Buffalo Bills fans love to debate the quality of Brandon Beane's drafts—but how good have they really been? After conducting a deep dive into the numbers, I set out to give you a concrete answer, moving beyond personal opinions and into hard data.

Let's break down the methodology. Inspired by Leah Cammarano's excellent work (which showed Beane as the best NFL GM at improving draft performance over previous regimes), I took a slightly different approach. My study focuses on one simple question: How well has Beane drafted compared to what you'd expect from each draft pick number?

To establish a baseline, I pulled draft results from Pro Football Reference for a clean 15-year sample (2003–2017). This gave me an expectation of NFL success for every single pick. Then, I used PFR's Weighted Approximate Value (wAV)—a metric that measures a player's peak performance rather than just career longevity. Think of it this way: a player with three amazing seasons and two average ones scores higher than someone who was just okay for eight straight years.

This approach provides a fair, apples-to-apples comparison across positions and eras. It rewards the kind of impact players that fans love to see in their team's colors—and that we love to outfit in the latest gear. So, is Beane hitting home runs or striking out? The data tells a story every Bills fan will want to hear.