On ESPN Insider, fans will find helpful second-screen companions to the completion of ESPN’s NFL Draft telecast, such as Scouts Inc. player rankings, blog posts and more. It’s a wealth of information and analysis and – remarkably – there are two people who produce a majority of it.
Meet Scouts Inc. college football and NFL Draft analysts Steve Muench and Kevin Weidl.
Weidl, who grew up a Pittsburgh Steelers fan and played quarterback for Indiana University, and Muench, a former guard at Richmond, work with Todd McShay, the director of college football scouting for Scouts Inc., to create the comprehensive DraftTracker, which provides analysis on 1,400 draft-eligible players.
To build this impressive database, Muench and Weidl study NFL prospects diligently in the months leading up to the draft. They watch upwards of 40 hours of game tape per week and Weidl traveled to 17 ACC and SEC games last fall, while Muench made the trip to seven games and two all-star contests.
“I’m usually sitting in front of the television and watching tape for most of the day,” Weidl said. “I was most interested in where the top three quarterbacks landed – [Blake] Bortles, [Johnny] Manziel and [Teddy] Bridgewater. With the draft in May, teams have extra time to watch more tape and dissect these quarterbacks.”
In addition to evaluating players, Muench notes the importance of evaluating team needs and draft trends as the draft nears.
“That’s not to say that player evaluations and rankings are set in stone,” Muench said. “We’d rather be right on May 8 than stick by something we said in April when we didn’t have as much information.”
Approaching their-day-to-day work with football acumen and genuine curiosity, Muench and Weidl offer fans insightful details on the next generation of NFL players.
Said Muench, “I quickly came to respect the discipline, work ethic and sacrifice it takes to be a successful team player. The more I played, the more I wanted to learn.”
