Due diligence on draftees?

Originally posted by redrathman:

Originally posted by danimal:
great point, and evidently they did not do a great job with due diligence.

I would say a player falling is to be expected, it pretty much happens almost every year, so yes you have to do due dilligence even on unlikely players falling to you.

Some where along the line somebody should have asked themselves:
If Stafford dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?
If Jason Smith dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?
If Tyson Jackson dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?
If Michael Crabtree dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?

Being prepared with that kind of knowledge is exactly what due diligence means.

They all get paid roughly the same with a variance of a few million either way. It's called the 'slotting system' for a reason.

You just don't get what some of us are saying. I think due diligence means something different to me than it does to you.

I criticize the Niners because I do excellent due diligence in my own work, so I expect nothing less from others.

If I were a GM I would expect nothing less than a report on ALL prospects for our pick and a "estimated" demand figure.

That figure would be based on.

1. The Slotting Guidelines(some of you are calling it a system but clearly it is really just a guideline)
2. Where the "Experts" mock him at
3. Known tendencies of the agent
4. Personal factors, such as his background, personality, psych evals
5. His financial situation

I am in no way saying this would have changed my mind on pulling the trigger on the selection, BUT to go into this without at least understanding that Michael Crabtree at #10 is less likely to follow the Slotted GUIDELINE.....is just pure ignorance

And keep in mind I don't include asking the player how much money he is going to want. Ha. Due diligence also means you have to do your own independent research

[ Edited by danimal on Sep 8, 2009 at 13:45:47 ]

Originally posted by nj49erfan:
With all do respect to a vet on this board this may be one of the worst posts I have ever read. Just so we are clear here you are mad because:

1. (Forget the fact that this is illegal by NFL rules for a moment) The 49ers were unable to contact all 15 or so people who may have still been available at the number 10 spot in which they would have picked if they were still there and ask the player if they would be willing to sign if we drafted them?
2. You would want us to pass up on a talent like Crabtree or someone of the caliber because they said they wouldn't sign with us?

Seriously? Really?

First, the Texans had the first pick and are allowed to negotiate with any player they want. Until the team with the first pick selects someone the next team drafting is not allowed to discuss any contract details with any draftee. This year was the first year the NFL allowed the team with the second pick to negotiate a contract with a darftee if the team with the first pick overall has already come to terms with the number one pick.

Second, the Texans did not ask who would sign. They asked how much guaranteed money it would take to sign each player. But again this is a luxuary only granted to the first team as if everyone could do it you could imagine a team like the redskins would tell Matt Stafford or Sanchez to hold out because they would offer a lot more money. Thus ruining the draft system all together.

Third, what draftee is going to tell any organization before the draft they will not sign?

Lastly, even if you could do this you take the best talent and assume they will realize 16 million guaranteed is better then no million guaranteed. To pass up on talent because you think they may not sign is stupid and negligent.

Now please proceed with calling me a newb lol.

good job noob

Originally posted by danimal:

Originally posted by redrathman:

Originally posted by danimal:
great point, and evidently they did not do a great job with due diligence.

I would say a player falling is to be expected, it pretty much happens almost every year, so yes you have to do due dilligence even on unlikely players falling to you.

Some where along the line somebody should have asked themselves:
If Stafford dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?
If Jason Smith dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?
If Tyson Jackson dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?
If Michael Crabtree dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?

Being prepared with that kind of knowledge is exactly what due diligence means.

They all get paid roughly the same with a variance of a few million either way. It's called the 'slotting system' for a reason.

You just don't get what some of us are saying. I think due diligence means something different to me than it does to you.

I criticize the Niners because I do excellent due diligence in my own work, so I expect nothing less from others.

If I were a GM I would expect nothing less than a report on ALL prospects for our pick and a "estimated" demand figure.

That figure would be based on.

1. The Slotting Guidelines(some of you are calling it a system but clearly it is really just a guideline)
2. Where the "Experts" mock him at
3. Known tendencies of the agent
4. Personal factors, such as his background, personality, psych evals
5. His financial situation

I am in no way saying this would have changed my mind on pulling the trigger on the selection, BUT to go into this without at least understanding that Michael Crabtree at #10 is less likely to follow the Slotted GUIDELINE.....is just pure ignorance

And keep in mind I don't include asking the player how much money he is going to want. Ha. Due diligence also means you have to do your own independent research

so if you still would have taken Crabtree, how do you know that the team didn't do its "due diligence" and decided it was worth the risk of a holdout, Hmmmm???

First, welcome back, doc. I was wondering if you had gotten disgusted with the quality of posts here. But it turns out that was not the case. Best wishes to you from here on out.

Now, back to Crabtree. My attitude is that he has become a blessing in disguise. Too many HIGH draft picks are not earning the incredible sums they are now demanding. So if you are going to overpay, I argue that we would be better off overpaying the better free agents. At least they have proven themselves in the NFL. Provided our personnel guys know what they are doing, there should be less risk.

We can be on the cutting edge of a new trend in the NFL: trading away our first round pick in the future if it is above the top 12, and use the extra picks and the extra money. When you have a surplus of talent, as NE apparently does, you can trade one of your good veterans to Oakland for their # 1 pick.

Originally posted by valrod33:

Originally posted by pasodoc9er:
Just out of curiousity, did the 9ers contact first rd picks 5-15 before draft day to see if any of them were drafted by us that they would indeed sign? Remember the Texans and Mario Williams instead of Reggie Bush, because the Texans knew Bush would not sign. Did we do any pre draft contacting like that, or did we just trust everything to luck?

To not do the above is not neglicence, it is stupidity, and results in the 9ers having the only unsigned first rounder in the nfl. That is an award we do not wish to have. Is anyone in our front office---scot, jed---still alive and able to actually manage a team , or are they on auto pilot, hoping that things just work out?

Nobody thought Crabtree was gonna drop to 10, so why would they have contacted him to see if he would sign. This is jsut an unfortunate situation, this is The 9ers fault for not contacting Crabtree to see if he would sign if we drafted him

kind of off topic but i'll say this.....

Nobody did expect him to be there, and we were really lucky. So why can't we pay him a little more than slot just because of that? Why do we have to play hardball when we and everybody knows we got lucky to have him drop this far.

Crabtree is a really special player....just pay the man. I disagree with everything Deipn Sanders said except for this....meet him halfway, or at least budge a little bit to get the ball moving again instead of trying to maneuver our way with goofy little incentives that he will likely never reach.

Look at our recieving core...we need him on our team.

Originally posted by AllTimeGreat:

Originally posted by valrod33:

Originally posted by pasodoc9er:
Just out of curiousity, did the 9ers contact first rd picks 5-15 before draft day to see if any of them were drafted by us that they would indeed sign? Remember the Texans and Mario Williams instead of Reggie Bush, because the Texans knew Bush would not sign. Did we do any pre draft contacting like that, or did we just trust everything to luck?

To not do the above is not neglicence, it is stupidity, and results in the 9ers having the only unsigned first rounder in the nfl. That is an award we do not wish to have. Is anyone in our front office---scot, jed---still alive and able to actually manage a team , or are they on auto pilot, hoping that things just work out?

Nobody thought Crabtree was gonna drop to 10, so why would they have contacted him to see if he would sign. This is jsut an unfortunate situation, this is The 9ers fault for not contacting Crabtree to see if he would sign if we drafted him

kind of off topic but i'll say this.....

Nobody did expect him to be there, and we were really lucky. So why can't we pay him a little more than slot just because of that? Why do we have to play hardball when we and everybody knows we got lucky to have him drop this far.

Crabtree is a really special player....just pay the man. I disagree with everything Deipn Sanders said except for this....meet him halfway, or at least budge a little bit to get the ball moving again instead of trying to maneuver our way with goofy little incentives that he will likely never reach.

Look at our recieving core...we need him on our team.

Its not about Incentives. The niners could easliy change the criteria. He wants guarantee money. Thats the true hold up. He doesn't want to have to earn it.

Originally posted by modninerfan:

Originally posted by nj49erfan:
With all do respect to a vet on this board this may be one of the worst posts I have ever read. Just so we are clear here you are mad because:

1. (Forget the fact that this is illegal by NFL rules for a moment) The 49ers were unable to contact all 15 or so people who may have still been available at the number 10 spot in which they would have picked if they were still there and ask the player if they would be willing to sign if we drafted them?
2. You would want us to pass up on a talent like Crabtree or someone of the caliber because they said they wouldn't sign with us?

Seriously? Really?

First, the Texans had the first pick and are allowed to negotiate with any player they want. Until the team with the first pick selects someone the next team drafting is not allowed to discuss any contract details with any draftee. This year was the first year the NFL allowed the team with the second pick to negotiate a contract with a darftee if the team with the first pick overall has already come to terms with the number one pick.

Second, the Texans did not ask who would sign. They asked how much guaranteed money it would take to sign each player. But again this is a luxuary only granted to the first team as if everyone could do it you could imagine a team like the redskins would tell Matt Stafford or Sanchez to hold out because they would offer a lot more money. Thus ruining the draft system all together.

Third, what draftee is going to tell any organization before the draft they will not sign?

Lastly, even if you could do this you take the best talent and assume they will realize 16 million guaranteed is better then no million guaranteed. To pass up on talent because you think they may not sign is stupid and negligent.

Now please proceed with calling me a newb lol.

good job noob

!!! Well, if you insist. But it was nice work, noob!

Originally posted by pasodoc9er:
Just out of curiousity, did the 9ers contact first rd picks 5-15 before draft day to see if any of them were drafted by us that they would indeed sign? Remember the Texans and Mario Williams instead of Reggie Bush, because the Texans knew Bush would not sign. Did we do any pre draft contacting like that, or did we just trust everything to luck?

To not do the above is not neglicence, it is stupidity, and results in the 9ers having the only unsigned first rounder in the nfl. That is an award we do not wish to have. Is anyone in our front office---scot, jed---still alive and able to actually manage a team , or are they on auto pilot, hoping that things just work out?

Perhaps they did, and Crabtree and/or his agent lied. Couldn't image what benefit it would be to a player to say they wouldn't sign. In this case, the result would have been Crabtree falling to #11 or farther...

So what exactly would you expect Parker to say? No, don't pick my player at #10, because he expects more than #10 money? They are going to tell you what you want to hear so that their player gets drafted. So I don't see why the 49ers would even bother asking the question since that is the case.

This does remind me of a dilbert comic, though:
http://www.dilbert.com/2009-08-30/

Originally posted by dirtysouthniner:

Originally posted by AllTimeGreat:

Originally posted by valrod33:

Originally posted by pasodoc9er:
Just out of curiousity, did the 9ers contact first rd picks 5-15 before draft day to see if any of them were drafted by us that they would indeed sign? Remember the Texans and Mario Williams instead of Reggie Bush, because the Texans knew Bush would not sign. Did we do any pre draft contacting like that, or did we just trust everything to luck?

To not do the above is not neglicence, it is stupidity, and results in the 9ers having the only unsigned first rounder in the nfl. That is an award we do not wish to have. Is anyone in our front office---scot, jed---still alive and able to actually manage a team , or are they on auto pilot, hoping that things just work out?

Nobody thought Crabtree was gonna drop to 10, so why would they have contacted him to see if he would sign. This is jsut an unfortunate situation, this is The 9ers fault for not contacting Crabtree to see if he would sign if we drafted him

kind of off topic but i'll say this.....

Nobody did expect him to be there, and we were really lucky. So why can't we pay him a little more than slot just because of that? Why do we have to play hardball when we and everybody knows we got lucky to have him drop this far.

Crabtree is a really special player....just pay the man. I disagree with everything Deipn Sanders said except for this....meet him halfway, or at least budge a little bit to get the ball moving again instead of trying to maneuver our way with goofy little incentives that he will likely never reach.

Look at our recieving core...we need him on our team.

Its not about Incentives. The niners could easliy change the criteria. He wants guarantee money. Thats the true hold up. He doesn't want to have to earn it.

I know. the 9ers (at least according to Deion who could be talking out of his ass) are trying to put a bunch of incentives in the contract that has little chance of making....just increase the guaranteed money a bit....we need him on our team.

Originally posted by AllTimeGreat:

Originally posted by dirtysouthniner:

Originally posted by AllTimeGreat:

Originally posted by valrod33:

Originally posted by pasodoc9er:
Just out of curiousity, did the 9ers contact first rd picks 5-15 before draft day to see if any of them were drafted by us that they would indeed sign? Remember the Texans and Mario Williams instead of Reggie Bush, because the Texans knew Bush would not sign. Did we do any pre draft contacting like that, or did we just trust everything to luck?

To not do the above is not neglicence, it is stupidity, and results in the 9ers having the only unsigned first rounder in the nfl. That is an award we do not wish to have. Is anyone in our front office---scot, jed---still alive and able to actually manage a team , or are they on auto pilot, hoping that things just work out?

Nobody thought Crabtree was gonna drop to 10, so why would they have contacted him to see if he would sign. This is jsut an unfortunate situation, this is The 9ers fault for not contacting Crabtree to see if he would sign if we drafted him

kind of off topic but i'll say this.....

Nobody did expect him to be there, and we were really lucky. So why can't we pay him a little more than slot just because of that? Why do we have to play hardball when we and everybody knows we got lucky to have him drop this far.

Crabtree is a really special player....just pay the man. I disagree with everything Deipn Sanders said except for this....meet him halfway, or at least budge a little bit to get the ball moving again instead of trying to maneuver our way with goofy little incentives that he will likely never reach.

Look at our recieving core...we need him on our team.

Its not about Incentives. The niners could easliy change the criteria. He wants guarantee money. Thats the true hold up. He doesn't want to have to earn it.

I know. the 9ers (at least according to Deion who could be talking out of his ass) are trying to put a bunch of incentives in the contract that has little chance of making....just increase the guaranteed money a bit....we need him on our team.

I think the problem is he wants alot more not a little bit. We better stop chatting about Crabtree otherwise this tread is going to be locked and merged

Originally posted by HessianDud:

Originally posted by danimal:

Originally posted by redrathman:

Originally posted by danimal:
great point, and evidently they did not do a great job with due diligence.

I would say a player falling is to be expected, it pretty much happens almost every year, so yes you have to do due dilligence even on unlikely players falling to you.

Some where along the line somebody should have asked themselves:
If Stafford dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?
If Jason Smith dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?
If Tyson Jackson dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?
If Michael Crabtree dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?

Being prepared with that kind of knowledge is exactly what due diligence means.

They all get paid roughly the same with a variance of a few million either way. It's called the 'slotting system' for a reason.

You just don't get what some of us are saying. I think due diligence means something different to me than it does to you.

I criticize the Niners because I do excellent due diligence in my own work, so I expect nothing less from others.

If I were a GM I would expect nothing less than a report on ALL prospects for our pick and a "estimated" demand figure.

That figure would be based on.

1. The Slotting Guidelines(some of you are calling it a system but clearly it is really just a guideline)
2. Where the "Experts" mock him at
3. Known tendencies of the agent
4. Personal factors, such as his background, personality, psych evals
5. His financial situation

I am in no way saying this would have changed my mind on pulling the trigger on the selection, BUT to go into this without at least understanding that Michael Crabtree at #10 is less likely to follow the Slotted GUIDELINE.....is just pure ignorance

And keep in mind I don't include asking the player how much money he is going to want. Ha. Due diligence also means you have to do your own independent research

so if you still would have taken Crabtree, how do you know that the team didn't do its "due diligence" and decided it was worth the risk of a holdout, Hmmmm???

You are right I don't know what they did or did not do. BUT my due diligence would have produced a likely figure we would have to pay. So in essence this report would have told me I can either draft him or not.

The Niners not budging from the slotted pay scale tells me they were never prepared to be asked for more.

So basically you have to assume an answer to these questions.

Why did the Niners not anticipate Crabtree would want to exceed the guideline model because he believes he is the best WR?
The only possible answers I see is.
A. They did not perform good due diligence
B. This falls outside of due diligence because the odds of it happening make it very unlikely and not worth anyones effort
C. They did somewhat anticipate he would want more

If the answer is C. Then why are they so inflexible now?

[ Edited by danimal on Sep 8, 2009 at 14:22:58 ]

Originally posted by danimal:

Originally posted by HessianDud:

Originally posted by danimal:

Originally posted by redrathman:

Originally posted by danimal:
great point, and evidently they did not do a great job with due diligence.

I would say a player falling is to be expected, it pretty much happens almost every year, so yes you have to do due dilligence even on unlikely players falling to you.

Some where along the line somebody should have asked themselves:
If Stafford dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?
If Jason Smith dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?
If Tyson Jackson dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?
If Michael Crabtree dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?

Being prepared with that kind of knowledge is exactly what due diligence means.

They all get paid roughly the same with a variance of a few million either way. It's called the 'slotting system' for a reason.

You just don't get what some of us are saying. I think due diligence means something different to me than it does to you.

I criticize the Niners because I do excellent due diligence in my own work, so I expect nothing less from others.

If I were a GM I would expect nothing less than a report on ALL prospects for our pick and a "estimated" demand figure.

That figure would be based on.

1. The Slotting Guidelines(some of you are calling it a system but clearly it is really just a guideline)
2. Where the "Experts" mock him at
3. Known tendencies of the agent
4. Personal factors, such as his background, personality, psych evals
5. His financial situation

I am in no way saying this would have changed my mind on pulling the trigger on the selection, BUT to go into this without at least understanding that Michael Crabtree at #10 is less likely to follow the Slotted GUIDELINE.....is just pure ignorance

And keep in mind I don't include asking the player how much money he is going to want. Ha. Due diligence also means you have to do your own independent research

so if you still would have taken Crabtree, how do you know that the team didn't do its "due diligence" and decided it was worth the risk of a holdout, Hmmmm???

You are right I don't know if what they did or did not do. BUT my due diligence would have produced a likely figure we would have to pay. So in essence this report would have told me I can either draft him or not.

The Niners not budging from the slotted pay scale tells me they were never prepared to be asked for more.

So basically you have to assume an answer to these questions.

Why did the Niners not anticipate Crabtree would want to exceed the guideline model because he believes he is the best WR?
The only possible answers I see is.
A. They did not perform good due diligence
B. This falls outside of due diligence because the odds of it happening make it very unlikely and not worth anyones effort
C. They did somewhat anticipate he would want more

If the answer is C. Then why are they so inflexible now?

The only way you can tell if a player is likely to hold out is to check the record of his agent. In this case the agent has a record of holding his players out. But how would we have felt if the niners passed on Crabtree because they didn't think they could sign him. We would have been a lot more pissed then we are now.

Originally posted by danimal:

Originally posted by HessianDud:

Originally posted by danimal:

Originally posted by redrathman:

Originally posted by danimal:
great point, and evidently they did not do a great job with due diligence.

I would say a player falling is to be expected, it pretty much happens almost every year, so yes you have to do due dilligence even on unlikely players falling to you.

Some where along the line somebody should have asked themselves:
If Stafford dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?
If Jason Smith dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?
If Tyson Jackson dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?
If Michael Crabtree dropped to us at 10, how much would he want?

Being prepared with that kind of knowledge is exactly what due diligence means.

They all get paid roughly the same with a variance of a few million either way. It's called the 'slotting system' for a reason.

You just don't get what some of us are saying. I think due diligence means something different to me than it does to you.

I criticize the Niners because I do excellent due diligence in my own work, so I expect nothing less from others.

If I were a GM I would expect nothing less than a report on ALL prospects for our pick and a "estimated" demand figure.

That figure would be based on.

1. The Slotting Guidelines(some of you are calling it a system but clearly it is really just a guideline)
2. Where the "Experts" mock him at
3. Known tendencies of the agent
4. Personal factors, such as his background, personality, psych evals
5. His financial situation

I am in no way saying this would have changed my mind on pulling the trigger on the selection, BUT to go into this without at least understanding that Michael Crabtree at #10 is less likely to follow the Slotted GUIDELINE.....is just pure ignorance

And keep in mind I don't include asking the player how much money he is going to want. Ha. Due diligence also means you have to do your own independent research

so if you still would have taken Crabtree, how do you know that the team didn't do its "due diligence" and decided it was worth the risk of a holdout, Hmmmm???

You are right I don't know what they did or did not do. BUT my due diligence would have produced a likely figure we would have to pay. So in essence this report would have told me I can either draft him or not.

The Niners not budging from the slotted pay scale tells me they were never prepared to be asked for more.

So basically you have to assume an answer to these questions.

Why did the Niners not anticipate Crabtree would want to exceed the guideline model because he believes he is the best WR?
The only possible answers I see is.
A. They did not perform good due diligence
B. This falls outside of due diligence because the odds of it happening make it very unlikely and not worth anyones effort
C. They did somewhat anticipate he would want more

If the answer is C. Then why are they so inflexible now?

I think you're misinterpreting the purview of due diligence in this case. They couldn't have discussed contract issues with any players, so it wouldn't have been a big part of their pre-draft work. They couldn't have laid out a number and said, "What do you think of that?" They can only go on the "slotting guidelines" as to what should be a reasonable contract for the position they're drafting in.

Pre-draft due diligence, to me, includes physical workouts, scouting of game tapes, interviews, investigations into personal history. So perhaps those last two things would have led the Niners to believe that Crabtree would potentially hold out, but they couldn't have known that

A) he would be available at 10
B) that DHB would get drafted ahead of him
C) that DHB would get such a ridiculous deal

Those are the things that are really determining the stalemate, and how could any amount of due diligence have provided the answers to that?

Furthermore, players hold out every year. Its part of the business and teams are prepared for that. Sometimes the holdouts last longer than usual, sometimes they holdouts are completely unreasonable. But part of the due diligence of the draft is knowing who the really special players are, what their risks are, and determining the value of them to the team. it's a risk-reward system and I believe that when the Niners saw Crabtree sitting there, they decided that the reward was worth the risk.

Originally posted by danimal:
You just don't get what some of us are saying. I think due diligence means something different to me than it does to you.

I criticize the Niners because I do excellent due diligence in my own work, so I expect nothing less from others.

If I were a GM I would expect nothing less than a report on ALL prospects for our pick and a "estimated" demand figure.

That figure would be based on.

1. The Slotting Guidelines(some of you are calling it a system but clearly it is really just a guideline)
2. Where the "Experts" mock him at
3. Known tendencies of the agent
4. Personal factors, such as his background, personality, psych evals
5. His financial situation

I am in no way saying this would have changed my mind on pulling the trigger on the selection, BUT to go into this without at least understanding that Michael Crabtree at #10 is less likely to follow the Slotted GUIDELINE.....is just pure ignorance

And keep in mind I don't include asking the player how much money he is going to want. Ha. Due diligence also means you have to do your own independent research

So then you're making the assumption that the 49ers didn't do this research? What gives you the indication they didn't? Had Crabtree slipped to 8 instead of 10, or 12 instead of 10, he'd be holding out on the Jaguars or the Broncos right now. You can't hardly blame the team for the holdout, when the player has been offered fair value based on his slot and has chose to sit out.

Aaron Rodgers signed his deal in August when he slipped to #24 after early consideration that he'd be a top ten pick. Adrian Peterson went #7 instead of within the top three and signed in July. Both had questionable character or injury issues prior to the draft. I'm sure both players had been extensively studied and deemed draftable much in same way the 49ers thought of Crabtree.

Clearly, you'd like to blame the franchise for the holdout. Ultimately, it's the player signing the contract and Crabtree just hasn't gotten it done yet.