After 362 agonizing days of nothing but mocks and projections and desperate attempts to convince us that utterly underwhelming college QBs will be surefire top-10 picks… it’s once again time for our annual three-day celebration of 32 billion-dollar businesses coming together to fill out a spreadsheet. Happy draft day, y’all.
The FTRS staff has internally conducted a mock draft every year since 2020, but unfortunately that streak came to an end this year. In lieu of a 2026 mock, though, we can offer something else: a look back at our 2020 mock draft to see how everyone we chose has done since that day.
Our 2020 FTRS mock, conducted a few weeks into the COVID-19 quarantine period, had seven staffers split the 32 NFL teams among ourselves and then pick as if we were running the show for each of our teams. The goal here is simply to look at who everyone took and grade each pick based on how our drafted players turned out. We’ll take a look at the class as a whole, along with each drafter’s best player selection, best value pick, and worst pick.
Let’s start things off with the man who was running the site at the time:
Overall: Ben whiffed on his first pick and several second-rounders, but he countered those by snagging some of the best players who came out of the 2020 class. Four of his players are top-tier NFL starters today (when healthy, in the case of Trevon Diggs), and he picked three of them ahead of where they actually went in the draft. Not a bad haul overall.
Best Player Pick: Justin Jefferson. Ben traded back a few spots from the #12 pick and still scooped up the best wideout in the draft and one of the best in the NFL today while hitting a huge need for the Raiders in that draft.
Best Value Pick: Antoine Winfield Jr. There’s an argument that Jefferson is the answer here too, but Winfield, an All-Pro safety, was a massive steal at the end of the second round.
Worst Pick: Isaiah Simmons. At the time, Simmons was a freakishly athletic tweener (between linebacker and safety) who seemed guaranteed to wreak havoc wherever he was on the field. Instead he never really found a home at either position, and he’s a non-factor at this point in his career.
Overall: Levi’s first three picks were all duds, even though the guy he took at #2 overall was the same guy who was actually picked there. Still, he went on to find some solid players later in the draft, resulting in a decent overall class.
Best Player Pick: Brandon Aiyuk. Injuries have derailed his last couple seasons, but Aiyuk was blossoming into a star around 2024 and could be a fun player once again if he gets back to full strength.
Best Value Pick: Robert Hunt. Once he moved inside to guard after his rookie year, Hunt emerged as a top-flight interior lineman and signed a large contract with the Panthers a couple years ago. Not bad for a guy whom Levi snagged 23 spots later than he was actually taken.
Worst Pick: C.J. Henderson. Levi had the Falcons trade up eight spots to grab Henderson, who turned out to be a colossal bust. He was shipped out midway through his second season in Jacksonville and has bounced around the league (including briefly to Atlanta) without making an impact anywhere.
Overall: Jake’s draft class was heavy on SEC players but lacking in star power, as his top two picks turned into solid but unspectacular NFL players and his next two picks were colossal busts for wildly different reasons. But he did snag a few capable starters along the way.
Best Player Pick: Andrew Thomas. He struggled mightily in his first couple seasons, indicating he might be a major bust, but he grew quickly after that and has settled in as a very capable lineman for the Giants.
Best Value Pick: Jeremy Chinn. He’s been a capable NFL starter for pretty much his entire career, and Jake snagged him 14 spots before he was actually taken in the draft.
Worst Pick: Isaiah Wilson, at least in football terms. We’ll never know how Ruggs would have turned out on the field, as he threw away his career midway through his second season and is serving a lengthy prison sentence. We did get to see how Wilson turned out: he played exactly one NFL game before the Titans decided he was a lost cause. Go Dwags.
Overall: Ethan’s draft was very hit or miss, with some excellent players mixed in with some major busts, but it all boiled down to a solid class overall. Some of his best picks were guys he took well ahead of where NFL teams actually picked them, so he showed a pretty good eye for talent.
Best Player Pick: Xavier McKinney. He was okay with the Giants but emerged as a superstar after going to the Packers. The talent was always there, so the real surprise is that he slid to the second round in the actual draft.
Best Value Pick: Cesar Ruiz. He’s been a consistent starter on the interior line (though mostly at guard) for the Saints, and he was a late first-rounder in reality, so getting him early in the second made the pick even more solid.
Worst Pick: Jeff Okudah. Yeah, he’s the guy Detroit took in that same spot in the real draft. Yeah, he was still a complete bust who never came close to being a shutdown corner despite getting opportunities with a few teams.