Posts Tagged ‘Draft Blueprint’

The Big Tuna

Please click here (Parcells Draft Blueprints) to view the attachment of the complete study on Parcells’ draft history.

Perhaps one of the most colorful personalities of the modern football era, Bill Parcells has become known as a savior of horrific franchises. When others have failed, he somehow has the Midas touch and sprinkles some of his magic on every organization in which he has been involved.
His first shot as a head coach in the NFL came in 1983, working with the hapless New York Giants. The previous ten years had produced only one winning season. However, Parcells showed his quality chiefly in the draft, where he showed a keen eye for talent. Within three years, his Giants had won the first of their two Superbowls during Parcells reign.
A decade later, Bill left the success in New York to

[take] over a weak New England team, which had gone 2-14 the year before he arrived. There he had quickly begun to work his specialty: the quick rehabilitation of teams embedded near the bottom of the standings.  In 1993, New England went to 5-11, and in 1994, 10-6. (David Halberstam, The Education Of A Coach)

After New England, Parcells took his talents to the New York Jets, helping make them perennial playoff contenders before leaving for his final coaching destination in Dallas.

2006 became the legendary coach’s final season before hanging up his spurs. But he became restless and took the job as Executive for the Miami Dolphins. In only one year, he turned that outfit from the worst in the league (1-15), into AFC East division champs. He still holds that position to this day.

How to Build a Championship Team

About 8 months ago, I was sitting at my work computer thinking “why are the Detroit Lions so incredibly bad?”

This question led me to two more fundamental questions: “how do the great front office executives draft? Do they draft certain positions at certain times, and how frequently do they draft those positions?”

Little did I know that these seemingly simple questions would lead me to create this blog!

So, I identified men who built great teams, both past and present, and came up with this list of eight names:

• Bill Polian, former executive of Buffalo Bills, Carolina Panthers. Current president of Indianapolis Colts.
• Bill Parcells, former head coach of New York Giants, New York Jets, New England Patriots, Dallas Cowboys. Current executive for Miami Dolphins.
• Bill Walsh, former head coach of San Francisco 49ers.
• Bill Belichick, current head coach of New England Patriots
• Ted Thompson, current GM for Green Bay Packers
• A.J. Smith, current GM of San Diego Chargers
• Kevin Colbert, current GM for Pittsburgh Steelers
• Ozzie Newsome, current GM of Baltimore Ravens

I broke down every draft pick by round and player position, and put it onto a series of Excel spreadsheets. I used NFL.com’s draft history section to help with this study.

Today, I have Bill Polian’s draft history, which will begin the Draft Blueprint series.

For those of you who might be unfamiliar with Polian, here is an excerpt from Wikipedia on him:

Bill Polian is the President of the Indianapolis Colts NFL team. He rose to league prominence as the General Manager of the Buffalo Bills, building a team that participated in four straight Super Bowls. Following his stint in Buffalo, Polian went on to become the General Manager of the expansion Carolina Panthers, where his initial success in building what was arguably the most rapidly successful expansion team in NFL history led to his moving on to the Colts. He has won the NFL’s Executive of the Year award 5 times (1988, 1991, 1995, 1996, and 1999).

I hope you enjoy the series!