans-Philadelphia Eagles

The trade: Eagles receive pick No. 13; Texans receive picks Nos. 15, 124, 162, 166
Value winner: Texans (acquired 7.2 chart points, gave up 4.9)
Surplus value: Late second-round pick

Philadelphia paid a steep price to move up two spots and take Jordan Davis at No. 13. It only cost three Day 3 picks, but the difference between what you get at 13 and 15 is tiny, and so the Eagles paid three picks for almost nothing.

In fact, according to our Draft Day Predictor there was a 55% chance before pick No. 13 that Davis would still be available at pick No. 15, so there was about a coin flip's shot they literally traded those three picks for nothing.  (This is bs.  Baltimore was all ready to swoop in on Davis - as the Ravens did when they traded up to snag Haloti Ngata back when)

I'm somewhat sympathetic to the argument that there was a talent drop-off after 14 in this draft -- and you could argue that's a knock against Houston's side of things -- though they also could have traded down again. That theory could also ease the burden of the Eagles' trade up, though I'm skeptical of any player whose primary strength coming in the run game -- like Davis -- being considered in an elite tier of prospects. Regardless, though: this deal was not close -- Houston came out ahead.

[b_west3]

No one will know anything until 2-3 years down the road...up to and including this clown. 

[Guest]

3 hours ago, Procus said:

ESPN

This was your mistake

[Traveler Vic]

You are missing the point! His article was not that they should not have traded up for Davis..it is about the high cost of moving up. Value wise..we gave up a lot for the move..irrelevant whether Davis was the pick or not. He even says so in his article, about talent drop off after 14, being a potential excuse.

We did give up a lot of value. I would have preferred that we traded back if possible, as the best value in the draft was at the bottom of the first and top of the second.

[Procus]

3 minutes ago, Traveler Vic said:

You are missing the point! His article was not that they should not have traded up for Davis..it is about the high cost of moving up. Value wise..we gave up a lot for the move..irrelevant whether Davis was the pick or not. He even says so in his article, about talent drop off after 14, being a potential excuse.

We did give up a lot of value. I would have preferred that we traded back if possible, as the best value in the draft was at the bottom of the first and top of the second.

I disagree.  The article explicitly states we shouldn't have traded up.  Go read where he says we had a "55%" chance of snagging Davis without doing so.  In reality, we had a zero percent chance without doing so.

[Traveler Vic]

16 minutes ago, Procus said:

I disagree.  The article explicitly states we shouldn't have traded up.  Go read where he says we had a "55%" chance of snagging Davis without doing so.  In reality, we had a zero percent chance without doing so.

Again.. I am talking about the value and not the pick. I do not care who the pick was! Davis , or someone also. But the VALUE that we gave up, was high. We overpaid for the 13th pick. We could have had an extra second rounder if we did trade down.

[NOTW]

Davis is a beast, he's going to make little girls out of Giants & Cowboys linemen.

[hputenis]

Here’s why the trade up was worth it.  It’s worth the gamble to snag an elite athlete on the DL. He might be the best athlete for his size we’ve ever seen (ironically maybe Mailata would compare).  If this guy is coached well and figures out how to rush the passer, then game over. 

[olsilverhair]

OP needs to have his vag sewed shut

[Arthur Jackson]

Howie's a nevernude?