A comparison of Dave Gettleman's and Jerry Reese's first 3 drafts as GM of the NY football Giants.
For the youngsters here, The Planet Theory (summarized in a nutshell) was that the good Lord only makes a very small percentage of human beings large enough and athletic or agile enough to play in the trenches at the NFL level of football, and if you want to accumulate those big gifted men on your team, you'd better draft them when you can, i.e. in the early rounds.
So what were the top three rounds breakdowns of Gettleman's vs Reese's first three drafts?
(I selected the top 3 rounds because that's roughly the top 100 players in each draft - as the Pros have selected them. It is less than half of each draft class from 7 rounds.)
Each Giants GM exercised 11 picks their first three years.
Reese selected these 11 by position:
8 skills players including
4 WRS
1 move TE
2 CBS
1 S
3 trench players
1 OL
1 DT
1 EDGE or OLB, whatever you call Sintim
FWIW, his lone DT was an undersized third rounder, Jay Alford.
Gettleman's 11 included only 4 skills players, and one of them was DJ, the presumed successor to Eli Manning as a franchise QB.
He drafted 7 trench players:
3 OL
2 DT
2 Edge/OLB
And 4 skills positions:
1 QB
1 RB
1 CB
1 S
It might further be noticed that among his OL two of them are jumbo in the length column (particularly arm length) and the other is thick in girth, and one of his two ER/OLB is extremely long as well (Carter.) Both his DTs were long armed 300+ pounders, and Lawrence, obviously, super sized in every way.
He didn't draft a single WR in top 3 rounds, despite what some would call the obvious need for a #1 WR once he traded away OBJ.
I think there's little doubt that this is a sizeable shift in team building philosophy from Jerry's "Basketball on grass" approach.
I for one applaud the shift. The long term results remain to be seen.
Plax (self-inflicted)
S. Smith
Nicks
Cruz
It seems like they were constantly having to replace these guys
Amen. If they were still here, Gettleman might have had the luxury of addressing skill positions or splurging on high-level defensive picks.
Interestingly, Reese clearly waited far too long to finally invest in that OL causing issues and then wound up missing on his early OL picks and free agent signings causing his ultimate departure. Gettleman has missed on his free agent OL signings and decided to use most of his premium picks elsewhere which resulted in him being desperate for OL in this latest draft...which if they don't hit will cause his ultimate departure.
Both guys
Now, if Gettleman has another draft I would put money on him taking a WR in the first three rounds next year and maybe even top 2 rounds. With that said, pass rusher is a huge need so that may also be a top pick. I do think the trend for Gettleman will be consistent though.
Reese's big failure as a GM was missing so badly on every OL. And I am fairly confident saying every OL. But with all those misses he basically had no OL in the pipeline. Maybe we can say Beatty was a guy in waiting, I can't fully remember. But that was basically it.
As far as the DL goes with Reese, we had such a dominant DL when he was here that he didn't have to spend a bunch of resources but he did draft JPP and went after Vernon so he did try to keep that going.
The overall outlook on Reese can be pointed to positions but when you look at it holistically you see that he missed on way too many players that weren't here long term whether that is just picking bad players or injuries.
More and more skill players are being developed at lower levels of football so I think the smart play is drafting them in later rounds with the occasional "generational" talent the exception.
I left those guys out to focus on the difference in philosophical approach, rather than on the performance of the Giants' scouting department as reflected by the picks themselves. There isn't really enough data on Gettleman's picks yet to fairly judge the selections themselves. Reese's third round (and later rounds too) were hugely disastrous, really terrible. Among the three drafts I picked (2007-2009) Reese and Ross's third round selections were as follows:
07 Jay Alford
08 Mario Manningham
09 Ramses Barden and Travis Beckum
Promising start with Alford and Manningham, but the 3rd rounders start flopping in 09 with both Barden and Beckum, and in later years gets worse and worse with Jerrel Jernigan, Jayron Hosley, Damontre Moore, Jay Bromley, Owa Odigizuwa, Darian Thompson and finally Davis Webb.
8 straight years of complete flops in the third round for Reese/Ross. How TF did those two keep their jobs through those 8 years?
We don't know yet about Hill, Carter, Ximines and Peart, obviously.
The Giants OL was already in big trouble when he drafted them. The writing was on the wall in 2010 and 2011, yet he didn't do anything until 2014. His OL picks were desperation reaches, especially Pugh and Flowers.
And Richburg was a weird pick. The 2014 draft was the best draft in a decade for OTs and OGs, and he picks a C, who wasn't even the consensus best C in the draft... and then the Giants play him at OG his rookie year. WTF!!!
Who made the catch on 3rd and 11 to set up the Plax TD?
Steve Smith, 2007 Round 2, who went on to set a franchise reception record.
Boss and Bradshaw aren't in your analysis, because they are late round picks, but also very big SB contributors.
Nicks and Manningham, who are in the analysis for the 08/09 drafts, were essential to SB 46.
I'm well aware that Gettleman has only drafted one late round receiver in three drafts. In comparison, the rest of the league selected 8 WRs in the the first 34 picks of the 2020 draft alone.
And what is the result?
Giants scored a total of 61 points in their last four losses of 2019.
For the season, Giants scored on 28% of their drives, 30th in the league.
I'm baffled why you would "applaud" before there are any positive results.
I applaud the change in philosophy prior to seeing any positive results in W/L columns for a few reasons:
1) I accept the Planet Theory's validity.
2) The DL is not getting shoved around like they did fielding Bromley and co....
3) At the very least, DG has to this point abandoned the "basketball on grass" approach to offense, it appears.
4) To quote Eli Wallach from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly...
"I like big men."
At least this team should look like Giants, even if they don't eventually play like them.
So I wanted to show how he has handled some things (the draft) in a fundamentally different way than Reese did. We know Reese failed, rather miserably, in his draft selections overall. At least DG is different, fundamentally different.
OC
ER
CB
Impact defender at any level... Perhaps especially at LB/ER.
So I wanted to show how he has handled some things (the draft) in a fundamentally different way than Reese did. We know Reese failed, rather miserably, in his draft selections overall. At least DG is different, fundamentally different.
BlueLou, I alluded to that in my post. I said I would have used Reese's whole tenure to further cement the point and I also said I believe Gettleman trend would continue.
For every guy who is 6-6 there are 140 guys who are 6-0 or taller.
Worst rushing attack in the league, that should have spoken volumes but it didn't register with Reese.
Look, if Gates is just worth his modest new extension, he's a better addition than any OL Reese added as a rookie aside Beatty.
For every guy who is 6-6 there are 140 guys who are 6-0 or taller.
Add 36 in long arms to that 6'6" guy. Now how rare are his dimensions?
Reese was fortunate. Didn’t have to waste a high first rounder on a QB
The only real complaint about Reese -- is that from 2012 to 2018 he couldn't sustain his earlier success --
Over those 3 drafts Reese picked 12 players who were multiyear starters on playoff and/or teams with winning records -- including 6 players who were major contributors to the 2011 championship team -- and another 2 players (Thomas and Beatty) who would have been but were hurt.
You've got to get a little deeper into his tenure to start tearing up his draft approach.
And there's another more difficult analysis to make, that concerns the opportunity cost of drafting so many skills players with high draft picks at the expense of continuing the pipeline of strength in the trenches.
Re the bubble bursting in 2008, I have always felt it had as much or more to do with Fred Robbins' injury and the DL, especially the DTs wearing out than Plax shooting himself. Gettleman (if his team ever gets good enough to even make the playoffs) has stacked a ton of depth along the DL, though we don't see much edge production yet.
Examples like Victor Cruz arriving as a UDFA and Darius Slayton as a fifth round pick seem to indicate that excellent, or at least more than adequate, play at the WR position can be found much later in the draft. When have the Giants put a top OL together from late round picks and UDFA?
That's the crux of my argument and why I think one must draft with Planet Theory in mind.
My argument is because Reese ignored Planet Theory (right from the beginning of his tenure as seen by his first 3 drafts) the decline of the team from 2012 through 2018 was inevitable!
This despite having a true franchise QB through those years.
You should study how teams that achieve sustained success, like the Ravens, draft. They emphasize big men much more than WRs.
Fun fact FWIW:
Reese's 11 picks in the first three rounds of his first three drafts as GM averaged 232# per player. Gettleman's players averaged 268#.
Gettleman has put emphasis on big men drafted highly, it appears.
Say what you will about 2013-2017 as it relates to the Giants, but Reese picked 14 players who were full or part time starters in the NFL last year. That’s a pretty good clip, and points to overall talent, coaching, and organizational failures over that time — not just drafting.
Quote:
The only real complaint about Reese -- is that from 2012 to 2018 he couldn't sustain his earlier success --
My argument is because Reese ignored Planet Theory (right from the beginning of his tenure as seen by his first 3 drafts) the decline of the team from 2012 through 2018 was inevitable!
This despite having a true franchise QB through those years.
You should study how teams that achieve sustained success, like the Ravens, draft. They emphasize big men much more than WRs.
Fun fact FWIW:
Reese's 11 picks in the first three rounds of his first three drafts as GM averaged 232# per player. Gettleman's players averaged 268#.
Gettleman has put emphasis on big men drafted highly, it appears.
Lou - based on your theory - then there would have been no super-bowl wins in 2007 or 2011, and possible run in 2008, and the team should have started sustained success somewhere in the 2012-2018 window --
you know what -- I'll take the wins in 2007 and 2011 rather than a what if in 2012-2018 -- thank you very much