Shaw66

Well, it's just semantics. A bridge is about the future - who's the QB who will get us to the future. Peyton wasn't a bridge. As you say, he was win-now move. Peyton wasn't in their future. I think we agree. Doesn't make sense to pay much of anything for a true bridge. Does make sense to pay for the future, and it does make sense to pay for win now. Right, and that's why the evaluation of Cousins is so critical. If Cousins is a top 10 QB for the next ten years, he's worth spending money on. If he's top 15 or top 20, he isn't. It's all about what Beane and McD see in the guy, and about what they see in some rookie they like.

I think you have this completely backward. First, every team lets free agents walk. The reality is that the best bargains in talent are coming out of college. The quality of their play compared to their cost is much better. So the smart teams often let guys walk after their rookie contracts. It's the coaches' jobs to get good play out of rookies and second year guys. The smart free agent moves are NOT signing the high priced guys in the first week. The smart are signing the guys available in June and even July, guys with experience in the league who fit what the coach is trying to do. Beane's been very clear about this since the day he arrived. He believes you build the team with young players out of college, not with players you acquire in free agency. I think the Bill's did their serious house cleaning this year and now they start building. That means they'll start acquiring players they want. Some of those will cause some other guys to leave, like in the linebacker corps, and the offensive and defensive lines. But that will be upgrades, not tanking.

I don't agree about Cousins, but that isn't the point. I get that some people don't think that he's worth what he'll get. My point was they are two different cases. If you want Cousins, it's because you've decided to bet on him for the future. If you want Smith, it's because you've decided you need a bridge for the future. If all you're looking for is a bridge, there's no point in paying more than you'd pay to keep Taylor, because either way you're going to have a QB you don't expect can be a big winner for you. If you're looking for a guy who's your future, you should expect to pay more, whether it's more cash (in the case of Cousins) or more draft picks (in the case of one of the top rookies).

Actually, as I look at the numbers, it may be that in actual cash Smith wouldn't cost much more than Taylor, but there'd be cap hit to make the move. I think Smith would strictly be a bridge, and for the one year he'd be used, I don't think it's worth paying any cash or cap space to get him. Plus you'd have to give up a pick to do it. Cousins isn't strictly a bridge. You'd get him thinking he's the future unless you find someone better. That's worth paying for.

I think if you're trading up to the top of the draft, you keep Taylor and don't sign another veteran. Reason? You're betting the farm on the new QB, and you're going to play him in 2019, if not 2018. So you may as well have the cheapest alternative veteran, and that's Tyrod. No point in giving Smith a three-year deal (which is what he'll want), because it costs too much money. If you've traded up to the top, you won't have good picks left, so you'll need cap room to sign free agents. Then what are you doing here? If you've read this thread before and you remember it, good for you. If you want to read it again, great. If not, great. Other people may not have read this thread before, or they may want to read it again. Was it really necessary that you tell us YOU'VE read it before?

I agree with the difference between top 5 and top 10. My point is that it's foolish to wait to make a bet on QB until you see one that you think is top 5. Rosen Darnold and Mayfield each has less than a10% probability of being top 5. Betting on them is a long shot. Better strategy to go after a guy who is high probably top 10 and hope he exceeds expectations. He gives you a chance to compete every year. Getting a top 5 guy is luck. Probably one out of 10 guys picked at 1 through 10 becomes top 5, 1 out of 50 of the guys picked after that. I'd take Cousins, know I can compete every year, and hope either he over achieves or I find my top 5 guy in the draft in succeeding years.

I don't think the objective is a top 5 QB. I think it's top 10. If you're objective is top 5, it will take 20 or 30 years to get there. Dolphins have been looking that long. Jets. Redskins, Tennessee, Baltimore, Cincinnati. Detroit, Buffalo, Denver, Jacksonville, Tampa Bay. Minnesota. Chicago's been looking 50 years. It's a fool's game to make your objective a top 5 QB. The objective is to be competitive this year, or next, or the year after. If you have a top 10 quarterback, you can compete. Look at anyone's list of the top 10. Those look like they have a legitimate shot at the playoffs every year, and that's what you want. So I think the question is whether Cousins is top 10, not top 5. Top 10 is a close question. Once Brady, Ben and Brees retire, Cousins probably is top 10. If you have a guy who's top 10, then I think Hapless is correct - it doesn't matter how much you pay him. Obviously, you'd like to pay him as little as possible, but even if he's the 10th best QB and you make him the highest paid QB in the league, it's worth it, because he gives you a shot at the playoffs every year. The Ravens did it with Flacco, but it turned out they were wrong - he isn't top 10. Lions did it with Stafford, probably a good move. Raiders did it with Carr, we'll see. Colts did it with Luck, and we'll see about that, too. Falcons did it with Ryan, good move. Bengals did it with Dalton, probably not such a good move. The point, however, is not whether the decision turned out to be a good move or not. It's whether the guy is a good bet to turn out top 10. If he is a good bet, you make the bet, and it really doesn't matter how many chips you have to put on the table. If you don't bet on someone, you can't win. And if you think Cousins is a good bet for the top 10, he's a better bet than an untested rookie, no matter how much contract money you save. The surest of sure things in the last 10 years, Andrew Luck, doesn't look so much like a top 10 QB, and there are no QBs in the draft with odds anything like Luck coming out of college.

I hate it but I admire it. And I think McD is trying to copy it.

I love this untapped upside stuff. 32 teams all missed his untapped upside for five rounds in the draft, and 31 have been kicking themselves since his pro debut a couple months ago.

This describes them really well. I'm sure there's one other related thing they do and that is they have a book on everything and everyone. They don't jus watch this year's FIL on someone, like Tyrod. They watch this year's film with all the info they've gathered on Taylor from previous years, so their knowledge becomes cumulative. They've played the same offensive and defensive schemes for years, and they don't forget the things they learned years ago. They bring plays and concepts back when they see an opportunity. It's called institutional knowledge. It gives tham an edge.

I agree with this. Brady gets calls. So do Brees and Rodgers. Newton gets hammered and no call. Taylor too, for that matter.

Why? Because Belichick is a better coach. Somehow he's able to prepare his players, teach his players to do things, and then they execute them regularly. Why does his entire offense get up to the line and properly set for a quick snap without motion or procedure calls? Because they practice it until they can do it right all the time. I heard a retired player on the radio say that he had played for several teams and the Patriots were the only team that EVERY WEEK gave him three or four or five particular keys to look for in the guy who was lining up against him, things that tipped whether it was a run or a pass, a blitz or not, etc. And he said those keys always were right. He said no team prepared him to play in a way that was remotely similar to what the Pats did.

They earned my respect a few years ago. I'm sick of their winning, and they ought to be punished much more severely when they get caught cheating, but they are better than everyone else and they deserve the wins they get. They get calls because they create opportunities for the refs to throw flags.

I don't agree. I think Belichick is light years ahead of all the other coaches in the league, and he has the 18-year record to prove it. The reason we think the Pats are cheaters is because he takes every advantage of every rule he can, and in doing so, he steps over the line occasionally and actually cheats. He and his staff think of everything, they teach it to their players, and the players execute. So, for example, I don't see receivers come back for balls to draw the interference call nearly as often as the Pats do. If that receiver had run back into Gilmore, he would have gotten the call, because Gilmore had been beaten and the refs give the call to the receiver when he beats the defender. Gilmore made a great play, but if the receiver had stepped up into Gilmore's path and made a play on the ball, he'd have gotten the call. So, for example, Brady's really good at getting his team to the line of scrimmage and snapping the ball quickly to catch the other side with too many men on the field, or before they can line up to stop a quick dive play, or to take advantage of a mismatch. Other teams try it, and many teams fail it, getting called for illegal motion or procedure, because they didn't get set properly, or jumping early, or one thing or another. It isn't that the refs call it on the other teams and not on the Pats. It's because the Pats are properly trained to execute that, and then they do it without making mistakes. So, for example, the Patriots know not to bring the kickoff out of the end zone in the fourth quarter. They never do. Why? Because Belichick has figured out and he teaches his coaches and players that coming out of the end zone is a high risk, low reward proposition. If you're behind, you don't want to burn the clock when you can get 25 yards without any time running. If you're ahead, you don't want to hurt yourself with bad field position. Belichick knows the rules and takes advantage of them. No one else does it like he does it.

This doesn't make sense. If you're talking about the situation where the guy blows by you, that's something that happens within 15 yards of the line of scrimmage, so a 15-yard penalty makes sense. When people are talking about is the downfield plays where the defender hits the receiver early or holds an arm down or something like that. The problem with that being a spot foul is that some of the time those penalties are close calls, the defender isn't intentionally interfering, and his team gets hit with a 35-yard penalty. That isn't right. Now, if they changed them all to 15 yards, maybe you'd start getting more intentional pass interference, and I suppose that would be a problem. Maybe you'd have to make intentional pass interference an unsportsmanlike conduct call - two of those and you're out of the game. Then of course there would be arguments about whether the ref was right to call it intentional, but that would still be better than now, where a guy is making a legitimate play but gets there too early and gets tagged for 35 yards.

One thing they do in that situation is the receivers are very good at coming back to the ball to create the interference. They do it all the time. It's just another example of how extraordinarily well coached and prepared they are. Late in the game yesterday, on the play that Gilmore made the great leaping defense of the throw, the receiver didn't do what the Pats' receivers do. He kept running downfield to make the over-the-shoulder catch if the ball got through. It was the wrong play. Put on the breaks, go up for the ball and Gilmore runs right into you. Even though Gilmore clearly was playing the ball, the receiver gets the interference call on that play every time. The receiver allowed Gilmore to make the play instead of taking the penalty.

I like Mayfield and if the Bills don't sign Cousins I hope it will just as you say. I don't think Mayfield will last to 21. Trading up to 12 or 15 would be okay. He has more upside than Cousins but more downside. Cousins involves less risk.

It's all about whether he's top 10 or not, and I get that people disagree. But if he is top 10, then someone will pay upwards of 30 AND IT WILL BE THE RIGHT DECISION. It may not work out, in which case you have a cap problem for a while, but if he's good but not at the top of the league, the fact that you're paying him $5 million more than he should get doesn't matter. He has more impact on the game than the two guys you'd get for that $5 million. One thing is sure - he's getting a big deal. Romo's a good comparison. Cousins has comparable stats for Romo's early years. Carr looked pretty weak sometimes this season. I wouldn't be too quick to bet on him. It's not an easy call.

He might stay in Washington, but I think there are several things causing him to leave, and in particular making Buffalo look like a good choice. First, everything suggests that he's unhappy with Washington. Sure, it's history, but that stuff eats at people. He's had to earn the job, over and over again. I can't remember a franchise being so reluctant to keep a high-performing QB in the starting job. I think that bothers him. Second, he's a mid-western, straight-laced guy. The east coast is different from Indiana and Michigan, and I wouldn't be surprised if he just doesn't like it there. Third, he's a serious Christian. Washington doesn't have much of an ecclesiastical feel to it. Although it's not likely to drive his decision, but in the back of his mind, something about having a serious Christian coach probably appeals to him. (Enter McDermott.) Fourth, I don't know what Gruden is like, but we know what McDermott is like. It's all about the process. He has a process for everything, a reason for everything he does and everything he wants his team to do. That's who Cousins is - constantly planning, organizing, following a process to get where he wants to go. Fifth, Buffalo is the midwest, where he's from. Sixth, he seems like the kind of guy who could buy into the mission - finally win a Lombardi for Buffalo. Seventh, unlike Washington, the Bills don't have an !@#$ owner. The Bills' owners are serious, down-to-earth people who genuinely care about people and show it. That will appeal to Cousins. So, yes, Cousins may very well stay in DC. But if he really wanted to stay in DC, he would have had a contract by now. I think he wants to go. And I think Buffalo may very well be attractive to him.

Thanks. Now people will start arguing other things - wins, playoffs, etc. But I start with the nunsserbers, because I've found that a broad range of stats don't lie. You can cherry pick stats, but if you like at the most important stats, you generally find good correlation between the best players and good stats. Passer rating does it all wrapped up into one number, but you can look at it individually and you get similar results. And here you have it. Look at the guy's numbers - he's right in there with the guys who are in the second half of the top 10, right after Hall of Famers. If he's putting up these numbers and not winning in Washington, what makes him worse than Stafford, who's putting up comparable numbers and not winning in Detroit? I don't get it. But it isn't up to me, or you. It's up to Beane and McDermott. If THEY think he's top 10, then I think the Bills should be serious bidders for the guy. If they don't think he's top 10, they have to move on to another plan.

Can't read the data, but I'm not surprised. Thanks about Schaub. The real point is that you don't many shots at guys who have had success in the league. Heck, when Brees was a free agent, people were worried that he'd bust.

Thanks for making the point about what it costs to re-sign your top 10 guy. As of today it appears that exactly ONE of those guys is on a Hall of Fame trajectory - Brees. The other four got what some people would think is Hall of Fame money. Is it working out in every case? Absolutely not. Was it the wrong move? No. Oakland betting on Carr was a better bet than saving $10 million and having no QB. That's fine with me, too. If you're the GM and you don't think he's top 10, top 12, then I agree you shouldn't spend the money. If Beane and McD don't think so, they should save their money. But if you think he's top 10, you're going to have to pay top dollar, and it's the right move, in the sense that it's a smart bet.

I don't know 26 that well, but I wouldn't dump on him that much. As for Jimmy, I like his prospects, but he hasn't proven anything to me yet. Paying him 25 is a much bigger risk than paying Cousins 25. What he doesn't get is that Cousins is solidly in the range of 5th to 12th best QB in the league. Look at his stats over the past three years. Same as Stafford's, better than Newton's (who's really had only one good year). People rave about Luck - Cousins has been better. Matt Ryan's had one blowout year; otherwise, he's struggled to put up numbers as good as Cousins, and he's throwing to Julio Jones. Cousins isn't Rodgers, I know. But look at the guys who are in the 12 to 20 range of QBs - Eli, Flacco, Taylor, Dalton. I can't believe he wouldn't want Cousins over those guys.

Mismatch offense. That's what the Pats offense is. When they spread the receivers, Brady throws to the mismatch just about all the time. The wideout on the linebacker. Gronk on the 5'10" back. When you have your heavies in, they pass, when you have your quick defense in, they run. They do it all day long. If that's what Daboll is bringing, I'm all for it.

This point is where I disagree fundamentally. This is the core issue. In my opinion, "not worth top tier money" is a concept that doesn't apply to QBs. It may to other players, but not QBs. In my opinion, if you want to compete for championships in the NFL, have a chance to compete every year, you have to have a top 10 QB. There are, in my opinion, only two tiers - the top 10 and the others. If you have a top 10 QB, you have a chance to compete every year. If you don't, you don't. You might get there once in a while with a top 20 QB, but you need a lot of things to fall right. So you gotta have a top 10 QB. Once you've decided that, in my opinion it doesn't matter if you're paying the guy #2 money and he's #8. Sure, you'd rather be paying #8 money to have a QB who's #8, but that isn't what's important. What's important is having a top 10 QB. If you're overpaying, well, that's the price you're paying to have a chance at a title every season. Under which scenario am I going to be the happier fan? (1) My team has a top 20 QB and the paying him like a top 30 guy. (2) My team has a top 10 QB and they're paying him like a top 2 guy. I'll take (2) all day, every day. When the Browns write the big check to get Cousins, am I going to be laughing because they overpaid and the Bills have Tyrod? No. The Bills have Peterman? No. The Bills have some guy they drafted? No, at least not until that guy turns into a top 10 NFL QB. A top 10 QB comes along in free agency maybe once every five years. Brees was the last. People thought Schaub was one but he busted. When that guy comes along, he gets overpaid. That's the way it works. Brees got overpaid when he signed. Do you think Saints fans cared? When you have a top 10 QB and his contract runs out, you have to pay him top 5 money to keep him, because if you don't, someone else will. That's simply the price. He doesn't get the highest salary in the league because people think he's the best QB in the league. He gets it because someone will pay it. Flacco got it, and it turned out to be a mistake. Ryan got it, and it wasn't a mistake. If you don't pay the price, you don't get the guy.