A cautionary tale of banking on compensatory draft picks

Yesterday at Steel Curtain Network I laid out how the complex and often confusing compensatory draft pick system works. While this is a system that many teams, especially the Baltimore Ravens, have used in their favor over the years, there are times where the compensatory formula can also lead to a disappointing outcome.

Although an example of compensatory mayhem which may come to mine to some Steelers fans is how they almost missed out on a third round draft pick because how things played out in the 2019 season, these rules were changed in the 2020 Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA). Just for a reminder, the Steelers were set to receive a third round draft pick due to the departure of Le’Veon Bell, but when the Eagles released L.J. Fort during the season to improve their compensatory situation, there was no longer a net loss in compensatory free agents (CFAs) for the Steelers. The Steelers had until the trade deadline to release one of their own gains in order to recoup the pick. The Steelers ultimately did so by releasing Donte Moncrief and still kept their third round draft pick where they drafted Alex Highsmith.

In the 2020 CBA, the deadline for locking in a potential CFA was moved from the trade deadline, in the middle of the next NFL season, to a date shortly after the NFL draft, typically the following Monday. This change kept teams from releasing players they had picked up during the offseason who weren’t working out as hoped in order to try to gain more compensatory picks, in turn taking away compensatory picks for others. Thankfully this is no longer the case.

But just because who the players are who qualify as CFAs can’t change In the summer or fall, it doesn’t mean other things can’t greatly affect the formula.

A perfect example of how things change is the last time the Pittsburgh Steelers received a compensatory draft pick, which was in 2022. Following the 2020 season, the Steelers lost three CFAs in Bud Dupre, Matt Feiler, and Mike Hilton. Throughout the offseason, it was believed the Steelers could potentially receive a comp pick for all three of these players, likely being in the third round, the fifth round, and potentially the seventh round if there weren’t 32 other picks ahead of them.

But as the season happened, everything changed.

When the Steelers traded for Ahkello Witherspoon at the beginning of the season, they also inherited his compensatory status which canceled one of the players. Witherspoon was projected at the time to be around a fifth round value, which would (and ultimately did) cancel the loss of Matt Feiler. This made the trade for Whitherspoon a double-whammy because the Steelers sent the Seahawks a fifth round pick and they lost out on another fifth round pick.

So the Steelers went from having two, maybe three, compensatory picks down to one, maybe two, with the top one being a third round pick.

At the end of the season, the possibility for the second pick was lost, not because it wasn’t in the top 32 compensatory picks but because it was cancelled by another CFA. Joe Haeg was not expected to be in the top 65% and qualify as a CFA, but that changed the final week of the season. Entering Week 18, Joe Haeg had played 231 of 1097 offensive snaps which was 21% which came in one start in Week 4 and otherwise being the “jumbo tight end” when called on. But Dan Moore Jr. injured his ankle in Week 17, and although he played through it and didn’t miss a snap, could not go in Week 18. Haeg got the start, played all 76 snaps, and finished with 26% of the snaps played on offense. He was not projected to qualify for the extra 26 points which ultimately put him into the top 65% and cancelled the potential of another compensatory draft pick.

Looking like the Steelers would be down to just one third round compensatory pick, Bud Dupree was injured for a significant portion of his first season in Tennessee and only played in 11 of 17 games. This equated to Dupree only logging 36% of the defensive snaps, much less than had been projected. This dropped Dupree’s ultimate landing spot on the list to a fourth round compensatory pick.

So not only did the Steelers only receive one pick, it wasn’t for the expected third round selection but ended up being in the fourth round.

Based on this, keep in mind that it is exciting at this time to see what the Steelers could potentially gain in next year‘s draft. But there are still other factors involved which could change between now and when the picks are announced around this time next year.