Falcons, NFL teams spend millions to build draft boards

The Falcons selected running back Bijan Robinson with the eighth overall pick in the draft. He’s in line to sign a four-year contract worth $21.9 million.

Before handing over that type of money, teams want to know all they can about the players. They can see the football player on tape, but most teams also do some form of psychological and cognitive testing to go along with elaborate background checks.

The big question for some teams is how will a 21-year-old change with newfound wealth and access to millions.

“It’s really important to us to know everything that we can about the players, the people to know everything we can about them,” Fontenot said. “Look, we’re flawed human beings evaluating other flawed human beings, so it’s not a perfect science. It’s never going to be a perfect science, but it’s our job to make sure our process is to a point to where we can do our very best to cover everything. It’s that important.”

One commentator, former team executive Pat Kirwan, recently estimated that teams spend $20 million on building their draft boards.

“Yeah, it’s a big number,” Fontenot said.

There is a large variance among the teams. But most teams’ scouting departments are supported by information-technology departments, medical personnel, testing.

On the $20 million figure, ”that would not be an outrageous estimate,” Scott Pioli, a former NFL general manager and former Falcons assistant general manager, texted to the AJC.

The Falcons, under owner Arthur Blank, spare no expense. They even used his private jet to attend workouts, such as the one they had for Robinson in Austin, Texas.

“This organization top to bottom, from our owner, Arthur Blank, any resource that we need, anything we need to make sure that we can build the best possible team that’s available to us, and it’s our job to,” Fontenot said. “We’re not just looking for – because everybody has the next best thing that they can sell you, but we want to make sure that we go through the process and find things that are really going to help us, be effective and help us in the process.

“Whatever we need, if it can help us win, then it’s going to be provided to us. It’s that important.”

The Falcons’ area scouts started working on this draft class of prospects in May last year. They travel the country attending games and interviewing players, coaches and staff members on campus.

The area scouts are away from their families 10-14 days at a time. Their boots-on-the-ground approach is the foundation of the information-gathering process.

After the season, coaches are looped into the process.

Then there is the all-star game circuit before the NFL scouting combine.

After the combine, teams have as many as 30 players in for interviews and can also hold private workouts to help solidify what they’ve evaluated on video.

The Falcons, who have picked in the top 10 of the first round in each of the past three drafts, will end up with a group of players in pods who could be available to them.

“I think everybody has different processes,” Falcons coach Arthur Smith said. “Scouts go through it. Terry and I talk all the time. There are so many variables that can happen in front of you where you pick. You try to have a good understanding, more importantly, of who realistically is going to be there, especially at eight.”

Some teams hold numerous mock drafts to prepare for decision-making on the clock.

“The reality is we try to game through that, and we’re talking all the time about, ‘All right, player X is here,” Smith said. “What do you want to do?’ He may be in our pod. Well, somebody (may) trade up and take him unexpectedly or vice versa. So, we’re always trying to work through that constantly.”

The Falcons traded some of their draft capital – a fourth-round pick – in the second round to move up to take offensive lineman Matthew Bergeron with the 38th overall pick. Bergeron nearly was selected by Dallas with the 26th pick.

“We try to talk through that stuff,” Smith said. “That’s why all of these calls are made, parameters if you want to go back, move up, so you understand. You’ve got that pod of players, and if you’ve got somebody that we think this guy can change the whole program – certainly, you’re going to have those conversations ahead of time.”

The Robinson pod was thoroughly scrutinized.

“We did a lot of work with guys that we thought would be in that pod we were picking in, whether we moved up or back a few spots,” Smith said. “We went down to Austin and were able to work Bijan out. Took him to dinner the night before. Worked him out. Felt really good about it.”

The Falcons held a similar meeting and workout with wide receiver Drake London in 2022 in California. Things went well during the Robinson visit.

“Some of the things that we were going to ask him to do, you see it on the tape, with the background, not just the running back, the running back stuff was obvious on the tape,” Smith said. “But the versatility part where you use him and where he has been effective. I mean, he did that at Texas at times, but his background, playing in the slot, was another big piece of it. That’s intriguing. We feel he is an explosive weapon, a home-run hitter however he gets the football in his hands.”

Kyle Smith, the Falcons’ vice president of player personnel, is a proponent of the old-school manual draft board.

“Magnets, we can put our hands on them,” Smith said. “We’ve got interns, scouting assistants sticking the magnets and putting them up on the board. It’s pretty old-school.

“We do have a lot of technology. We have a virtual board that’s on the computer that you can drag and do all of those things. ... I’m an old-school guy that way. Draft boards, I’d rather write it down, write them on the board, than have all the virtual stuff. I don’t trust that stuff.”

The Giants used the magnet system last season, but migrated to a 42-screen draft room that covered 1,200 square feet with no windows for the 2023 draft.

“The thought on changing the draft room and revamping the way we did things in here was just trying to evolve with technology and modernize the football operation the best we could,” Giants general manager Joe Schoen told his team’s website. “We went away from the manual process of printing out magnets, putting labels on magnets, manually moving them up and down the board.”

The information gathered preparing for the draft may come in handy for years to come.

“You don’t want to waste anybody’s time or money, and there is a cost to everything,” Arthur Smith said. “It’s not just return you may get on the particular picks you put into this draft. There’s information you get that can help you in free agency, that can help you post-draft, and certainly a lot of these players, you know how transactional the National Football League is.”

Once the information is stored, it can be used later.

“It’s not just this draft class, but it can pay off as the year goes on or maybe a couple of years from now,” Smith said. “That’s what you hope as you sustain success in a program.”

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