Why some teams draft better than others

Once again the footballoutisders.com have uncovered a gem of an article. Seriously, if you care at all about football, you gotta read their site. This time it's by the Washington Post about the Ravens draft strategy. You'll quickly notice that the Ravens and Colts are in a similar league when it comes to draft success. But maybe we now know why. According to the Post, all but six teams in the NFL participate in a common scouting service. Those six teams are New England, Chicago, Baltimore, Indy, Washington and Oakland.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/24/AR2007042402416.html

Right away, you'll notice that these six teams represent 4 elite franchises and 2 bottom feeders. This shouldn't be surprising. Most teams use the same scouts so they get lumped to the middle. The other six either do better than the scouting service or worse. So if we were to grade out the six teams that don't use the common scouting service what would we find? If we use the grades handed out by Cold Hard Football Facts...

http://coldhardfootballfacts.com/Article.php?Page=1424&Category=1

We would find: Indianapolis A+, Baltimore A, New England A-, Oakland D, Chicago got a B-but that grade was actually an D- for the first round (when execs and coaches most flex their muscles) and an A+ for all subsequent rounds, and Washington got a C- with the comment, "They have generally had a good eye for talent, but their strategy just doesn’t seem to be working". That is to say their scouts aren't the problem, their front office is.

This would seem to validate the opinion that having an independent scouting system leads generally to better drafting. The Bears and Skins problem is not talent evaluation, but rather poor front office decisions. Oakland, well they are a mess on all levels.

So remember folks, the losers you hear yapping all weekend are all working off the same play book as MOST NFL teams, but NOT the BEST NFL teams, and that means they don't know crap about what the Colts should do.