The Oklahoma State Cowboys football team has had 112 players drafted into the National Football League (NFL) since the league began holding drafts in 1936.[A 1]
Each NFL franchise seeks to add new players through the annual NFL draft. The draft rules were last updated in 2009. The team with the worst record the previous year picks first, the next-worst team second, and so on. Teams that did not make the playoffs are ordered by their regular-season record with any remaining ties broken by strength of schedule. Playoff participants are sequenced after non-playoff teams, based on their round of elimination (wild card, division, conference, and Super Bowl).[3]
Before the merger agreements in 1966, the American Football League (AFL) operated in direct competition with the NFL and held a separate draft. This led to a massive bidding war over top prospects between the two leagues. As part of the merger agreement on June 8, 1966, the two leagues would hold a multiple round "common draft". Once the AFL officially merged with the NFL in 1970, the "common draft" simply became the NFL draft.[1][2][4]
↑Because of the NFL–AFL merger agreement, the history of the AFL is officially recognized by the NFL and therefore this list includes the AFL draft (1960–1966) and the common draft (1967–1969).[1][2]
↑From 1960 through 1966, teams with a superscript AFL denotes player drafted in the AFL draft and teams with a superscript NFL denotes a player drafted in the NFL draft.
↑This is the team that drafted the player, not their most recent team.