List of LSU Tigers in the NFL draft
The LSU Tigers football team has had 326 players drafted into the National Football League since the league began holding drafts in 1936. This includes 42 players taken in the first round and three overall number one picks: Billy Cannon, Jamarcus Russell and Joe Burrow. Six former LSU players have been elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame: Steve Van Buren, Y. A. Tittle, Jim Taylor, Johnny Robinson, Alan Faneca, and Kevin Mawae. As of the beginning of the 2015 NFL season, there were 40 former LSU players on active rosters in the NFL, the most of any college program.
Each NFL franchise adds new players through the annual NFL draft. 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. Prior to the merger agreements in 1966, the American Football League operated in direct competition with the NFL and held a separate draft. This led to a bidding war over top prospects between the two leagues. As part of the merger agreement on June 8, 1966, the two leagues held a multiple round "Common Draft". Once the AFL officially merged with the NFL in 1970, the "Common Draft" became the NFL Draft.