skinny21

Haha, me to brother, me too. Fortunately we have JMU running cover for us 😁

Yep. I’ll even go so far as to say there’s a small part of me that wishes we’d finished outside of the top 3 picks, lol. But we didn’t and so going for a qb is a no brainer IMO (and I’m excited about it). I’d actually say that the way everything has lined up - Snyder selling, landing a quality GM, Ron accidentally tanking, etc. - well, I’m a big believer in taking what the universe drops in your lap.

You said it was ludicrous, and I agreed with you…? Anyway, I agree that “getting cute” with the decision to take a blue chip qb prospect is idiotic. If I had 2 guys rated closely or was torn on which to take though? I’d take the trade down in a heart beat. This is more about philosophy than what I think the Bears do, though I suppose there’s a small (maybe minuscule) chance that’s the boat they find themselves in… I’ll just add that part of my thinking stems from how opinions differ on Maye vs Daniels on this board, and in the media. Seems a general consensus that Williams is ahead of Maye, though of course we’ve seen some outliers there as well.

You hit on the main point that I didn’t initially spell out. If it’s a career defining pick, it seems to me adding high end picks softens the blow if you wind up wrong. And there’s a scarily decent chance they’re wrong whichever route they go. Again though, my hypothetical only applies if they have the prospects rated really close to each other. In other words, they wouldn’t need a guarantee of which qb was traded up for. Almost certainly wasting my time posting on the issue because I agree with you that’s it’s basically a lock CHI takes Williams (or at the very least stays put at 1)… just wanted to clarify my point a bit. Your scenario is definitely ludicrous lol. Are people suggesting that? I guess maybe I saw something akin to it mentioned a while back regarding us trading with NE?

Funny enough, your post actually gives me some pause. I mean, I’m right there with you in that I didn’t (and still don’t) think Chicago trades down. With that said, if I was in their shoes and had two (or 3) qbs rated close to each other, and/or if the room is divided on the pick, I’d have to consider a trade down. Given the crapshoot nature of the draft, particularly with qbs, adding a couple 1st round picks (or whatever) might be a really smart hedge. Of course that’s easy for me to say.

Yeah, I’ve had the same thought for a while now but decided I wasn’t stupid enough to suggest it. sorry, I meant “brave enough”… 😁

Obviously I have no idea how that would play out, but I can see clear potential for it being a big plus. 1. You’d have two guys with experience in the same offense, and that shared experience can serve as a translation bridge for the new offense. 2. If they’re good friends, you probably have less ego in the qb room, they’ll likely support each other and won’t be afraid to speak up in front of each other. 3. They’re apt to spend a lot of time outside of the facility together, which potentially means a lot more time learning together. 4. I imagine it’s easier to coach two guys that have the shared experience in terms of offense experience and age. 5. I could see how having a friend (that’s in all the same meeting rooms) might help a rookie get more comfortable, faster. 6. There’s a decent chance that whatever one qb needs to hear, the other needs to as well. There are potential negatives of course. To me, the big one (if we don’t wind up with a vet in the room) is that your rookie isn’t hearing/seeing the higher level questions and coaching that a vet might bring. Now, part of me wonders if that’s a little like learning pre-cal and calculus at the same time, but even if you only retain some of the advanced stuff, I’d think it might help provide context to the more basic stuff. I have no idea though.

All things being equal, yes, you’d think he’d go to a contender. Thing is, there are a lot of other factors in play here: 1) how many teams are seen as contenders right now, 2) what is their cap situation, 3) do they have backers in house already, 4) is ILB where they want to spend their money, and 5) might they prefer one of the other fair few quality linebackers set to hit FA. Not gonna dissect all of those, but just regarding cap space, I’m seeing the Bengals, Lions, Texans and I guess Rams as the only contenders with over 15mil in effective cap space. Ravens have just over 1mil, and I think 8 teams that were in the playoffs are in the red on cap space.

With Fuller, there’s a question of whether he, as more of a zone corner, fits what they’re looking for. We can’t really know that of course since it seems they’re not even sure what type of D they’ll run. I’m right there with you on the rest though.

Yeah, I think the contender issue is going to be a factor for sure. I do think other things factor in/are prioritized at times though - culture, relationships, locale, and of course money. Don’t love our chances of landing top notch guys, but I’d say there’s a chance that having Quinn here (and plenty of cap space) makes a difference. We’ll see.

Early on, my reasoning for putting the seat down for every flush: Fairness - this way we both have work to do. Then I saw a graphic showing the germ cloud when the lid is left open* *of course, this might have been paid for by the Toothbrush Council - “You’re brushing **** on your teeth! Buy a dozen a year!” (paraphrasing) What the hell is this thread about?

You mean Wagner on a 1 year deal or thereabouts? I’d definitely be on board for that…

I sure wouldn’t scoff at adding Wagner, but I’d prefer a (proven) younger guy. Good point.

From ‘22 to opening day ‘23, the only real changes were losing coach Harris and Bobby McCain, both of which could have attributed to our communication issues in the secondary. Given how poorly our D was playing up until Sweat/Young were traded, sure seems like the schematic changes Del Rio made must of had a pretty big negative impact. To your point though, Sweat was the only major personnel loss overall as of now. Of course, now we have Fuller, Curl, our rotational DEs, and Barton/Mayo as FAs. I’m looking at the defensive personnel like this: High end guys that can benefit from a better supporting cast (and scheme) - Payne/Allen Guys that have shown a lot of quality play that can hopefully take a significant step forward via improved coaching/scheme/supporting cast - Davis/Forrest/Martin. Guys that have shown relatively little, but have some quality traits and/or pedigree that can hopefully take a huge step forward (w/ improved coaching/scheme/supporting cast) - St Juste/Forbes/Butler/Mathis/Ridgeway/Henry/Jones. That’s a lot of hoping, lol. Looks to me like we need a minimum of 1 quality player added to every position group (except DT) - FS, corner, ILB and DE. Bare minimum for me would be a good (to very good) DE and ILB addition, and a (at the least) decent FS and corner. With that said, it looks like there’s a big opportunity for coaching (including a clarity of scheme) to lift the play of a lot of these guys, especially given how young the group is overall.

I absolutely love the fact that your trig teacher sold green triangles on the side… You could base a movie on that angle. (I’ll see myself out)

Be even cooler to have good players at LT and LG 😁

What you’re saying makes sense of course, but it sure sounded to me like he said we finished in-house roster evals… not “we started roster evals”. Probably a moot point though - while they have a lot of work to do constructing a scheme, seeing where guys fit, seeing what they need and getting into the draft… surely they wind up spending some more time on their current guys. Also, I imagine our player personnel team was relied on heavily, as opposed to position coaches (who’ve literally just been hired) zooming through film.

Yeah, maybe so, though it being the first stage of evals wasn’t the impression I got. Whitt was strangely upbeat having just gotten the report “easily bullied, walking PI, can’t rush, can’t rush, underperformer, underperformer, Quan’s interesting.” 😁 On a more serious note, I agree that this could be huge for Davis, but Forrest is another I’m looking forward to seeing what they can get out of. And while I’ve kind of written him off, Butler is guy that could potentially benefit from clarity of coaching.

I’ll echo the positive comments. Both of these guys sound bent on getting the best they can from the roster and seems like the diverse/quality staff is going to be big. I’ll be real curious how the Frankenstein approach to an offensive and defensive scheme will pan out. Obviously possible it leads to a disjointed affair, but the lack of ego, the implied creativity, and potential for unity/buy in by each coach is exciting. I was a little taken aback that they did current defensive player evaluations in a day (or a couple of hours maybe), especially the comment (paraphrasing) “each coach gave a one liner about each player”. Not saying it’s a bad thing necessarily, just surprised it would boil down to that basic of a level. As to last year’s record predictions, we had a very good defense in ‘22, added a proven offensive scheme (lol), and were starting a qb with far more talent than TH. In hindsight it looks crazy to have expect a 1-3 win improvement, but at the time, eh….

Easy fix - just trade down a bunch to a add a few dozen rooks. Seriously though, I’m with you. Just hope we don’t go after the Nick Gates/Jon Bostic’s of the world in an effort to fill out the roster with stopgaps - the journeyman vets that have shown to be sub-average.

Yeah, my “decent” comment was in regards to guys like Cushenberry, not Williams. I don’t have faith in Gates either, but as a stopgap for a short time until Williams is healthy, I’m fine with that… though I’d much rather Stromberg take that job over Gates. Of course, I don’t know how Stromberg/Gates/any of the “decent” guys (or even Williams) might fit into whatever scheme we run, so that could change things obviously.

Obviously comes down to cost and health (ie did surgery go well and is rehabbing progressing on schedule), but Williams could potentially be a great fit for us IMO. If he needs time to regain his form, we have Gates/Stromberg to hold down the fort. If it’s a 1 year deal, it buys us time to time to find a long term solution to the position (and perhaps nets us a comp pick). If it’s a multi year deal, we can allocate draft picks elsewhere and have (likely) added a quality veteran center that should be a boon to a young qb. Personally, I’d rather roll with Stromberg/Gates over signing a “decent” vet center. In fact, that would be my favored philosophy for FA in general - avoid “decent” (and overpaid) FAs, and instead target high end quality players, up-and-coming young guys with potential, and 1 year prove-it types.

I’m curious how much film you’ve watched of Maye. I’ve watched almost zilch, so I’m not asking because I think you’re wrong, just from my own experience I watched two highlight reels of his that were vastly different. After the first, my thought was “I don’t really get the hype” (he looked like Will Grier 2.0 to me), but the second was a much better illustration of why people are high on him. Surprised me that 2 highlight reels could be so disparate.

Lol. Probably no one? As I said, highly doubtful they do anything but select a qb at 2, and the league will expect that to be the outcome. To be clear though, I didn’t meaning to make it sound like the staff might leak out a bunch of lies in order to try to manipulate the draft. Simply that I could see them (truthfully) pointing out Howell’s positives when asked how they feel about him - his arm talent, athleticism, intangibles, toughness, poor supporting cast, etc. And I wouldn’t be shocked if they spoke very highly about both Maye and Daniels, but raved about MJII. And of course, this line of thinking stemmed in part from the fact that Howell has a strong familiarity with Kingsbury’s system (via Longo), and KK and Longo have a connection. Not sure I agree with your second point, even though it’s kind of besides my point. Guess it depends on how someone views Howell. With (what should hopefully be) vastly improved coaching, quality draft capital and tons of cap space, I’d be surprised if other teams just (essentially) pointed at Howell and laughed. Maybe that’s just me. Overall, I don’t see ARI sweating either the chances of us taking MJII or another team trading up to take him. I do wonder if NE might want to try to trade up to ensure they get their guy. For example, if they have say Maye clearly ahead of Daniels, but we seem to have them as more of a coin toss. Unlikely, but maybe an outside chance of them trying to swap picks with us.

Was just thinking the same thing. I’ll add that it’s even possible Kingsbury completely switches it up, like moving to a predominantly west coast offense with some of the guys he brought on being able to serve as, well, something like interpreters between the two systems. Regardless, looks like a sign his offense is likely to look a fair bit different than we might have expected. (“We” meaning those versed in the Air Raid system… which doesn’t really include me, lol)