Once upon a time, the NFL draft was merely something the fledgling network ESPN televised to break up its broadcasts of Australian Rules Football.

But, thanks to the explosion of interest in the NFL the past two decades, the draft has muscled its way into the sports mainstream.

The fact that Iowa doesn't have any NFL team makes no difference this time of the year. Recognizing the best teams in professional football are built through the draft these days, many Northeast Iowans will huddle in front of a television to live and die with the announcement of each team's selection.

Waterloo's Rob Green will be watching the first hour of today's draft with an especially keen interest. He is a Tampa Bay Buccaneers fan, and he's hoping that the biggest blue-chipper of the bunch - Georgia Tech receiver Calvin Johnson - will somehow drop through the Raiders, Lions and Browns to his Bucs at No. 4 overall.

In preparation for the big day, Green has spent the last few months taking in all NFL Network programming about the prospects - generally 1 to 2 hours per day, as well as digging around for information and rankings on the Internet.

"I don't know if you can really put a number on (the time spent studying)," Green said.

Jared Huntington of New Hartford has spent even longer prepping for the draft - like the entire college football season.

"I'm a draft freak," said Huntington, an Indianapolis Colts fan who plans to watch the draft from the start despite the fact his team won't make its first pick until at least six hours into the telecast. "I'm an NFL fan first and a college fan second. I watch the college season just to evaluate. I think, 'You know what, that team has some players.'"

Area establishments have recognized the NFL draft has become big business, too. Peppers Grill and Sports Pub in Cedar Falls has planned food and drink specials throughout the 10 hours broadcasting that ESPN and NFL Network will offer. In addition, anything draft-related will be shown and heard on most of its TVs.

"When they first started showing the draft, you maybe glanced at it (on TV) and just said, 'Hey, these guys went to these teams,'" said Zeke Flick, a Chiefs fan and a manager at Peppers. "Now, everybody wants to watch it live, and since we got the NFL Network, it's been especially crazy. Even the (NFL) Combine was huge."

If Peppers' cash registers don't tell the story of the draft's popularity, Flick can. Each year he struggles to staff enough help because many of his employees request the day off to stay home and watch the draft themselves.

Dennis and Karyn Salmon eat it up, too. The Cedar Falls couple watched virtually all of last year's draft - together.

"She loves football," Steelers fan Dennis said with a smile.

"That's kind of our NFL thing," says Karyn, a Dolphins fan. "We always try to get away on Monday nights together and watch the games, and we watch this, too."

Still, Dennis acknowledges no amount of draft study can truly prepare fans for what will play out on draft day.

"I check my team's Web site religiously every day and always try to figure out what my team's trying to do," Dennis said. "And then it just ends up being a smokescreen because they do something completely different. It's cheap entertainment, I guess, because we listen to what all the experts have to say and then it's something totally different."

Huntington, unlike the others, should enter today's draft without that sense of desperation shared by fans of the other 31 NFL franchises. After all, his Colts are the reigning world champs and wouldn't appear to have many needs. Furthermore, they have just one first-round pick (No. 32 overall) and two thirds (Nos. 95 and 98) on the first day.

"It looks like I've got a boring day ahead (today), but I've still got four or five players I'm rooting for," he said.

Contact Sean Hylton at (319) 291-1428 or sean.hylton@wcfcourier.com