Few things go together as well the Cleveland Browns and analytics. Specifically, Pro Football Focus’ love for the Browns draft picks — especially on the second night of the NFL Draft.
Andrew Berry and Paul DePodesta have already won the Draft in PFF’s eyes.
Although most draft boards value second-round pick Grant Delpit and the 88 overall selection, Jordan Elliott, as ‘day two’ selections, PFF essentially has them listed as first-rounders. In fact, the Browns were the only team to take three top 25 players on PFF’s board.
For Delpit, PFF wasted no time to highlight the Browns selection of the Jim Thorpe Award Winner who was picked as the No. 13 player in the second round. PFF had Delpit as their 15th-highest rated player of the entire draft.
Much has been made of Delpit’s difficulty of tackling during the 2019 season. PFF took to Twitter to note that Delpit recorded 10 tackles and didn’t miss a single one in the SEC Championship, College Football Semifinal, or Championship. Mike Renner, an analyst for PFF, also noted that Delpit has started as a true freshman and has recorded at least seven pass breakups each season and eight career interceptions.
PFF extended their love further of a Delpit, acknowledging he nearly had twice as many career run stops as Xavier McKinney, who was the next closest safety to catching him in that category in this year’s draft. Delpit finished with 46 over his collegiate career, McKinney marked just 23. In the passing game, PFF praised Delpit for having the most forced incompletions at a higher rate than any other top safety in the NFL Draft.
Another fellow SEC player, Jedrick Wills, sparked the love from PFF for the Browns 2020 daft class. Wills held the spot at the 11th-best player in the NFL Draft on their big board.
Even though Elliott was pick No. 88 in this year’s draft, PFF had him ranked 65 spots higher as their 23rd-best prospect. Elliott only trailed first-round picks Derrick Brown and Javon Kinlaw as the best interior defensive lineman on PFF’s board.
The analytics-based football graded website made sure to note that Elliott has the best pass rush grade of interior defensive linemen since 2017. If that’s not enough, PFF also highlighted that he is the only Power-5 interior defender with 90.0+ run-defense and pass-rush grades.
As day three of the NFL Draft nears, PFF will surely be keeping close tabs on who the Browns plug as their picks in rounds four through seven. At this pace, the Browns have one of the best batting averages so far in the draft.
Now, it just has to translate onto the field.
All PFF date came from tweets from the company