25 crushing NFL Draft mistakes since 2000
It's way too early after just one season, in 99 out of 100 cases, to label anyone a bust, or say that a draft pick was a complete mistake, or say that one NFL team irreversibly screwed up with their crop of new players. However, it can be much easier to tell that this will be the case in some situations than in others.
We can't really say that this is the case for quarterbacks Tua Tagovailoa and Justin Herbert, who were selected with back-to-back selections in the 2020 NFL Draft. Of course, the statistics will tell you one story: Tagovailoa had 1,814 yards, 11 touchdowns and five interceptions, while Herbert had 4,336 yards, 31 touchdowns and 10 interceptions. But does this mean that the Dolphins made an undeniable mistake by taking Tagovailoa instead of Herbert with their No. 5 pick? Maybe that will become the case, but we really can't say so at this point. As sports fans, we're quick to jump to conclusions, and that's half the fun of the most contested sports debates. But we need to remember that some things just take time to play out in full, and overreactions in front offices could lead to even more mistakes being made.
We'll likely be faced with some of these debates in one year's time due to the quantity of quarterbacks who will be picked in the first round of the 2021 draft. It's completely feasible that Trevor Lawrence, Zach Wilson, Justin Fields, Trey Lance and Mac Jones — not necessarily in that order — are all gone after just the first eight or nine picks. Or, if you're of the same thought process as Chris Simms, you might think that someone like Fields could drop to the very bottom of the first round and go No. 32 overall, similarly to how Lamar Jackson fell to the last slot of the 2018 NFL Draft.
By November, will we be criticizing the Jets for picking "enter QB's name here" as opposed to "enter QB's name here"? Or will we be doing that for the 49ers, or Falcons, or Broncos, or Patriots, or... *gasp*.... the Jaguars?
Who knows? Only time will tell, as was the case for these 25 NFL Draft mistakes that teams probably regret more than they're willing to let on. And yes, there are some obvious slip-ups that you'll notice aren't in here. Where's JaMarcus Russell? He's not on here, because there weren't any other quarterback prospects that year who were likely candidates at No. 1 overall and who far outperformed Russell. It was just a bad year to draft a quarterback at the top of the draft. Instead, the 25 draft gaffes (draffes?) below occurred when a team chose one player at a certain position over another at the same position who came off the board a little bit later, and the drastic difference in production is just too much to ignore.
All statistics and draft information retrieved from Pro Football Reference.
