Going Commando

The best defenses don't play any of their IDLs more than 60-65% of their snaps. I don't think we've ever really appreciated how crazy and detrimental it was that we played Daron 900+ snaps some years, and that he sits at over 800 snaps on average. And Allen hasn't been that far off from that, which is worse because we know he has chronic shoulder issues. Aaron Donald was basically the only IDL in the NFL that can handle that workload and remain effective, and he retired super young for a GOAT tier DT. The best defenses have their top IDLs play 600 to low 700 snaps per season, and that needs to be the pitch count for Allen and Payne. That means there will easily be 500+ snaps available for Newton if he is healthy and earns the IDL3 job. And that's assuming we don't play any of them at edge or run 3 IDL packages. Great defenses almost all play a four man rotation at IDL, with three players getting 400-700 snaps. We have been ruining Allen and Payne by playing them too much ever since Ioannidis went down in 2020. If we get 500 snaps from Newton next year, and 200+ from either Ridgeway or Mathis, then that'd put Allen and Payne at upper 600s or very low 700s at most, and I promise you will see a drastic improvement in the performance of both the DL and the defense as a whole. ~670 is the sweet spot for them, and if we can hit that from a full season, then the best years of their careers are ahead.

I'm not sure that is true. I'm looking at the snap counts of the best linebackers in the NFL and Jamin's snap count last season would have been the same as Fred Warner's average season. He played 57 per game, which puts him at 970 for the year if he didn't get hurt and go on IR. I don't think there is anything wrong with rotating linebackers off the field and limiting their snap counts. Jeremiah Owusu-Koromoah made the Probowl last season as the best linebacker on the best defense while only playing 47 snaps per game.

Good coaches adapt scheme to player, and I don't think they're going to leave Forbes in island single coverages in press. If they wanted to play a lot of that, they wouldn't have drafted Sainristil either. Sainristil is a pretty similar player to Forbes in skill set. That suggests to me that guys like Forbes are in the plans. Forbes has some trouble getting off run blocks, but he's actually a hard hitter. He got thrown out of the Seahawks game last season for hitting Tyler Lockett too hard. It was a bang bang play that ended up being helmet to helmet because Lockett fell as he tried to complete the catch and his head unexpectedly dropped, but it showed that Forbes is physical at the catch point. His first real highlight play was also blowing up a screen or swing pass in the first preseason game, which is a trait that pops from his college cut ups. He closes hard when he reads these flat throws fast. Davis is the only traditional press man DB they added to the roster this off-season. I think they're going to play most of the secondary in off coverages, press and reroute the few big match ups to slow down timing, and try and generate a lot of turnovers off of zone match and zone, and I think those will be paired really well with creative pressure schemes. We've finally got the linebackers to diversify our coverages and pressures, and still play the run well even if we get super aggressive with our IDLs.

Well, for the purposes of this, let's assume the Eagles still make the trade up for someone else.

2 - Drake Maye 36 - Cooper DeJean 50 - Cooper Beebe 53 - Kingsley Suamataia 67 - Blake Corum 100 - Troy Franklin 139 - Sedrick Van Pran Granger 161 - Johnny Wilson 222 - Myles Cole That's rigidly going off my board without considering overloading on positions. I might have picked Austin Booker over SVPG at 139 because of already having Biadasz and the better position value of Edge. But if I stay true to my board, SVPG was the BPA here for me.

I had Sainristil and Sinnott as negligible reaches on my overall slotting. Where I think there could be some regret is that I had Beebe and Suamataia a fair bit higher than them on my board, and if they hit, then Sainristil and Sinnott need to hit bigger to feel like great value. Sainristil was pretty risky. I think there is an outcome where he quickly and significantly outplays his draft slot like Terry McClaurin did. And I think there is an equally likely outcome where he doesn't really work out because of his size. IMO Sinnott has a high floor and will probably end up being a good starter, and if he busts, it'll probably be due to injury. I think Coleman was a pretty sizable reach at 67, and that's the Day 2 pick I don't have a ton of confidence in. I think we all see McCaffrey as a reach, but his film, his Senior Bowl week, and his pedigree are good enough to look at him as having the potential to justify his draft range. As for Day 3, Magee is the guy I'm not sold on. I know our FO has a reputation for excelling at drafting LBers, I just couldn't find enough cut ups to form a strong take on him, and what I did see was not very impressive. In the end, who is really going to care if he doesn't hit though. This class is 100% going to be defined by Jayden Daniels. If he hits, then we'll be competitive at the highest level of the NFL. If he busts, then we'll be going through turmoil again in a few seasons.

Seeing the way Deion and Shedeur Sanders behave on social media, I'm so glad we're not in the market for a 2025 QB.

Five picks in the top 67 should net 4-5 starters. We had to trade three starters to get this ammo.

There aren't many stud tackles period, but there are many more on the list of the current best tackles in the NFL with 33" arms than 36" arms. It's overrated as a determinant of success. Penei Sewell was the top graded OT in the NFL according to PFF, and he has 33 1/4" arms. Braden Smith was the sixth highest graded OT, and his arm length is 32 1/4". Bernhard Raimann was the eighth highest graded OT and his was 32 7/8. Taylor Decker was ninth, and his arm length is 33 3/4. Rob Havenstein has the same arm length and he was 14th in the NFL. Zach Thom was 15th and his arm length is 33 1/4". Slater was 17th and has already been discussed, but his arms are 33" flat. Kaleb McGary's arms are 32 7/8 and he was tied for 20th. That's eight of the top 20 OTs in the league last season with less than 34" arms. Arm length isn't going to hold Cosmi back from playing tackle. He got moved inside because we lost Scherff and signed Wylie. He played RT as a rookie and was good. He only struggled at RT in year two because he played most of the season hurt and got moved back and forth on a line that had to constantly shuffle personnel due to injury. Good linemen are good linemen, and he has spent more of his career at tackle than guard. If we didn't have Wylie, he'd probably be playing tackle still. And if Wylie gets hurt, there is a good chance he'll have to kick back outside to tackle unless Coleman is ready to play as a rookie.

There's not a good, objective way to grade our classes. Just going on numerical value minus reach scores doesn't work, because a reach at the end of the draft shouldn't matter in comparison to reaches at the beginning. Should there be some consideration about accurately drafting compared to our teams' real draft class? What if we are accurate with our picks in that regard, but our team makes bad picks? We have at least three objectives here, and they can contradict each other: 1 - to pick good players 2 - to pick the players that our teams realistically would 3 - to pick players after they are actually drafted in the real draft So in assessing my own class, Jarrian Jones at 96 feels like my best pick because that's what actually happened on draft day. But that also means a +0 value, and it's also not going to be an impressive pick in the ultimate consideration of the class if he ends up being a scrub. Then let's say you pick a player 50 picks early in the second round, and it looks like you committed a -50 reach and that it was one of your worst picks. But that player ends up being an All Pro, and in reality, you've outpicked both the NFL and your real team. Finally, let's say that I picked Michael Penix as the Jacksonville Jaguars this year, and he ends up being a star IRL. That pick would have been a value pick where I chose a star QB, so it seems like it should be considered a home run. Except that Michael Penix is a completely unrealistic pick for Jacksonville, and the reality is he would probably be the third stringer there. So how do we assess that?

Building an NFL team is like building a tower, not a house. The competition isn't over who can build the most complete house, it's over who can build the tallest tower. The players are all building blocks of the same shape and basic function, but where they differ is in size. The best players are the biggest blocks. If every team is restricted to building with 53 blocks, then the ones who get the most big blocks are the ones that will win. Need-drafting stems from looking at the problem of building a team with constricted resources wrong. It's misunderstanding the true competition in the sport, and the end result is a team that doesn't have enough talent to compete.

Probably. I get the logic to try and work around your first round pick, but the obvious solution is to play Guyton at RT, Smith at LT, and bench Steele because he sucks.

He makes plays against man coverage too. I think he kind of has a reputation for being a zone beater, but his man grades are better than his zone. He's got good strength and toughness and he's a no frills route runner who efficiently creates separation early in the concept.

I hope we're lucky too. I wanted Maye and still wish we had picked him, but I'm very glad that we picked Jayden instead of McCarthy #2. It's a super negative hypothetical for me that I don't want to unnecessarily ponder. We got a QB that has legit big play capability, and I don't have to worry about a scenario where that wouldn't have been the case. I think franchise QBs are more made than found, and that's why I'm still optimistic about this build. Guys like Jalen Hurts, Russell Wilson, Dak Prescott, Brock Purdy, Jordan Love, Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, even Patrick Mahomes were all made into franchise QBs by the situations they got drafted into. None had the kind of can't-miss pre-cast greatness of a Lawrence, Luck, or Burrow where they were almost immune to situational instability (although the Bengals found a gem in Zac Taylor). They got forged by their teams. Excellent stability, excellent coaching, excellent culture, excellent supporting talent, and a sincere commitment to their development--all of that was necessary for them to be successful, and all of them would have been busts if they had they ended up in a place like DC during the time they came into the league. Our hope is that the conditions here for developing a franchise QB are right this time. Harris, Peters, and Quinn are all on the same timeline of the build, all on the same page about Jayden, and Peters and Quinn are 100% married to him. They're going to do everything they can to make sure he works out. If he doesn't, then it'll probably be due to injuries that are beyond our control at this point. Health provided, I think it's going to work too. They made building a championship caliber defense a huge priority, and I think they are going to pull it off. An elite defense is a big part of a QB development cradle, because it gives them the ability to make mistakes and go through growing pains. Most prospects are not like a Matt Stafford or Peyton Manning or Andrew Luck, where they can come in and be almost immediately competitive while running an expansive passing game and carrying the burden of their team's competitiveness on their shoulders. Most QBs need a training wheels offense and the opportunity to get the ball back when drives stall or the ball gets turned over. And all QBs suffer in development from playing uncompetitive football. Being able to still compete at the highest level of the sport while running a limited passing offense is how guys like Roethlisberger, Brady, and Wilson got the very, very long runway to grow into future HoFers. We still have a lot of work to do, but I think the foundation of our defense is outstanding.

The team that picked JJ McCarthy didn't even have JJ McCarthy over Drake Maye. I find it hard to believe that we did.