Draft Changes for Future Madden Titles

[Toupal]

People play CFM for a variety of reasons. Some reasons people may play CFM is to build their own dynasty with their favorite team, rebuild a terrible team, or just have a custom NFL experience of their own. Regardless of your reason for playing CFM, a very important aspect to building any team is the NFL Draft.

The NFL Draft is essentially the Super Bowl of the offseason, and Madden does not do a good job of portraying the importance of the draft. Some factors that Madden should consider to improving the draft are as follows:

Scouting- In reality, if a general manager sends out a scout to scout a player, and they come back with a scouting report that says, "I would say he is probably a B- overall, but I will need to scout him again to be sure." I would imagine that the scout would be fired immediately.

Scouting doesn't necessarily give you their ratings, but rather give you combine times and numbers.

The most important tool for any scout is game tape. How does the player play. He may be able to run fast and bench a lot, but can he play football? In this instance, I think it would be acceptable to display grades for a player.

The run down of it would be using your scouting points for one of two categories.
"Test-Out Results"- Where you spend points to get the numbers that you would see in the combine. For the 40, it will say he runs from a 4.41-4.47. Then you can spend extra points to find out for sure that he runs a 4.45.

"Tale of the Tape"- This is used for finding out the football intangibles such as catching, break tackle, block shedding, accuracy, etc... Say you are looking at a 6'6 wide receiver and you are curious how good his hands are. All you do is use the scouting points to find out that his hands are an B-, while another receiver you have had your eye on is 6'1 and has A+ hands, now you have to decide what is more important to you.

This is from Madden 2005!!! 10 years ago

Draft Day
Madden has certainly made improvements to the draft day with the addition of story lines. However, some tweaks madden needs to add to the draft are:

Mock Drafts- I know Madden shows the projected draft position, but lets make use of that ESPN contract and throw out some Mel Kiper and Todd McShay mock drafts so I have an idea who might go where before I have to draft.

Improving Draft Day Trades- Yeah you can trade back in the draft, but say there is a player I am eye who is a top 10 pick, and I have the 23rd pick, I can't trade up for the pick until right before the draft. Especially, say I have invested a lot into scouting a player and he falls to the 14th pick, I for sure want to do everything in my power to move up and get him.

Think of where the NFL would be without draft day trades? No Jerry Rice to the 49ers, no Steve Young to the 49ers, Phillip Rivers to the Giants, Eli Manning playing for the Giants. The underline town, Draft Day trades are important.

Player Comparisons- When I draft a player like Randy Gregory, I want to hear who he plays like, and what kind of player I am getting. I want to see something along with his scouting supports saying he reminds us a lot of Aldon Smith, or comparing a Jameis Winston to Cam Newton.

Post Draft
Undrafted Free-Agents- Without undrafted free agents we would be without NFL Legends like Kurt Warner, John Randle, Warren Moon, or Tony Romo.
After the Draft, Madden has the contract part screen, but I think immediately after the draft you should enter another free agency with the undrafted playes.

Supplemental Draft- Granted not that many success stories have come out of the Supplemental Draft, but it is still a part of the NFL none the less. Right before the next season starts, there should be a supplemental draft. Some memorable Supplemental Draft Picks have been Cris Carter, Brian Bosworth, Bernie Kosar, and recently Terrelle Pryor.

Bonus-
Customizing- Allow us to create a draft prospects before the draft. Or more importantly allow us to edit/ create draft classes. It is an easy fix and something that is extremely achievable.

How much better does this look?

[cusefan74]

I think they have the draft pretty good right now, and scouting is the best it has ever been. I think they need to leave it alone for now and work on other things.

Also you can trade up in the draft as it is happening.

[7County]

Quote: Originally Posted by cusefan74

I think they have the draft pretty good right now, and scouting is the best it has ever been. I think they need to leave it alone for now and work on other things. Also you can trade up in the draft as it is happening.

So because it has improved from the garbage that it once was, they should just stop working on it? lol

Imagine EA saying after Madden 2003, "Well good job, I don't see a reason in the world to do anything else to this game!" Then again that is the same attitude most of the people at EA have.

Improving the game and throwing ideas out there is a reason these forums exist.

[cusefan74]

Quote: Originally Posted by 7County

So because it has improved from the garbage that it once was, they should just stop working on it? lol Imagine EA saying after Madden 2003, "Well good job, I don't see a reason in the world to do anything else to this game!" Then again that is the same attitude most of the people at EA have. Improving the game and throwing ideas out there is a reason these forums exist.

I don't think they should stop working on it totally. I'm just afraid anything they do with it would hurt it. You know how EA is, they can't leave things alone. Right now it is one thing in the game that works good. The scouting is good, not complicated in any way, and the draft is pretty good. My only real complaint with that is not enough time between picks. I just don't think they need to change it right away.

[JaymeeAwesome]

I agree with everything in the original post except for customizing. I love the randomness and it allows for storylines. They need to improve storylines instead of allowing customization. I would hate to see them get in trouble with someone making a full draft of college players and their likenesses and sharing it.

Improve storylines and make pre-draft, draft day, and post draft more fun.

The rest of the resource dollars should be invested in making the game more sim....especially with their simmed games algorithms.

[Toupal]

Quote: Originally Posted by JaymeeAwesome

I would hate to see them get in trouble with someone making a full draft of college players and their likenesses and sharing it.

I don't see how they could get in trouble for something like that.

Crayola isn't going to get in trouble if a kid draws a picture of Marcus Mariota.

As long as no one pays for the draft classes, everything is legal.

[jayenomics]

I think the draft is nearly perfect as is. Allowing the league admin to select for other people would be a welcome addition. As would being able to draft from the app.

[TheDominator273]

Quote: Originally Posted by jayenomics

I think the draft is nearly perfect as is. Allowing the league admin to select for other people would be a welcome addition. As would being able to draft from the app.

Agreed. And all I would change about scouting is gicing us combine numbers, or at the very least we shouldn't have to scout for the things the combine measures. Speed, acceleration, agility and strength should all be known quantities.