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NFL Draft Scout’s Chad Reuter – Part IV

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Chad Reuter and Matt Waldman explain that learning about the game of football comes down to good, old-fashioned hard work. Photo by Duke Yearlook

If you thought ESPN analyst Matt Williamson’s path to becoming a paid evaluator of talent was unusual, consider NFL Draft Scout.com senior analyst Chad Reuter. The Wisconsin native lacks a football background, but he managed to transform a hobby into a job because of his tremendous analytical skills, sincere passion for the game, and a veteran scout’s work ethic. In this multi-part conversation, Reuter and I spent a couple of hours discussing a variety of topics related to player evaluation.

In Part I of this conversation, Chad and I discuss why he enjoys studying offensive line play, evaluating technique versus results, and balancing these two behaviors with the craft of projecting a player’s future in the NFL. In Part II  we covered Reuter’s path to  studying football as a full-time job, a defensive position that is difficult to evaluate, and why “instincts” and “intangibles” may not be innate after all. In Part III, Chad and I discuss sabermetrics and football, the mathematical logic of drafting a quarterback in the first round, and the importance of tiers when building a draftboard.

The final part of our conversation covers Reuter’s typical work process as a talent analyst and the resources he recommends to the general audience to become students of the game.

Waldman: Share with everyone what your typical day at work is like to completely a long-term project of scouting all draft-eligible players for a given season?

Reuter: The process occurs in stages. You study film for 12 months. A lot of the film work on rising seniors and juniors comes immediately after the draft. You want to get ready for the approaching season and to get the know the players. During that time and throughout the summer, you’re watching tape, you’re researching, and learning about the senior prospects and underclassmen with the end goal of producing our preseason draft guide in August. It’s not just a matter of watching tape, but also looking through media guide information. You’re also talking to sources to find out about any off-field stuff. You want to know as much as you can going into the year. During the summer, I’m working between 8am-6pm at a minimum during the week.  During the weekends I try to put in anywhere between 4-8 hours each day depending on what else is going on – including trying to maintain some sort of life outside of this.

Waldman: How do you try to maintain a life outside of this?

Reuter: You try to schedule things in a way where you find time to work around those events. If we’re going out in the afternoon then I try to do work in the morning.

Waldman: Based on my own level of self-awareness, I would think it takes somewhat of an obsessive personality to do this job.

Reuter: Yeah, I think that’s right. Continue reading →

Conversation With NFL Draft Scout’s Chad Reuter-Part II

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Clemson's DeAndre McDaniel plays a position that Chad Reuter says has an underrated difficulty to evaluate. Photo by whateyesee13 http://www.flickr.com/photos/whateyesee13/

If you thought ESPN analyst Matt Williamson’s path to becoming a paid evaluator of talent was unusual, consider NFL Draft Scout.com senior analyst Chad Reuter. The Wisconsin native learned about the craft of personnel evaluation from a decade of interactions with NFL scouts and general managers.  Although he lacks a football background, he managed to transform a hobby into a job because of his tremendous analytical skills, sincere passion for the game, and a veteran scout’s work ethic.

In this multi-part conversation, Reuter and I spent a couple of hours discussing a variety of topics related to player evaluation. In Part I of this conversation, Chad and I discuss why he enjoys studying offensive line play, evaluating technique versus results, and balancing these two behaviors with the craft of projecting a player’s future in the NFL. In this portion of our discussion we cover his path to studying football as a full-time job, a defensive position that is difficult to evaluate, and why “instincts” and “intangibles” may not be innate after all.

Waldman:Tell me about your background and how you got into this profession.

Reuter: I came into it kind of backwards. I’m not Mr. Athlete by any stretch. I was not a player. But I knew enough about the game. I think most athletes who get into scouting or work in a front office have the initial advantage of having played, but then they have to learn how to analyze what they are seeing when they are watching film. Obviously some of them may know their position, but they don’t know all of the positions. I came in backwards. I had the analytic skills and then I applied them to football.

I had a fan site called Packerdraft.com and I started in in 2000. I started applying my analytic skills to football in terms of what was being seen on the field, but also looking at the data side – analyzing trends and trying to figure out what some of the numbers really mean.  So I started doing that and it earned me opportunities to work with teams doing some consulting.  After a few years of that, I left my state government gig to do this full-time.

Waldman: What was that gig?

Reuter: I was a research analyst for the department of transportation. My education is in economics and public policy analysis.

Waldman: With that kind of education and position you must have a fairly extensive understanding of statistics.

Reuter: My job was more or less to ferret out information that was helpful for our decision makers in the building – not just putting a bunch of numbers in front of people. I spent a lot of time pointing to things that some people said had merit, but actually didn’t. Most of the time I was telling people that statistics could be misinterpreted and used to mislead people than actually used to help!

(Laughter)

I find it also being the same thing I do with football. Continue reading →