The Baltimore Ravens are as acutely aware as any team how compensation works. They have worked the formulas as well as any team under the league, particularly with compensatory picks. Odds are they are one of few teams who spend a great deal of time worrying about such things, though.
Indeed, general manager Eric DeCosta recently brought up an interesting long-game hypothetical in the draft. How do you turn a seventh-round pick into a first-round pick? Patience. And perhaps they’ll actually get to work on that this year.
Asked about potentially trading out of the late rounds of this draft to move into next year’s due to the lack of depth, DeCosta mentioned what he called “The Bisciotti Reign of Terror”, referring to Ravens owner Steve Bisciotti, via the team’s website.
“That’s one of the nuances of the draft; when you trade a pick in a given round for next year’s pick, you get the benefit of increased value”, he explained. “So, if you trade a fifth-round pick this year, you’d get a fourth-round pick, hypothetically, next year”.
“[Bisciotti] has what he calls ‘The Bisciotti Reign of Terror’, and that would basically be that you trade a seventh-round pick in any given year for a sixth-round pick next year, and then take that sixth-round pick and trade it for a five, and then trade that five for a four, and so, in seven or eight years, you’d have a first-round pick”, DeCosta elaborated. “We’ve always talked about that, but we never get to that point”.
Indeed, the Ravens usually quite enjoy using their draft picks. Last year, they traded back into the seventh round to draft OL Andrew Vorhees after having made their last selection.
The Steelers have traded into a round for a future pick a couple times. They gave up a 2014 third-round pick in 2013 to draft Shamarko Thomas in the fourth round. In 2021, they traded a 2022 fourth to draft Isaiahh Loudermilk in the fifth round. The Ravens traded a 2024 sixth-round pick to the Browns in order to draft Vorhees last year.
Of course, only an organization with great stability could really carry out a plan like this. But you know that the Ravens are one such organization when that concept comes directly from the owner. DeCosta has been with the team for nearly three decades, and head coach John Harbaugh is in Year 17.
The Ravens and the Pittsburgh Steelers are two of the very few teams that would probably even entertain the “Reign of Terror” as a thought experiment. The problem for the Ravens, apparently, is that they always find someone they want to draft. You need a lot of patience to turn a seventh-round pick into a first. It takes at least seven years, unless perhaps you get lucky along the way.
But if we’re being honest, this is bound to stay in thought experiment territory, most likely. It’s fun to think about, in theory, but every team has to think about the now at some point. If it makes sense to draft a player in the third round during the fourth year of the trial, are you going to trade the pick instead? A lot of times you’re drafting players you have a higher-round grade on, which is another factor to consider.
