YattaOkasan

But thats not true. We saw his numbers relative to his age. He has performed well for a young player. OBJ is old and now looking like hes becoming a TEAM liability. If were gonna play the guys they could've gotten game were gonna be here all day and every GM is gonna look awful. It was a risky move to get someone who was considered the best in a deep WR class. Barring injuries the kid's gonna be playing for a long time.

Lot to point out that I disagree with. Just to start on you D stat, does whaley not get credit for his good defensive draft picks (Darby and Brown?) and his FA signings look good (Hughes, Brown, Alexander). We havent even seen this years players so we will need wait but I assume at least one will be pretty good. As has been stated before, that list of FA signings looks like an average FA class for a GM. It could be a great one if TT pans out. Arguably TT has already shown great investment and at this point he is developing and is now in the coach's hands. All the Byrd stuff is speculation to me. I think the team's record with Whaley says what he is, an average but trending up GM (I'm starting from his first full offseason).

Our numbers in these categories from 2014 was insane. I think top 3 IIRC for both (might've been higher)

The idea of it from a no huddle/hurry up is interesting. Particularly if you get a favorable defensive set out there like a nickel against 12 personnel.

Retort is who did we lose? Hogan/Felton/Gragg/Karlos? Either way its 10 of 11 starters returning. All the starters have another year in the system; thus should be better.

He did say startling. But I also don't understand how depth will matter that much in Game 1 of the season. I guess that poster extrapolated to the whole season.

No link...?

I had a decent stream with the nfl live streams sub group on reddit for the Indy game. I am going to try that again

I'd have to read the links but your quotes have some holes to me. The first quote only talks about starts. That is not the only metric to gauge value and may not even be close to the best. Might be that those early picks are hit or miss, but the hit is big enough that its worth the risk. The second quote talks about the best player in the draft. Again I don't think thats a great metric. Do you need to get the best player in the top 5 (how do they even evaluate, guess I should read) or just one of the top 5 in that draft? The value assessments on Sammy that you make can not be made in a vacuum. There is no way of know if any of those guys would put up Sammy's numbers if here. If they couldn't put up half his numbers then would Sammy be worth it? I find balance to be important and while more often then not getting draft picks is a good idea, there are plenty of reasons to move up (I think Sammy was a good one).

Thanks for the clarification. I think its tough for the fans to know how the game plan might change for different OL. I don't think its crazy to think they could roll a safety into the box against a good lineman or give more run support from the ILBs. These seem small but ability of Smith (to keep the example) to pancake his guy in run support may open up things over the middle if the ILB needs to be run support. Again would love to see if theres any work on this.

I thought Kirby's point (and would love to know if I'm wrong) is that because OL and other postions (ILB, iDL) doesn't take over games, then they should not be chosen early in the draft (first 15). I am trying to say that just because the OL doesn't score that TD doesn't mean that they don't have a profound impact on the game (particularly in the rush game). I would think the run support to the defense's right would change considerably. That does change pass rush/coverage responsibilities of the ILBs. Its subtle which could make it hard to see but I think its there. This all sounds like a thing that cover1.net would do. BTW shout out to their great work in an entirely different thread.

I'd have to go to the tape, but I thought it was more than just double or triple team. I thought we pulled and pinned him along with other strategies to use his aggressiveness against him. We also ran away from him. I think maybe the difference is the idea that OL don't just pass block. Yes pass blocking is much more of unit operation, but run blocking is much less of a unit operation. If Smith wins a run block at the point of attack then you're likely to get good yardage. They can easily be (and is) diagnosed at the LOS.

I'm hearing the points on drafting OL in the 1st round, but I'm still on the fence. The Watt example doesn't seem that great. Didn't we do a great job of game planning around him last year? Effectively neutralizing him even though he lined up on our offenses right alot. I think to some degree you do need to game plan for a great OL. I know last year it wasn't a big deal for the Cowboys, but two years ago I'm sure there were game plans on creating pressure on Romo and how to plug holes against Murray. I understand you can't move Tyron Smith to match up with Watt, but you can audible into a play behind Smith if hes going to pancake the DE on his side. It might only be 4-5 yards but thats a pretty good clip. Like most things in life I find this to be a balance issue. You can't neglect your OL/DL or just assume it'll be schemed away (I would have big concerns if IK lined up against Smith all game).

Some very good discussion. I am not so sure you can just move your strongest players to align against the OL weakest players. I think that leaves you susceptible to a lot. The offense can easily check into plays away from those strong D players and run behind their horses (blocking the backside is easier). Additionally, if these awesome D players are overly aggressive you can take advantage of that. I think the chess match is much more nuanced then "Oh you have a good LT, LG; then I'm going to move my awesome DE, OLB to the other side." Also I missed the connection between poor three and out performance and poor OL performance. Why are the skill players not indicted in that poor performance? I think I understand the connection but I think that may have been a reach.

They, PFF, made it sound like it wasn't meaningless. I am also interested to see a breakdown of preseason to regular. I think the biggest caveat is this is through 2 weeks and is subject to a lot of change.

I thought it was backwards. Defenses are ahead of Offenses early in the year. But it could be backwards with Rex's complex D.

I love that TTs height is 5th percentile but his hand size is 73rd. Sheesh.

4 violations yes but I think a missed test counts as a violation. I do think his other violations were positive tests, but I thought this one was a missed test. Could be wrong. Would love some verification.

I thought I saw a couple things up thread that said he missed a test (besides just him). If so I think the reason could be interesting.

Doesn't your response say you could miss a test because you might not have had your cell phone (not saying thats what happened); not just because you know you're dirty. I am interested to hear the reason for why he missed. If there isn't one then its likely because he knows he wouldn't have passed.

Hmm... not as stark as I had remembered (numbers I'm recalling may have been from when Kyle wasn't hurt), but K WIlliams absence sort skews this data. Kyle would likely have been well over his 2014 66% mark in 2015 if he wasn't injured. In 2014 the back ups were playing 1 in every 3 snaps almost. In 2015 that dropped to 1 in every 5 snaps (making the bold assumption that Bryant is closer to 20% than 25%). I do think thats a large drop, and as you mentioned there is no denying that Mario and Hughes were not being substituted. Thanks for the data, and I do think it supports the assertion that this defense was less reliant on subbing than Schwartz (so I'm backing off my assertion a little). What are your thoughts.

He was disagreeing with a posters opinion that pot shouldn't be banned because people will lose millions of dollars to use it (I paraphrased). I agree that is not a good argument. Although I would not have countered with the food example (life necessity) but said that alcohol. People get addicted to it, will do stupid **** for it (like lose millions of dollars), and it can do harm to others. Really the compelling argument for being upset at Dareus is that it was the rules and youre so important to the team (as shown by the teams commitment to you) that it was a huge let down. And yes Rex has monicrum of blame but to the point of being insignificant.

Not true. Schwartz subbed DL a lot. Rex didnt.

As said up thread. No. I do think TT's contract lets them pick a QB in this year's draft once they part ways with EJ. Thats the back up battle CJ will have to win.

Doomed!!!