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The Ringer's Kevin Clark says Washington is one of 4 teams that are all in for 2016


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If you don't get the daily emails from The Ringer (Bill Simmons' next project), here is what they had in today's email:

 

 

 

Four NFL Teams That Are All In for 2016

By Kevin Clark

In hindsight, Super Bowl winners usually look pretty obvious. They tend to have peaking rosters filled with guys who shouldn’t have been on cheap contracts, along with a few major but costly short-term mercenaries. Like your classic ’80s teen movie, there’s one last party before everyone goes their separate ways.

In short, to win a championship, you have to go all in. Sometimes it isn’t even by choice, but whether it’s because of players on the verge of departing, a pending salary cap crunch, or a star entering his twilight, certain teams are forced to confront the reality that, for better or worse, this is their year. Now that the draft is over and most relevant free agents have been signed, we can start to see which teams are pushing all their chips toward Super Bowl LI.

Arizona Cardinals

Arizona’s roster could look very different a year from now: Chandler Jones, who came over in a trade with New England, is under contract only for 2016, while Calais Campbell and Tyrann Mathieu are also entering the last years of their deals. On the other side of the ball, wideouts Michael Floyd and Larry Fitzgerald could hit the open market next offseason, and guard Evan Mathis signed a one-year deal. Even Arizona’s draft picks have a win-now flavor: Robert Nkemdiche should help make that front seven unstoppable right away, and center Evan Boehm may be expected to start from day one.

Washington Redskins

In what looked to be a wide-open NFC East, the Redskins established themselves as division favorites by signing Josh Norman two weeks ago. Thanks to the surprise addition of one of the league’s best defensive backs, no team, according to Spotrac, has spent more cap money for 2016. Going forward, Kirk Cousins’s eventual long-term deal will likely hamper their ability to retain other weapons like DeSean Jackson, who’s in the last year of his contract.

Kansas City Chiefs

While the Chiefs traded down in both the first and second rounds, there’s still plenty of urgency toward 2016. Stalwarts Dontari Poe and Eric Berry are going to be very expensive next offseason, so this will likely be the last year the defensive unit is together. On offense, the window is “whenever Jamaal Charles is healthy.”

Dallas Cowboys

With Dez Bryant, Jason Witten, and Tony romoSUCKS all under contract, the Cowboys’ core is likely to stay together for a few more years, but selecting Ezekiel Elliott was a splash decision to help with the very near term. Ignoring the pick’s many flaws, most first-round running backs, due to the short shelf life of the position, produce the most value while on their rookie deals.

 

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Even with Josh Norman and no other moves we still have $48M in cap space next year. So good research done by the writer. I do agree one of Jackson or Garcon are probably not back next year but that's why you draft Josh Doctson this year.

 

We are anything but all in this year. We are still rebuilding.

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I don't know why he is so focused on the cap number for next year and somehow linking them to not being to able to resign players. Long term deals for Cousins and Reed could easily be structured like Norman's with a very small cap hit next year and allow plenty of cap space to resign key veterans like Jackson.

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Now that the draft is over and most relevant free agents have been signed, we can start to see which teams are pushing all their chips toward Super Bowl LI.

 

 

He actually made a very good point on their podcast that we are fringe super bowl contenders after the Doctson pick. Said we can now pass and defend the pass and get after the QB and could be one of those teams that takes the next step.

That's kind of where I thought this was headed

I think he made it pretty clear in his last sentence what he implied, that we were pushing our chips toward a SB run this year. I disagree, we're still building, and have a couple of holes that we could have filled this year, and didn't.

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Arizona, 6 guys with 1 year left on their deal

 

Skins- DJax. 

 

Yup, that is about the same...

 

If we make it to the SB, awesome.  However, it does seem like a limited view/research job at best/

I think there is another offensive starter who is in the last year of his current deal.

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With all due respect to Arizona, DJax is a huge part of our team last year, and this year.  Now maybe Dotson and Crowder step up and make him less of a need, but until that happens, DJax is probably worth at least half of AZ's 3 1 year leftivers

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Arizona, 6 guys with 1 year left on their deal

Skins- DJax.

Yup, that is about the same...

If we make it to the SB, awesome. However, it does seem like a limited view/research job at best/

Think you meant:

Skins - Jackson, Garçon, Cousins, Reed, Baker, Galette (obviously we have plenty more one year guys - our starting ILBs for example - but those are our big guys).

Agreed though, the above does not, in any way, mean we're "all in". We'll re-sign Cousins, Reed, likely Baker, and (probably) 1 or 2 of the other 3 (with replacements Doctson and Smith in the wings).

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I think there is another offensive starter who is in the last year of his current deal.

 

At least 3 actually (Garcon, Reed and Cousins).  But his article points to none of them.  That was more my point.

 

A team doesn't trade draft picks for next years picks if they are all in.

 

He mentioned Nkemdiche to help be shut down, but we have people still upset that Billings wasn't taken.

 

Every team has free agents every year.  So what! Signing 1 guy like Norman, doesn't make it all in.

 

All in teams (in my mind), pick up character questions (Nkemdiche) or add a bad contract to get a guy that puts them over the top.  We can keep all of the 2017 FA if we want, with the cap space we have.  If DJax leaves we still have a solid team.  I think Reed, Cousins, Baker get re-signed.  If the team likes the player or the value I think Galette, Garcon and/or DJax could be re-signed. 

 

Denver went all in and then couldn't pay to keep the team together.

 

This was written like Arizona has a bunch that they are likely to keep together.

 

The skins can keep the team together.  (Maybe Arizona can, I don't care about them and have zero interest in looking at their cap situation).  For me that means they're in...not all in.  Lazy, damn near empty reporting.

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sort of a dumb analysis. Every team is pushing to win the superbowl every year. Some have better chance that others due to complimentary pieces/ coaching/ etc. Any given year you see teams nobody expected to do well come out of the woodwork.

Division winners want to stay on top. Average and bad teams want to be winners. 

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I think he made it pretty clear in his last sentence what he implied, that we were pushing our chips toward a SB run this year. I disagree, we're still building, and have a couple of holes that we could have filled this year, and didn't.

Yeah I'm saying he made a different point about us being s possible SB team in the podcast

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I stopped worrying about the cap long ago..   "all-in" to me is more factored by age than cap.

Cap can be adjusted numerous ways.. a couple of restructures here, a release there and voila, all sorts of room. 

(I assume this was written prior to Culliver's release?)

The NFL adds to the cap, and no one knows how much it will be every year, bt it is typically a significant amount.

 

the other teams on ths list... age is clearly a factor and major rebuilds are staring at them,, meaning they have old quarterbacks and very few teams survive the retirement of a stud QB. 

Specifically Arizona and Dallas.. romoSUCKS and Palmer could easily hang it up after this year, and both have injury histories. 

 

I don't see the Chiefs on this list as all in.. they just had a miracle season..  i think it remains to be seen if they can repeat that.
Alex Smith is not OLD, but he's not young, and he's also not the franchise type QB that can carry a team to the big game because he wants to.

 

The Redskins signed a big money guy. Everyone knew prior to the signing that D-Jax and Garcon were up for next year and maneuvering would need to be done,, but no more than normal. The Redskins are not "all in or bust" because of them.
Drafting Doctson pretty much proves that. If you're "all in " for this year, he isn't the pick. he's a pick for future consideration.. he's a pick that looks way past this year.

 

~Bang

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I don't know why he is so focused on the cap number for next year and somehow linking them to not being to able to resign players. Long term deals for Cousins and Reed could easily be structured like Norman's with a very small cap hit next year and allow plenty of cap space to resign key veterans like Jackson.

Eventually you need to pay the piper.  Norman's contract has a cap friendly $8M hit in 2016, but very unfriendly hits of $20M and $17M in 2017 and 2018.  Most big contracts follow the same pattern: the player (or agent) wants big guaranteed money and the team wants to make the bulk of that guaranteed money in the form of guaranteed salaries in the early years of the contract, because it is very unlikely a marquee player would be cut in the early years of his contract.  

 

I'd be very surprised if Cousins (assuming a good year in 2016) did not want at least $50M in guarantees on a five year contract and Reed did not want at least $20M guaranteed.  Jackson is looking at his last contract, and will probably at least test the waters (and has a good chance of finding someone who will overpay).  I'm assuming that the Skins won't try to re-sign Garcon (replaced by Doctson) or Galette. Even so, unless SM plans on cutting Norman in 2018, which I doubt, something has to give in either 2017 or 2018.  For 2017 and 2018 combined, we're looking at three players (Norman, Williams and Kerrigan) taking up $90M and Cousins and Reed taking up another $50+M.  That's close to 40% of the cap space on 5 players.

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Eventually you need to pay the piper.  Norman's contract has a cap friendly $8M hit in 2016, but very unfriendly hits of $20M and $17M in 2017 and 2018.  Most big contracts follow the same pattern: the player (or agent) wants big guaranteed money and the team wants to make the bulk of that guaranteed money in the form of guaranteed salaries in the early years of the contract, because it is very unlikely a marquee player would be cut in the early years of his contract.  

 

I'd be very surprised if Cousins (assuming a good year in 2016) did not want at least $50M in guarantees on a five year contract and Reed did not want at least $20M guaranteed.  Jackson is looking at his last contract, and will probably at least test the waters (and has a good chance of finding someone who will overpay).  I'm assuming that the Skins won't try to re-sign Garcon (replaced by Doctson) or Galette. Even so, unless SM plans on cutting Norman in 2018, which I doubt, something has to give in either 2017 or 2018.  For 2017 and 2018 combined, we're looking at three players (Norman, Williams and Kerrigan) taking up $90M and Cousins and Reed taking up another $50+M.  That's close to 40% of the cap space on 5 players.

 

Copied my post from a different thread:

 

Looking at the cap numbers for next year (listed as ~39 mill if you click on the 2017 tab)

 

http://overthecap.co...ngton-redskins/

 

Some rough estimates:

Cousins (~20 mill per)  http://overthecap.co...n/quarterback/ (Top 5 have SB rings)

Reed (~10 mill per) http://overthecap.co...tion/tight-end/

Baker (~5 mill per) http://overthecap.co...fensive-tackle/(This puts him as highest paid, not sure he goes that much)

Gillette (~10-12 mill per?) Kerrigan at 11 and I have a feeling he'd want similar if he does well. http://overthecap.co...ide-linebacker/

 

That adds ~45-47 million to keep the 4 (they can reduce for next year, but more or less that's the math).

 

Without bumps in play level, I think Paea (3.3 savings), Licht (3.5) and Lauvao (4 mill) will be likely cuts.  Possibly add Hall (4.25 mill).  Perry next year if it doesn't happen this year.  Maybe a smaller Garcon contract (~5 mill per?)  I know some find him expendable, but Scot like's what he brings and I expect a vet in the group.

 

Even without Hall it's doable and leds to another boring FA offseason (which you should all expect) and we build through the draft and 9 picks.  (or 10 since hopefully conditions weren't met for Carrier...).

 

That link shows 46 players signed for next year (Cully already off and it's already 46.4 cap space, meaning they already have room for all this).  4-5 guys cut in my thoughts, add in 9 draft picks.  That's 50-51 guys.  There is room for the big contracts when you draft well and often.

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Just seems like piss poor analysis and faulty logic to me *shrug

 

If there is some analysis in it...

 

I think he made it pretty clear in his last sentence what he implied, that we were pushing our chips toward a SB run this year. I disagree, we're still building, and have a couple of holes that we could have filled this year, and didn't.

 

So you're playing the season to lose? Don't even play it then.

And can we stop with that theory of holes that we could have filled and haven't? You don't even know the 53 and even less the starting lineup for 2016 right now, so yeah we didn't fill any holes because we've got none to fill right now see quotes from Jay and Scott from those last days. And we have yet to lose a game and get crush here or there...

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Yeah I'm saying he made a different point about us being s possible SB team in the podcast

OK. I'd disagree with that too. I don't think we're contenders.......yet. Give us 2 more years of Scot doing what he does, and then we might be in the mix, we still have a ways to go.

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What crap reasoning in this article...Cowgirls are nowhere near a Super Bowl push, Skins are at least a season or two away from a push, KC well...Andy Reid.  However, there is an argument to be made for the Cardinals.

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If there is some analysis in it...

 

 

So you're playing the season to lose? Don't even play it then.

And can we stop with that theory of holes that we could have filled and haven't? You don't even know the 53 and even less the starting lineup for 2016 right now, so yeah we didn't fill any holes because we've got none to fill right now see quotes from Jay and Scott from those last days. And we have yet to lose a game and get crush here or there...

Dude, I'm being realistic. NT is a question mark. Both ILBs are a question mark. RB is a question mark. Safety is a question mark. C and LG are a question mark. We got some guys, but have no idea how they will work out. And then we didn't even address some areas. When you have that many question marks, and are not proven as a team, don't expect great result. Do you WANT them, of course. But to expect them? No. You always play to win, but you don't look at the schedule and say, yeah, all we have to do is show up to win. We have some holes.

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If there is some analysis in it...

 

 

So you're playing the season to lose? Don't even play it then.

And can we stop with that theory of holes that we could have filled and haven't? You don't even know the 53 and even less the starting lineup for 2016 right now, so yeah we didn't fill any holes because we've got none to fill right now see quotes from Jay and Scott from those last days. And we have yet to lose a game and get crush here or there...

Good point about holes.

Very few holes are filled in April because the season has a way of creating holes.

Last year in August our pass rush was looking good due to plugging a hole with Gallette..  last day of camp, and boom, we have a hole when he goes down.

How do you draft or fill for holes you don't know you have yet?

TE is another position that looked strong heading in,, and was left in shambles in a few days.

 

I totall agree with McCloughan on drafting 'football players".. football players in his definition fill holes because they know how to play the game, not how to play a scheme or how to be a specialist. Even though we took a ton of injuries especially in specific positions that took multiple injuries, we still won the division and turned out a very good season, in no small part of McCloughan filling those holes on the fly as they appeared.

 

Filling holes in positions deemed weak..  such a our nose tackle.. you can't expect draft picks to be those answers in their rookie year.. if you do, you lose. Only in very special circumstances do rookies step right into the NFL and lock down their position.

 

Being beholden to names as 'hole fillers'... this is the sort of nonsense we did for years, and were mocked continuously for by writers just like this. 

Interesting how we see guys like Len Pasquarelli, who we all hated for basically telling us what we didn't want to hear (and he was often right)..  and now writers have flipped so that teams signing gigantic contracts to mismatched players ie: the giants ; are suddenly contenders.

 

~Bang

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Dude, I'm being realistic. NT is a question mark. Both ILBs are a question mark. RB is a question mark. Safety is a question mark. C and LG are a question mark. We got some guys, but have no idea how they will work out. And then we didn't even address some areas. When you have that many question marks, and are not proven as a team, don't expect great result. Do you WANT them, of course. But to expect them? No. You always play to win, but you don't look at the schedule and say, yeah, all we have to do is show up to win. We have some holes.

 

I'm surprised you didn't even include the QB position as a question mark.

You're talking about NT, but the whole DL is a question mark. The whole secondary is... You don't have any clue how things will sort out during TC.

Scott was praised for getting guys off the street last year and those guys performed well.

They performed well because we've got a great coaching staff that got those guys ready.

 

Now if you only look at names on a roster sheet to tell me that there's question marks on here, that's a pity. Last year should have taught you that our coaching staff was valueing production over name and salary.

There's holes on every NFL team, you just can't solve them all in one draft. You have to deal with it.

And you can start with checking the last 2 SB contenders: Broncos and Panthers. They've got some freaking holes.

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I'm surprised you didn't even include the QB position as a question mark.

You're talking about NT, but the whole DL is a question mark. The whole secondary is... You don't have any clue how things will sort out during TC.

Scott was praised for getting guys off the street last year and those guys performed well.

They performed well because we've got a great coaching staff that got those guys ready.

 

Now if you only look at names on a roster sheet to tell me that there's question marks on here, that's a pity. Last year should have taught you that our coaching staff was valueing production over name and salary.

There's holes on every NFL team, you just can't solve them all in one draft. You have to deal with it.

And you can start with checking the last 2 SB contenders: Broncos and Panthers. They've got some freaking holes.

Really? Going by that logic then, the entire team is a hole. /facepalm

To your remark at DL, we have 6 guys that can play DE, and have been productive in the NFL. As for NT, the best NT on the squad is out starting RDE and then we have a rookie 5th round draft choice and...Goldston (who is a 43 DT)? You call that a hole. It wasn't good last year.

 

Also it's one thing to have 3 guys go down and have issues, but another to have no one go down and have issues. Injuries will turn a strength into a weakness, but a opening day weakness is a hole.

 

So, you think we're going to win the SB this year. No HOPE, but willing to say we are the favorites? Since that is what this thread was about (are we going all in to win it all this year), are you going to put money on it?

 

Give it a rest. We might not even win the division. We might not even make the playoffs. We just might have a loosing record.

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