NFL Offseason 2022 - The Slog of Slogs!

[aceluby]

Well over 400 in the last thread.  Let the trade speculation, GOAT arguments, and draft analysis continue for the next 9 months.

[Rhom]

To the coffers boys!!!  A real chopper!!!

[Rhom]

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Bengals lost for a variety of reasons, mostly their OL but in that moment, they got screwed and that's deflating.

No weeping on the slog!

[Mexal]

15 minutes ago, Rhom said:

No weeping on the slog!

I'm hopeful today. I was upset last night but hopeful for the future. Bengals have $60m+ in cap space, a clear need, a QB who will get his first offseason with the team and a locker room that other players will want to play in. If anything, this SB room magnified why playing in Cincinnati is a good thing for FAs. We had great injury luck this year (outside of right side of OL) so that's a concern but I'm definitely optimistic for future.

Downside is Bengals play in AFC with Mahomes, Allen, Herbert and Jackson. Talk about tough sledding.

[Rhom]

8 minutes ago, Mexal said:

I'm hopeful today. I was upset last night but hopeful for the future. Bengals have $60m+ in cap space, a clear need, a QB who will get his first offseason with the team and a locker room that other players will want to play in. If anything, this SB room magnified why playing in Cincinnati is a good thing for FAs. We had great injury luck this year (outside of right side of OL) so that's a concern but I'm definitely optimistic for future.

Downside is Bengals play in AFC with Mahomes, Allen, Herbert and Jackson. Talk about tough sledding.

That's gonna be a rough decade.  We are in for some great football.

Any word in your Bengals spaces on Burrow's knee?  I saw him postgame and someone asked him about it and his response was "We'll get it checked out Monday.  But there was no way I was coming out."

[Mexal]

1 minute ago, Rhom said:

That's gonna be a rough decade.  We are in for some great football.

Any word in your Bengals spaces on Burrow's knee?  I saw him postgame and someone asked him about it and his response was "We'll get it checked out Monday.  But there was no way I was coming out."

Nothing. From the video, Dr. Chao thought it was an MCL injury. If that's the case, prob will need ~6 weeks of rest without surgery and should be fine I would think.

[Maithanet]

17 minutes ago, Mexal said:

I'm hopeful today. I was upset last night but hopeful for the future. Bengals have $60m+ in cap space, a clear need, a QB who will get his first offseason with the team and a locker room that other players will want to play in. If anything, this SB room magnified why playing in Cincinnati is a good thing for FAs. We had great injury luck this year (outside of right side of OL) so that's a concern but I'm definitely optimistic for future.

I agree that things look good.  The team isn't losing a lot of talent and with merely mediocre O line play they win the Owl this year.  I want to highlight Dcoordinator Anarumo who is not a high profile guy at all (I had to look up his name), but he did a masterful job with the defense.  There were a lot of guys out there last night who were either castoffs from other teams or workman late round picks, and nonetheless that defense came to play.  They gave up 19, 19, 24 and 23 points in four playoff games, which is a damn good run. 

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Downside is Bengals play in AFC with Mahomes, Allen, Herbert and Jackson. Talk about tough sledding.

Yeah...But it's ok, maybe Rodgers will join the Broncos?  (I don't think he's really going to do this because volunteering to play in the same division as Mahomes and Allen would be extremely foolish). 

[Rhom]

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I really didn’t need to see this… 

@Nictarion the crazy thing about that play is how closely it mirrored the end of the NFC Championship game.  QB in the clutch getting spun around and throws the ball desperately in the general direction of a running back.   

[Mexal]

4 minutes ago, Rhom said:

@Nictarion the crazy thing about that play is how closely it mirrored the end of the NFC Championship game.  QB in the clutch getting spun around and throws the ball desperately in the general direction of a running back.   

Who did nothing to actually catch it. That shit was there, all he had to do was lay out. But it was Perine.

[Kalnak the Magnificent]

On Stafford and HoF -

For the last 12 years has Stafford ever been what you would call the best qb around? Has he even been in the top 5? 

Has he made any particularly great individual records in a season? Any great lifetime ones? 

Not every qb who wins a superbowl should make it to the hof. That by itself is not so big a deal. Certainly not where he puts in a decent but not incredible performance either. That isn't to say he'll never make it or anything, but at this point he is worse than Eli in fame and overall performance and I'd say Eli is pretty questionable.

[DireWolfSpirit]

For me if I'm Cinci the sting of this loss is tempered with the idea that their core are young enough to have another shot.

Whereas for Donald, OBJ, Von Miller, Ramsay and Stafford this fealt very much like the all in have to win now. The proverbial swan song. I dont see that group repeating with another years mileage, it's a cherish the day and celebrate the service win for a lot of those guys.

I see Burrows and Chase back in it eventually.

[Maithanet]

Stafford is a great compiler in an era where gaudy passing stats are very possible if you stay healthy, which he has for the most part.  But Stafford's numbers are clearly inferior (look it up, it's not close) than Matt Ryan's.  So is Matt Ryan a Hall of Famer?  Because if the answer is yes, then you have a situation where, if you look at, for example, 2020, then like 40% of the teams have a hall of famer at quarterback. 

2020 Starters who have as good or better case than Matt Stafford at being in the hall of fame at some point:

Brady, Brees, Rodgers, Roethlisburger, Wilson, Ryan, Stafford, Rivers, Mahomes

Too early to say, but they are better than Stafford so it could easily happen

Allen, Burrow, Herbert, Prescott, Watson

 

That's 14 of the 32 starters.  They can't all be Hall of Famers, that's just ridiculous. 

[Rhom]

8 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

Stafford is a great compiler in an era where gaudy passing stats are very possible if you stay healthy, which he has for the most part.  But Stafford's numbers are clearly inferior (look it up, it's not close) than Matt Ryan's.  So is Matt Ryan a Hall of Famer?  Because if the answer is yes, then you have a situation where, if you look at, for example, 2020, then like 40% of the teams have a hall of famer at quarterback. 

2020 Starters who have as good or better case than Matt Stafford at being in the hall of fame at some point:

Brady, Brees, Rodgers, Roethlisburger, Wilson, Ryan, Stafford, Rivers, Mahomes

Too early to say, but they are better than Stafford so it could easily happen

Allen, Burrow, Herbert, Prescott, Watson

 

That's 14 of the 32 starters.  They can't all be Hall of Famers, that's just ridiculous. 

Can you tell me which of those you would cut out?

I would also argue that its not quite fair to look at that as a snapshot in time.  Brady/Brees/Rodgers/Roethlisberger are all a completely different generation of QB on the tail end while your Mahomes et al are on the come up.

[Kalnak the Magnificent]

18 minutes ago, Rhom said:

Can you tell me which of those you would cut out?

I would also argue that its not quite fair to look at that as a snapshot in time.  Brady/Brees/Rodgers/Roethlisberger are all a completely different generation of QB on the tail end while your Mahomes et al are on the come up.

I'd cut Ryan, Stafford, Rivers, and probably Wilson at this point. 

Mahomes probably should be in because he's won it all and because he's put up some absurd individual numbers, was MVP, etc. That he has a longer career ahead of him is icing on the cake, but even if he retired now he'd probably make it just on those first few seasons and how crazy good he was. 

None of the new QBs have been either good enough long enough or great enough for a given season for me to give them the goahead. But yeah, all look better than Stafford at this stage in their careers. 

[Maithanet]

17 minutes ago, Rhom said:

Can you tell me which of those you would cut out?

I would also argue that its not quite fair to look at that as a snapshot in time.  Brady/Brees/Rodgers/Roethlisberger are all a completely different generation of QB on the tail end while your Mahomes et al are on the come up.

They may be almost different generations, but with great qbs playing 15+ years these days, they aren't totally different. 

As for who to cut, to me it's a matter of you're not in the Hall until you earn your way in, so the second list is all Nos for right now.  Of the first list I would cut Ryan and Stafford for sure.  Rivers is borderline.

 

[Tywin et al.]

Guys, don't overthink this. Ask yourself "Was QB X one of the top QBs for a sustained period of time?"

If yes, in the convo for HoF. If not, well, there's no shame in just being in a team's circle of honor or whatever they're called. 

[briantw]

2 hours ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

For me if I'm Cinci the sting of this loss is tempered with the idea that their core are young enough to have another shot.

Whereas for Donald, OBJ, Von Miller, Ramsay and Stafford this fealt very much like the all in have to win now. The proverbial swan song. I dont see that group repeating with another years mileage, it's a cherish the day and celebrate the service win for a lot of those guys.

I see Burrows and Chase back in it eventually.

OBJ tore the same ACL he tore with the Browns, so he legit might be toast.  Always tough when you tear the same one twice.

[Maithanet]

2 minutes ago, briantw said:

OBJ tore the same ACL he tore with the Browns, so he legit might be toast.  Always tough when you tear the same one twice.

Sucks, he was going to be looking at a big payday after how well he was getting open in this playoff run.  But he got a ring, so that will be some consolation. 

[Tywin et al.]

I've been waiting for Alex Smith's response to this for years:

 

[DMC]

4 hours ago, Maithanet said:

Because if the answer is yes, then you have a situation where, if you look at, for example, 2020, then like 40% of the teams have a hall of famer at quarterback. 

Well, I agree that Ryan, Stafford, and Rivers are borderline at best, and the young guys still have a ways to go - plus it appears very unlikely DeShaun Watson will ever even be considered for the Hall.  But this is kinda singling out an outlier.  The past couple years have been unique in how many QBs with great careers (or potentially great careers) are/were still playing.  Pretty sure we've discussed this on here. 

Also, you left out Jackson, who I'd definitely put with the young guys.

ETA:  Couple more thoughts...

First, I think the "has Stafford ever been a top 5 QB" question is kinda funny.  According to QBR, Stafford was a top 5 QB this season - he ranked 4th despite leading the league in interceptions (he also ranked 6th in passer rating).  Hell in the first half of the season he was one of the frontrunners for MVP, maybe the frontrunner.

Second, I couldn't help but think of the fact Bryant Young is one of this year's inductees.  I love Young and I got no problem with it, but when I talked about it with my brother last night - who is just as much a Niners fan as I am - he scoffed and said Young didn't deserve it.  And..he has a point if we're being strict about it.  But based on a lot of the inductees in recent years, it seems the selection committee is getting pretty lax. 

Bottomline, if I asked myself "if Bryant Young is in the HOF shouldn't Stafford be too," I'd have a hard time saying no.