Pitiful Prognostication
Posted Apr 24, 2005, 10:28 AM ET

Now that the NFL Draft is over, somebody should remind Mel Kiper, Jr. that he needs to hibernate until next April.

Has anybody ever carved out a niche in the sports broadcasting landscape that has been more inept than Mel Kiper, Jr.?

Don't get me wrong, I think it is fantastic that he found an ability to become an "expert" on the NFL Draft...the problem is that he is seldom right or accurate.

I give weather geeks a hard time for constantly badgering us with useless information...well, Mel Kiper, Jr. is the sports broadcasting version of the clueless meteorologist.

All the guy does is spend endless time breaking down the players with total BS tidbits like 40-yard times, bench press stats, vertical leap figures, not to mention the obvious needs of each NFL team. He has more information at his fingertips than any sports broadcaster known to man...And when I took a look at his final selections and predictions of the 2005 NFL Draft, his analysis was way off.

Of the 32 selections in the First Round of the NFL Draft, "Magnificent Mel" was able to predict 8 correctly. That is a whopping 25% rate...when you consider that an orangutan blindfolded can get the first five selecions right, selecting 8 of the first 32 picks isn't much to brag about.

In fact, after the Top 10 picks, Mel was able to correctly pick only one other team/player...and that was Heath Miller, a TE from UVa, on the 30th pick by the Pittsburgh Steelers. Way to go, Mel...great insight.

The only way to accurately describe Mel Kiper, Jr. is to read what he said about himself last week...and I'm not making this up:

Kiper was asked a question in reference to NFL General Managers and his quote was, "If I was in their position and they had somebody else doing what I do, I wouldn't even react to it. They don't care what Mel Kiper says, and they shouldn't care what I say."

I couldn't have said it better, myself. Good night, Mel...we'll wake you up next April.