Arizona Cardinals Draft Day Tendencies

[stchamp98]

This was posted in the NFL Draft Forum, a great thread indeed. With the 2012 NFL Draft now just 13(!!!) days away, I figured it should be posted here to not only refresh the memories for some of you guys who forgot a few of these things but also to spark the debate about my answers and/or how my answers will affect us in less than two weeks.

A posted by the name of "FinMan" asked the questions, my answers are in italics:

Arizona Cardinals
Have they shown a tendency to draft or stay away from UNDERCLASSMAN?
Since the Ken Whisenhunt regime began in 2007, the Arizona Cardinals have selected 35 players in the NFL Draft. Of those 35 players, only 5(Alan Branch, Calais Campbell, Beanie Wells, Patrick Peterson, Ryan Williams) have been underclassmen. That said, all 5 of those underclassmen draftees were selected in either rounds 1 or 2

-Do their draft picks have a lot of production in college?
I tried very hard to find a pattern in this area and failed. The people in Arizona's draft room over the past 5 years seems to be almost 50-50 in terms of selecting players with years of big time production and players with limited college production or only 1 year of legitimate college production. I see no trend whatsoever and again, I tried very hard to do so

-How highly is character valued when they draft?
While character seems to be taken heavily into account in the early rounds(Round 1-3), this regime has taken multiple players who have character red flags in the mid-to-late rounds. 4th round selection CB Greg Toler played very low level college football due to poor high school academics(Literally couldn't get in ANYWHERE). 6th round selection CB Jorrick Calvin was ineligible to play his senior season at Troy due to poor academics. 7th round selection OT Brandon Keith was arrested for rioting and disorderly conduct in 2008 and 7th round selection OG Trevor Canfield was arrested for assault in 2008. As you can see, there is a willingness to take chances on character flawed individuals later in the draft but the team is very rooted in character in the early goings.

-Have they favored Senior Bowl guys?
Yes, as a matter of fact they have. Since 2007, 15 of our 35 NFL Draft Picks have been players who participated in the Under Armour Senior Bowl. That comes out to over 42% probability of an Arizona Cardinals draft pick coming from that game

-Have they shown a tendency to draft from a specific school, region or conference?
Not from what I can tell. It's been a solid mix of guys who played college football all throughout the Midwest, Southern and Eastern regions. The West Coast does seem to be ignored by our decision makers, oddly enough. Only 3(Jim Dray of Stanford, David Carter of UCLA, DeMarco Sampson of San Diego State) of our 35 draft picks under this regime have come from a West Coast school, all of which were either 6th or 7th round selections. As far as specific schools, there seems to be no coorelation present. The most players we've selected from 1 college and/or unversity has been 3 players from LSU(Early Doucet, Herman Johnson, Patrick Peterson). That represents just 8% of our picks since 2007

-Is there a position they favor early? Is there a position they stay away from early?
Not from what I can tell. It's been a solid mix of players from numerous positions in numerous rounds. Seems to be little bias for us in this area

-Is there anyone in particular they've tipped their hat on early or late for the 2012 draft?
The best source of Arizona Cardinals team knowledge is all world beat writer Mike Jurecki, who consistently calls Cardinals news before it happens. He has reported that the Cardinals current first round pick is down to 1 of 5 player: Michael Floyd, David DeCastro, Cordy Glenn, Riley Reiff and Melvin Ingram

-Do they always address a unit in the draft?
The Cardinals have selected a player in the secondary in 4 of 5 drafts under head coach Ken Whisenhunt, including multiple secondary players in 2009. The Cardinals have also selected a pass catching offensive player in the middle rounds(Rounds 3-5) in 4 of 5 drafts under coach Whiz

-Do they draft the guys they bring in on official visits (like the Cowboys and Bears) or do they bluff as much as possible leading up to the draft?
I have only been able to confirm draft visits from the 2009, 2010 and 2011 draft periods but from those years, the Cardinals have drafted 6 players(Beanie Wells, Rashad Johnson, Daryl Washington, John Skelton, Patrick Peterson, Ryan Williams) that visited the Cardinals facility for an official, private team visit.

-Overall, how predictable are they?
In the first round, very predictable. I've yet to be shocked by a 1st round pick from this regime. Beyond that, anything goes. Still shocked, even today, at the selection of 2011 2nd round pick RB Ryan Williams

-Any other information you can share?
1. Over the past 5 years, the Rod Graves-Ken Whisenhunt-Steve Keim trio has selected 8 players who played their college football at non-FCS schools.
2. Russ Grimm is still very much this teams co-offensive coordinator
3. The Arizona Cardinals have selected 5 players and signed 4 UDFA's who had played in the East-West Shrine game.
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[Yibbyl]

Thanks for posting this!
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[11sanchez11]

Good stuff StChamp. I really like reading stuff like this even though I'm not really into doing mock drafts.

[khodder]

We seem to favor the trio of Big 10, ACC and SEC for our draft picks with Small Schools scattered around all over the place.

Only two from the Big 12 (Harrington and Acho) and only four from the Big East (LSH, Canfield, Brown and Sherman)

Harrington and Acho were 4th and 5th rounders, LSH and Canfield were 7th rounders, Brown was a 2nd rounder, but acheived nothing and Sherman was a 5th rounder)

Our first round picks have been as such, Big 10, Small School, Big 10, SEC, SEC.

Top 3 round picks for this team;

Levi Brown, Alan Branch, Buster Davis (Two Big 10, one ACC)
DRC, Calais Campbell, Early Doucet (Small School, ACC, SEC)
Beanie Wells, Cody Brown, Rashad Johnson (Big 10, Big East, SEC)
Dan Williams, Daryl Washington, Andre Roberts (SEC, SS, SS)
Patrick Peterson, Ryan Williams, Rob Housler (SEC, ACC, SS)

The last two drafts we have moved away somewhat from the Big 10 bias we had early on and formed more of an SEC Bias early. Each of the last four years we have taken and SEC player in the first 100 picks.

However this correlation is not that strong in terms of isolating one conference, but if you look ACC, SEC,Big 10, Small School you get something like 75% of our draft choices under Whis/Keim. 27/35 picks have come from those four "Conferences"
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Patrick Peterson - 92 targets, 40 catches allowed, 602 yards, 6 TD's, 7 INT's

The Big Brain am winning again, I am the Greetest.

[#1CARDSFAN]

Nice work Champ.Small school tendencies at times for this regime. A later round small school pick will happen this year again.

[khodder]

http://www.azcardinals.com/videos-photos/videos/Flight-Plan--Graves-and-Keim-Talk-Draft-Prep/bda63a2a-ee9f-4a45-b440-13809a1787bc

Nice Watch.

Interesting how Keim says we really emphasize work ethic and football intelligence later on in the draft, and Graves says with the draft we are going to generally look at the best player available.
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Patrick Peterson - 92 targets, 40 catches allowed, 602 yards, 6 TD's, 7 INT's

The Big Brain am winning again, I am the Greetest.

[stchamp98]

Looking back on the weekend in the books, here is how our draft tendancies played out as layed out in the original posting:

1. 6 of our 7 draft picks were Seniors.
2. Our selections again seemed to be a solid mix of prime production and measurables.
3. Obviously, we went outside the box character wise with our first 2 selections. That's a first for us in those early rounds.
4. 3 of our 7 selections were at the Senior Bowl. Michael Floyd would have been 4 but he opted out at the last minute due to injury.
5. Again, big mix of guys from the Midwest, South and Eastern regions with selections from Notre Dame, Oklahoma, Ole Miss and Presbyterian(Located in South Carolina) but we did take multiple players from the Western region this year in guys from Washington, San Diego State and Boise State. That's a first for us as well.
6. Tipped our hat on Floyd(Who I mentioned in the OP), Floyd was the selection.
7. Another secondary player selected(2, actually). That's 5 of 6 drafts now.
8. From what I can gather, and our total visit list isn't confirmed, the only guy we drafted that we brought in for an official team visit was Michael Floyd.
9. First round was pretty predictable once again. That it down to 1 of 2 guys, Floyd or Reiff, and that's exactly who we took.
10. With Justin Bethel, we now have selected 9 players from sub-FCS schools, including 1 in every single draft since 2007(The beginning of the Whiz era).
11. Justin Bethel became the 6th Arizona Cardinals draftee since 2007 to attend the East-West Shrine game.
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[Boise&cards Fan]

[shawn]

its funny i was reading this thread a few hours ago and thought about bumping it up...but i decided not to.

anyway...besides the fact that we took a couple of guys who have been in trouble with the law, and or school. we did stay true to form.

we did select a junior in the 4th round though...which is a first.
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sig made by mike23md

[#1CARDSFAN]

[khodder]

[khodder]

I have been thinking about it for a little while. I wonder if our senior bowl tendency is above the "Average" I mean there are what 100 odd guys who go to the Senior Bowl. If on average 70% of this guys are draft you have 70 of 255 guys being drafted from the senior bowl, this is 27% of all draftees played in the senior bowl.

Our number is higher, but the numbers are estimates. I still think there is something in it with the Shrine Game guys we like too, but it does bear thinking about.
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Patrick Peterson - 92 targets, 40 catches allowed, 602 yards, 6 TD's, 7 INT's

The Big Brain am winning again, I am the Greetest.

[khodder]

Draftees by conference in 2012;

BCS
Independent = 1
Big XII = 1
SEC = 1
Pac 12 = 1

NonBCS
WAC = 2
FCS = 1

We seem to be moving away from the Big 10, and that makes sense with the way teams out West and in the Big XII tend to spread teams out more.

Interesting to note all of our picks from the Big XII have been defensive players.
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Patrick Peterson - 92 targets, 40 catches allowed, 602 yards, 6 TD's, 7 INT's

The Big Brain am winning again, I am the Greetest.

[Boise&cards Fan]

Nate Potter and Lindley are from the MWC
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That right I won. Thank you NS922 for the Sig.

[khodder]