Each Team’s Best Draft Class of the Last 10 Years

In 1974, the Pittsburgh Steelers drafted Lynn Swann in the first round of the NFL Draft. They drafted Jack Lambert in the second, John Stallworth in the fourth, Mike Webster in the fifth. That’s a Hall of Famer and then three more Hall of Famers. It was maybe the best draft class in history.

(That was back when the draft was 17 rounds, which … imagine the content these days. Mel Kiper Jr. would have to be cloned or something.)

A single draft pick generally won’t make or break a team’s future (finding an elite quarterback possible excepted). But if a team can nail an entire draft class, that can set its roster up for success for a generation. It’s hard to do, which is why the teams that do nail a draft get talked about for a long time.

Today, I’m looking back on each team’s best draft class of the last decade (and will note when there was a close second for a team’s best class). Which teams have remade their future with a draft class? And which haven’t had a single class that really moved the needle?

The things we’re looking for here:

• Did you nail the first round? It’s very hard to have a home run of a draft class if you swung and missed at the first pick, or even if you didn’t pick at all.
• Did you get value from all or most of the picks? One great pick is nice, but if you take a future Hall of Famer first and then get no value anywhere else, that’s not a great class, that’s one great pick.
• Did you find value late? It’s hard to find significant value on Day 3 of the draft, but when you do it, you set yourself apart.

Maybe teams won’t nail all three of these categories, but it is the lens through which the best classes are determined. Each team got a score out of 5 for each category to determine their best class.

Each Team’s Best Draft Class, 2015-2024

Arizona Cardinals: 2017

Score: 9

Grades:

• First Round: 3
• Value from Picks: 4
• Late Value: 2

The Cardinals’ home run of Budda Baker is more than offset here by the fact that he was the 36^th pick, there were 217 more made after him, and Arizona could have called it a weekend after Baker and not missed much. Chad Williams and T.J. Logan combined for barely 200 career scrimmage yards, Dorian Johnson never even made the roster. Rudy Ford made a career, but almost all of it came after leaving Arizona. No one after Baker even made it to a third season on the team. And since Reddick left town as early as he could have and didn’t really show star performance until after departing, you can’t build a whole draft class grade out of Budda Baker alone.

Honorable Mention: 2019. The Cardinals got Kyler Murray and Byron Murphy Jr., but then things got much worse after that, including swings-and-misses on Andy Isabella and Hakeem Butler.

Atlanta Falcons: 2016

Score: 11

Grades:

• First Round: 3
• Value from Picks: 5
• Late Value: 3

The name value here is strong. The actual performance is also strong, but … possibly a bit the Q rating. Keanu Neal and Austin Hooper were both good for brief blips. Deion Jones was excellent early and then became an average player. De’Vondre Campbell Sr. was a star (at least until he quit on the Packers last year) and a prize as a Day 3 pick, but the Falcons got a bunch of “good, but maybe lacking?” picks in 2016.

Baltimore Ravens: 2018

Score: 15

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 5
• Late Value: 5

The Ravens get praise for being the team that drafted Lamar Jackson when everyone else passed, except … they also passed, taking Hayden Hurst at 25 before getting Jackson at 32. Still, that’s a two-time MVP and three-time first-team All Pro, and they got a star tackle and star tight end in the third round. Add in five starter (three multi-year starters) on Day 3 in Anthony Averett, Kenny Young, DeShon Elliott, Bradley Bozeman and Zach Sieler (admittedly, Young and Sieler became starters after leaving Baltimore), and you can’t possibly complain about this group. The only knock on Baltimore’s 2018 class (and it’s a small one) is that they had so many picks that you’d expect them to hit, and they had several misses (Jordan Lasley never played a game). But … man, that’s a nitpick. Home run draft.

Buffalo Bills: 2018

Score: 13

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 4
• Late Value: 4

If you get an above-average starting quarterback in the draft, it’s a win, even if you have to use the first overall pick to get him. But even without Josh Allen, this was a heck of a class for Buffalo. They use a second first-rounder on two-time Pro Bowler Tremaine Edmunds, got a three-time Pro Bowler on Day 3 in Wyatt Teller (admittedly, Teller was a nonfactor as a Bill and didn’t become a star until leaving for Cleveland), and added more starters in Harrison Phillips and Taron Johnson. First-round value, check. Picks up and down the draft, check. Day 3 value, check. Nailed it.

Honorable Mention: 2017. Tre’Davious White on Day 1, Dion Dawkins on Day 2 and Matt Milano on Day 3. They only made six picks, and Nathan Peterman–Tanner Vallejo were two, but the peaks were very high.

Carolina Panthers: 2017

Score: 9

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 3
• Late Value: 1

The Daeshon Hall/Corn Elder picks in the middle didn’t amount to much. But Christian McCaffrey returned everything you could ever hope for out of a top-eight running back pick, and Curtis Samuel had flashes of greatness. Moton is still a starter along the Carolina line as well. Do you give them credit for drafting Harrison Butker but then never playing him a game? I don’t give them much, but hey, they identified a guy who has done a lot of kicking, that’s not bad.

Chicago Bears: 2016

Score: 8

Grades:

• First Round: 3
• Value from Picks: 3
• Late Value: 2

There’s no shame in Leonard Floyd and Cody Whitehair in Rounds 1 and 2. Trustworthy, workaday, guys who are nice picks if you also have a star. The Bears … did not also have a star. They did get back-to-back top-14 PPR seasons out of Jordan Howard in the fifth round. That’s good. But all in all, this was a class that was just “there.”

Honorable Mention: 2020. The Bears had no picks in the first, third or fourth rounds in 2020, but Cole Kmet and Jaylon Johnson in the second is at least solid, and they also found Darnell Mooney on Day 3.

Cincinnati Bengals: 2020

Score: 10

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 3
• Late Value: 2

In theory, if you were to draw up a bar chart of “value received by picks in order of when they were picked,” you’d expect it to look like one of those old Verizon commercials where things just naturally looked like a staircase to show how good their reception is. Highest first, then a little less, a little less, a little less, down to almost nothing. The Bengals are the platonic ideal there. Hall of Fame quarterback first, star-but-not-superstar receiver second, trustworthy starter third, decent player who has never been a start fourth, filler late. So the Bengals don’t get a lot of value for their Day 3 picks, but starting Joe Burrow–Tee Higgins–Logan Wilson is just fine.

Cleveland Browns: 2017

Score: 9

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 3
• Late Value: 1

What a weird draft class. The Browns crushed Round 1, even with the marginal disappointment of Jabrill Peppers Myles Garrett is one of the best defensive (and highest-paid) players in football, while David Njoku is a quality tight end. And then, welp. Larry Ogunjobi has been a starter for a long time, and otherwise … are you giving the Browns much credit for getting a season-ish out of Zane Gonzalez as their seventh-rounder?

Honorable Mention: 2018. Maybe Baker Mayfield’s Browns career will go down as a disappointment, but he set some records on the way and got them back to the playoffs. And of course Denzel Ward and Nick Chubb are or were stars for a while. They team just basically struck out on Day 3.

Dallas Cowboys: 2016

Score: 13

Grades:

• First Round: 4
• Value from Picks: 4
• Late Value: 5

The Cowboys have been a good-drafting team for a while, which, given their free agency choices, has been necessary. A year ago, I called Ezekiel Elliott their worst first-round pick in a decade, but that was mostly because he went fourth overall, right before Jalen Ramsey–Ronnie Stanley–DeForest Buckner, so it was a bad use of resources; Zeke himself was pretty darn good for a long time. They also got a Pro Bowler whose career got cut short by injury in Jaylon Smith and a long-time starter in Maliek Collins on Day 2. And then of course the Cowboys got a star quarterback on Day 3, which is the golden goose of drafting. Maybe you think Dak Prescott isn’t a star-star, but he’s one of the highest-paid players in league history and he was taken at pick 135.

Denver Broncos: 2018

Score: 11

Grades:

• First Round: 4
• Value from Picks: 4
• Late Value: 3

Bradley Chubb was a very nice pick, even if the Broncos had to send him away in his fifth year as part of a micro-rebuild. And Courtland Sutton (my favorite receiver in the 2018 draft class, which is apropos of nothing but I wanted to mention it) has shown to be at a minimum a good receiver, even if he stops short of great. But after that, it’s mid-range and/or short-term starters like Isaac Yiadom and Josey Jewell. After Jewell, the Broncos just about flunked on Day 3, which is hardly an indictment, but it doesn’t cover them in glory either.

Detroit Lions: 2021

Score: 14

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 4
• Late Value: 5

I love debates like the Penei Sewell/Ja’Marr Chase one in 2021, because the right answer was “LOL, who cares?” The Bengals and Lions couldn’t really go wrong there, with both at least on the path toward the Hall of Fame. Levi Onwuzurike and Alim McNeil on Day 2 is a solid haul, and Derrick Barnes has been a contributor on Day 3. But of course the other prize is Amon-Ra St. Brown in the fourth round. He spent the first half of his rookie year appearing deep in fantasy football waiver wire columns, but the calendar hit December and he became a superstar, and … it’s been “December 2021” ever since.

Honorable Mention: 2023. The Lions got mocked for taking a running back (Jahmyr Gibbs) and linebacker (Jack Campbell) at 12 and 18, but it’s worked out for them, and they followed that up with Sam LaPorta and Brian Branch in the second. They just haven’t gotten much of anything from the third round and beyond.

Green Bay Packers: 2023

Score: 9

Grades:

• First Round: 2
• Value from Picks: 5
• Late Value: 2

It is an absolutely testament to Matt LaFleur (and, sure, Aaron Rodgers and Jordan Love) that the Packers have been reliable contenders almost every year despite their draft results. Because they have moderate hits here and there, but there is no class here that anyone is waving flags about. Even in 2023, when they landed pass-catchers in Luke Musgrave, Jayden Reed, Tucker Kraft and Dontayvion Wicks, they got … almost nothing else. Lukas Van Ness has been a below-average D-lineman so far, and there otherwise hasn’t really been anything out of this class.

Honorable Mention: 2018. Dishonorable mention maybe? Green Bay got Jaire Alexander in the first, which is great, and Marquez Valdes-Scantling in the fifth, which is fine. But this is only close to the crown because the Packers appear to be bad at this.

Houston Texans: 2023

Score: 11

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 4
• Late Value: 2

I was in Nashville on draft night of 2023, and when the Texans traded up for Will Anderson Jr., I told my wife and her friend how silly the Texans were being, taking Anderson and C.J. Stroud and mortgaging their future for it. They gave me blank stares, because they did not care even a little. But that’s better than what their reaction should have been, something more like “You’re dumb, the Texans are smart,” because those two because the Rookies of the Year at their respective positions. It was a smash. Add in Tank Dell in the third (he might never be what he was again, but you have to call that a success) and a competent starter in Henry To’oTo’o in the ffith, and its nice, but really, it’s those top two picks that matter the most.

Indianapolis Colts: 2018

Score: 12

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 3
• Late Value: 4

Bookend! The Colts knocked it out of the park with their first two picks (Quenton Nelson and Shaquille Leonard) and then crushed their last (Zaire Franklin), getting 11 Pro Bowls and 16 starting seasons out of those three players. In between, Braden Smith has been a reliable starter, and Nyheim Hines had some moments. But it’s the beginning and the end that made this class.

Jacksonville Jaguars: 2019

Score: 10

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 2
• Late Value: 3

Josh Hines-Allen has been a great player basically from the start, which is exactly what you want from a seventh overall pick. And then Jawaan Taylor in the second has played (and started!) 99 of a possible 100 games in his career, missing only a meaningless Week 18 of last year with Kansas City. Sure, maybe he’s the most penalized player over the last two years, but hey, playing time counts. Quincy Williams didn’t make an All Pro until after Jacksonville, but they still found that in the third round. And while Gardner Minshew II isn’t and never has been a star quarterback, he’s been a starter in four seasons for three different teams, and finding that in the sixth is nice.

Kansas City Chiefs: 2016

Score: 10

Grades:

• First Round: 1
• Value from Picks: 4
• Late Value: 5

No first-round pick! That speaks to what the Chiefs found later, because not getting that value and still showing well is impressive. But Chris Jones in the second and Tyreek Hill in the fifth is more than enough to make up for no first-rounder. That’s 14 Pro Bowls and eight first-team All Pros out of just two players. The class isn’t all that otherwise (fourth-rounders Eric Murray and Demarcus Robinson are the only other players who have ever been regular starters), which is why it’s a little lacking overall, but Jones-Hill along would be a nice class.

Honorable Mention: 2015. Marcus Peters was a star for a while, and Mitch Morse and Steven Nelson were very nice Day 2 picks as well.

Las Vegas Raiders: 2019

Score: 10

Grades:

• First Round: 2
• Value from Picks: 3
• Late Value: 5

Bryan Knowles looked back on the weirdness of the Raiders’ 2019 class earlier this week. Clelin Ferrell and Johnathan Abram were both first-round picks and combined to be two first-round busts. But then Josh Jacobs was a hit. And the Raiders also found a superstar in Maxx Crosby in the fourth and added contributors like Foster Moreau and Hunter Renfrow later on Day 3. It’s such a weird draft class, but it’s the best the Raiders have had.

Los Angeles Chargers: 2018

Score: 11

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 3
• Late Value: 2

I’m comfortable calling Derwin James Jr. a nailed pick, especially given he’s played at least 14 games in four straight years after dealing with injuries early in his career. But after that, it’s a bunch of guys who played a while, got some starts and then stopped getting starts. Finding starters up and down the draft board (they found a full-time starter for at least a couple seasons in each of the first five rounds) is plenty valuable, but you’d like something that moves the needle more.

Los Angeles Rams: 2024

Score: 12

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 4
• Late Value: 3

You don’t have to go back very far for this one, with the Rams nailing a draft for the second straight year after they looked like they were going to have to rebuild. Getting the DRoY and the No. 3 in DRoY voting in the first two rounds would be enough … and it almost has to be. But just a year in, the Rams also got a starting kicker (Joshua Karty), a starting O-lineman (Beaux Limmer) and some respectable receiver depth (Jordan Whittington), all in the sixth round.

Miami Dolphins: 2018

Score: 10

Grades:

• First Round: 4
• Value from Picks: 3
• Late Value: 3

The first-round pick of Minkah Fitzpatrick would probably be a 5 if the Dolphins had gotten more than 18 games out of the safety before trading him to Pittsburgh. Just as a football player, the pick was a home run, but the Dolphins didn’t get as much of the benefit as you’d like. They got plenty of tight end value with Mike Gesicki and Durham Smythe, although Gesicki probably goes down as a bit of a disappointment given his pre-draft hype. Jerome Baker was a starter for a long time in Miami, and Jason Sanders has been a stud kicker. Great class? No. Quality class? Sure.

Honorable Mention: 2016: Laremy Tunsil and Xavien Howard in Rounds 1-2? Awesome. After that? Verrrrry little.

Minnesota Vikings: 2015

Score: 13

Grades:

• First Round: 3
• Value from Picks: 5
• Late Value: 5

Trae Waynes probably goes down as a marginal disappointment as a first-rounder, which is a point against the Vikings here. But Eric Kendricks, Danielle Hunter and Stefon Diggs on Days 2 and 3 more than make up for that. That’s 26 starting seasons, 10 Pro Bowls and 2 first-team All Pros without a first-rounder to be seen there. MyCole Pruitt has hung around for a long time, and T.J. Clemmings was a two-year starter, but this is a Kendricks-Hunter-Diggs blurb.

New England Patriots: 2015

Score: 10

Grades:

• First Round: 2
• Value from Picks: 3
• Late Value: 5

The Patriots have been such a weird team when it comes to the draft. During the late days of the Bill Belichick era, they were famously terrible at the first round, but they were actually pretty good at finding late value. And then the last couple years, they’ve nailed their first-round picks and did almost nothing on Days 2 and 3. So we’ll settle on 2015, when Malcom Brown was more-or-less fine on Day 1, but the team also found Trey Flowers and Shaq Mason on Day 3. It’s fine. If you want to pick 2016 (Joe Thuney, Elandon Roberts, Ted Karras), 2023 (Christian Gonzalez, DeMario Douglas) or 2024 (Drake Maye), I won’t argue.

New Orleans Saints: 2017

Score: 12

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 5
• Late Value: 2

The Saints’ 2017 haul is the stuff of legends. Yes, it involved trades — they got the Ryan Ramczyk and Trey Hendrickson picks from the Patriots in the Brandin Cooks trade, and they mostly traded out of the later rounds. But who cares? Every single Saints pick in 2017 got at least one season as his team’s primary starter, everyone but Muhammad got at least four. Lattimore, Kamara and Hendrickson have each made at least four Pro Bowls, and Ramczyk and Hendrickson have been first-team All Pros. Maybe the 1974 Steelers will go down in history as the best draft class ever, but this one is on the list.

New York Giants: 2024

Score: 10

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 2
• Late Value: 3

You could argue for 2019 here given Dexter Lawrence II and Darius Slayton, but given the Giants had three first-rounders that year and used two of them on Daniel Jones and Deandre Baker, I’m opting for last year’s class. They got what looks like a superstar receiver in Malik Nabers They got four players who spent most of last year as a starter, a fifth (Dru Phillips) posted a 77.5 PFF grade and started six of 14 games, and a potential starter at RB (Tyrone Tracy Jr.) in the fifth. We’ll see if that success continues, but for one year, that’s more than good.

New York Jets: 2022

Score: 10

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 4
• Late Value: 1

Other than the Saints, this was comfortably the easiest team to pick a best draft class for. The Jets have been pretty terrible at drafting for a while now, rankings 27^th on Day 1, 31^st on Day 2 and 30^th on Day 3 in my rankings. The thing is, though, that their best first- and second-round picks in the last decade all came in 2022, with the Sauce Gardner–Garrett Wilson–Jermaine Johnson group being a hit in the first, and Breece Hall being at least good (and arguably better than that) in the second. The haul after that leaves a lot to be desired, but then most of what the Jets do in the draft leaves a lot to be desired.

Philadelphia Eagles: 2016

Score: 11

Grades:

• First Round: 3
• Value from Picks: 4
• Late Value: 4

Say what you will about Carson Wentz (and there’s plenty to say), but he started for the team for five years, was an MVP candidate in 2017 and helped the team to the 1 seed en route to a Super Bowl title (that, sure, Nick Foles actually won) before his injury. Maybe that wasn’t a home run at second overall, but it was fine. And then they got multi-year starters in the third (Isaac Seumalo), fifth (Halapoulivaati Vaitai) and seventh (Jalen Mills). For a team that has been one of the best in the NFC, the Eagles’ overall draft haul has regularly been good-not-great, but this one is solid.

Honorable Mention: 2018. No first-round pick and only five picks overall, but Dallas Goedert–Avonte Maddox–Josh Sweat–Matt Pryor–Jordan Mailata is a heck of a five.

Pittsburgh Steelers: 2017

Score: 10

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 4
• Late Value: 1

The Steelers got nothing out of Day 3, but then that’s been true every year in the last decade (seriously, go look at it). But in the first three rounds, they got T.J. Watt, JuJu Smith-Schuster, Cameron Sutton and James Conner That’s pretty good with a “great” at the top. And while Joshua Dobbs’ success was more meme-based than football-based, he’s not a disaster as a fourth-rounder.

San Francisco 49ers: 2019

Score: 11

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 4
• Late Value: 2

If I had been right about Jalen Hurd being a star, this would look even better. (Injuries suck.) But Nick Bosa has been a big success out of second overall, and while Deebo Samuel Sr. didn’t have prolonged success, when he was good he was very good. And then finding Dre Greenlaw on Day 3 is a nice pull as well.

Seattle Seahawks: 2023

Score: 11

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 3
• Late Value: 3

The Seahawks were another team where picking their best class wasn’t actually very hard (and — spoiler alert — their worst class will be even easier). Seattle hasn’t been very good in the first round for a decade now, but the 2023 duo of Devon Witherspoon and Jaxon Smith-Njigba at least looks like it’ll work out better, if it doesn’t qualify yet. Zach Charbonnet looks like a very good RB2 with RB1 potential, and Anthony Bradford has 21 starts over two seasons. The first round is the king here, but it’s a good draft regardless.

Tampa Bay Buccaneers: 2018

Score: 13

Grades:

• First Round: 5
• Value from Picks: 5
• Late Value: 3

Vita Vea has been a star almost since the beginning. And then Carlton Davis–Alex Cappa–Jordan Whitehead in Rounds 2-4 is strong as well. Ronald Jones as their first second-rounder didn’t work out that well, and the best you can say about M.J. Stewart as their second second-rounder is that he wasn’t a clear bust, but that’s four wins out of eight picks.

Tennessee Titans: 2019

Score: 11

Grades:

• First Round: 4
• Value from Picks: 5
• Late Value: 2

As Bryan Knowles noted earlier this week, the 2019 class was not only the Titans’ best of the last decade, the Titans’ 2019 haul was the best any team got that year. D’Andre Walker was a bust, but there’s no other black mark there. The only other problem coming out of this class is that A.J. Brown looks like a Hall of Famer as a second-round pick, but he’s going to go into that Hall of Fame as an Eagle, because the Titans made a bad miscalculation by trading him for the pick that became Treylon Burks.

Honorable Mention: 2016. Jack Conklin in the first, Derrick Henry in the second, Kevin Byard III in the third. This class has the hits, but there were plenty of misses, including Kevin Dodd in the second. Good overall, just more whiffs than hits.

Washington Commanders: 2015

Score: 11

Grades:

• First Round: 4
• Value from Picks: 3
• Late Value: 4

Brandon Scherff was a very nice pick at fifth overall, making five Pro Bowls and a first-team All Pro as a Washington player. The problem is he’s the only player in this class you’d look back on and say “Nailed it.” Preston Smith has been fine, still a starter through at least the first half of last year, but he’s hardly Scherff-esque. Jamison Crowder has been a nice player for a long time, but he never even had a top-30 season. No shame in that on Day 3, but he’s hardly redefining expectation for the fourth round. Even the relative hit in the seventh round, Austin Reiter — who spent four seasons as a starter — never actually made the roster in Washington, bouncing around before playing for the Browns, Chiefs and Dolphins in his career.