Packers' Rookie Class Not Highly Regarded by Dallas Cowboys

SBNation's Dallas Cowboys blog, Blogging the Boys, put together a remarkable piece today. If you have not seen it yet, go check it out now -- they were able to generate Jerry Jones' entire 2013 draft board, both by position and in overall order, and in doing so have given everyone a look into the mindset of one NFL front office.

Are you done reading? Good. This is where it gets interesting for Green Bay Packers fans.

Using the Cowboys' board, we plotted how they would have judged the Packers' 2013 draft class. Let me tell you - Ted Thompson and Jerry Jones are not seeing eye to eye on a number of players. One reason is likely scheme, as Dallas is switching back to a 4-3 defense from the 3-4 they have run over the past few years. That's certainly not the only philosophical difference between the two GMs, but it's arguably the biggest one.

That said, let's see where each of the Packers draft picks fit in (or didn't fit, in many cases) on the Cowboys' board. For purposes of comparison, the actual or graded draft round is shown first, followed by the actual overall draft selection or projected overall board ranking.

Note that the Cowboys' board does not have the full number of players to complete the entire crop of picks in each round, so the overall numbers don't necessarily match up. Still, I find this fascinating. I was very surprised to see Jones, who was extremely versatile in college, ranked so low on the Cowboys' board. He's big enough to play end for the Packers' 3-4, but plenty athletic enough to make a transition for a 4-3 team. Lacy and Bakhtiari appear to be right on, as Dallas had them projected in the same rounds they were selected in. Bakhtiari was projected at the end of round 4 instead of early, but that's splitting hairs a bit. The same goes for Boyd in the 5th.

Franklin was a high 5th rounder on the Cowboys' board, so that wasn't much of a reach. However, as I expected, many of the Packers' later draft selections were not even targeted by Dallas as possible picks. Palmer was hardly on any other teams' radar screens, and the Cowboys didn't appear to scout much past the big name players, as few small-school prospects appear anywhere on their board.

The only player that the Packers got good value on (at least according to Jerry) was ILB Sam Barrington, who clocked in with a 5th-round grade.

Take this for what it is: a comparison of one team's draft board to the actions of another. It probably does not mean a whole lot in the grand scheme of things, but it's still fascinating to see different schools of thought colliding.