Vikings, Howie Roseman, Jameson Williams discussed on The Bill Simmons Podcast
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Straight trading backwards from 12 to 32. For what they got. And for what that point of the draft was, because look, you could say whatever you want about drafts, but they always have tears. And there had clearly hit a point in that draft, was there was the one awesome receiver left, even though he was coming off the ACL injury. And then you had two more really, really highly regarded defensive players, and they were going to go in some order, 12, 13, 14. And I just don't understand why you would trade out of that, especially when all of these teams wanted receivers and what you saw a la Vega, you know, what just with the saints paid just to get him, I didn't get that at all. I still don't understand it. Yeah, that was one that was certainly a little bit perplexing, especially trading with a team in your own division in the Detroit Lions to make that move. I like who the Lions went up to God. I like their strategy in general. Now, that's not to say, I don't dislike who the Vikings ultimately selected and they thought that there was some value there in making that move. Louis scene is great. I just think you have to get if you're going down 20 spots, I have to get a first round pick back. That's the history of the draft. That's too many spots. You're going from top 12, we're about to drop off, I need a first. That's the price to do that. And they just didn't get it. Well, there are certain GMs, and I'm not saying the lines team has been there for a while, but there are certain GMs like the Vikings GM. First year guys in the door and some of these guys are not getting the right type of value as they should on some of these trades and GMs like Howie roseman are taking advantage of them and some of the other GMs around the league, taking advantage of some of the more youthful, less experienced GMs that are looking to make moves. And in general, like the common thought processes, you gain value by trading down. Like it is a plus EV move because you're going to get extra picks in doing so and the draft is so difficult to hit on a specific player that having these extra arrows in your quiver will provide more upside, big picture. And that's why generally speaking, you do get more value in doing that. But the Vikings move, I agree, it was one of the more perplexing trade downs based upon what they got in return. Well, especially during the year when the receiver getting the receiver on The Rookie contract was like the new inefficiency because of how crazy the receiver prices got. So even if the lines have to wait, I don't know. To a week 11 for Williams or even next year. It's still worth it. If that guy's a number one receiver, you see that. Exactly. And if you look at the wide receiver run, was basically ended there after crystal lava, like the last guy on the board that was viewed in the same class at the top of the first round is Jameson Williams. After that, it was like Jahan dotson and treylon Burks, who obviously, I believe, the run on wide receivers pulled them up the draft board as well. No question. Nobody thought that John Dodson should be going 16 overall. And yet he was because if you need a wide receiver and all the other guys have already been picked 12, what are you going to do? So that's why those guys got shifted up the board, but that pick at number 12 had so much inherent value at that time. The value increased over that pick as soon as the saints took Chris olave at number 11. Yeah, and that's why I didn't get it. And that, you know, I don't go crazy, but oh my God, I can't believe they took this guy here, but it was just so clear that we're about to go crater. One last thing on the rest edge, you said, since 2015, teams that had a legitimate rest edge, 92 of this is home favorites of three to ten points since 2015, rest edge. 92 and 38. Straight up, 70, almost 71%. And then against the spread at 70, 58 and two. Those are real numbers. Well, those are not only real numbers, Bill. Look at the comparison when you talk about equal rest or rest deficit to see, does this actually matter? I will tell you this. The NFL tries to say that this is a minor thing. This doesn't really matter that much. And so if that's true, we should be able to look back at historical data and that's why they probably don't want to look at the point spread element of it. But the point spread is the equalizer that we need to factor into context. So you had equal was 45% and if there's a deficit, it was 40.8 against the spread. So we went from 54.7 to 45 to 40.8 if there was actually a deficit. Those are real numbers. Those are definitely real numbers. And the reason I'm segregating out home favorites of three to ten points is because we want to look at the team that is viewed as better. The better team in general should have more of an advantage if they have a rest edge. They should be in a better position because think about it like one of the reasons you guys end up doing pretty well, you've got a great coaching staff. You know how to prepare the players if you have a short Thursday game, you know what needs to happen? Whereas an inexperienced coach or a bad coach may not know the right strategy to get this team ready for a short week road game on a Thursday night like Belichick does. And so looking at home favorites of three to ten points generally we're talking about this team is viewed as the Betty market as the superior team and double digit favorites are generally speaking terrible, whether you're gonna look at, rest edge, not rest edge. So you could include them if you want to or you could take them out like I did is really not gonna do a make a difference to the general comparison which is these teams that are viewed as the better team by the Las Vegas betting market when they play at home. If they have a rest edge, they're covering the spread almost 55% of the time. If they have equal rest, it's down to 45% of the time. That's basically a ten percentage point differential. And then if they have a deficit, even though their viewed is the better team, they're down to 40.8% ATS. As you said, real numbers. These are things that are different speakers. Different major digital especially with a tease too. If you're getting, if I know I get 55% to cover this straight up, then I know you hate teases, but you're never going to make me a house quit. If I get that on a teaser number, that maybe that's up to like 75%, something like that. Just to win the game. Easily. And I think the difficult part for somebody listening to the show right now is, okay, so you're telling me these numbers, but how do I know you told me the big picture rest advantage? How do I know on a per game basis during the season who's got the rest edge? Because most of you already know. Most people aren't sitting at home like running these calculations. What I will tell you is I am planning on this year in the book. The 500 page book for every single team chapter on the very first page of that team's chapter. I'm going to tell you every single week if this team has a rest advantage or a rest disadvantage in that game. And that.