The drafts for the 'Big 3' sports are different, even in what constitutes success. In baseball getting 1/2 of your draft picks from rounds 1-3 on the roster over a 5 year period is to be an admired success, that gets you fired in the NFL and the NBA only has two rounds. That despite the fact that the NBA draft has the most diverse talent pool as they draft players from all over the world, the NFL currently drafts from US and Canadian colleges and universities, baseball has players from Central America, the Pacific Rim even Australia, however they are signed as free agents, their amateur draft is for US high school, college and Independent League players.

The other differences are obviously in how production, potential and pure athletic ability are weighed in evaluating prospects. Robin Ventura was a great player at Oklahoma State, a limited pure athlete but a record setting hitter and he was taken picked tenth in the 1st round of the MLB draft, a decent analogy would be Steve Alford Alford slipped to the #3 pick in the second round, due to his marginal athletic ability, concerns on defense and that he could not create his own shot. Graham Harrell went undrafted in the recent NFL draft despite a great college career due to his athletic limitations and concerns about how he’d adapt to a NFL offense.

The NBA Draft is about to take place and players rise and fall largely based on perceived upside as productive college stars like Tyler Hansbrough, Dante Cunningham, Chase Budinger and Patrick Mills are ranked well behind more athletically gifted works-in-progress like: B.J. Mullens, Austin Daye, Jrue Holiday and Brandon Jennings. The experts could be right and I could be wrong but I still like guys who have produced.