FanPost

The Dolphins Draft and a New Way to Look at it From an Outsider

Hello all, I come into your humble abode as an active participant in other SB nation blogs, namely CatScratchReader and MTD on the football side. I enjoy looking at the draft and have come here today to ask you your thoughts on your particular teams  needs and the level of needs in each case.

Recently over on CSR, a reader of ours, Tater, came up with a nice way of putting numbers on needs and values of the team and players.  Here is how it works from his own words:

The system provides a point value to the situation of a team at a position from 10 to 1. 10 being the MOST dire and 1 being no worries. It then goes on to provide a point value to a draftable player from 10 to 1, 10 being the best in the draft and 1 being unproven questionable talent.

To compute the DVI of a position, you simply add the two numbers together.

Let me go ahead and show you the metrics...

Draft Value Index (DVI)

Team Situation at position (TS)

10 - No viable or serviceable starter and no legitimate or serviceable future starter
9 - No viable or serviceable starter and serviceable future starter
8 - Serviceable starter with injury/time issues and no legitimate or servicable future starter
7 - Viable starter with injury/time issues and no legitimate or servicable future starter
6 - Serviceable starter with injury/time issues and no legitimate future starter, but servicable future starter exists
5 - Viable starter with injury/time issues and future viable starter exists
4 - Serviceable starter with no legitimate future starter
3 - Serviceable starter with legitimate future starter
2 -  Viable starter with serviceable depth
1 - Viable starter with legitimate depth

Projected Player Quality (PQ)


10 - Once in a generation player, immediate viable starter, future HOF'er
9 - Special talent, proven college track record, immediate viable starter, future Pro Bowler
8 - Above Average talent, proven college track record, immediate viable starter
7 - Special talent, unproven college track record, immediate serviceable starter, future viable starter
6 - Above Average talent, unproven college track record, immediate serviceable starter, future viable starter
5 - Average talent, proven college track record, immediate and future serviceable starter
4 - Average talent, unproven college track record, future serviceable starter
3 - Developmental talent, proven college track record at position, future viable starter
2 - Developmental talent, proven college track record at other position, future viable starter
1 - Developmental talent, unproven college track record, future serviceable starter

A couple of key terms:

Viable starter- Someone you are fully comfortable carrying the load at a position
Serviceable starter - Someone you are comfortable carrying the load until better talent can be acquired

I think you guys get the picture, so from now on I will just list the positions with the greatest need.

WR - 6, OT - 7, G - 4, DT - 9, OLB - 7,

Now to apply these findings a little...

DT is our greatest need. We should draft DT if a player of quality 10-8 exists when we pick, for comparison, Ndamukong Suh has a PQ of 10, we have a TS of 9, that gives Suh a DVI of 19. The reason that we go DT, is that the next greatest need we have is OLB which we should only consider drafting if a player has a DVI of 17 and no DT is higher than 16. If there is a tie, as say the best DT is a 17 and the best linebacker is a 17, the tiebreaker is organization philosophy, which for Carolina is BPA over Need. Therefore, we draft the "Once in a generation linebacker" first over the "Special but unproven talent" at DT.

Also here is the link to the original post: http://www.catscratchreader.com/2011/10/19/2501145/the-draft-value-index-drafting-by-the-numbers

I am interested in hearing your thoughts on the system and how the numbers work out for your team, and also if you have any traded draft picks. This would help me a lot in putting together my mocks and planning for the draft. Thanks all. Look forward to the discussions.

This is a FanPost and does not necessarily reflect the views of The Phinsider's writers or editors. It does reflect the views of this particular fan though, which is as important as the views of The Phinsider writers or editors.