5 overall) on running back Ricky Williams, who gained 59 AV in his first five years. 5 pick to gain 37 AV, so the Saints come out ahead.

But the team famously traded the 12th, 71st, 107th, 144th, 179th and 218th picks (plus what became the 2nd and 64th picks in 2000) to move up to No. Taken together, those picks had an expected AV of 133, an insane value that Williams (or any other single player) couldn’t live up to.

Using the five-year AV of all 5,000 draftees since 1996, we can calculate an expected value for every pick.

Every team is ranked below by their draft performance against expectations, using the percentage difference between the actual and expected AVs of their draftees. For one, we’re not accounting for what teams gave up to get their picks.

The 1999 New Orleans Saints used their only selection (No.

(This involves some smoothing, to make sure that higher picks are always expected to produce more value than lower picks). 1 pick to gain 44 AV over five years, and their 65th pick to produce about a third of that, 16 AV.

Adding all 11 Browns selections together, it turns out the team has the best set of picks since 1996.