UPDATE: No team selected a player on Thursday, making them all eligible free agents.
In last year's NFL supplemental draft, the St. Louis Rams used a fifth-round pick on offensive tackle Isaiah Battle, who didn't even make the team's final 53-man roster. Oops. Battle was the first pick in the supplemental draft since the Cleveland Browns used a second-round pick on wide receiver Josh Gordon in 2012.
Only 46 players have ever been picked in the supplemental draft, with wide receiver Cris Carter and quarterback Bernie Kosar in the 1980s the most notable among them. There are six players eligible for this year's NFL supplemental draft, which takes place on Thursday.
The way the supplemental draft order works is slightly complex. It's a tiered lottery system, with the first tier consisting of teams with six or fewer wins in 2015. The next tier is teams with seven or more wins that didn’t make the playoffs. The final tier is the 12 playoff teams. Each tier then has a weighted lottery. The team with the worst record in each tier has the best chance of winning the lottery. After the lottery, the order is set and teams silently bid on a player with a round associated. If they have the highest-round bid, they get the player and forfeit that selection in the 2017 NFL Draft.
Any player who is not drafted becomes a street free agent.
Players have to be granted special eligibility to enter the supplemental draft. That often includes players who have academic issues or serious off-field transgressions.
Here's who teams will consider on Thursday:
Ra'Zahn Howard, DT, Purdue
Perhaps the highest profile name in this year's supplemental draft is Purdue defensive tackle Ra'Zahn Howard. He's a classic nose tackle at 6'2 and 325 pounds. He was utilized as one at Purdue before being dismissed for academic reasons.
Howard started 10 of 11 games in 2015, playing in a Purdue system that used a heavy rotation on the defensive line. Most of Howard's snaps came on run plays where he has the size to occupy blockers. He has some decent quickness and maneuverability and finished with 23 tackles, 1.5 tackles for loss and a sack last season. For his career, he had 47 tackles, 3.5 tackles for loss and three sacks over three seasons and 29 games.
Because he was on and off the field so much in college, you can't help but label Howard as inconsistent. He flashed at times, but was on the sidelines far too often. It's also difficult to see much of a market for a backup nose tackle.
Howard should garner some interest from teams as a nose guard, but he may be too one-dimensional to warrant a pick. In front of nine NFL scouts, Howard looked a little gassed and heavy footed working through drills, and that's not a good thing:
Rashaun Simonise, WR, Calgary
At the University of Calgary last season, Simonise had 51 receptions for 1,079 yards and 11 touchdowns in just eight games. He’s in the supplemental draft after being ruled academically ineligible. Of all the players in this year's supplemental draft, he may be the most intriguing. Maybe it's because he's largely unknown while playing college football in Canada. But at 6'5, some team is at least going to give him a training camp invitation to see if he can be developed.
Simonise held a pro day this week, and representatives from Arizona, Green Bay, Indianapolis, Los Angeles, the New York Jets and Washington were in attendance, according to the Winnipeg Free Press. There he ran his 40-yard dash between 4.42 and 4.52 seconds.
Judging at least by his highlight reel, Simonise looks like mostly a vertical receiver who can do some work on bubble routes. He admitted at his pro day he needs to work on his route running and blocking. Because of that, he's probably a long shot for a team to use a valuable 2017 draft pick on.
He may be best served developing for a season or two in the CFL and hoping an NFL team adds him as a free agent. On the flip side, the Packers used a seventh-round pick on Jeff Jannis in the regular draft a few seasons ago, and have let him develop on their roster. Maybe that could happen with Simonise.
(Language warning, if that sort of thing offends you)
Tee Shepard, CB, Ole Miss
Ole Miss defensive back Tee Shepard had a winding journey to the supplemental draft. A five-star recruit out of high school, he was initially enrolled at Notre Dame until academics pushed him to community college. He signed with Ole Miss before last season.
Certainly based on where he was recruited, too, Shepard obviously has some talent. He left Ole Miss, though, after a disagreement with coaches about where he should play. Ole Miss head coach Hugh Freeze wanted to play Shepard at nickel cornerback because he is hearing impaired.
"If there is any short motion or shift, he has to look back to see it," Freeze said last year. "And when you turn around, all of a sudden, the ball is snapped. So, that has been an issue for us. While all of us hate that, there is part of that to it. It has nothing to do with his physical skills."
Shepard left the school last October, and had just two tackles and one defended pass in five games at Ole Miss. He was expected to transfer to Miami (OH), but that obviously never materialized. The talent is there with Shepard, but teams may be too hesitant to gamble a future pick because of his hearing.
Others
Cameron Walton, DE, Concordia
He's in the supplemental draft after Concordia discontinued its football program. He's slight for a pass rusher at 6'3 and 230 pounds. One of his coaches said he had "around 20 sacks" last season. (Maybe they gave up the football program because nobody bothered to keep stats there)
Eddie D'Antuono, long snapper, Virginia Tech
Chances are D'Antuono won't get drafted because he's a long snapper, but the NFL is a copycat league and the Patriots used a draft pick this year on the position. D'Antuono started the past three seasons for Virginia Tech, and has unique size at 6'7 and 267 pounds.
Jalen Overstreet, RB, Sam Houston State
Pro: Overstreet is a 6'2, 212-pound running back who averaged 5 yards per carry last season (albeit in two games).
Con: He could be sentenced to up to two years in jail for felony debit or credit card abuse, and he's had numerous run-ins with the law.