Teams were more aggressive than ever with UDFAs

The draft procedure is, in theory, supposed to be simple. Teams make pick after pick and then after the last pick is made it's open season on anyone who wasn't picked.

That's not how it actually goes.

Teams talk to agents representing players who aren't expected to be drafted well before the draft ends. It starts before the last day of the draft. During the final four rounds on Saturday, it builds to a fever pitch.

By the middle of round five, multiple teams are making offers to players who aren't expected to be drafted, with the understanding that, if the player is drafted, the handshake deal becomes null and void.

And some teams are aggressive. As one source who dealt with multiple teams on Saturday (and who has been doing so annually) put it, teams were more aggressive than ever before.

Some teams will tell the agents representing potentially undrafted players that, if a deal isn't agreed to then and there, the teams will move on to someone else. Even as the draft is still happening.

It should be no surprise, then, that reports of players agreeing to terms as undrafted free agents emerge as soon as the draft ends. Many of those deals had already been in place.

Given that plenty of undrafted players emerge with more guarantees than they'd get if drafted, plenty of guys are surely crossing their fingers and hoping they don't get picked once they know what they'll be getting, if they aren't picked.

It surely creates for some players a dilemma. On one hand, getting drafted becomes a status symbol. On the other hand, not getting drafted can be far more lucrative. Setting aside for now the question of whether the rookie wage scale should be adjusted to ensure that, financially, it's always better to be drafted than not drafted, the final day of the draft includes a free-agent feeding frenzy that begins well before the dinner bell officially rings.

The NFL traditionally has done nothing about it. Which has resulted in the violations becoming so blatant and brazen that anyone who follows the rule is at a major competitive disadvantage. Which means that everyone will be breaking the rule.

Which means that, if the NFL isn't going to enforce the rule, it should just get rid of it.