Draftmetrics History
DRAFTMETRICS is published by Tony Villiotti, a retired old geezer with plenty of time on his hands. DRAFTMETRICS was established in 2010 but its roots were planted long before. My obsession with the NFL Draft began in 1969. That year, my younger brother and I, as die-hard and (at the time) long-suffering Steelers fans began an annual rite of predicting Steelers draft choices (and as he never lets me forget, he correctly predicted Joe Greene in the first round). As the number of draft "experts", and mock drafts, increased exponentially over the years, my interest shifted from predicting draft choices to trying to better understand the draft's importance by examining its eventual outcomes. In 1989 I published a study of the NFL Draft (The NFL Draft: A Historical Perspective) that was purchased by about a dozen NFL teams and a small number of fellow football-geeks. I resurrected and updated that study early in 2010 and published Draftmetrics, which was purchased by several NFL teams (including both of that year's Super Bowl participants), a few player agents and a few fans. The study was also cited by columnists and bloggers in a number of newspapers. After thinking about it, I came to conclusion that my research is better suited to a media that allows for frequent updating and periodic articles rather than a printed media. Hence, the idea to put this information out there for all to see at no cost.