Building a team through the draft is a consistent mantra from almost every NFL team because getting cost-controlled young players in a salary-capped league is crucial to success.

Pulling that off isn’t as easy with the draft often looking like a crapshoot, with some widely heralded prospects taken in the first round flaming out each year and the league filled with later-round gems who were overlooked coming out of college.

That can be because of bad evaluation, poor development, injuries or bad fortune but the teams that do the best to avoid it are often the ones playing deep into January.

Evaluating drafts in the immediate aftermath each spring is often foolhardy as it often takes a year or even more to see if picks worked out.

Leaguewide, 55% of all players drafted from 2021-24 were

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