This is not a post about Mayhew's ability to draft. I feel like we've had enough debate about his drafting performance lately, so this is just a fun post with random numbers and statistics to see what we might/might not expect to see in May. Since Mayhew took over the General Manager position in 2009, the Lions have had 38 draft picks. That's 7.6 picks a year. This year, the Lions currently have 6 picks, and will likely end up with 7.
Drafting by Year
Year | 2009 | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
# of Picks | 10 | 6 | 5 | 8 | 9 |
The Lions have had 38 draft picks since 2009. That's tied for 22nd in the NFL with the average being at ~39.9 picks per team. The Eagles had the most with 49 picks and the Saints only had 26 picks over the past 5 years.
Drafting by Position
QB | RB/FB | WR | TE | OT | OG/C | DE | DT | LB | CB | S | K/P |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 4 | 5 | 3 | 4 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 7 | 5 | 1 | 1 |
Obviously every year is different. For instance, it made much more sense to draft a punter last year than any other year. Also, since Stafford has been our guy since 2009 and Hill has been a great backup for us, there hasn't really been any reason to draft a QB the past 4 years. But it is interesting to see how many linebackers we have chosen. 7 in the past 5 years seems to be a lot. 2010 was the only year we didn't take one. And after doing a little bit of research, only two teams (Eagles, Patriots) have picked more linebackers (8) than us in the past 5 years. 3 teams are tied with us (Dolphins, Steelers, Vikings) at 7.
Also, the Lions have never drafted a center or kicker under Mayhew. The only guard taken was Larry Warford last year. The only safety taken by Mayhew was Louis Delmas in 2009. Now that he's been released, I think we may see another one taken in 2014. If Hill isn't re-signed, could we possibly see Mayhew taking his 2nd ever QB in the later rounds?
Drafting by Conference
Conference | # of Players Picked |
---|---|
SEC | 6 |
Big 12 | 6 |
Big Ten | 5 |
ACC | 4 |
Ind. | 2 |
MAC | 2 |
MEAC | 2 |
Pac-10 | 2 |
WAC | 2 |
Big East | 1 |
Big Sky | 1 |
MIAA | 1 |
MWC | 1 |
SIAC | 1 |
SoCon | 1 |
Sun Belt | 1 |
This doesn't really tell us a whole lot, but it is interesting that we only picked 6 players from the SEC, and it's not alone in the lead. The SEC has had the most players taken in the NFL draft since 2009 and it's not even close.
Top 5
- SEC 229
- ACC 160
- BIG 10 154
- PAC-10 147
- BIG-12 136
So yeah, it's a little strange to see only 6 players taken from the SEC with 38 picks, especially when 4 of our picks last year were SEC players. No point in sorting by school, because we all know how much Mayhew loves him some Oklahoma.
Anyways, these numbers don't really have any correlation or anything, just felt like putting something together that I found interesting.