FanPost

Predicting (not mocking) the Bengals 2012 draft

While it may be frustrating as a fan of this team, there are some benefits of the Bengals being extremely predictable. If you look back at the Marvin Lewis era drafts, the team has drafted almost as a reaction to the previous year. There are of course many factors that play into who the team picks in the draft (free agency results, how high the team is picking each round and presumably/hopefully their draft board versus who is available when it's time to pick). The trend however is undeniable: if the offense is ranked lower than the defense, we pick more offense players in the draft, and conversely if the defense is ranked lower than the offense, we pick more defensive players in the draft. The chart below shows the actual results.

Year

OFF

DEF

ST

Prev Year OFF Rank

Prev Year DEF Rank

Pick Diff OFF-DEF

Rank Diff OFF-DEF

2012

20

7

0

13

2011

5

3

0

20

15

2

5

2010

5

4

0

24

4

1

20

2009

6

4

1

32

12

2

20

2008

5

5

0

10

27

0

-17

2007

3

4

0

8

30

-1

-22

2006

3

4

0

6

28

-1

-22

2005

4

3

0

18

19

1

-1

2004

4

6

0

13

28

-2

-15

2003

5

4

0

18

17

1

1

The only exception is 2008 when picked the same number of offensive vs defensive players despite the large disparity between the rankings but even there is was an even number and not the opposite trend. You could say 2005 is an exception as well but I think the rankings are so close that it's within the "margin of error" for such a small sample like this.

The other trend is that our drafts are always very balanced year-to-year and obviously then also overall. I would suspect that most teams also seek balance, but not all. Dallas, for example, picked 6 offensive and 2 defensive players last year.

So who will the Bengals draft in 2012? I would anticipate that 5 picks for the offense and 4 picks for the defense, but I have suspicion that the defensive picks will actually be more weighted in the earlier rounds despite the better team ranking. We'll see...

This is a FanPost and does not necessarily reflect the views of Cincy Jungle's writers or editors. It does reflect the views of this particular fan, which is as important as the views of Cincy Jungle's writers or editors.