Stuff from our new GM

[mondry]

Agreed, nice read, hope he nails it this draft!

[dead_poet]

Final preparations

Spielman said he's no closer to determining whether Southern California left tackle Matt Kalil, LSU cornerback Morris Claiborne or Oklahoma State receiver Justin Blackmon will be his pick at No. 3 overall in the NFL Draft on Thursday -- if the Vikings stay put.

The personnel department wrapped meetings with coaches on Wednesday. Spielman said he spent much of the past four days finalizing grades and playing out possible scenarios the Vikings could face in Rounds 2 and 3.

"The other thing you've got to look at," Spielman said, "is knowing the needs of the teams behind you, because there's a lot of potential for us in the second round and even in the third round to potentially move back if we feel that strong about the depth in those rounds where we can still get a good player and continue to add draft picks. I think that would be something we would be definitely interested in doing."

As for trading the No. 3 pick, Spielman said he has received calls from "some teams" but declined to say which teams or how many. He wouldn't even rule out a scenario in which the Vikings trade so far back Kalil, Claiborne and Blackmon all are off the board.

"If someone's willing to give you something that you think is just too good to pass up, you have to look at that option as well," Spielman said, "because if it is something where you have some future potentially number one picks in '13 and '14, those are things that you have to definitely keep in consideration."

http://www.1500espn.com/sportswire/Note ... _2_3042212

[dead_poet]

Spielman has little difficulty going up and down the roster, citing evidence to prove these Vikings are on an upward arc.

There's the dedication and enthusiasm second-year quarterback Christian Ponder has shown throughout the offseason, eager to take ownership of the offense.

There's the leadership skills and savvy of rookie safety Harrison Smith, one of two first-round draft picks expected to start right away.

There's Matt Kalil's strength and agility, Jerome Simpson's field-stretching speed and Chris Cook's rapid growth at cornerback.

And then there's the overall depth -- "very much improved" in Spielman's eyes -- which should significantly heighten the daily battles in Mankato.

So where is all this positive energy, atypical for a team that finished last season at 3-13, coming from? Maybe it's the predictable, yet often hollow, hope that the preseason brings through every NFL city. Maybe legitimate strides have indeed been made. And maybe there's a bit of youthful exuberance kicking in, too.

"We have a young team but we have a hungry team," said linebacker/defensive lineman Everson Griffen. "And you have to use that hunger to stay focused. You can't always worry about the next opponent. First, worry about the team. Once we get us right, battling that next opponent is going to come easy."

http://www.startribune.com/sports/vikin ... ml?refer=y

[Mothman]

http://www.startribune.com/sports/vikin ... ml?refer=y

Thanks for the link. That was a good read!

[dead_poet]

Some really good stuff here. Latest powow with Rick Spielman.

http://www.1500espn.com/sportswire/QA_w ... vate111412

[cstelter]

Some really good stuff here. Latest powow with Rick Spielman.

http://www.1500espn.com/sportswire/QA_w ... vate111412

How do you grade this rookie class so far?

"I put expectations on myself and our staff that every one of our draft picks should be successful. Our goal is to be 100 percent right. Every year, when they're coming into December, we'll give an evaluation and our pro guys will write up evaluations of rookies on other teams. But we do -- just like coaches do -- we self-scout ourselves on, what is our success rate individually when we're grading these guys? What is our success rate broken down to position?

"If we miss a guy, we spend a lot of time on why we missed. What was the reason we missed this player? Even if it's not one of our players and we had graded someone wrong and he's either successful or he failed (with another team), depending on the kind of grade, we go back and evaluate that and we talk about that.

"To me, you have to do that in order to get better yourself and so you don't make a similar mistake. I put a huge point of emphasis on that, especially coming up now that you've got a pretty good feel for this rookie class. We'll have a half-a-day meeting on that."

I really liked reading this. It seems like a very 'smart' approach to a complex problem. This is the type of thinking that can really pay off years down the road if they can keep the process in place that long. Maybe this is just scouting 101, but it seems like it is very thorough tracking down root cause of overvaluing or undervaluing a propsect.

[Eli]

I really liked reading this. It seems like a very 'smart' approach to a complex problem. This is the type of thinking that can really pay off years down the road if they can keep the process in place that long. Maybe this is just scouting 101, but it seems like it is very thorough tracking down root cause of overvaluing or undervaluing a propsect.

Sounded pretty good until he got to "We'll have a half-a-day meeting on that." Wow. All of four hours devoted to evaluating your previous year's draft performance? Pat yourself on the back some more, why don't you?

[Mothman]

Sounded pretty good until he got to "We'll have a half-a-day meeting on that." Wow. All of four hours devoted to evaluating your previous year's draft performance? Pat yourself on the back some more, why don't you?

They might spend half a day meeting about it but that doesn't mean it's all the time they devote to it! If you consider the context, it sounds like a lot of research and evaluation probably happens prior to the meeting and then they have a meeting to go over the results. Plus, something tells me the typical work day for an NFL GM might be longer than 8 hours...

[mondry]

Sounded pretty good until he got to "We'll have a half-a-day meeting on that." Wow. All of four hours devoted to evaluating your previous year's draft performance? Pat yourself on the back some more, why don't you?

Well half a day is 12 hours so that sounds pretty in-depth to me. In all fairness though, and it is still early, it's a well deserved pat on the back!

[cstelter]

Sounded pretty good until he got to "We'll have a half-a-day meeting on that." Wow. All of four hours devoted to evaluating your previous year's draft performance? Pat yourself on the back some more, why don't you?

I've got to remember to read the *whole* bit... I'm forever skimming and dropping off the last sentence. I agree, a half day sounds a bit light. I would assume they would want to review their top 10 on the board at each of their picks and how those guys turned out vs how they graded them. Then they probably also have to try to identify all draftees below their pick who turned out better than the guy they picked if they weren't on the top 10 of their board and figure out why they weren't on their top 10.

Assuming they are right at least 50% of the time (and thus don't need to discuss much about half of the guys who turned out about as well as they had graded them), that could mean there are maybe 5-8 guys at each draft pick to talk about. For 7 picks that's 35-56 guys and at 5 minutes discussion about each, I suppose that could be about a half a day. That's a lot of assumptions and I'm hardly qualified to even be throwing out such estimates.

So maybe it's a bit light, or maybe not. I guess the fact that the process is in play still encourages me.

[Mothman]

I've got to remember to read the *whole* bit... I'm forever skimming and dropping off the last sentence. I agree, a half day sounds a bit light. I would assume they would want to review their top 10 on the board at each of their picks and how those guys turned out vs how they graded them. Then they probably also have to try to identify all draftees below their pick who turned out better than the guy they picked if they weren't on the top 10 of their board and figure out why they weren't on their top 10.

Assuming they are right at least 50% of the time (and thus don't need to discuss much about half of the guys who turned out about as well as they had graded them), that could mean there are maybe 5-8 guys at each draft pick to talk about. For 7 picks that's 35-56 guys and at 5 minutes discussion about each, I suppose that could be about a half a day. That's a lot of assumptions and I'm hardly qualified to even be throwing out such estimates.

So maybe it's a bit light, or maybe not. I guess the fact that the process is in play still encourages me.

It IS encouraging and in my experience, meetings usually involve preparation so who knows how much examination they do of these players before they meet to discuss them.

In the same interview, Spielman said the following:

"I think what we'll do at the end of this season, just like our normal procedure we go through. It takes about 3½ days to go through an evaluation on each one of our players. We talk about each player -- not only what they do on the field, from A to Z. We have (vice president of football operations) Rob Brzezinski will come in we'll talk. I'll sit with him and Leslie and George and just understand where we're at from the financial standpoint and the decisions we have to make.

If they are that spending that much time examining their own players, they're probably being pretty thorough when evaluating some of the players they passed on in the draft.

[mondry]

If they are that spending that much time examining their own players, they're probably being pretty thorough when evaluating some of the players they passed on in the draft.

Oh for sure! The "half a day meeting" to me just sounds like the conclusion or wrap up of many many days of analyzing and talking about players.

[losperros]

Oh for sure! The "half a day meeting" to me just sounds like the conclusion or wrap up of many many days of analyzing and talking about players.

I don't think there is any doubt about that.

I'd love to sit in on some of those meetings and give my point of view. Well...that is until they threw me out (which would probably be 30 seconds into the meeting).

[Mothman]

I don't think there is any doubt about that.

I'd love to sit in on some of those meetings and give my point of view. Well...that is until they threw me out (which would probably be 30 seconds into the meeting).

Do you really think it would take that long?

[losperros]

Do you really think it would take that long?

They'd have to catch me first. I'm pretty quick. Really!