Just CHILL: Draft strategy/trade remains puzzling even to Cowboys' scouts

boozeman

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Just CHILL: Draft strategy/trade remains puzzling even to Cowboys' scouts



Mymug
Clarence Hill

Almost a week later, the decisions the Cowboys made in the first round of the NFL Draft remains puzzling, even troubling, to those inside and outside the Cowboys organization.

It still is a sore subject among scouts, according to a source.

Call them mess ups 1 and 1A.

The decision to bypass Florida defensive tackle Shariff Floyd, who was ranked as a top-10 pick on the Cowboys draft board was first.

“We are not disappointed in what we drafted at 31, more disappointed in who we passed up at 18," the source said.

It has been well chronicled that owner Jerry Jones made the call to pass on Floyd and trade down in the draft, because Floyd wasn't deemed a good fit for the "under" tackle in the 4-3 defense by the coaches.

Jones was focused on addressing the offensive line or safety in the first round, according to a source. The main targets for those positions -- offensive guards Chance Warmack and Jonathan Cooper and Texas safety Kenny Vaccaro _ were gone before the 18th pick.

They didn't expect Floyd to be there, so there was a long discussion on Floyd. Jones sided with the coaches.

"Jerry wanted to address the offensive line or safety in the first round; no other options were viable," the source said. "When it was said that [Floyd] was not a fit, that's all he needed to hear."

Jones made the call to make a trade to move down in the draft, where the Cowboys were targeting Syracuse guard Justin Pugh with the 31st pick they got from the 49ers.

They assumed/hoped he would be there, but the Giants drafted him 19th.

The Cowboys then took Wisconsin center Travis Frederick, who they deemed to be the last offensive lineman worthy of the pick and capable of helping them this year. Never mind that other teams had Frederick as a second-round pick and some as low as a third-round pick. He was a high second-round pick on the Cowboys board.

Don't misunderstand. People in the Cowboys organization aren't troubled by the pick, just the process and decision to pass on a top-10 player.

"Frederick will be a quality player," a source said. "He has Nick Mangold qualities to him in terms of strength and intelligence. His upper body is strong. He will fight in the hole. The Cowboys got better with Frederick."

Again, it's not the pick that has everyone puzzled; it was the process.

The same goes with the trade with the 49ers. No matter how much owner Jerry Jones and Stephen Jones say they got good value, everyone knows they got snookered -- even those in the organization.

The Cowboys traded the 18th pick for the 31st pick and a third-round pick, 74th overall. Most trade charts indicated the Cowboys should have received a second- and third-round pick from the 49ers in the swap of first rounders -- based on value and how many picks the loaded 49ers had to deal.

Making matters worse is the Cowboys had gone over all scenarios before the draft, including a trade back with the 49ers for the 31st pick. The in-house mock trade had them picking up a second- and a third-round pick in addition to swapping first round picks. Neither Jones nor executive vice president of player personnel Stephen Jones was in the room during the pre-draft scenario.

"You've got to get more than that third-round pick," the source said. "It makes no sense. It is still a sore subject. The scenario had been talked about. A second and third had been talked about. When we did it, Stephen and Jerry weren't in there. It's a learning experience. The decision-makers make the decisions, and we live with it."

-- Clarence Hill
 

Genghis Khan

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It's a shame when the underlings know way more than the decision makers.

And this is pretty much what I was saying leading up to the draft - that we would be so fixated on addressing needs that we would bypass clearly better players. It's not a good way to draft. I just thank Christ that we traded down and got something rather than reach for Frederick (or worse, Pugh or Long) at 18.
 

L.T. Fan

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I would be interested to know who the "source" is. It may be true but it is awfully easy to write about speculation and have a source that was overheard down at the local bar.
 

Smitty

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"Jerry wanted to address the offensive line or safety in the first round; no other options were viable," the source said. "When it was said that [Floyd] was not a fit, that's all he needed to hear."
:budd
 

Cujo

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"You've got to get more than that third-round pick," the source said. "It makes no sense. It is still a sore subject. The scenario had been talked about. A second and third had been talked about. When we did it, Stephen and Jerry weren't in there. It's a learning experience. The decision-makers make the decisions, and we live with it."

That just about says it all right there. If he's calling all the shots, as the GM, why wouldn't he want to be briefed on any contingencies? Pathetic.
 

Simpleton

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I agree on all accounts, I was disappointed that we passed up Floyd, I thought we should've gotten more in the trade down but I was pleased with the Frederick pick at 31.

It's interesting though that the coaches, presumably Marinelli and Kiffin, didn't think Floyd was a fit, assuming this "source" is correct. If so, we might just have to live with that, those guys know what kind of DL they need for this scheme better than just about anybody in the world.
 

Plan9Misfit

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I agree on all accounts, I was disappointed that we passed up Floyd, I thought we should've gotten more in the trade down but I was pleased with the Frederick pick at 31.

It's interesting though that the coaches, presumably Marinelli and Kiffin, didn't think Floyd was a fit, assuming this "source" is correct. If so, we might just have to live with that, those guys know what kind of DL they need for this scheme better than just about anybody in the world.
But Jerry should be smart enough to understand that a 3rd round pick is bullshit compensation for moving back 13 spots in the 1st round. The trouble is that he isn't smart enough to understand that and ran a panic trade because he pissed down his leg (again) when the players he really wanted were gone and didn't have a contingency plan in place if that scenario happened. He literally placed himself at the mercy of the team looking to trade up and fucked himself. All in the name of "value".
 

Simpleton

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But Jerry should be smart enough to understand that a 3rd round pick is bullshit compensation for moving back 13 spots in the 1st round. The trouble is that he isn't smart enough to understand that and ran a panic trade because he pissed down his leg (again) when the players he really wanted were gone and didn't have a contingency plan in place if that scenario happened. He literally placed himself at the mercy of the team looking to trade up and fucked himself. All in the name of "value".
I agree, I was just saying we have to live with that RELATIVE to passing up Floyd if Marinelli/Kiffin didn't think he fit, we should've gotten more out of the trade down either way.

As an aside, I think I might start trying to use "relative" in every one of my posts.
 

Simpleton

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Here's a question out of curiosity, would people rather have Frederick+Terrance Williams or Vaccaro?

Seems like Vaccaro definitely would've been the pick if he was there at 18, which most of us expected anyway.
 

Cujo

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Here's a question out of curiosity, would people rather have Frederick+Terrance Williams or Vaccaro?

Seems like Vaccaro definitely would've been the pick if he was there at 18, which most of us expected anyway.


Nope. O-line, IMHO, was more important. Just don't agree with how it went down.
 

Hawkeye19

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Here's a question out of curiosity, would people rather have Frederick+Terrance Williams or Vaccaro?

Seems like Vaccaro definitely would've been the pick if he was there at 18, which most of us expected anyway.
No question for me... Frederick and Williams >>> Vaccaro. We should have gotten more value on the trade-- but considering we got screwed, we did pretty well in terms of who we drafted. We reached for mid second rounder, but then had a late-first/early second rounder fall right in our laps in the 3rd.

Doesn't excuse JJ's incompetence or the systemic dysfunction of the FO-- but from a sheer talent and need standpoint-- we got two really good players.
 

VA Cowboy

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"You've got to get more than that third-round pick," the source said. "It makes no sense. It is still a sore subject. The scenario had been talked about. A second and third had been talked about. When we did it, Stephen and Jerry weren't in there. It's a learning experience. The decision-makers make the decisions, and we live with it."
You mean the pretend GM isn't involved in the entire process? Shocking.

Everyone except Jerry and Stephen knew moving down from 18 to 31 in the first should cost more than a 3rd, especially with the 49ers being overloaded with picks. Amazing how a supposed hotshot businessman like Jerry continually gets taken in deals.
 
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VA Cowboy

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Here's a question out of curiosity, would people rather have Frederick+Terrance Williams or Vaccaro?

Seems like Vaccaro definitely would've been the pick if he was there at 18, which most of us expected anyway.
Quite possible if we sat at 18 we could've had all three. Frederick at 47 and Terrance at 80.
 

Plan9Misfit

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Quite possible if we sat at 18 we could've had all three. Frederick at 47 and Terrance at 80.
That's irrelevant because Vaccaro was selected 15th overall. He wasn't there when we were up at 18.
 

GShock

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Making matters worse is the Cowboys had gone over all scenarios before the draft, including a trade back with the 49ers for the 31st pick. The in-house mock trade had them picking up a second- and a third-round pick in addition to swapping first round picks. Neither Jones nor executive vice president of player personnel Stephen Jones was in the room during the pre-draft scenario.
:doh What the hell good is it to have a draft plan and strategy, if the decision makers aren't aware of it?

This was all Jerry's gut. He simply did not want Floyd, and was willing to take less than fair value to avoid picking him. He knew Floyd was top 10 on the scouts' board, and knew he was not getting good trade-down value and elected to do it anyway.

Interesting, though not surprising, that the scouts are leaking this. I'm sure they recognize that a failed season means pink slips all around, and they want to make sure that their resume does not include a misevaluation of Floyd, Frederick, or draft pick trade value.
 

Cowboysrock55

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But Jerry should be smart enough to understand that a 3rd round pick is bullshit compensation for moving back 13 spots in the 1st round. He literally placed himself at the mercy of the team looking to trade up and fucked himself. All in the name of "value".
The problem is if your board looks like this Floyd, Pugh, Frederick and you decide that Floyd doesn't fit your defense what do you do at 18? You can either stay put and take Pugh or you can move down and get Frederick and Terrance Williams. Should we have gotten more in the trade down? Of course. That doesn't necessarily mean the trade down was bad. In my scenario the trade down was absolutely the correct move even if you were getting less value then the trade chart says. My real problem has to do with the Cowboys draft board which seems to be so small that it forces us to absolutely trade down too often. When you don't rate guys like Sylvester Williams, Werner and Matt Elam. Are these guys even on our board? I mean why do we have guys like Escobar as the 23 best prospect or so in the draft? If this is seriously what our draft board looks like then in my opinion we may need to garbage the whole scouting department. Our scouting director is a fossil who was here during the really horrible years. I'm starting to wonder the scouting department isn't a serious problem.
 

dallen

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My problem is, if he is not a fit for the system, then why is he in the top 10 of your draft board? Complete disorganization
 
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