Cal Bears By The Numbers in the NFL Draft
The NFL Draft is still months away, but now is as good a time as any to look at the history of the Cal Bears in the NFL Draft.
The California Golden Bears have a long, rich history, as does the NFL Draft. The 2016 NFL Draft begins on Thursday, April 28th, and will come to conclusion on Saturday, April 30th. There’s still a lot of time until commissioner Roger Goodell steps up to the podium to announce that the Tennessee Titans are on the clock, but now is a great time to dive into the history of Cal Bears being selected in the NFL Draft. But first, a brief history on the NFL Draft itself.
The draft has been around for 80 years, with the first draft held in 1936, making it the oldest amateur draft among the four major American sports. The first player ever taken in the NFL Draft was University of Chicago running back Jay Berwanger , whom the Philadelphia Eagles selected after his Heisman Trophy winning season (the first Heisman ever given out) in 1935. Interestingly enough, the Eagles traded Berwanger to the Chicago Bears when they were unable to meet his demands of $1,000 per game (chump change nowadays). Berwanger never played in the NFL, instead choosing to pursue dreams of competing in the decathlon in the 1936 Olympics. He failed to make the cut, and couldn’t come to a deal with the Bears to play in the NFL afterwards.
The NFL’s version of the draft has been constantly evolving, as the first rendition had nine rounds, the second rendition had 10 rounds, and the third had 12. The 1939 draft featured 22 rounds, which would be the length for four years. In 1943, it expanded again, this time to 32 rounds, and it would stay that way until 1949, when it was reduced to 25 rounds.
It would last 25 rounds for just one year, as the draft expanded to 30 rounds in 1950. In 1960, it would condense again, this time to 20 rounds. In 1967, when the NFL and the AFL held the first common draft as part of the merger, the length dropped to 17 rounds. It would stay that way for 10 years, until the 1977 draft lasted 12 rounds. That lasted for 15 years, the longest thus far, until another drop, down to eight rounds, took place in 1993. The current format come to be in 1994, when seven rounds became the norm.
Now it’s time to move on to Cal Bears in the NFL Draft, by the numbers.
Next: Draftees