Big 12 Football's NFL Draft Struggles Have Become Disturbing Trend

There was a time not too long ago—2010, to be exact—when the Big 12 claimed five of the first six picks in the NFL draft. And the first overall pick, Oklahoma quarterback Sam Bradford, was coming off a season-ending shoulder injury that required surgery. 

In fact, 2010 was a huge draft year for the Sooners. Bradford was one of three Oklahoma players taken with the first four picks. Defensive tackle Gerald McCoy and tackle Trent Williams went to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Washington, respectively. Additionally, tight end Jermaine Gresham went 21st to the Cincinnati Bengals. 

The Big 12 as a whole was equally as impressive that year. Nebraska defensive tackle Ndamukong Suh went second overall to the Detroit Lions. Oklahoma State tackle Russell Okung and Texas safety Earl Thomas went sixth and 14th overall, respectively, to the Seattle Seahawks. Missouri linebacker Sean Weatherspoon went 19th to the Falcons. Dez Bryant went 24th to the Dallas Cowboys.

Then, things changed for the worse, as Stewart Mandel of Sports Illustrated pointed out over the weekend during the 2015 NFL draft: 

The Big 12 finished last among Power Five conferences in the '15 draft with 25 drafted players, only two of which went in the first round: West Virginia wide receiver Kevin White and Texas defensive tackle Malcom Brown. And Brown could have gone much higher, with ESPN draft analyst Mel Kiper Jr. saying Brown was the "best value selection in Round 1" at No. 32. 

From 2011-14, the number of players drafted from Big 12 schools has declined at an alarming rate. If it hadn't been for the 25 Big 12 players drafted last weekend, the Big 12 would have seen a drop in the number of players drafted in each of the last four years. 

Conference	Overall Selections	Underclassmen Selections
ACC	47	13
Big Ten	35	10
Big 12	25	2
Pac-12	39	13
SEC	54	17

Still, looking at 2010 and 2015, the Big 12 is the only Power Five conference to see the number of drafted players go down. 

Put simply, the Big 12 isn't producing the NFL talent it was five years or six years ago. Not only did the conference have the fewest number of drafted players over the weekend, it churned out only two underclassmen who were drafted. 

Conference	2014	2013	2012	2011	2010
ACC	42 (5)	30 (6)	31 (3)	35 (3)	31 (4)
Big Ten	30 (4)	20 (1)	41 (4)	28 (6)	33 (3)
Big 12	17 (2)	22 (3)	25 (5)	30 (8)	30 (9)
Pac-12	34 (3)	28 (5)	28 (4)	31 (3)	28 (2)
SEC	49 (11)	63 (12)	42 (9)	38 (10)	49 (7)

Diving into why the Big 12 has been noticeably thin at the NFL draft over the past few years is another topic entirely. Bryan Fischer of NFL.com goes into a few more reasons in a 2014 post. However, suffice to say conference realignment plays enough of a role that the data collection deserves an asterisk. Of all the Power Five conferences, the Big 12 was hit hardest by realignment in the past few years.  

Consider the 2011 draft year, which was the final draft for the Big 12 as the 12-member conference it used to be. That year, half of the players drafted from the conference were from Colorado, Nebraska, Missouri and Texas A&M—four schools that would eventually leave for the Pac-12, Big Ten and SEC over the next two years. 

A more specific example involves Texas A&M's 2010 offensive line class, which has now produced four NFL-caliber offensive linemen as noted by Bruce Feldman of Fox Sports:

"

When the Jets selected massive Texas A&M O-lineman Jarvis Harrison in the fourth round, it put a bow on what should go down as arguably the top O-line recruiting class in recent college football history. Earlier in the draft, Harrison's teammate OT Cedric Ogbuehi went in the first round to Cincinnati to become the third offensive tackle from A&M's 2010 signing class picked in the first round, joining Luke Joeckel and Jake Matthews from the previous two drafts. Former A&M coach Mike Sherman, a long-time line coach, had a keen eye for O-line talent.

"

Sherman, of course, recruited those players when the Aggies were a member of the Big 12. 

Granted, that line of thought goes both ways. The Big 12 will gladly take credit for West Virginia wide receiver Kevin White and TCU linebacker Paul Dawson, who started their careers in the Big East and Mountain West, respectively. There's also talent development that needs to be taken into consideration. 

But the point remains: The Big 12 has lost out on more NFL talent in realignment than it has acquired. It also doesn't help that one of its bell-cow programs, Texas, has't produced a lot of NFL players lately. The Longhorns hit a low point as a program when they had zero players drafted in 2014. Since 2012, 11 Longhorns have been drafted. 

Florida State had 11 players taken in the '15 draft alone. 

Can the Big 12 rebound?

Mock drafts published a year in advance serve little more than entertainment purposes. But to give you an idea as to where the Big 12 stands with its talent pool for 2016, take a glance at the early mock released by B/R draft insider Matt Miller. The Big 12 has one player—Baylor defensive end Shawn Oakman—in the first round. 

This is subject to change, of course—probably dramatically. Bears offensive lineman Spencer Drango is a possible first-round talent, as listed by Walterfootball.com, as is Oklahoma cornerback Zack Sanchez. 

Is the Big 12 an NFL factory like it used to be? Not even close. Realignment or not, the Big 12 is a bottom dweller for producing NFL talent. It's not like the state of Texas doesn't produce talent, either. That means Big 12 schools aren't getting that talent on campus, or not developing. Or both. 

Either way, it's a bad trend that's developed. Whether it's corrected soon, if at all, remains to be seen. 

Ben Kercheval is a lead writer for college football. Draft numbers courtesy of NFL.com unless noted otherwise.