The 2023 NFL Draft Industry Consensus Big Board includes over 70 different boards and breaks down the top 300 prospects heading into the week of the draft.
Every year, I put out a big board that features the consensus of opinions from draft analysts worldwide, condensing the industry’s rankings into one board that represents the feeling, at large, on each year’s prospects.
Industry Consensus Big Board: What It Means
I’ve compiled rankings from more than 70 different boards around the industry. This board for the 2023 NFL Draft started at 85 players and has grown since then. Now, we have the top 300 ranked ahead of the draft at the end of April.
This method has historically done a fantastic job at predicting where players will go in the draft, telling which players are the most polarizing, explaining how different kinds of experts evaluate different types of prospects, and anchoring our discussions on the NFL draft.
As we continue to update this board, we’ll drop any boards that are over a month old and add in any new ones that might have fresh insight. That way, we can best keep track of player movement until the 2023 NFL Draft rolls around in Kansas City.
How To Read the Industry Consensus Big Board
All of the columns are self-explanatory except the final one, marked “Variance.” This is the rank-adjusted variance in rankings for that player. 100 is average, and the larger the number, the more variance in rankings there is for that prospect. We should see 68% of all players have a rank variance between 85 and 115.
Because variance naturally increases the further down the board one goes, it all variance is adjusted for the average variance in that range of ranks.
You might notice some unusual positional designations as you read through the chart. “DL1T” refers to nose tackles, “DL3T” refers to defensive tackles with more pass-rushing responsibility, and “DL5T” refers to players who can play 3-4 defensive end or could be either an edge rusher or interior pass rusher. We also have nickel corners listed as NCBs, which represents who will primarily be expected to play in the slot.
