Some thoughts...on the Big Ten's NFL Draft numbers since 2020

Nebraska has had one winning season since 2020. Its draft production reflects that.

Courtesy Nebraska Athletics

Let’s say you happened to live next door to the biggest Minnesota Vikings fan you’ve ever met. This goes beyond “went to their house for a barbecue one day and the cornhole boards were Viking.”

No, your neighbor is probably the biggest Vikings fan most people have ever met. Every Sunday you watch your neighbor get suited up for game day in a full-on Viking costume that gets a little more elaborate each year. You are convinced their horned Viking helmet—handmade in Sweden—cost at least $1,000, and you’re not far off. You don’t live in or near Minneapolis, so this is just what your neighbor wears to wherever they go to watch the games.

This is endearing and entertaining when it’s just your neighbor, maybe even envy-inducing. “Hey, isn’t it cool that someone can love something so much?” you think every Sunday while shaking your head and cracking half a smile between sips of coffee as you see your neighbor leave the house next door.

The reason I have a hard time watching the NFL Draft on TV is the NFL tries to make me believe your neighbor is every fan. They all have custom-made Viking helmets or elaborate Saints parasols or spiky Raiders gauntlets or whatever. At the Draft, every Vikings fan is the biggest Viking fan anyone has ever met and that’s the case for every team, its supporters helpfully collated into a group that can be cut to when each team makes a pick. I don’t know where the NFL finds¹ these people, but it takes me right out of the business at hand, and that feels bad because watching 22-year-olds’ life dream come true should be enjoyable whether you pay attention to the NFL or not. I’m decidedly in the latter category.

But I paid attention for college football reasons, as tricky a game as that might be. I’m always hesitant to draw a straight line from what happens in the college game to NFL draft picks, but the two things are not completely unrelated, so let’s talk about the draft from a Nebraska/Big Ten perspective.