Thurman#1

I think many fans here don't like 'em, but me, I hate the Fins and Pats, Pittsburgh and the Cowboys. The Jets are way below those four. People here often talk about tiers ... and it makes sense here. For me those are the top tier, and the Jets are on a second tier with a bunch of other teams.

Yup, too early. But all predictions are too early, really. And very very pessimistic, IMO.

yeah, the big act of defiance will be to not watch the preseason games they wouldn't have watched anyway.

That may have been a question four years ago or whenever he last played. A bit of one anyway. It's not now. He'll have to compete. He'll be aware of that.

Yup. good point. We're all getting upset about guys he's saying aren't even in the top 32. Fair enough, really. But he does this yearly, makes this top 40 list. It's what he likes, diving deep on QBs. And so he has to try to fit people in based on the information he's got.

These are your best arguments? Again, you're not going back to his real argument. You're the one who asked, and now you found a fragment and act like it holds his main arguments. It doesn't. Then you find another fragment that's about Taysom Hill but not about whether he's a top 40 guy? "Bridgewater made a fool out of Simms ... yet Simms is doubling down a year later with the same nonsense"? Just not true. On your barely connected clip there he talks about not trusting Bridgewater, where did he say in the recent stuff the same things about Bridgewater? He didn't. Where is Bridgewater ranked? You're making these bizarre arguments. Simms said, again in your fragment, "The big thing I saw especially during the season a little this past season, and then especially last preseason." And that little thing gets you all upset? It's a nothing, and you have to cut out the words right after to get upset at all. He says, everywhere, that he wants to see more, can't put him higher till he does. You act like Simms said he'd showed growth - in the pass game - during the season, but he didn't say that, You're so desperate to make your argument that you're saying stuff you can't possibly know. "Florio gave him all the time he wanted," you say. Really? You were in the studio? Nobody was in his ear or in front of him giving him the hurry up sign? Nobody had said, "We've only got two minutes, so be quick here?" They didn't tell him they wanted to talk about something else before break? You know this? Nonsense. He might have gotten all the time he wanted and he might not have. The fact that you felt you had to throw this in despite having no clue is of a piece with most of the rest of your post. Going off target talking about Bridgewater, getting upset about one little phrase. "Other than that he says the guy throws hard," you say, but again even in your little fragment he gives a bunch more substance about what he's seen in terms of improvements in making progressions and reading the field. If there's nothing there to get angry about, you're making stuff up. You are trying to stick with this fragment because you wanna make your point with as little work as possible. And again, even the fragment there is very reasonable. You have to stretch and bob and weave, and your whole thing with the adjectives and adverbs, "he goes on endlessly". Endlessly, for you, is four seconds? Really? Dude, again, you're showing more about yourself than about him. "... eyes darting weirdly." "... literally babbles." You've got a major case of confirmation bias going on here. You don't like Simms. Fine, whatever. You disagree with is opinion. Fine, whatever. But your takes are getting wacky and off-target with Bridgewater. Honestly, I've had enough of this. You won't even go and look at his main argument. You're throwing irrelevant stuff in here, it's not worth my time. I generally find you a good poster, I'm not clear on whatever has you so upset here. Whatever it is, it's not holding my interest and the conversation just isn't working well. I'm pretty sure you can agree with me that much. See you on the boards.

And again, Simms is NOT saying Tua will not be the better QB. He's saying that if he were a coach today who was on the hot seat right now and needs a guy to play right now this year, a guy he can trust to save his job, who would he want, Stidham after a year being coached up by the Patriots or Tua as a rookie?

OK, first, no, that is not what he said originally when he expressed fully what he felt. This is a short response to Florio. To get what he said you have to go back to the podcast where he listed Dude, your wacky response about babbling and weirdly darting says a lot more about your than him. He watched plays to think some thoughts, and you find that really weird and idiotic? Yeah, again, that says more about you than him. As for what he says here, responding to Florio, for those interested, here's what was said: Florio: "I’ve seen enough of Taysom Hill as an all-around weapon. He strikes fear in the heart of the defense. He was the best player on the field in the wild card game between Minnesota and New Orleans. If they had used him just a little bit more, the Saints would have won that game. That’s why I’m a believer in Taysom Hill. I’ve seen enough flashes of him to know he can be a man among boys, and we’ve seen it from time to time and that’s why I think he’s going to more than justify that placement once he gets a chance to play quarterback on a regular basis, especially with Sean Payton designing the plays, dialing up the easy completions, devising the offense that fits his skillset, Chris." Simms: "Sure. Yeah, you said it, Sean Payton one of the most creative offensive minds we’ve ever seen in the NFL. He’s going to have plays that use Taysom Hill’s strengths to the utmost, and he’s going to really accentuate that. So, Mike, I hear what you’re saying. I know you think he should be higher than 36. You know, I’m glad to hear you say that. Most people when they hear this on social media, it’s the opposite. ‘How could you have a guy at 36 who hasn’t thrown a regular season touchdown pass?’ Those type of reactions. I understand. But I think you and I both see the big potential here and we’ve seen growth at the quarterback position too. "Now, I couldn’t make him any higher. Really, I couldn’t because it still is really a bit of an unproven commodity. And hey, when you do get to come in on a special ‘dial it up, Sean Payton had this play in his back pocket for a week now,’ ... that can make life easier on a quarterback. I need to see some more reps and meat and potatoes. But the things I like and what I see … I do see a guy where I go, ‘I understand, this guy’s got the chance to be the franchise quarterback. I understand why … you know this is Drew Brees’ last year in New Orleans. Because this guy has a bigtime arm, I mean a really bigtime arm. He can really spin it, throw it with power, we see how he launches the ball down the field. Of course his athleticism. "The big thing I saw especially during the season a little this past season, and then especially last preseason, Mike. And when I was accumulating a list and going back to watch plays just to think about some thoughts I wanted to say about some players, man, Taysom Hill in preseason last year …Leaps and bounds from where he was the year before. Ability to play in the pocket, process information, go through reads, get to that second read, read it and get the ball out of his hands in a hurry was all really good." Yeah, not particularly wacky or idiotic. Someone can disagree, certainly. But understanding that this is not his full explanation, it's just a response to Florio, it's not idiotic. The thing he says that I thought was really interesting was "the fact of the matter is he's being coached by Sean Payton. And anyone who comes in after Drew Brees, you go through it. If Drew Brees has been hurt or is not able to play, go back and look, anybody out there. They've come in and all played well. I mean Teddy Bridgewater went 5-0. Luke McCown, when he was the backup to Brees, he came in and had a few 300 yard games and touchdowns and things like that, so I just think he's been taught well and understands the position and really refined himself." (Simms was wrong, it wasn't "a few" 300 yard gains for McCown, in the regular seasons it was one, but he basically played one real game for them and played very well indeed.)

You might be disagreeing with EJ himself about his abilities, as he has retired from a profession where if he'd continued on Barkley's career path he might probably have made far more than he could ever make at most other career paths, even for smart and charismatic guys, which he is. The thread is not Chris Simms' original opinion. It's a clickbait thread which apparently somewhat misrepresented what Simms said. As for your opinion that Stidham is a dime a dozen guy ... you might be right. You also might be wrong. Have an opinion? Fine. And if you want to bet on it, you will probably find some Pats fans who might take you up on that.

Heh heh. Nice.

Not at all. Happens all the time. First round QBs fail pretty often. Using your logic it's easy to point out how idiotic it would have been to predict that, say Tom Brady might have done better than people who were drafted well before him. And there are a ton of examples of guys doing better than people drafted far above them. Look at Fitzy. Was EJ Manuel better than Matt Barkley? Was Griffin III better than Foles or Cousins or Russell Wilson? And again, the argument is about how that guy would do this year, not over the long term. I don't know which one is better, now or over the course of their career. But it's pretty reasonable to agree or disagree at this point, I think. We just don't know. These are all just opinions.

Well, right now you know absolutely nothing about how he made the decision or why he thinks so ... so a lot deeper than that if you want people to care. And great point about the mocking. I don't know of any mocked arguments that have ever been correct, so you've got an excellent point ther.e

Yup. Also worth noting that Simms was talking - as has been pointed out a few pages back - not on long term potential, but on what value a coach on the hot seat would put on the guy. This year, in other words. One major advantage Stidham has on Tua when looked at in that light is simply that he's had a year of experience in the NFL. He knows a lot more about the systems and how defenses work in the NFL, a lot more.

Perhaps for the same reason that, say, Lamar Jackson went ahead of Wait, you mean a guy who every year evaluates the top 40 QBs ... gasp, sob ... was ... I can't say it ... wrong in one of his opinions? Wow, well, you're really done a great job there of proving that all of his opinions are wrong. I'll be sure to only listen to people who have perfect records of evaluating future preformance. Great job in going in depth on why he thinks that about Hill, too. Deep, detailed evaluation of Simms' position. How did his opinion about Bridgewater over Hill turn out? Nobody knows, really. Bridgewater did really well. Would Hill have done better? Worse? Nobody has any idea. Fine, you want to express an opinion on something you know absolutely nothing about - and seem proud of it - that's fine. Just don't be surprised when I'm not the only one who feels your argument has absolutely zero validity.

Yes, preseason. It's part of what's available. Have you gone through and watched his preseason throws? And again, if you have a question about how he did this or why he thought so, do some work and go find out what he said and how he made the decision. Otherwise your opinion (and anyone trying to make a good argument with no idea what he's talking about) doesn't have any real validity as it's not based on anything. If after you know what he said you still disagree, I'd be much more inclined to be interested in what you have to say at that point.

Well, if you're going to start off on an entirely new tangent and ask a new question, I would urge you to answer your own question and find out why he thinks what he thinks of Taysom Hill. If you think it's impossible to have an opinion about Taysom Hill, I'd say most of the football world proves you wrong by having one, one way or the other. And I'd guess that his excellent preseason pass performance over 108 throws might be a part of the answer. But again, go check it out if you'd like an answer to your question. I'm certainly not going to do your work for you.

It's arguable on both ends, but IMO Romo and Prescott fit, though hopefully Prescott will regress and have me looking like an idiot for saying this. Should've been Kemp and Lamonica, but that didn't work out.

This. Emphasis on cheap.

Faneca and Hutchinson were probably better, both right in his era, Faneca in the AFC until 2010 and Hutchinson in the AFC for his first six years. Faneca got six out of seven years in a row first-team All-Pro, Hutchinson five out of seven years. And Bruce Matthews, Randall McDaniel during Ruben's earlier years. Oh, Larry Allen too. So I don't think anyone would argue that he was the best at his position for the era. But among the best? Yeah, fair enough.

Pro Bowls? He absolutely deserved those. He was ferocious, one of the absolute run blockers in the league at that time. And please ... with the "he got well-known" thing. He wasn't on great teams much. Early in his career he was on the teams that were the dregs of those earlier Super Bowl teams, good, but not great. In order, The reason he got well-known is simply that he was extremely good, which was the reason he made All-Pro four times, not just the Pro Bowl, but All-Pro. Not HOF-good, IMO, but very very good. As a rookie, he didn't make the Pro Bowl on a team that won a Wild Card game and then lost the division round. Next year he made it on a team that lost the Wild Card game. Next year, 6-10 no playoffs, next year lost the Wild Card game, lost the Music City miscarriage of Justice, and that was the last time he reached the Playoffs.

It's not an unreasonable opinion, not at all. Doesn't mean he'll be right, but he's certainly got a chance to be, on this prediction. Simms is smart, smart and opinionated. He probably puts a bit too much emphasis on the physical ability to throw hard for my taste but he knows how to watch tape and he knows a lot more about QBing than his moderately talented physique ever let him personally display on the field.

I'd argue that you don't get to be All-Pro four years (no first team All-Pros, but still) without being one of the absolute best of your time. Top 2 - 3? Yeah, I think so, though a lot of his career. Ruben used to drive Bills fans crazy with his illegal motion penalties. Man he did that a lot. But he was an absolute road grader, physically dominant, a true beast. He incurred a lot of ire speaking up about problems at OBD, which led to his being traded. But I think he was right on target at the time. Most fans now seem to agree with this. That was a poor front office. IMO, Wall yes, Hall probably not quite.

Cutting Murphy and Smith would save them a bit over $7 mill against the cap after subtracting the dead cap. Anyone think Clowney's coming here for $7 mill?

They've made it clear they want to re-sign guys. Doing this would make that a lot harder. He might be available for a short-term deal, but it won't be a cheap one. Possible, but very very unlikely.

I agree that I don't think Kaepernick can throw from the pocket. But he's not going to be turning down offers at this point because of money, or at least not unless the offers are downright insulting, like veteran minimum or something. He might even accept that, things being what they are.