Rob's House

The kind that claws up the carpet and stinks up the house with its **** box. I swore I'd never have a cat in my house. I told my wife I'd be a Pats* fan before we got a cat. I'd turn commie and campaign for Bernie Sanders before we got a cat. Taylor Swift and her boyfriend would get back together before we got a cat. Then my daughter cried because daddy wouldn't let her get a kitty; now I have a cat.

Thanks, man. The feeling's mutual. I can see how it could be interpreted that way.

The idea that someone else's decision that he had no control over amounts to him letting someone down doesn't compute for me. That could be. It would explain the logical void in his statement.

It's not really their choice. (The police, I mean).

If you're going to reply to me please try to say something that at least vaguely addresses something I said. My first post in this thread stated that I'd wait til the end of the season to judge the trade. And this "hindsight" business is getting a bit ridiculous. I stated a truism: you can only judge the accuracy of your evaluations with the benefit of hindsight. Care to explain what part of that you take issue with? And as an aside, to use your criteria, Matt Millen was a great GM because the busts he drafted were thought to be good prospects when he drafted them.

The NFL - Where being accused of pushing your girlfriend gets you a year and a half suspension, but being accused of rape gets you drafted 1st overall.

I don't know how else to explain it; I've analogized it to the point of exhaustion. I know you're a smart guy. If you still don't get it it's because you don't want to.

No, but it could be a position of absolute domination.

I'm not sure how saying that hindsight is the only way of knowing whether your predictions were right is showing contempt for the process nor do I see how it is a declaration that the jury's in after one season, but if you want to let every bit of those points stand then so be it.

I never said anything about auditions. I'm not arguing that point. I'm arguing that Ebron is not the standard by which that trade/pick should be judged.

I'd be cool with either L. Collins or Nate Orchard. Dorial Green Beckham is intriguing, but we've got a lot of questionable character guys already.

I get that. I just don't understand why so many people fail to see the distinction between an objective analysis of the trade as it relates to the overall value of the assets in play and the subjective analysis based on the value relative to what a particular GM would have done with it. Let me illustrate with an analogy: If you invested $100k into a low risk investment with a high minimum buy in that gives you a 3% annual return, it's okay, but that's not a great investment. The fact that your 2nd option was to put 2/3 of that money into a high risk stock that plummeted doesn't make your investment great, it just means you made the better of two less than ideal moves that you yourself decided were your best two options. If there were plenty of popular mutual funds with lower minimum buy ins that you could have invested in that got a 7%-10% return and you passed on them for the other then your investment was a poor one despite being better than the other ****ty investment you were going to make. To be clear, I'm not suggesting Sammy is the football equivalent of the 3% return in this analogy, just illustrating how measuring one choice by another without considering the other alternatives can paint a false picture of the wisdom and value of that choice.

It's the question of you're trying to guage the value of the deal by any kind of objective standard. Otherwise you're just saying it is better (by an unquantified margin) than something that is very bad. I agree with you. But if you look through this and countless other threads it is repeatedly held up as the sole criteria upon which the value of the pick should be judged. It's like saying Spiller was a great pick because otherwise they'd have drafted Jahvid Best (assuming that were true).

They think their assessment is right and the results on the field are wrong?

I don't disagree. I just find this business of using Ebron as the measuring stick to be absolutely idiotic. It wouldn't be as frustrating if it were only morons saying it, but when otherwise intelligent people say that stupid **** it's maddening.

Hindsight's the only way of auditing your evaluations.

But is he better than the worst of Benjamin, Beckham, and Evans + whoever was left at 19? That's the real question.

I got a Honda Shadow 600 a few years ago for $2200, put 5k miles on it, and sold it to a friend for $1500. It was a great starter bike and I'd recommend that or a similar model to any newby, but my next bike will be at least a 1300. After riding my buddy's 1800 the 600 feels like a moped.

My decision to drink a 6 pack and drive last night was a great decision because otherwise I was going to drink a 12 pack and drive.

It could still be a bad move that's merely preferable to another bad move. I'm not saying it is, but better than bad doesn't necessarily mean good.

The alternative was to take anyone still available or trade down.

Bryce Petty. You heard it here first.

That was one reason I thought he was an awkward fit for us even before we took him. It seemed odd to draft a guy whose specialty is the screen game to play in an offense that doesn't utilize WR screens. Hopefully the new regime takes a different approach.

I look at the big picture. If Watkins is ~ 3 or 4 other guys then I'll say it wasn't a good trade. I might say it's preferable to what they would have otherwise done but stI'll not good. If he separates himself from the rest of the pack I'll say it was worth it even if OBJ puts up better numbers.

Ask me again at the end of the season and I'll be in a better position to answer. Either way, Ebron will have nothing to do with my answer. I just don't get the logic. The move was preferable to the colossal disaster they would have otherwise made* so that makes it good? * It's too early to say Ebron's a bust, but for the sake of argument.