BRAVEONTHEWARPATH93

It’s really hard to be a defense first team in the modern NFL. 9/10, you’re going to get beat by good/great offenses. I think they’ll be fine going forward against lesser competition. But they will always have a ceiling bc they don’t have a true 1%er stud on defense. That’s the only way to constantly threaten offenses week over week. You need a Bosa, Parson, Garrett. We don’t. We have some good rushers but they don’t wreck games. You need a consistent guy that consistently is forcing turnovers whether that’s through strips or forcing bad throws. That’s why I didn’t hate drafting Forbes bc even if he’s getting cooked, INTs will change games. Here’s to hoping on that one…

Offense was COOKING. Deserved better. I know it’s not realistic to expect a defense to win games against good offenses but damn, not one of the “generationals” made a big play. In games like this, your blue chips have to make plays. That’s the difference

What a drive. Complete bounce back game.

This is the biggest game they’ve played since SNF against NYG. If today’s “moral victory” is real, you ****ing wreck a **** ass Chicago team even if it’s a weird Thursday game. Until I see it, I don’t believe so I’ll go with a close, ugly unconvincing win. Bears 17 Commanders 20

If this is real, you ****ing wreck Chicago on Thursday

Hell of a bounce back by Sam.

He needs a pick desperately to save this performance. Barbecue chicken out there

He’s playing a raw 5th round rookie QB that is magnetically attracted to getting sacked in the 4th year of his regime lol. That’s insanity. I’d think issues would be expected even if the line was a strong point. The roster itself is ready to win except for the most important position.

They are a C+ to C- offensive line relative to the rest of the league. They’ll have good days and bad days depending on the team they’re playing but it’ll end up in the C range come year and. The NFL in general has a lack of OL talent around the league. Very few teams have “set it and forget it” lines. Cosmi is a good player. Gates is solid. Charles is developing but still raw. Leno is a perfectly average LT. Whylie is probably the worst one but he’s not a scrub like you guys think. He was good enough to play for the SB champions and also good enough to get a pretty decent FA deal after. Collectively, they grade out across different sites as league average or maybe just below. Guys get beat during reps. It happens. No lineman is exempt from that. But if you look across the league, very few QBs are just sitting back there not being harassed. Honestly pick a random game and watch it today. Chances are most of their pockets are muddy as well. Go one further and look up their fans’ tweets and I promise you you’ll find similar arguments to the ones we’re currently having. Again, they aren’t a particularly strong group collectively like you might see in Philly or older Dallas teams but I think they’d be much less of a talking point with a more developed QB behind them. They’ll have days where they get wrecked of course bc that is what happens to average Olines. They can get wrecked by good defenses. So long story short, my answer is that they’re “good enough” especially if Charles keeps developing. Did I want a lineman in the draft? Yes. That’s one of the few positions I paid attention to leading up to the draft. Lots of good talent we missed out on. Now if you want to argue that a “good enough” line is woefully inadequate for a raw QB like Sam Howell and it was naive of the staff to try this out in a must win year, you’ll get no argument from me. I think this whole thing is reckless and they’ll all end up fired before long. But as I watch and learn more about the league, I’m also starting to realize that a basic part of playing QB in the league is learning to live with dirty pockets and pressure. I think this is why a lot of young QBs struggle bc they get to sit in pristine pockets all through college so any time, a pocket is dirty in the NFL (the majority), it’s a learning process. Maybe you go all out to make the line as strong as possible for your young QB but then that means you have less talent elsewhere.

A player like Forbes should be measured by INTs and PBUs. He’s a ball hawk. He’s gonna get cooked at times. Is what it is. He’s already got one pick and could have had another week one. Fuller and BSJ are good cover corners. We needed playmakers. Desperately.

Debates like these usually sort themselves out. Howell will likely get injured/benched at some point. Brisset will play and the sacks will materially come down. Same thing with Robert and Kirk. Likely the same once Fields is benched in Chicago. Happens all the time. Of course the offense in general will suffer bc we’ll be back to caveman “run the damn ball” inefficient nonsense but hey, we’ll have another ES debate settled! I’m 15 years in and I’m just getting started lol. Feel like I’m in college again. Seriously tho, I think we’re all really criticizing Ron more than any individual players or units. No matter how you go about analyzing it, he’s the one in charge and he’s the one that decided to go into this season on a hope and prayer. He will get his receipt soon enough I believe. I actually think he’s ready for retirement.

We agree at a high level then. I think part of the reason for my “pessimism” tone is that I honestly don’t think Sam will get a fair chance to be the future here. He’s been set up to fail in a hair brain, last ditch effort to save jobs/advance careers. He needs to be on a team with muted expectations where he can have his roller coaster ride performances and the results not really matter. Instead, he has to win (and credit to him, he’s 3-1 as a starter). I’m a big believer in a unified vision in whatever organization you’re in. One common goal. We do not have that in Washington right now and it’s basically malpractice. The goal needs to be either to win or to develop Sam. You can’t do both. Ask the 49ers with Trey Lance. I think tomorrow will be really tough and that’ll put a huge emphasis on Thursday as a “really need to win” game. That’s a lot of pressure on a raw talent like him. I think there’s potential for issues if Ls start to stack and seats start getting hotter. Again, it’s very unfair to Sam. There’s likely to be new management next year that have no ties to him and want to make a splash. He pretty much has to answer all questions this season to solidify his spot here if we’re being honest. I worry he’s gonna turn into a solid Kirk Cousins tier QB some time in the next 3 years but it won’t be here. I still hold out hope that we’ll get lucky for once and he just goes super nova this season and my fears can abide.

Honestly, I think it’s easier for fans to blame “nameless” Olinemen than it is to cast blame on the young QB that represents hope and promise. It’s the same story as 2013 and 2014 tbh. I’ve been oddly invested in the career of Justin Fields since he was drafted bc I was much lower on him than consensus. I read a lot of Bears content as a result. Their fans do the exact same thing when analyzing him. Way easier to blame random fat guys than the young, handsome QB. No matter how many stats you throw out, their/our OLine is the equivalent of 5 turnstiles. Now if you want to analyze it from the 10,000 view and question the entire idea/operation of playing a rookie behind an average at best line in a win now season, I’m in unison. I’ve been screaming about that for literally 8+ months. Honestly it’s a pretty ridiculous idea and unfair to Sam Howell and his development. But it’s still kinda crazy how fans want to shield unproven players from valid criticism. We’ve been through this process enough to know better imo. He’s young and he has enough talent that I think he’ll eventually overcome it. But ignoring it seems weird to me. It’s right there. Even when he was cooking the Ravens 3rd string, it was noticeable. I traveled 3K miles to watch the week 1 game. Had seats right around the home bench. His pocket play really sticks out in a bad way in person. So when I see tons of stats that confirm that, there’s no debate. But hopefully he turns the corner soon and this is a moot argument.

The team they play Sunday intentionally lost to us in 2020 and finished with 4 wins. 9 months ago, they played in Super Bowl. Ron Rivera has been coach of this team since before 98% of the population knew what Covid was. He’s never won more than 8 games.

Boy, did I miss this place. Lol Only on ES will you get intentionally disingenuous posts like this

From a macro view, is it not disappointing for us to have such low expectations for a division game in YEAR FOUR?? Like…that alone infuriates me.

Idk. You can certainly question the stat but I think it makes more sense to question the young, inexperienced QB that’s falling victim to the same things he did in college in a completely unrelated environment. Id recommend everyone go and listen to Logan Paulsen on Keim’s podcast. He didn’t dance around that he thinks most of it is Sam and with a veteran QB back there, none of these discussions are being had. Bills players basically came out and said similar statements after the game. It’s not so much a defense of the OLine as much as it is a statement of what Oline play looks like in the modern NFL. There’s a huge dearth of competent Oline play across the league right now. I was listening to PFF’s weekly pod and Sam Monsoon argued the biggest benefit of a developmental football league would be solving the lack of Oline talent issue league wide. It’s almost a crisis with few exceptions where teams really invest hard. I think Logan Paulsen used the phrase “Cs get degrees” in reference to Oline play. You can run competent/good offense with average OLine play provided you have a QB with competent pocket presence. So back to our team, if anything we should be sideeying Ron for not building a better than average Oline to mitigate the known flaws of the rookie QB you’ve decided to rest your career on.

Your entire 2nd paragraph is exactly my feelings on the entire season.

That post was just push back on the idea of giving any young QB 17 games based solely on them being young. It was a hypothetical to make a point.

100% Im not really worried about him getting benched for performance at this point. Injury? Hell yeah. All it takes is one rolled ankle or sprained AC Joint

Guys, if he has more games like he did Sunday, he’s not playing 17 games and it would be unrealistic to think he would. Come on. No NFL team is going to send a guy out there and watch him turn the ball over and get sacked a million times for the sake of development. “Rookie” or not. That’s completely unreasonable. Jets didn’t just let Zach Wilson suck out loud for the sake of it last year. I totally get your sentiment and I definitely think Sam will show marked improvement over time but the notion that he should get an unquestioned 17 game trial if he continuously sucks is ridiculous. Not to mention he’s a 5th round pick. That matters a lot.

Certainly more willing than Taylor but idk, Sam looks really awkward running the ball. The one Sunday looked super awkward to me. Definitely more productive in college but I feel Taylor was a more natural athlete. Honestly, this is a pretty sad debate tho bc I don’t think either one as “plus” NFL athleticism. But again, I don’t think Sam needs it. Long as he’s a threat to convert 3rd downs with his legs, I’m good. Maybe a read option around the goal line like Kirk used to run.

He’s too small and honestly not dynamic enough to have many designed runs. That’s asking for injuries. I was screaming for him to slide during that run on Sunday. Honestly, he reminds me so much of Heinicke except he has a stronger arm but less escapability. Both are smaller guys with functional athleticism. Sam should be good for 1-2 3rd down conversions a game with his legs but I think that’s the extent of it. Once his passing instincts are refined, that should be a solid combo.