Several NFL GMs, including Pittsburgh’s Kevin Colbert, aren’t happy about this year’s virtual NFL Draft.
Well, former NFL executive and current CBS Sports analyst Amy Trask doesn’t feel bad for them – and neither should you.
“I’m going to bifurcate two issues,” Trask said on The DA Show. “Issue No. 1 is whether or not they believe from a societal standpoint it’s appropriate. Put that aside for a minute and let’s focus just on the logistics associated with this draft. I wrote a piece on this for The Athletic in which I said, ‘Enough. Stop. It is not hard to hold the draft in the manner in which the draft will be held.’”
Trask, who spent nearly 30 years in the NFL, can’t count how many times she heard executives whine, “No one understands how hard this is.”
Newsflash: It’s not.
“I heard this from men who were standing on the sideline of a practice field in the warmth of the Napa Valley sun in clothes that the team provided for them and washed for them, eating meals the team provided for them and cleaned up for them, and driving cars the team provided for them and gassed for them and washed for them,” Lawrence said. “No, it’s not that hard. We are all seeing that there are jobs right now which are extremely hard. There are people on the frontlines – doctors, nurses, healthcare providers, hospitals, those who clean the hospitals, provide the food in the hospitals, our first-responders, people providing essential services – those are hard jobs.
“When GMs and coaches are saying, ‘Oh, this is going to be really hard,’ stop it,” Trask continued. “It’s not hard to sit in your home and draft remotely. And you know what? If you’re scared of the technology, ask your 14-year-old to help you with the draft. You’ll be fine.”
So, why are NFL executives so frazzled about an online draft anyway?
“They don’t like things that are different, new,” Lawrence said. “And when I say, ‘they,’ it’s not fair for me to lump everyone together. There are some teams that are embracing this, some GMs that are embracing this.”
Cleveland GM Andrew Berry, who has a master’s degree in computer science from Harvard, is one example.
“Cleveland Browns fans, you’re going to be okay,” Lawrence said. “But the GMs and the coaches who have said it’s hard, [sure], it’s not their routine, it’s not what they’re used to, [and] they don’t like change. [But] it’s just not that hard. And if you’re going to say it’s hard, think about all the people who are doing things for the rest of us, the people that are doing things that really are hard.”
Trask also doesn’t buy that the virtual format will hurt a team’s draft performance.
“The draft is not a science,” she said. “There’s no enigma code. There’s no Rosetta Stone. There are mistakes every single year in the draft. If there weren’t, and if it was a science, there wouldn’t be men in the Pro Football Hall of Fame that went undrafted. So to those people that are saying there’s going to be a lot of mistakes this year, there’s always mistakes. What would be fun is to look back in four years and compare the data as to whether statistically there were more or less mistakes.”