Agreed. I'm just saying that's not our measure of success. Nobody is going to lose sleep over draft picks compared to how these players impacted the team and program.
See Lazard. He's doing fine for himself, and came here for the program and culture (when it was in the dumps). He helped to build this program to where it is today and maybe sacrificed draft stock for it. Good for the program, good for him too as he kept pounding and found a spot in the league.
Also most players will end up being great college players, maybe not suited for the pro game. We can thrive on those types and build them up for their future doing other things outside the NFL.
While I agree that you can win without NFL players, where it really helps is recruiting. TOE makes a living recruiting off of NFL draft picks. There's a reason why players like Nwankpa are considering them even though they run a boring system with racist coaches. They put guys in the league. And so far, we pretty much don't. Hopefully, that starts to change this year...although ISU fans on here consistently overrate how draftable our players are and are consistently disappointed.
One thing to consider, with the covid year, this will likely be the most competitive draft ever. There are going to be guys drafted in the 7th round that would have went 5th or even 4th in other years. My opinion is that Hall, McDonald and Kolar are locks. I think that Rose and Enyi can sneak in late. Everyone else is UFA or camp invites. Just my opinion.
