And rightfully so considering where he was drafted among that group - neck-and-neck with Foles. Those grades must have been very accurate. Nobody knew Wilson would pan out the way he did. It happens. Hard to determine how good they'll be, but apparently a good gauge for how teams rank their boards.
So do these grades actually mean anything? I mean they rated Blaine Gabbert higher than Cam Newton back in 2011.
There's obviously outliers, but for the most part they are a good guide. Also of note, these are pre-combine numbers, they will come out with different numbers after the combine.
I think there was a lot of buzz about Gabbert and a lot of people down on Newton, so yeah, I think their grade, whatever it was - was fair.
They rated Gabbert an 8.5 and Newton an 8.1. Not much of a difference but, hindsight now, Gabbert is closer to a Christian Ponder 6.5 than a Newtown 8.1.
Yeah, how they actually turn out is a completely different story, but how these guys are ranked on draft boards... that's another story. And also how they rank historically. Meaning if Manziel was available back during Newton's draft he would have gone wayyyyyyyyyy later than he will this year.
For a 3rd round pick, I heard more effusive praise of Wilson entering that draft. I'd heard more about him than many of the 1st rounders. There were a handful of people who actually thought that highly of Wilson. They were just afraid to stick their necks out too far, for fear of being wrong on someone with that height. Actually he was similar to Manziel and Bridgewater in that he had a bunch of "true believers" and a bunch of guys who thought he'd have to move to safety or something. Very polarizing. I guess the lesson is that NFL.com "grades" may be vastly different that the actual grades that teams give, and they are all different between individual teams. Probably if you asked two different scouts for the same team on a player, they'd give vastly different grades.
This... But, despite how high Seattle was on Russell, they still said they weren't going to take him before the 3rd round. And they possibly could have drafted Foles if Russell wasn't there.
They're likely worthless as a predictor of actual NFL success. But then again, the draft itself is a horrible predictor or actual NFL success. But they are likely a good preliminary look at how the draft order will look like. With adjustment to QBs of course like with every draft.
Well I expect the ratings to change a bit after the combine, I think they are just being conservative.
Ultimately Wilson was drafted high IMO. Or about where you'd have thought he would be taken considering his size and skillset.
