MrEpsYtown

Beane has talked a bunch about the new kickoff rules and how it could change your special teams corps a bit. It would seem that guys with super long arms are going to be more important than ever as they have to engage, disengage, and make a tackle. He mentioned this when talking about Olofosio with 32-inch arms as well as Javon Solomon with nearly 34 inch arms. Nicholas Morrow has freakishly long arms nearly 35. I just bring this up because it gives the Justin Shorters and Tyrell Shavers of the world a bit of an advantage in terms of how they can help on special teams. Cephus has long arms as well. I know that doesn't excite people, but the special teams corps is made up of Gilliam, linebackers, DBs and WRs so you do have to have depth receivers who can help on teams. At the end of the day, I do think they must really like Shorter or Shavers and I am guessing one of them makes the roster. ALso have to add Hollins to the list of long-armed guys who will be a factor on teams and is a deep threat.

Yeah I agree with Grable possibly over Van Denmark. I like RVD, but this move allows you to kind of reset the minimum contract and you used a 6th on the guy. But instinct having seen very little of Grable is that there is a world in which they both make it.

Not that it’s that important, but Gallup signed with the Raiders for up to 3 million. It’s interesting to see the going rate for a guy of his caliber.

Beckham makes more sense than he ever did before. Adds a vet who is close with Adam Henry and could be a great influence on the Louisiana kid in Coleman. Beckham has a weird media reputation, but his teammates love him and he is a grinder. He adds legitimacy to the WR core and fills some of the void left by Diggs leaving. He also doesn’t have to be the guy…just a piece of the puzzle. He’s probably getting closer to the end of the line, but I think he could help. If nothing else he can teach Coleman many tricks of the trade. In another thread I made the argument for Mecole Hardman, who is on the small side but obviously extremely fast and would fit well in the “4” role. He isn’t tiny. MVS could do it. Jamal Agnew. Scotty Miller. Michael Gallup is interesting as well and would be a nice upgrade. He also played for Henry in Dallas and had one of his better years then. But if you don’t sign OBJ I would probably just wait and see what shakes loose from these teams who drafted wide receivers. Also, I’m going to keep riding the lonely Terrance Marshall Jr. train who needs to get out of Carolina purgatory. Safety I would just wait to see what Simmons, Diggs, Jackson decide to do. If any of them want to play for cheap, I think they all fit and are upgrades. Other DBs that make sense are former Commander Terrell Burgess, who is a strong special teams guy and former Lion Will Harris who can play corner, nickel, safety and is excellent on teams. I like where we are with the DL and OL. I would be more than happy to add Ogbah. The other guys are meh to me. Obviously you can only sign maybe one of these guys, but those are my thoughts on who I think can help.

OBJ thing seems inevitable at some point. But I do think they will add one more piece to the room in June.

Defintely the right move. Not sure he has earned anything long-term at this point, but I hope he has 2 great years to prove himself here.

They took a big swing on Harty and were incredibly wrong on him. They expected him to be WR4 and give them inside and outside flexibility and it just was a complete failure. At least they took a swing but it failed. Sherfield should have never played as much as he did, but injuries to Gabe, Harty being terrible, and Diggs taking himself out of games led to that result. Honestly, I would have rather those reps went to Shorter instead of keeping him on "IR." At some point, they have to kind of develop what they have and I think that is what they may be trying to do here.

I love that QB17 does all the drills everyone else is doing. Something to be said for that. I am not sure how many QBs on his level participate in all these agility drills and things.

Lovely looks fun

Ian tweeted this out:

So kind of mitigating some of the risk with the Coleman pick by having a backup plan that could hit. It's a fair point and makes sense. Speculating here, but my guess is that they like the young guys they have at the bottom of the roster more than what was available at that point in the draft. I don't know what Shorter is, but when I look at Baker I see a smaller Shorter. Maybe they feel a KJ Hamler does a lot of the things Franklin does, albeit he is smaller and has a bad injury history. I would have loved Tez Walker somewhere. But if you are going to trade assets to move up for a guy, he better make the roster IMO. But to your point, that should not stop them from adding to the competition.

I am seeing this sentiment a lot. I guess my question is why? Like why would trading up in the 4th for a guy like Baker or Walker or Franklin have made that much of a difference in your mind? I think it made sense to stack receivers, but it has no impact on how I feel about Coleman. Not trying to be a jerk, just like genuinely curious.

I love the comp and the difference between these guys is just refinement in their game. You have a guy in Pittman whose dad played in the NFL, who was born and bred to do this thing, and you have a guy in Coleman who spent half his time playing basketball without the daily support of a former NFL player. Pittman was also much older when he came out and is already turning 27 this season. Coleman is a raw, young, unrefined version of a Pittman.

Very well-thought-out out post. I appreciate the time it took. A few of my thoughts... I think there were a couple of things at work here with the leadership guys. With the team in "transition," I think they needed a culture change. It seemed like things had gotten a bit rotten, and stale, and the Diggs stuff felt like a cancer spreading through the team. This is a culture/leadership reset to go along with the cap reset. They did acquire a lot of talent and if those guys happen to be a bit older it does not really matter because they are cheap labor for 4 years. I would much rather grab Carter in the third round than pay a guy like Tim Settle. I think it is a good approach because if you simply go boom or bust, there is a good chance you still have to go sign washed-up vets if the young guys are not ready to contribute. You want to avoid having to add AJ Klein for a playoff game. While it is true that a lot of this draft is singles and doubles, the Coleman pick is the ultimate swing for the fences pick. This is like the Josh Allen of receivers in some ways. He is unconventional and has holes in his game that can be fixed. He is young and if it hits it is massive, massive upside. A guy who is shifty enough to return punts at 6-3, 215 and to be a D1 big time basketball recruit who can't run good routes? That screams to me a kid who has not been coached enough. Clearly, he has the potential to put that together. He just has to learn how to run routes without the ball the way he runs and moves with the ball in his hands. All that time spent on basketball and AAU stuff probably hurt his football development some. Huge potential is there, but it is risky. You have to trust your development system. Ladd McConkey would have been a bunt. Micthell was my guy, and Mitchell would have been a big swing, but you may be bringing in another head case. He started his Lions interview with the media Josh Rosen style, saying how angry he is about being passed up etc rather than being thankful and grateful. A lot of people wanted Javon Baker as the second guy, an underachieving former big time prospect who runs 4.55? That guy is already on the roster, he's a lot bigger and named Justin Shorter. The bold move up into the top ten just wasn't going to happen. It sounds great on paper, but it is clear none of those teams were going to move all the way down to 28. Additionally, there would have been no second or third round pick this year and likely no 1 or 2 next year. So now you are stuck filling out the roster with mediocre veterans again. This path just never seemed realistic to me. Should they have double-dipped with another WR? Maybe. But if the value wasn’t there for them I get it. In hindsight they must really like what Hamler, Shorter, Shavers etc bring to the table. Hamler is the sleeper here imo. He's still younger than a bunch of the guys who got drafted. Whether we agree with it or not, we don’t know what these guys are doing in the background. It was a solid draft with basically 4 swing for the fences picks in Coleman, Solomon, Grable, and Clayton. The rest of the draft was adding a bust-proof future starter safety and a DT who is excellent at rushing the passer from the interior, and then a bunch of solid depth. Did they do enough to really help Josh? Maybe. They got him the receiver he wanted and a back who can get tough yards. I am not sure what else they could have done aside from draft another receiver somewhere who may or may not make the team. Perhaps a trade-up for Franklin or Walker would have made sense, but again those guys have flaws as well and you have to consider what you miss out on if you make those moves. If Coleman hits, it does have the potential to put the team over the top in a way that no one else outside the top 3 receivers could.

That is definitely true. If we drafted Worthy, fans would be complaining about our WR corps being too small, that we should have drafted someone bigger and people would be worried about us letting Coleman/Legette fall to the Chiefs.

His vision and instincts are crazy in these highlight films. I watched so many WR highlights this year I forgot how much fun it is to watch RBs.

Have to include Casey Toohill in this. His contract is modest with very little guarantees, but he’s a part of the conversation. Miller, Rousseau, Epenesa are locks. The last 2 spots I figure come down to a 3 way competition between Toohill, Jonathan, Solomon. My money is on Toohill and Solomon, Jonathan maybe a practice squad spot.

I will say this, they do not have an X receiver. Brown and Worthy play in an out and are small so can’t win consistently against press. Maybe Worthy can, but that was the concern pre-draft. For all the hype about Rice, he mostly played a big slot. Kelce obviously a generational TE. Like us, Reid, and most teams move guys around and hopefully create opportunities for receivers. The argument about winning one on ones as a boundary X…there aren’t that many guys in the NFL who can.

It’s a fun dramatic media story. Just to add, the Chiefs did not have a great draft. I love Jaden Hicks and I think that he was their best pick. The linemen they added are meh and they gave up a third to move up a few spots. The TE is interesting. If Worthy is good, it’s fine. I would not trade our draft for theirs.

I think it makes a ton of sense to churn through late round RBs for 4 year rookie contracts and never pay any of them. In that case, his age really does not matter. The tread on the tire doesn’t matter. What does matter is that there is a maturity in his game and his body that make him plug and play and very cheap labor for the next 4 years.

I think it makes sense to check in on Simmons, Quandre Diggs, Eddie Jackson as possible starters. That’s if you want a true full time starter. Outside of those 3 I don’t see any true starters better than what we have. But I do think we are actually ok with Edwards, Bishop, Rapp. Lewis would be the fourth. I am not a Lewis guy, but they clearly are and he offers position flexibility. Bishop is going to start somewhere imo. You could add some functional young depth like a Terrell Burgess who is coming out of the Washington system, so would be familiar with the concepts here. He is also excellent on special teams. Another guy who makes sense on some level for depth is Will Harris. He has position flexibilty as a safety, outside corner or nickel where he has played predominately the last couple of years. So I think there could be room to add a starter if the price is right and there are some opportunities to add depth out there.

This is why I don’t bet. Didin’t have Quintez Chephus on my bingo card

So in my opinion, your starting center does not have to be versatile. He can be a center only guy. However, your backup center cannot be a center only guy, he should really have position flexibility. Let’s say McGovern starts at center and Edwards at LG and lets say Edwards gets hurt…this regime is not going to want to move their starting center over to guard and stick Van Pran in there in the middle of a game. That just becomes a messy move. If it becomes a long term injury, you can make that switch during the week. Van Pran either needs to win the center job, or needs to prove he can do enough at guard to get us out of a game. I do not think he has a chance to start at LG. Cross training him makes a ton of sense in that regard, but this is a polished center who I do think has a chance to start right away at center.

I love that comp

To me, they believe Coleman is their X, Samuel is the Z or the other receiver and Shakir is the slot. Beane has talked in the past about the “4” that they look for and that was Harty last year. A guy who can play inside and outside, kind of knows all the positions and if he comes with return ability, even better. That is still missing from the roster, though KJ Hamler could fill that role. Mecole Hardman makes the most sense with the speed and return ability. I am guessing he is a bit too expensive. This would also be pretty high profile so I feel like someone would have reported it. But I like that fit. Jamal Agnew is probably in the same category, same type of player with a ton of return ability as well. He’s got all pro return ability. Kind of a poor man’s Hardman. Similar size and speed, Agnew is a bit older. If I were a betting man, I would say Agnew was here today. With the new rules for kickoff this would be a dynamite add. I am a Jalen Guyton guy. Good size and speed combination. He tore the ACL a couple of years ago so should be fully healthy at this point. Small guy who is stupid fast and fills that “4” role that Harty was in and would be cheap is Scotty Miller. 4.28 with some big play ability when he was with Tampa. MVS makes some level of sense. He, like Chark are big and fast so they fit. but both are probably out of the price range.