i could probably put this in another thread, but a great example is here. i have a question for the draft guys because i'd really like to learn and better understand the process ... why do guys rise and fall? through much of the season and after the season, jake matthews was the #1 tackle and as the topic reads was the top overall prospect. a couple months after the season his stock has dropped a bit, even to where he's probably not best fit at tackle anymore. at the same time greg robinson is shooting up the boards. what happened after the games were played?
i change my mind by the second, if i can even get off the fence long enough to form a solid opinion - so i get the fluidity. i'm curious though what goes into the thought process of those who are giving this their full attention. is there more access to games? is it a better digestion of the tape? is it someone's opinion that catches fire and spreads?
what goes into the ups and downs for the people who do this for a hobby or even a living?
First off, you have to remember that what you're seeing is the opinions of the DRAFT EXPERTS.
Those opinions are formed by
1) Their watching of tape. As they watch more tape on guys, their own opinions will go up and down.
2) What they hear other EXPERTS saying. They may hear someone say something and realize that they've got a guy too high or too low.
3) The opinions they hear trickling out of the various front offices.
4) Their estimations of how the teams are going to draft.
For the teams, this is a process. Each team's board may be very, very different because it's based on their team's needs, their estimation of which guys will fit in their schemes, and their estimation of where a player will be on OTHER teams' boards.
For the experts, they're trying to merge that all together to figure out where these guys are going to go. They have to try to figure out which teams are going to be interested in which players.
For the teams, they start chopping their lists down pretty early. The experts boards might have 400-500 guys on them while a team's board may only have 100.
What's more, the teams are throwing smoke screens out there. They don't want the other teams to figure out how they've got guys ranked and which guys they're targeting in each round. So they're feeding these draft experts both good and bad information.