NFL general manager superlatives, trends: Most successful at trade-ups, best Day 3 drafters and more

With just over two weeks before the 2023 NFL Draft, we wanted to take a look backward to see what it could tell us going forward.

First and foremost, it’s important to understand who is making the decisions for each team. There has been a lot of turnover among general managers the past few offseasons, so here is where things stand with each club headed into the 2023 draft.

Some teams have operated under the same front-office leadership for several decades and others are steered by relative newcomers, so we wanted to split our analysis into the entire rookie wage scale era (2011-2022) as well as the back half of the rookie wage scale era since 2017.

Most successful drafting in the first round

First, we take a look at how teams have performed at drafting in the first round only. The below charts illustrate how each draft pick performed in terms of generating PFF wins above replacement over their four-year rookie contract, with each position at each pick having a percentile outcome from 0-100. The range of outcomes is based on the historical performance of draft picks in each range from 2006 through 2022. The earlier a pick takes place, the larger the weight that result carries in the overall score.

From 2011 to 2022, the Dallas Cowboys have been the most successful team in the first round, with notable hits including tackle Tyron Smith, center Travis Frederick, guard Zack Martin, wide receiver CeeDee Lamb and edge defender Micah Parsons. Parsons is early in his career but has already generated a ton of value for Dallas through two seasons.