Junior league: Underclassmen's early impact on NFL is on the rise

Rashard Mendenhall was one of 11 juniors to be selected in the first round of the draft. AP Don Banks's Mailbag Don Banks will periodically answer questions from SI.com users in his mailbag. Name: Email: Hometown: Question: SEND

The draft is all of 10 days past, and already it seems hopelessly dated to declare Oakland's Darren McFadden the chic pick to be the NFL's impact rookie in 2008. And not just because he's a running back. Maybe more importantly, he's a running back who entered the draft after his junior season.

In case you haven't noticed, underclassmen have fairly well ruled the NFL's rookie classes in recent years. It was Minnesota running back Adrian Peterson's impact that made headlines in 2007. Tennessee quarterback Vince Young, New Orleans running back Reggie Bush and Jacksonville's Maurice Jones-Drew did likewise in 2006. And in 2004, we were all raving about the play of Pittsburgh rookie quarterback Ben Roethlisberger. Three of the NFL's last four Offensive Rookie of the Year winners were among that group, and they were juniors all.

McFadden looks like the best bet to continue the impact junior trend, but he's far from the only candidate in the draft's Class of 2008. Though there were no underclassmen quarterbacks selected this year, the first four running backs off the board were all juniors -- McFadden at No. 4, Jonathan Stewart to No. 13 Carolina, Felix Jones to No. 22 Dallas and Rashard Mendenhall to No. 23 Pittsburgh. All told, eight of the 11 running backs taken in the first three rounds were juniors, with only Chris Johnson (No. 24 to Tennessee), Matt Forte (No. 44 to Chicago), and Jacob Hester (No. 69 to San Diego) going against the trend.

"It's unbelievable, but the juniors actually provided the depth to this year's draft,'' said Baltimore executive vice president/general manager Ozzie Newsome, noting that 31 juniors went in the top three rounds. "If it wasn't for the juniors, I don't know what the draft would have been like this year. Take the running back position. If the juniors don't come out, what would you have had?''

Sifting through the results of this year's draft, it is hard to miss how pronounced the underclassmen effect has become at the very top of the proceedings. In 2008, juniors again made a strong showing in the top 10 and the first round, with four of the first 10 players selected being underclassmen, and 11 of 31 in the opening round.

That's actually down a bit from 2007, when five of the top 10 picks were juniors, with 14 of 32 first-round selections being underclassmen. Same basic story in 2006, when six of the top 10 were juniors -- including the first three picks in Mario Williams, Bush and Young -- and the first round included 12 underclassmen. That's a three-year total of 37 juniors out of a possible 95 first-round picks, or a whopping 39 percent.

While there haven't been quite as many impact juniors on the defensive side in the past three years, three of the past six Defensive Rookie of the Year winners were underclassmen: Carolina defensive end Julius Peppers in 2002, Baltimore linebacker Terrell Suggs in 2003 and San Diego linebacker Shawne Merriman in 2005. This year's strongest DROY candidates figure to include Jets linebacker Vernon Gholston, Jacksonville defensive end Derrick Harvey, and Patriots linebacker Jerod Mayo, all of whom were top 10 picks as underclassmen.

"It is a case by case judgment when you're scouting juniors, but what we're learning is if you're a three-year starter as a junior, you're probably experienced enough to play in the NFL,'' said Newsome, whose Ravens have had some success drafting juniors such as Suggs and running back Jamal Lewis, and some misses, like receiver Travis Taylor.

"That junior who is a three-year starter, he's been playing since the day he stepped on campus. But of course you've got to think about the position they play too. Certainly running backs and cornerbacks and even linebackers, they can contribute quickly because a lot of it is more instinctive. But that's not really the case at quarterback, and receiver and defensive line. Those positions are ones where it's hard for juniors to show up quickly.''

Baltimore drafted a junior running back this year, selecting Rutgers' Ray Rice with a second-round pick, the 55th overall selection. Three more junior running backs went in the third round: Central Florida's Kevin Smith to Detroit, Texas's Jamaal Charles to Kansas City and West Virginia's Steve Slaton to Houston.

"If I could choose between the two, my preference would be for a senior, because it's a little bit of on-the-job-training for a junior,'' Newsome said. "With a senior, there's a certain maturity level. If he stays through that senior year, he's been through quite a process. You go through all that scrutiny your senior year, from the scouts coming on campus, to a bowl game, going to a college all-star game, making it through the combine.

"The seniors learn to manage all of that and deal with a lot of different responsibilities that year. If you can maintain your game and stand up under all that scrutiny, and really it's almost a 12-month process, you're probably going to be a fairly successful pro. The juniors aren't really put through all of that process, so you don't really know as much about them.''

One longtime NFL executive I talked to this week said the biggest drawback to drafting juniors up high -- and his team was one of the 11 to take an underclassmen in the first round -- is the compressed time frame that you have to scout them. You get about three months, from mid-January's declaration of eligibility to April's draft, to do your homework on them.

"I would think there's a good chance more mistakes are made on underclassmen, not because they're more volatile, but because the process is less thorough on those guys,'' said the NFL executive. "By rule we can't evaluate underclassmen on campus. We can't ask about them to coaches and trainers. We can't talk about them. So you end up trying to cram what usually takes a little more than a year into three months. There's a lot more opportunity to make a mistake because you don't have as much information.''

Or as Newsome says, "Sometimes you're just grading flashes. You see somebody flash on the game film, and that's what you're grading off of. You don't have a lot of ability or time to go through everything.''

In last year's draft, eight of the top 15 picks were juniors, and there's no other way to assess their rookie results than to say it was all over the board. Peterson was boffo, but Oakland quarterback JaMarcus Russell never recovered from his contract holdout, Detroit receiver Calvin Johnson battled an injury after a promising start, Atlanta defensive end Jamaal Anderson had modest impact, as did Miami's receiver/return man Ted Ginn Jr.

On the flip side among the top 15, Buffalo running back Marshawn Lynch gave the Bills a strong first season, and the same can be said for Jets cornerback Darrelle Revis and Steelers linebacker Lawrence Timmons.

While the impact junior has become a staple of the NFL draft, debating how much any particular junior class means to any particular draft is rather pointless, said the veteran NFL executive. The cream of the junior crop will always strengthen a particular year's draft class, with that talent merely hitting the league a year earlier than it would otherwise.

"How much juniors affect the draft is always a tough question to answer, because while they're always a factor, it's a little like what came first, the chicken or the egg?'' the league executive said. "If those juniors who came out last year didn't come out, but waited and came out naturally as seniors, then you would have seen an impact from their absence. But there's always a junior class now, raising the talent level of every draft. Those same players would still be joining the league, it would just happen a year later than it does now.''

It's a fair point, and logically reasoned. All the same, we're probably going to be talking about Darren McFadden, Jonathan Stewart and Rashard Mendenhall when it comes to this year's Offensive Rookie of the Year race. These days, coming out early seems to portend getting the jump on the rest of the league's draft class in more ways than one.