April 23, 2010
I wasn’t sure about the new Thursday/Friday NFL draft idea. Seemed a little unnecessary and that the NFL was thinking it was too important.
Turns out, it was a good idea, at least for me. I don’t really like watching the draft anymore. I like to keep up with the picks and trades but I don’t need the analysis. I read enough online leading up to the draft. With so many people covering the draft on tv now, the quality of analysis had dropped off a cliff. Toward the end of the night I was able to flip between NFL Net and ESPN. NFL Net was good (once Deion stopped interviewing people) and ESPN had a lot of holes (I barely heard from Mel Kiper with so many people on the panel).
The Thursday night worked because I wanted to watch the Flyers playoff game and Phillies more than the draft. Thankfully NFL Network was streaming online. I was able to fire up the draft on my laptop and flip to the Phillies during breaks and intermissions in the Flyers game.
The Friday bonus: I don’t think this was fully taken advantage of. This morning every site should have been pushing mock drafts for rounds 2 and 3 along side their recaps. Everyone was already invested in what happened in Round 1. They also had a good idea of who was left on the board. No one cares about the guys ranked in the 30s before the draft. Now, the top 10 guys not picked in the first round are known with a day of coverage to devote to them. The mock drafts have been coming out during the day but they weren’t on them this morning.
Now, the draft will pick up tonight. 6pm is a brilliant move as well. They’d lose a ton of audience if they started at 8pm, fewer people would even start watching. Now fans will get to see most of the 2nd round and maybe get hooked for the rest of the night.
Saturday for rounds 4-7, who really cares. The underrated benefit of all of this is that the NFL has given me a Saturday back. I probably won’t do anything useful with it, but I could.
March 5, 2014
September 16, 2012