What value did the Arizona Cardinals get in the 2014 NFL Draft?

The idea behind draft value has been a debated topic amongst fans recently.

Throughout my journey as a football blogger and someone who closely follows the game I have evolved my beliefs. One thing I have evolved the most in is how I define the draft and what I think of what happens.

Value is inherent to the person doing the evaluation, not necessarily how good the player turns out to be. Then we ignore the results.

Well, let’s take a look at the 2014 NFL Draft and what “value” the Arizona Cardinals drafted.

For this exercise, I am using Arif Hasan’s 2014 Consensus Big Board, that takes into account all of the rankings from the experts then averages them to give us the consensus.

Round 1 Pick 27 Deone Bucannon

Bucannon was picked 27th after the Cardinals traded down from the 20th pick.

Based on the rules I have heard and read, Bucannon was a big time reach, as the 57th ranked consensus player on the evaluator board.

Round 2 Pick Pick 52 Troy Niklas

Why are defining reaches and steals odd to me? Troy Niklas was ranked higher than Deone Bucannon on the Consensus Big Board.

The Cardinals really reached for Bucannon, but got a good value in the 53rd ranked Niklas.

Round 3 Pick 84 Kareem Martin

Martin was picked 84th and was ranked 106th. A reach, not a huge reach like their next third round pick.

Round 3 Pick 91 John Brown

Did you know that the consensus top 200 player big board by the experts didn’t even rank Brown as a top 200 player? John Brown was such a reach he wasn’t even a top 200 player in the draft according to the experts.

Round 4 Pick 120 Logan Thomas

Thank goodness the Arizona Cardinals made up for their massive reaches of Bucannon and John Brown by drafting 98th ranked Logan Thomas.

Round 5 Pick 160 Ed Stinson

The Cardinals got Stinson, ranked 174, at a fair value, right?

Round 6 Pick 196 Walt Powell

Not ranked in the consensus top 200.

Overall:

Bucannon was selected 30 spots over his consensus rank.

Niklas was selected one position over his consensus rank.

Martin was selected 22 spots over his consensus rank.

Logan Thomas was the best value in the draft for the Cardinals, drafted 22 spots below his consensus rank.

Ed Stinson was selected 14 spots over his consensus rank.

John Brown and Walt Powell were not ranked in the top 200, so we know that Brown was at least drafted 110 spots over his consensus rank while Powell was drafted at least five spots over his rank.

That means the best value in the 2014 draft for the Arizona Cardinals were as followed:

Logan Thomas
Troy Niklas
Ed Stinson
Kareem Martin
Deone Bucannon

John Brown was a huge reach while Logan Thomas was a great value. I am excited to see the 2015 results next week.