After all, only about four to six players are selected within the first hour — yeah, that's about 2 percent of everyone drafted — and the drawn-out process can be a killer for top-10 prospects and mid-round hopefuls alike.
"It's antsy," said Patriots center Dan Koppen, who was a fifth-round pick in 2003. "The nerves are in you. You don't know where you're going to be. It's a whole new experience, but it's definitely fun, maybe something that I wouldn't want to do again but definitely glad I was part of it the first time."
Koppen, a three-year starter at Boston College, went home to Pennsylvania for draft weekend. He kicked things off Saturday morning by playing a round of golf — Koppen hit it "pretty well," he recalled Thursday — but the next 36 hours made him feel like he was standing on the 17th tee at TPC Sawgrass in the middle of a hurricane with nothing but a sand wedge. (For those not into golf, that's code for "It sucked.")
"It's very nerve-wracking," said Koppen, who has been the Patriots' starting center since Day 1. "I got done with the round, and my name still wasn't called, so that sort of wasn't the greatest. Then it got done with the first day, so I went into the second day. "
Saturday's sunny morning turned into a sleepless night. Strip the control from an elite athlete, and the wandering mind can be a devilish place. The "what ifs?" and "why hims?" can make some prospects stir-crazy, especially after hearing about how great they are from agents and scouts.
When Koppen awoke Sunday morning, he watched the draft alone upstairs in his house while the rest of his family viewed downstairs in the living room. It didn't take too, too long for the dramatics to end and the tension to subside.
"It was kind of crazy. I saw my name on the bottom line at first," Koppen said. "We had a satellite upstairs and cable downstairs, so it's a bit of a delay. So I heard my family go crazy downstairs because I was upstairs alone — no one wanted to be by me that day. I heard them yell, and then I saw it, and the phone rang. It's kind of a crazy day."
While it might have taken a little longer to unfold than Koppen might have wished, he had two things going for him. First, he's a very smart center, and that is crucial in the eyes of head coach Bill Belichick, who was also a center in college. Second, Koppen left a BC program that has long since earned a great reputation for churning out elite talent along the offensive line.
"I think we had a good offense when we were there, more of a pro-style offense. We had great coaches," Koppen said. "Really, guys that cared about you, cared about how you played, cared about how you did in school. It was just a great experience."
The good times have obviously continued into his Patriots career, and it's helped Koppen learn a good lesson about draft weekend. Sure, everyone wants to get taken as high as possible for status and monetary reasons. But if a high pick doesn't land in the right situation, it can throw his whole career out of whack, and vice versa.
"It's a long process, but it really doesn't matter where you're drafted," Koppen said. "It's what you do when you get here and how you're able to contribute to the team. For guys that are going through it, take it as what it is. Enjoy it. It's the only time you're going to go through it."
