With the fourth pick in the 1999 NFL Draft, the Indianapolis Colts select Running Back Edgerrin James, from the University of Miami. Every draft is critical to a team s future. Attendance in the room involves almost every human emotion. At alternating periods during the process, elation is expressed over a prospect taken and a job well done. Dejection might be evident over a prospect lost to an opponent.
Surprise is elicited over a player taken surprisingly high or low by another team.
Anxiety is a constant companion because of the hours spent reaching this day, the pressure of the moment and the stakes for the future. Healthy exchanges of ideas over prospects long since have been completed by those who performed the elbow grease grading talent. Evaluations are finished, as are in-house scenarios for how the draft selection order might ensue. The only wildcard factor in the room are phone calls among teams as possible trades are explored. A team s office outside the War Room is busy, too.