With all the draft talk the last couple of weeks, I've been trying to break down some of Gutekunst's patterns to see if we can speculate a little more accurately on how next weekend is going to play out. This thread really got me thinkng, and I keep comng back and using it as a starting point to do reserch on various aspects of Gute's tendencies. Someone asked a question last night in another sub-forum that got my started on what I've picked up on, and the more I started to write, the more kept coming out. So I finally just gave in and wrote up everything I was thinking of.
Some people will think I'm full of crap, but maybe some will find some value in it. At any rate, hopefully it spawns some discussions. And keep in mind, some of the apparent patterns are somewhat difficult to solidly support, because of a limited sample size (like, the paucity of 4th Round picks he's made).
I try to stick to just objective data and limit whatever opinions I draw from that data, but there seem to be some very consistent patterns to the way he manages different stages of the draft. He places a very high priority on using the first 2 rounds to snag premium players at posiitons of need, and Round 1 and 2 tend to follow mostly the same pattern. There is historically a big departure from that pattern in Round 3, and an entirely new pattern altogether in Round 4... Rounds 5 & 6 follow a somewhat new pattern, and Round 7 is... well... Round 7. Not much different than most teams' 7th round, but interestingly, his Round 7 pattern for prioritizing players is in many ways very similar to Rounds 1 & 2.
And in the last part, after I've gone through the rounds, I briefly touch on what seem to be his tendencies for draft day trades.
FWIW, I looked up the RAS of every player he's ever drafted, in every round, as well as the schools they came out of. In many cases, I deep-dove into their player profile at school to see how much they played, and what their strengths and weaknesses were considered to be at taht time. I also went back in time and looked up their draft profiles on quite a few of them from their draft year, to see where they were projected to go compared to where we took them. I especially did this in cases where a kid coming out of a powerhouse program like Miami or Michigan was drafted in a later round; why was a 4-year starter drafted in the 7th? Tried to get a sense of why some players went sooner or later than one might expect.
It's long, and I'm sorry for that, but I wanted mostly to not leave out any potentially relevant detail. So, here goes.... flame away!
ROUND 1
He seems to see the first round as his best chance in the draft to add a surefire, elite player, a difference-maker, a cornerstone. He goes to whatever lengths he feels necessary to make sure he comes out of Round 1 with a premium player.
He tends to be cautious and prudent, and he values athleticism very highly; only 2 of his 8 first round picks were below 9.39 RAS - Savage at 8.35. and Jordan Love at 8.46 (very high for a quarterback - Aaron Rodgers scored 7.14, Pay Mahomes, was 8.24, and Tom Brady managed just 2.74). Average RAS of Gutekunst's 1st round picks is 9.28.
Of the 8 first round picks he has made in his time here, 5 of them have involved trades - 3 of them a trade up, 2 of them a trade down. He traded both down and then back up to select Jaire with his very first draft pick as Packers GM.
4 out of 6 years, he's spent lower draft picks to move up in the first and get the player he wants the most. And that's not a bad strategy; he usually hits extra base hits in the first, outside of Savage. His first round is almost always a major success. Given where we're sitting this year, and the talent pool, this is a year he could just as easily trade up as trade down, and history suggests he's likely to do at least one of those two things. He's not shy about using 4th and 5th rounders to move up in the 1st; this is a year where I think that's likely - possibly combined with a trade back for an extra Day 3.
He also concentrates in this round on players from major colleges with elite football programs - no Boston Colleges or North Dakota States here. He wants a player who's been coached at a high level and has competed against the top college players in the country. The closest things to exceptions have been Jordan Love and Darnell Savage, and we all see how Savage worked out. I'm sure Gute noticed the significance of that abberation as well.
ROUND 2
2nd round is usually a slightly looser continuation of his 1st round philosophy - he still wants top notch athletes (he's only drafted one 2nd rounder with an RAS below 9, and that was Jayden Reed), and for the most part his 2nd-rounders are legitimate 2nd-rounders - with some obvious question marks like Dillon and Myers. He doesn't focus quite as much on premium football programs as he does in the 1st round. He's not afraid to take a skilled player in this round from a lesser school or conference if the scouting supports that choice.
So, he seems to feel perhaps slightly more free to gamble with a 2nd-rounder, but only within fairly narrow parameters, and he remains highly disciplined with his choices and focused on an elite athlete. Average second round RAS is 9.07.
ROUND 3
This where he tends to break those patterns for the first time... rolls the dice, and throws caution to the wind and RAS scores out the window. The average RAS of Gute's 3rd round picks is 7.65, with a couple of them down in the low 5s - whereas 8.35 was the lowest RAS he ever drafted in the first two rounds, Darnell Savage.
In round 3 of his first 5 drafts, Gutekunst consistently both reached and deviated from his prioritization on athleticism, apparently feeling that was a safe round to take long shots, and last year was the first exception. If you back out the RAS scores from his 3rd Rounders in 23, (Tucker Kraft, the only decent player he ever took in the 3rd) the average RAS of his 3rd round draft picks was a dismal 7.24 - Tucker Kraft bumped it up almost a half point last year. He also continues to favor players from upper-tier programs in the 3rd, Tucker Kraft again being the exception.
People often speak of Gute's "3rd round curse", his bad luck in the third round, but I don't think it's bad luck at all - it's just that prior to 2023 he completely departed from his normal draft strategy in that round every single year. With 3 of his 3rd-round picks those first 5 years, he abandoned his commitment to elite athletes, and took players with an RAS of 6.67 or lower - 1.3 points lower than anyone he had ever drafted in Rounds 1 or 2. With the other 2 picks, he stayed true to athleticism (his picks were 9.35 and 9.75); but both players were a reach, having been projected for the 5th and 6th rounds.
2023 is the first year he follows the same pattern in the 3rd as he does in the 1st and 2nd. Hopefully that represents the beginning of a new trend, rather than a temporary departure from the existing trend.
ROUND 4
The 4th round is where Gutekunst gets focused again and looks for reliable rotational players and depth; players who can sit on the practice squad and/or special teams for a year or two and see if NFL level coaching can turn them into NFL level players. His 4th-round formula has generally worked out very well; he's gotten some good and even excellent players with that pick - 3 out of 5, in fact. That's pretty good for a 4th round, very much better than the league average. And he's back onboard the "elite athlete" train - average 4th round RAS is a solid 9.
He seems to look here for players from lower-profile schools who may not have attracted a lot of attention from scouts - Nevada, Wake Forest, Missouri, Auburn... good schools, but not a lot of prime time exposure. No Ohio States or Georgias in his 4th rounds.
ROUNDS 5-6
As with most teams, the 5th and 6th are where he finds project players who may spend a year on special teams and the practice squad and see how they respond to NFL coaching; 5-6 are usually depth/rotational players with good upside to become starters within a couple of years and maybe provide some competition at their positions, or even just special teams. RAS scores start to matter less; he still prioritizes pure athleticism, but is more willing to set it aside if he thinks a player has some sort of special qualities.
RAS values in Round 5 range from 4.27 to 9.27, with an average of 7.27; 6th round ranges from 3.74 to 9.84, for an average of 7.6 - both comparable to his average in the 3rd round, but with much more range. By the time he gets to these later rounds, he seems to feel that with so many other things being equal, let's grab the guy with the most pure athletic ability and see what he turns into. About 70% of his picks in these 2 rounds are from major (or at least solid) college programs, with an occasional Appalachian State or Bowling Green sprinkled in.
ROUND 7
By the 7th round, he's apparently focusing on the best athletes he can find who show some signs of football skills. Average RAS is back up to 8.73 - the highest since Round 4, and a range of 3.83 to 9.89. The widest range of any round, although 7 of the 13 for whom RAS is available are 9+ and 2 more are 8+.
He's generally just throwing darts at a board here, like every other team in the 7th, hoping that one of the really good athletes who have a promising set of football tools might bloom a year or two later than most players... or a guy who may not be an extremely talented athlete, but can work his way onto the practice squad and, later, the team. Good athletes who are just raw.
Most of his 7th rounders are from premium schools ike Miami, Penn State, Nebraska, etc, who've had several years' exposure to a top-tier program but need more development (Samori Toure), or had injury concerns (Rasheed Walker).
DRAFT DAY TRADES
Expect trades. In his first 6 drafts, Gutekunst has been a real wheeler-dealer - 10 draft day trades in 6 years.
In the 1st round, Gute has made 4 trades - trading down once, and up three times. These trades brought us Jaire Alexander, Darnelle Savage, and Jordan Love.
Round 2: 2 trades back, 1 trade up... Jayden Reed, Karl Brooks, Dontayvion Wicks, and Christian Watson
Round 3: 2 trades up, getting us Owen Burks and Amari Rodgers; 1 trade back and got Jonathan Ford
He has a tendency to trade back when he see an opportunity to pick up 3rd, 4th, or 5th round picks that he can then use to trade up in the 1st and 2nd and steal an impact player who he thinks slipped through the cracks. Trading up to get a good player in the 1st or 2nd has worked well for him; mid- to late-round picks that he traded back for tend to be inconsequential - but then again, most mid- to late-round picks do.
History (along with our draft posiition, and the talent pool this year) suggests it's more likely than not Gutekunst will trade up in he 1st this weekend. But really, anything is possible, and all we can do is wait and see.
