Are Mock Drafts Really Accurate? Part II: Data and Analysis

PART II: DATA AND ANALYSIS

When considering the question of whether mock drafts are an accurate prediction of the the way the NFL draft will play out, one must keep in mind that accuracy is the key. There are many factors to take into consideration when determining which player will be drafted by which team and when. One player's talent may project him over another player, but there are other factors, such as: injuries, NFL teams' needs, combine and pro day performances, college resume, and interview results. This can be so confusing that mock draft designers' prediction accuracy may suffer. Also, not every mocker has access to all of this information, which places sports writers at a considerable advantage.

The purpose of this study is to determine whether the experts are truly more accurate than the novice mockers and to discover exactly how accurate these mock drafts are in predicting the results of the draft. To save time and space, I am going to post links to each website and analyze sections of data.

I will be fair with draft analysts in my measure of their accuracy. Since there are hundreds of players drafted every year and each team determines what their needs are in the draft (not the writers and analysts), I will grant a three-position margin of error. What that means is that I will accept a prediction of a player's position in the draft within three picks of his actual draft position. It is true (as I stated above) that teams determine their own needs, but mock draft designers should be taking every possible scenario (within reason) into consideration when constructing their mock drafts.

I will grade predictions based upon first round results for all five candidates, and I will grade three candidate who chose to be more adventurous in creating a three round mock draft. I will examine the predictions of only last year's draft with the exception that I will test Mel Kiper's mocking accuracy over the last three years. The point assignment for each position prediction per the results will break down as follows:

4 pts = accurate prediction
3 pts = within 1 position
2 pts = within 2 positions
1 pt = within 3 positions

Considering that there are 32 teams (32 draft positions per round), there are 128 points possible for every round. Since teams trade out of positions, I will award half credit to those who pick the team's correct draft choice even though it is out of position in the order unless the original point value is higher. Unfortunately, since predicting a team's desire to trade up or down in the draft is almost impossible, mockers cannot be held too accountable.

The Round Accuracy Rating (RAR) is computing simply by dividing the mocker's amount of points accumulated by the total number of points available per round.

FIRST ROUND MOCK DRAFTS

Mel Kiper, Jr.

To begin with the "expert," Mel Kiper, Jr's mock draft on ESPN.com is considered the most reputable of all mock drafts. Mel's extensive experience with college football and the NFL draft has made him the premier draft analyst in football. Mel's last mock draft of 2006 posted a first round RAR of 29.69%. He scored a 38 points out of the possible 128.

DraftKing

Next, we come to DraftKing. The final mock draft of 2006 for DraftKing posted a RAR of 36.72%. The score was 47 points out of 128. This score was the second best of the five first round mock drafts rated.

NFL Draft Countdown

NFL Draft Countdown posted the best score of the five mocks. More accurate middle round projections boosted this site's score to 51 out of 128 for a RAR of 39.84%.

Football's Future

The site that tied with Mel Kiper in predicting the draft results is Football's Future. Along with Kiper, this site posted the second lowest score at 38 points with a RAR of 29.69%.

Sports Nutz

Sports Nutz posted the lowest score of the mocks at 37 of 128 for a RAR of 28.9%. Although this site is not backed by as reputable analysts as those from ESPN, they were only one point behind the great Mel Kiper, Jr.

THREE-ROUND MOCK DRAFTS

Mel Kiper, Jr.

For the 2006 NFL Draft, Mel Kiper constructed a four-round mock draft. For the purpose of this study, I am going to examine the results of only three rounds. As noted above, Kiper posted an RAR of 29.69% for the first round. In the second round, Kiper scored 12 of 128 possible points (9.38% RAR), and in the third round he scored 3 of a possible 132 (2.27% RAR). The third round included a compensatory pick allotted to the New York Jets at 97th overall.

NFL Draft Countdown

Draft Countdown, in the second round, scored 10 points of 128 (7.81% RAR), and in the third round, the site scored 6 of 132 points (4.54% RAR). Draft Countdown scored lower than Kiper in the second round but beat him out in the third round.

Football's Future

The final three-round mock draft to examine is Football's Future. In the second round, FF scored 5 of 128 points (3.9% RAR), and in the third round, they scored 9 of 132 points (6.82% RAR). FF had the best results in the third round but fell short with the worst second round.


Now that the results are in, I will use the third part of this examination to comment on similarities, differences, tendencies, etc. Stay tuned...