12/11 Update with 2 Mock Drafts: Who the Bills have been scouting

[DCOrange]

 

Original Post: https://www.buffalorumblings.com/2018/11/14/18094913/who-the-buffalo-bills-have-been-scouting-for-the-draft

 

Update: Matt Miller has updated his big board and positional rankings, and so I've gone through and updated everything. You can see it all at the link here: https://www.buffalorumblings.com/201...-4-round-bills

The Bills have seemingly expanded their WR scouting quite a bit since the last update, which is a welcome sight to see.

My post on BR includes updates at each position as well as two separate 4-round mocks of what the Bills might look to do based on who they've scouted so far. Is it realistic to expect them to have personally gone to games for every prospect that they draft? No, but these mocks should give an idea of the types of players I could see them going for based on who has been scouted so far.

Edited December 12, 2018 by DCOrange

[YoloinOhio]

Smokescreen!

 

(too soon?)

[billspro]

Well it looks like DT and CB will be BPA in round 1. There is not much offensive talent right now. I would be happy if the first three picks were CB, RB, TE

[mannc]

2 minutes ago, billspro said:

Well it looks like DT and CB will be BPA in round 1. There is not much offensive talent right now. I would be happy if the first three picks were CB, RB, TE

Will you be happy watching the Bills score 9 points per game again next year?

[billsfan1959]

4 minutes ago, mannc said:

Will you be happy watching the Bills score 9 points per game again next year?

Aren't RB and TE offensive positions?

[Rigotz]

I appreciate the effort on this, but there's zero chance it's correct.

We're scouting O-Line and WR. Beane is not an idiot. He realizes how bad our Offense is and has mentioned it in press conferences.

[mannc]

1 minute ago, billsfan1959 said:

Aren't RB and TE offensive positions?

Yes, but they aren’t positions that should necessarily be addressed with premium picks, and last I checked, CB is not an offensive position.  WR has to be the number 1 draft priority, for obvious reasons, and because it will be a tough position to fix in free agency.

[YoloinOhio]

4 minutes ago, Rigotz said:

I appreciate the effort on this, but there's zero chance it's correct.

We're scouting O-Line and WR. Beane is not an idiot. He realizes how bad our Offense is and has mentioned it in press conferences.

I don’t get why it’s not “correct.” When NFL teams live scout at games, they are scouting all players with NFL potential. Not just players they plan to take in the 1st round. They are scouting all positions. Not just “OL and WR”. That doesn’t even make sense. They may have certain players they are scouting more closely but it’s not like the scouts are sitting at a game where there is a good defensive player and ignoring him because “our offense is bad”. They aren’t taking 10 offensive players in the draft and they aren’t signing all offense as UDFAs.

[DCOrange]

7 minutes ago, Rigotz said:

I appreciate the effort on this, but there's zero chance it's correct.

We're scouting O-Line and WR. Beane is not an idiot. He realizes how bad our Offense is and has mentioned it in press conferences.

 

That's why I clarified specifically in regard to the WR position; there's so many of them this year that just because we haven't scouted a ton of Matt Miller's top 10 WRs doesn't mean we haven't scouted the guys that Buffalo actually thinks are the top 10 WRs.

 

I'm not as convinced regarding O-Line though. Perhaps they simply plan on taking a guy like Jonah or Little early and therefore don't feel the need to scout the others, but they've scouted O-Line pretty sparingly across the board. If there's a takeaway regarding O-Line, I think it would be that they plan on addressing it in free agency or they're already locked in on a couple prospects and don't think they need to scout the rest.

[billsfan1959]

7 minutes ago, mannc said:

Yes, but they aren’t positions that should necessarily be addressed with premium picks, and last I checked, CB is not an offensive position.  WR has to be the number 1 draft priority, for obvious reasons, and because it will be a tough position to fix in free agency.

Depends on whether or not there is a wide receiver that is worth the value of whatever pick they end up with in the first round. They clearly need to add offensive talent to this roster, particularly at Receiver, OL, and a RB to groom behind Shady. However, they do not need to overvalue players, either in the draft or free agency just to fill positions of need. 

Edited November 16, 2018 by billsfan1959

[MrEpsYtown]

I think this is interesting information but it really is hard to quantify things. When we did this last year everyone went Chris Trappaso and went all in on Mason Rudolph because we had scouts at a bunch of OK state games. And low and behold we have no OK state players.n

[billspro]

27 minutes ago, mannc said:

Will you be happy watching the Bills score 9 points per game again next year?

 

Do RBs and TEs not score points? Obviously if the Bills draft like this oline was addressed in free agency.

[Pre1236]

As much as I think the Cowboys overpaid for Amari Cooper, given the lack of wr talent in this draft, maybe that deal wasn't so ridiculous.  What are the chances the Bills draft a wr better than Cooper?

[DCOrange]

1 minute ago, Pre1236 said:

As much as I think the Cowboys overpaid for Amari Cooper, given the lack of wr talent in this draft, maybe that deal wasn't so ridiculous.  What are the chances the Bills draft a wr better than Cooper?

 

I don't know about the Bills, but I think there's a lot of WR prospects in this draft that are on par with how Amari has played in recent years. Amari was a better prospect coming out of Alabama though.

[YoloinOhio]

2 minutes ago, Pre1236 said:

As much as I think the Cowboys overpaid for Amari Cooper, given the lack of wr talent in this draft, maybe that deal wasn't so ridiculous.  What are the chances the Bills draft a wr better than Cooper?

Maybe they didn’t need to take a WR in the 1st. It’s not about which WRs they could take over cooper in the 1st, it’s about the other players they are passing on in the 1st. They need more than just a WR. With the recent history of 1st rd WRs, I would rather take one in the 2nd. 2014 with OBJ  was kind of an anomaly looking at 2015-18.

[Rigotz]

22 minutes ago, YoloinOhio said:

I don’t get why it’s not “correct.” When NFL teams live scout at games, they are scouting all players with NFL potential. Not just players they plan to take in the 1st round. They are scouting all positions. Not just “OL and WR”. That doesn’t even make sense. They may have certain players they are scouting more closely but it’s not like the scouts are sitting at a game where there is a good defensive player and ignoring him because “our offense is bad”. They aren’t taking 10 offensive players in the draft and they aren’t signing all offense as UDFAs.

 

The thesis of the article is that you can infer "top priorities" based on this data and that appears to be incorrect.

You actually made my point for me. Just looking at who we (overtly) scouted out of the top 10 available players doesn't give any indication of how we value the middle and late round players. It also tries to correlate number of scouting visits to interest in a player. This would be a great article if they left the thesis out that there's some correlation between who we looked at in the top 10 and what our "top priorities" are.

[TigerJ]

1 hour ago, mannc said:

Will you be happy watching the Bills score 9 points per game again next year?

It's tough to find an offensive player ranked in the top half of the openning round of the draft this year.  Some draftniks have Justin Herbert (QB from Oregon) going early, but there are rumblings he might go back to school.  Other QBs may rise later, but are not highly rankied yet.  There there are a couple offensive tackiles that some like (Greg Little and Jonahy Williams, but they are not sure things by any means (Greg Little has been criticized for his attitude and inconsistency).  While the receiving position is deep in the draft, there are no blue chip prospects.  If Buffalo picks top ten and picks an offensive player, they will almost certainly be reaching.  Buffalo does have a huge amount of cap space going into the off season, and they are going to be major players.  Hopefully, they can fill some holes with quality veterans.  If the Bills are picking high in the draft, free agency should give them a lot of options with their first pick, either drafting a blue chip defensive player or trading down.

[hondo in seattle]

1 hour ago, DCOrange said:

I wasn't going to post it on this section of the board, but with how popular the Big Board thread has been here, I figured I'd throw this one over here as its own post...

 

This guy: https://twitter.com/ChaseGoodbread tweets out which NFL teams are scouting which games throughout the year. I'm sure some sneak around him (for example, he didn't know about Buffalo scouting the Ole Miss-South Carolina game a week or two ago), but it's still a pretty good resource. I jotted down all the teams that he says Buffalo has scouted (plus the couple of games that I know we've scouted that he didn't report on) and then compared that to Matt Miller's big board (which includes a top 10 at each position) to see if there's any trends in positions that we seem to be prioritizing.

 

You can see the whole thing over at Buffalo Rumblings: https://www.buffalorumblings.com/2018/11/14/18094913/who-the-buffalo-bills-have-been-scouting-for-the-draft

 

Based strictly on the results of this, it seems to me that the top priorities (in no particular order) are RB, LB, TE, DT, and CB. I would also note that, for example, we've "only" scouted 6 of the top 10 WRs, but that's just Matt Miller's rankings of the WRs. Mel Kiper has also posted his top 10 at each position, and Miller and Kiper only agree on 5 of their top 10 WRs; the WR class in particular is insanely deep this year, with guys like Anthony Johnson ranging anywhere from the #3 WR in the class to the #23 WR in the class. Buffalo has been in attendance for 19 of the top 35 WR prospects listed by Charlie Campbell, so it's entirely possible that they've already scouted the guys that they believe are the top 10 WRs in the class and they simply have some of Matt Miller's guys rated lower on their own board.

 

This is a worthy thread. 

 

Rather than another Let-me-share-my-opinion-again-why-I-think- Terry/Kim/Beane/McD/Peterman-sucks thread, I want to thank DCO for sharing new and interesting insights.  

 

Good work!

[mannc]

9 minutes ago, TigerJ said:

It's tough to find an offensive player ranked in the top half of the openning round of the draft this year.  Some draftniks have Justin Herbert (QB from Oregon) going early, but there are rumblings he might go back to school.  Other QBs may rise later, but are not highly rankied yet.  There there are a couple offensive tackiles that some like (Greg Little and Jonahy Williams, but they are not sure things by any means (Greg Little has been criticized for his attitude and inconsistency).  While the receiving position is deep in the draft, there are no blue chip prospects.  If Buffalo picks top ten and picks an offensive player, they will almost certainly be reaching.  Buffalo does have a huge amount of cap space going into the off season, and they are going to be major players.  Hopefully, they can fill some holes with quality veterans.  If the Bills are picking high in the draft, free agency should give them a lot of options with their first pick, either drafting a blue chip defensive player or trading down.

Then trade back.  Reportedly, this draft is deep at WR, especially in rounds 2 and 3.  Late first round is a great place to find o-line prospects, too.

[Fan in Chicago]

1 hour ago, billspro said:

 

Do RBs and TEs not score points? Obviously if the Bills draft like this oline was addressed in free agency.

RBs drafted in the lower rounds also score plenty of touch downs. We need help at a lot of positions. Picking of RBs in the first or second round should be reserved for teams which are otherwise stacked. 

2 minutes ago, mannc said:

Then trade back.  Reportedly, this draft is deep at WR, especially in rounds 2 and 3.  Late first round is a great place to find o-line prospects, too.

I hope they draft a C in the first three rounds to be Allen's long term buddy

[DCOrange]

41 minutes ago, Rigotz said:

 

The thesis of the article is that you can infer "top priorities" based on this data and that appears to be incorrect.

You actually made my point for me. Just looking at who we (overtly) scouted out of the top 10 available players doesn't give any indication of how we value the middle and late round players. It also tries to correlate number of scouting visits to interest in a player. This would be a great article if they left the thesis out that there's some correlation between who we looked at in the top 10 and what our "top priorities" are.

 

Obviously some of the limitations is that for example, they've technically scouted Shea Patterson (Michigan's QB) twice now, but do we really think he is what drew them there? I doubt it; it was most likely their defense or possibly Karan Higdon.

 

But I think what I've compiled here is different from saying "We've gone to three Oklahoma State games, so we must be locked in on Mason Rudolph". For example, the only team that we've gone to see three times so far is Alabama. I think that makes a lot of sense because they have so many NFL prospects; I would guess going to multiple games has allowed them to focus on guys in game #2 or 3 that they weren't able to focus on in game #1 for example. So I'm not really reading into the fact that they scouted this team multiple times and therefore must be locked in on this one player that plays for that team.

 

I think the fact that, for example, they've scouted every single team that the top 10 DTs play on is probably an indicator that they will further address the DT position this offseason. The likelihood of it just being coincidence that they've just so happened to scout literally all 10 of the top 10, including three of them multiple times, is pretty unlikely IMO. Likewise with the CB position. This is especially true when you further factor in the fact that these guys are easily the main draws for NFL teams. Like Buffalo isn't going to Houston to watch whoever their WR is. Maybe they notice another player that stands out while watching Ed Oliver, but Ed Oliver is without a doubt what drew Buffalo to that game. I think seeing Greedy Williams against Auburn and Alabama's WRs was most likely one of the main draws for them to go see those games (along with just wanting to see all of Alabama's guys).

 

Point being, I'm not trying to use this analysis to single out specific players that I think Buffalo will take; I'm just using it to paint the picture of which positions they appear to be taking a lot of looks at, and in the case of DT and CB particularly, I think the conclusion is pretty concrete; Buffalo wants to upgrade those positions. I don't think there was any reason to believe that Buffalo was locked in on Mason Rudolph last year, but the fact that they were in attendance for games featuring literally every QB that was worth a damn strongly indicated that they'd be prioritizing a QB and that obviously proved to be the case.

[billsfan_34]

2 hours ago, billspro said:

Well it looks like DT and CB will be BPA in round 1. There is not much offensive talent right now. I would be happy if the first three picks were CB, RB, TE

You would want another corner? Im not saying thats a bad thing as you always need a nice staple of them, im just thinking later on in the draft. We need WR/RB in a big way.

[billspro]

12 minutes ago, billsfan_34 said:

You would want another corner? Im not saying thats a bad thing as you always need a nice staple of them, im just thinking later on in the draft. We need WR/RB in a big way.

 

We do need a WR in the worst way. I don’t see any top 10 WRs right now. Maybe we can get the kid from UB in round 2? I think the Bills will try to add some veterans to offence in free agency. 

 

My my first choice would be offensive line in round 1. If that doesn’t work I would love to have Greedy Williams opposite Trey White. 

 

Again my first choice in round 2 would be center, but a WR, TE, or RB would help as well. 

 

It will become much clearer after they add 3 or 4 starters in free agency.

[Pine Barrens Mafia]

1 hour ago, hondo in seattle said:

 

This is a worthy thread. 

 

Rather than another Let-me-share-my-opinion-again-why-I-think- Terry/Kim/Beane/McD/Peterman-sucks thread, I want to thank DCO for sharing new and interesting insights.  

 

Good work!

 

Agreed.

 

[Soda Popinski]

If we draft a RB in the top 10 I will lose my ****

[GG]

2 hours ago, mannc said:

Yes, but they aren’t positions that should necessarily be addressed with premium picks, and last I checked, CB is not an offensive position.  WR has to be the number 1 draft priority, for obvious reasons, and because it will be a tough position to fix in free agency.

 

I'd argue that a premier TE is far more important for the Bills to get next year.

[ocemur]

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but if you don't scout everybody at all positions, how do you know who the BPA is? Particularly in the middle and late rounds? Further, what can we tell about specific types of players at a given position? Are they scouting big possession type receivers or speed guys to take the top off of defenses? Are they scouting certain programs because they have a culture similar to McD's philosophy and he knows they are more likely to be "process" guys?

 

There's a ton variables at play here besides just position or within each position itself. Don't get me wrong, more information is better and I appreciate the thread, I'm just not so sure about drawing any conclusions from it yet.

[BuffaloHokie13]

39 minutes ago, Soda Popinski said:

If we draft a RB in the top 10 I will lose my ****

I don't have a RB in my top 32, let alone the top 10. Not seeing a Zeke or Barkley situation this year.

[wppete]

In this order:

 

1. OL

2. WR

3. CB

4. DE

5. DT

6. LB

7. TE

8. RB

[formerlyofCtown]

3 hours ago, mannc said:

Yes, but they aren’t positions that should necessarily be addressed with premium picks, and last I checked, CB is not an offensive position.  WR has to be the number 1 draft priority, for obvious reasons, and because it will be a tough position to fix in free agency.

The draft is insanely deep at WR.  Although maybe we should trade up giving 2 first to take a WR in a deep draft.  Who knows they may even turn out to be injury prone.

Edited November 16, 2018 by formerlyofCtown

[mannc]

1 hour ago, GG said:

 

I'd argue that a premier TE is far more important for the Bills to get next year.

It’s important, for sure, and we definitely should draft one.  But history suggests that really good TEs, like RBs, can be found throughout the draft, not just at the top.

[TigerJ]

34 minutes ago, BuffaloHokie13 said:

I don't have a RB in my top 32, let alone the top 10. Not seeing a Zeke or Barkley situation this year.

Agreed.  A year ago draftniks were touting Bryce Love as a first round worthy RB in the 2019 draft, but he's had injuries and has struggled this year.  He still may be a great prospect, but now he's a 2nd or 3rd rounder.

[Victory Formation]

Nobody likes Marquise Brown?

[HuSeYiN_NYC]

To those who think we have a need at RB just simply can't analyze the talent we already have. Shady is still elusive. Murphy runs hard and fast (just needs to study more on blocking) and Ivory runs hard...

 

To spend a 1st round draft pick on a RB will be a waste imo. We need to address offensive line, WR and TE in the 1st. I understand CB may be a need just as much, but our #1 overall defense would have something to say about that.

 

No matter who we draft at the end of the day, none of it matters unless Allen develops and shows progress which is why I'm excited to watch our 3-7 Bills go against the Jaguars to see if Allen sitting and "learning" from the sidelines helped at all.

 

I'm not opposed to drafting QB in the 1st if Allen doesn't show progress. I can withstand another losing season next year long as we are comfortable in THAT position. 

[MJS]

I thought scouts have certain areas that they cover and try to get to know each team in their area really well.

 

So scouts would be focusing on a bunch of different players at these games, right?

[YoloinOhio]

18 minutes ago, NewDayBills said:

Nobody likes Marquise Brown?

I do, I do!!

[Buffalo Barbarian]

5 hours ago, YoloinOhio said:

Smokescreen!

 

(too soon?)

 

Your just mad that you didn't post it first

 

 

[4thandGoal]

4 hours ago, billspro said:

Well it looks like DT and CB will be BPA in round 1. There is not much offensive talent right now. I would be happy if the first three picks were CB, RB, TE

really--- maybe the CB in first rd but dont you think O-Line should be a priority

[rodneykm]

You can grab a decent RB in the 3rd and 4th rounds - absolutely no reason to spend a high round pick on one. Hell, sign a FA back if you must. 

 

Enough of the defensive players, it is time to build that monster offensive line and grab a speed WR to stretch things out a bit. TE might not be a bad idea either, but I have a feeling Croom is going to be awesome. 

[CaptnCoke11]

4 hours ago, mannc said:

Yes, but they aren’t positions that should necessarily be addressed with premium picks, and last I checked, CB is not an offensive position.  WR has to be the number 1 draft priority, for obvious reasons, and because it will be a tough position to fix in free agency.

And if none of the WRs are worth the high selection Buffalo has they should just take one anyway?  That’s a sound strategy