Thompson had worst 2011 & 2012 drafts in NFL

ivo610

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Wolf's protege, I think you meant to say.

Schneider joined the Packers scouting department in 1993 and worked for Wolf for 7 years. I seem to recall he was an intern in the Packers scouting department for a couple of years before that. He moved on to be Director of Pro Personnel for the Chiefs for 4 years. Then he served one year under Holmgren/Thompson in Seattle as Director of Player Personnel. He followed that with 1 year as VP of Player Personnel with the Redskins. Then he was back to the Packers under Thompson.

That's a long resume, going around the league, with positions of authority over personnel decisions long before his more recent extended stay with the Packers under Thompson.

He can scout the h*ll out of a draft board, and he first learned the craft under Wolf just as Thompson had.

While Thompson is nearly 2 decades older than Schneider, they're professional contemporaries in the scouting game, Schneider starting in 1993 (if you don't count the internship) and Thompson in 1992.

I put him under Thompson as they worked closer than him and wolf but I am the last person to take credit away from wolf, god knows favre fans try to do enough of that
 

ivo610

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That's a odd way to look at it when the #2 you speak of was Seneca Wallace. Things looked up a bit when we secured a real #2.

The un-spun version of the question is, "what was our record with the #3 QB".

Under our #3, Tolzien, our record was either 0-2 (including the Nov. 10 game where he played almost the entire thing after Wallace limped off). I give the MIN tie to Flynn since he played most the game after Tolzien started and was mercifully pulled.

There likely were not many teams that dipped into their #3, but I think they couldn't do worse than no wins.

But since you asked, the Bills lost their presumptive #1 Kevin Kolb to a career-ending off-the-field slip-and-fall injury (or so the story goes...I seen to recall it was in the locker room, not Walmart, by the way). The #2, rookie Manual, who had all of 20 snaps in preseason due to injury, got hurt again in game 5 with #3 Jeff Tuell finishing up, taking his first NFL snaps in the process. Tuell looked decent in preseason earning the #3 job but was nowhere ready for prime time based on this cup of coffee.

Tuell was so bad in relief they went to Thad Lewis the following week, the #4, in their next 3 games. Lewis was brought in two weeks before the season started as the new #3 after the aforementioned injuries.

I seem to recall it was in the Tuell/Lewis period the Bills auditioned Flynn.

So, this #4 guy Lewis lost in OT to CIN, beat MIA, and lost to NO for a 1-2 record against some decent competition.

I happen to live in Buffalo so it's a little hard to avoid noting the QB train wreck of last season. I know a lot less about the week-to-week details of most of the other teams where "Tolzien outperformance" might be documented.

Buffalo isnt the offensive driven team the packers are but I will take your your comparison of their #4 vs our #4.
 

brandon2348

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TT had a couple questionable drafts and I am not giving up on the 2012 draft yet. If Perry has a good year and Hayward plays like he did in 2012 and Daniels makes another jump I think it would be considered a solid draft. You can't hit home runs all the time. If you look at his whole body of work he has done an outstanding job IMO considering were always drafting at the back end of the bus. It's not like were Cleveland or Buffalo or one of these other losers that gets a top 5 or 10 pick every year and still whiffs and gets to draft again at the top of the second and every other round.

IMO some of the frustration with TT is a direct frustration that most of us have with the defense and I believe there has been more to our defensive problems then just the draft when you consider some of the other factors. Injuries play a huge role and I put some of it on Capers.

Someone brought up Schneider. Look at his 2013 draft and you will see it already has the makings of a huge bust. His 2014 draft is very very questionable already. Schneider might be the guy that walked into the casino and had some "beginners luck".
 
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HardRightEdge

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Buffalo isnt the offensive driven team the packers are but I will take your your comparison of their #4 vs our #4.
I think you're not looking at it quite the right way. "Offensive teams" are the ones fortunate enough to land a true franchise QB. The teams that don't have one are categorized as something else. Consequently, the 2013 version of the Buffalo Bills is not an offensive team, and neither were the Packers without Rodgers. After that, what you are depends on the other 52 components.
 

ivo610

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I think you're not looking at it quite the right way. "Offensive teams" are the ones fortunate enough to land a true franchise QB. The teams that don't have one are categorized as something else. Consequently, the 2013 version of the Buffalo Bills is not an offensive team, and neither were the Packers without Rodgers. After that, what you are depends on the other 52 components.

I more or less look at them as a built around their defense but you can look at them as you see fit
 

Luca

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Both the 2011 draft and the 2012 draft have been bad, but there is a huge difference between those two drafts.

In 2011 we had 3 middle round picks (3th to 5th). Only one of them (House) is still with the Packers. The other two, Green and DJ Williams have a good shot at making a team. We also had 5 late round picks (6th or 7th round). Of those guys 4 are still in the league, although 3 are with other teams. I actually think that Schlauderaff, Smith and Guy have a good opportunity to make a NFL team. Only Ricky Elmore is out of the league.

In 2012 we drafted McMillian and Manning in the middle rounds. Both are long shots to make a team. We also drafted Coleman and Datko in the 7th round, who are both out of the league.

So in short, although we cut too many guys from the 2011 draft, most of them might still an NFL roster. On the other hand, 4 guys from the 2012 draft might be out of the league after the final cuts. So depth wise the 2012 draft was way worse.
 

Pack-12

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We also had 7 6th/7th rounders between those 2 seasons so going by % it's obviously going to be a little skewed. They weren't very good drafts overall but most of those late rounders are at least till playing in the NFL they just didn't make our team.
 
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Sunshinepacker

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Find me a team that is offense driven, loses their 1st and 2nd string QBs, and does as well as we did

How about we actually change this to what really happened last year? Let's find another team that had #2 and #3 qurterbacks that weren't even on the team until the week before the regular season started.
 
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Sunshinepacker

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So, to follow up my initial post, I'm not saying that Thompson is poor GM. I'm just not sure that he's been able to overcome the front office attrition that has occured the last few years and he may be moving from "one of the best" to just "above average". I think people bring up his earlier drafts and forget that he had guys like Schneider and Mackenzie on his staff during those years.

Really look at our team, we have depth at RB, CB and WR (and we're couting on a lot of unknowns to claim WR has depth), that's it. We have ONE good player on the dline and one good player in the linebacking group. Our oline is one injured center from becoming a problem and our QB depth is, well, that's been discussed. Our TE position is far from good.

In reading the above it may sound like I'm down on TT but I also realize that injuries have really impacted this team and that makes it tough to evaluate.
 

Oski

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So, to follow up my initial post, I'm not saying that Thompson is poor GM. I'm just not sure that he's been able to overcome the front office attrition that has occured the last few years and he may be moving from "one of the best" to just "above average". I think people bring up his earlier drafts and forget that he had guys like Schneider and Mackenzie on his staff during those years.

Really look at our team, we have depth at RB, CB and WR (and we're couting on a lot of unknowns to claim WR has depth), that's it. We have ONE good player on the dline and one good player in the linebacking group. Our oline is one injured center from becoming a problem and our QB depth is, well, that's been discussed. Our TE position is far from good.

In reading the above it may sound like I'm down on TT but I also realize that injuries have really impacted this team and that makes it tough to evaluate.

He certainly shouldn't be fired, but it is something pay attenti0n to.
 

gemoran4

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I think it hasn't helped (having so few players pan out in those drafts), but as long as TT follows up with some strong drafts it doesn't bother me too much. What team hasn't had a weak draft here or there? The New England Patriots have had more than their fair share of busts in recent drafts (they ended up having to sign free agent corners because they couldn't draft any that were good enough to man the positions).


And perhaps winning the superbowl had something to do with it. The staff got too comfortable with what they had (a young team that had performed at a high level on both sides of the field the latter half of the season and in the playoffs) that they didn't go into the 2011 draft as prepared as they usually had been. Then after the 2011 season they realized they needed to shore up the front seven, and went heavy defense in the 2012 draft. Couple that with the fact that TT has never been amazing at drafting defensive players (he's gotten a few like clay matthews and nick collins but i feel like his defensive picks have always been more miss than hit) and you have a recipe for two poor drafts.
 

longtimefan

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Wolf had bad ones too and considering what he did to get Reynolds, it wasnt good at all

http://www.footballnation.com/conte...biggest-draft-day-regrets-team-history/28911/


Jamal Reynolds -- 2001

This draft pick hits a new stratosphere of atrociousness when you consider the trade the Packers made to acquire the No. 10 overall selection in 2001. The Packers shipped backup quarterback Matt Hasselbeck and their No. 17 overall draft pick to the Seattle Seahawks for the selection used on Reynolds.



http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...-the-last-ten-green-bay-packers-drafts/page/2

2001 Draft Results:


(1-10) Jamal Reynolds DE, Florida State


(2-41) Robert Ferguson WR, Texas A&M


(3-71) Bhawoh Jue FS, Penn State


(3-72) Torrance Marshall MLB, Oklahoma


(4-105) Bill Farrario G, Wisconsin


(6-198) David Martin TE, Tennessee



Martin did a good job as a back up, Ferggy (IMO) just never seemed to be able to be that next good wr
 

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During the 1999 draft, Wolf also traded away his 5th round pick for Allen Rossum. Rossum and Jue were average players that contributed valuable time, but were certainly not studs. They weren't flameouts though.

Possibly tying 1999 as Wolf's worst draft was 1997. Sharper was his best pick by far, with Ross Verba coming in a distant second place. Everybody after that was a bust, highlighted by the surprisingly awful Brett Conway (punter) pick in the third round. I'll just list of the names of nobodies: Brett Conway (P), Jermaine Smith (DT), Anthony Hicks (LB), Ronnie McAda (QB), Jerald Sowell (FB), Chris Miller (WR).
 

TJV

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In addition to the drafts already mentioned, Wolf had a couple of other bad picks early in drafts. He reached in the 1999 draft for Antwan Edwards in the first round and Fred Vinson in the second (good thing he picked an NFL CB in McKenzie in the 3rd). John Michels was a another first round reach (IMO) to replace Ruettgers in 1996.
 
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5 straight playoff years. 3 straight NFC North Championships, 2 NFC Championship Games and 1 NFL Championship and a team that will be a contender for many years to come. That's the only stat I need to know about his drafts ;)

Thompson gets credit for drafting Rodgers but as I've stated elsewhere, it's tough to seperate how much of our success is due to Rodgers verse Thompson. It would be hard NOT to make the playoffs with Rodgers under center in a division as bad as the North has been recently (serisouly, we went 2-5-1 down the stretch and STILL won the North).

Peyton Manning lead the Colts to the playoffs quite a bit but how good was the Colts GM at that time? I think, in hindsight, many would say that the Colts GM wasted much of Manning's prime.
 

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In addition to the drafts already mentioned, Wolf had a couple of other bad picks early in drafts. He reached in the 1999 draft for Antwan Edwards in the first round and Fred Vinson in the second (good thing he picked an NFL CB in McKenzie in the 3rd). John Michels was a another first round reach (IMO) to replace Ruettgers in 1996.
In fairness though, Vinson was traded to Seattle for Ahman Green. That worked out well for us.
 

PikeBadger

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In addition to the drafts already mentioned, Wolf had a couple of other bad picks early in drafts. He reached in the 1999 draft for Antwan Edwards in the first round and Fred Vinson in the second (good thing he picked an NFL CB in McKenzie in the 3rd). John Michels was a another first round reach (IMO) to replace Ruettgers in 1996.
Always drafting between 20-32 is dicey. I've gotten to the point where I wish Thompson would trade back almost every year. I think you generally get better value not messing around with that 15-35. These guys are so similar in talent level with the 36-60 picks it seems.
 

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In fairness though, Vinson was traded to Seattle for Ahman Green. That worked out well for us.
Agreed but just because Wolf swindled Seattle doesn’t make the pick itself better – at least at the time of the draft. (BTW, Vinson didn’t play a regular season game for Seattle and retired after the 2000 season.)

Regarding trading back, there’s certainly an argument for that and the 2012 draft is an argument against trading up as 2 of the three didn’t work out. The trade up for Hayward certainly did though. Each draft is different and I wouldn’t advocate Thompson institute a policy of “automatically” trading out of the first round (not that he would). IMO it depends upon the talent tiers and where the Packers have the current tier (where they’re picking in round 1) ending. And of course not trade back beyond that point.

The 2012 draft looks like Thompson’s most needs based draft to me. That’s the lesson that should be learned from it IMO – he should go back to his normal MO. And I think he should also evaluate his current personnel staff: He’s lost a lot of personnel evaluating talent since he’s arrived.
 

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I was a HUGE proponent of trading out of the first round, but that was before the new CBA was instituted and first rounders ceased costing teams dearly. Where I still like the trade-down is when you have a high pick and more needs than draft picks, I would prefer a method of not selecting the BPA and engineering a trade (if a willing partner is found) to expand the number of draft picks. There is a method to winning the draft lottery, but it is still a gamble. Often times I'd rather just have more lottery tickets than trying to guess the perfect winning number.
 

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