The Challenge Of Medical Evaluations
While Kirchner for the most part feels like the Seahawks compensated as well as possible with less information, one place where it was impossible to fully make up for everything lost over the past year was the medical evaluations of players.
"If there's a spot we have less information, it's medical," he said.
While some players with injury concerns did go to Indianapolis for medical checks, it was only a small portion of 300 or so players who would normally be evaluated at the combine. Teams also can conduct their own medical checks in their building during the 30 visits, which didn't take place this year.
"It's really put a stress on Strick (head athletic trainer David Stricklin), (assistant athletic trainer) C.J. (Neumann), (assistant athletic trainer) Mackenzie (Marques), (assistant athletic trainer/physical therapist) Harrison (Grube), those people down in the training room having to contact schools and get medical information," Kirchner said. "… You're dealing with HIPAA laws, it's tough to get access. Our docs and training staff have really had to grind this offseason. It's been difficult, but they've done a great job and provided us with as much information as they could."
As Berry notes, teams would usually have full medical reports on roughly 350 prospects at this time in a normal year, this year that total is closer to 150.
"So there's a lot more questions about players' health and longevity," he said.
Lessons Learned For Future Drafts
While the Seahawks and every other team want to see the world get back to normal, there are things they have learned over the past year that they think can help them moving forward.
Berry points to the idea of having scouts start working on evaluations earlier as something that could stick, while Kirchner notes that coaches, scouts and the analytics department continue to push to come up with new ways to evaluate players.
Then there's also just the simple fact that the pandemic has made it clear that a lot of things can be done remotely that weren't in the past.
"From a communications standpoint and a technology standpoint, I think we're in a much better place than we were before COVID," Berry said.
Said Ramsey, "It's been a challenge, but it's been good too. It has shown us that we're able to do things a little different than it's always been done. None of us have this personnel thing figured out, so finding new little ways of doing things that might streamline it might be helpful going forward."
Kirchner credits the open-minded approach of general manager John Schneider with helping the Seahawks adapt well throughout the past year.
"John continues to try to fine-tune so many things," Kirchner said. "He doesn't push people, but we have people who do a great job of educating themselves and always trying to improve the process, and John has always been great at doing that and trying to get the rest of the staff to do that, and I think we've all taken that mindset in. No idea is a dumb idea, you know?"
For example, a coach or scout might take something to the analytics department and come up with an idea that can help the team in the future. Or, that idea might be met with a "why the hell are you looking at this," from Ward and Smith, Kirchner said with a laugh. "But nothing's ever off the table in terms of questions or ways to improve the process."
More Uncertainty & Less Depth
For fans and media members, the draft is always something of a crapshoot, though obviously some draft pundits are better informed than others. And while teams never know for sure what other teams will do, in a normal year, scouts and executives probably have a lot better idea of how things will unfold than those on the outside of the business. This year, however, the draft is likely going to feature more surprises even for the most informed people in the NFL.
In a normal year, plenty of information is exchanged between scouts on the road and at the combine, and things like free agent visits and 30 visits can act as tells heading into the draft, both on the positions and specific players teams might be looking at. Add to that the fact that there's less information on players from a medical standpoint, and that teams have had fewer chances to evaluate players both on the field and as people, and this year's draft has even more mystery to it than usual.
"When it comes to predicting what positions teams are going to take, free agency helps because you see what positions they bring in, and this year you didn't really have a true sense of what positions they were bringing in or working out," Kirchner said. "I think there will be more surprises than in the past."
Said Berry, "There's more uncertainty around every pick."
Ramsey added, "No combine is big, that's a level playing field to measure guys against each other, and it's a week of information gathering among your peers. It'll be very interesting to see which teams come out of this better and which teams don't in the long run. And I could see it being more predictable, yeah. There's definitely going to be surprises."
And in addition to being more unpredictable, this draft class is also expected to be less deep than usual, in large part because the NCAA gave players a chance to return to school for an extra year of eligibility next year. That likely won't change much in the early rounds—top prospects likely are still are going to come out given the chance—but if a senior is looking at being a late-round pick or potential free agent and can instead try to improve his draft stock next fall, a lot of those players will opt to go back to school.
"One of the biggest things about this past year is the amount of players who are going back to college," Kirchner said. "The NCAA allowed players an additional year (of eligibility)… If they're thinking, 'I'm a fifth for sixth-round draft pick, I'm going to go back, train my tail off, and try to improve my stock to a third or fourth-round grade.' So the overall numbers in this draft are down, but the biggest area it's going to affect is undrafted free agency."
Just how much worse the depth is won't be known for years to come, but in terms of sheer numbers, teams are dealing with a smaller talent pool.
"This year, I think there's only 650 or 700 guys who signed with agents," Ramsey said. "Last year it was 1,900, the year before that it was 1,800."
As Berry noted approximately 485 football players took the NCAA up on that extra year of eligibility, and while not every one of those players would have been drafted or even signed after the draft, "it really thins out the back half of the draft and free agency," he said.
On the flip side of that, Berry notes that "Next year's class is going to be incredibly deep and you might be able to get some more quality players than you normally would."
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