glazeduck

@Virgil count me in for mocks, but haven't had enough time to dig into this class to provide any sort of thought leadership

I think A- Antonio Brown (seems quite a bit more mentally stable, however 😀) fits pretty well.

NFL Draft X Oregon Ducks... Feels like a good time to chime in here. Troy Franklin is -- by a significant margin -- the best receiver to ever play at the U of O (to be fair, it's not exactly a who's who list, but he was an absolute star). It makes sense to me that Buffalo would have interest, Franklin excels at a lot of things that Gabe Davis did -- he's just a much better player. He gets open deep, he sets up DBs extremely well, he makes clutch catches routinely, and he runs extremely precise routes. I think perhaps the most promising aspect of Franklin as a prospect? He was pretty much Oregon's only option on 3rd downs, and everyone knew it, yet consistently got open and made the play needed. Looking past his combine, because it sounds like he was sick, his biggest knock against him is probably his hand size -- they're small by NFL standards, which could be an issue -- but I do know that some NFL personnel execs use hand size more as an evaluation metric of natural hands, than a go/no-go determinant (the logic being if you're still a good hands catcher with small hands, that's a more innate skill, versus struggling to catch the ball despite having baseball mitts for hands). I haven't watched the other guys enough to know where, exactly, I'd slot Franklin, but I think he's just a natural WR who's going to succeed, despite perhaps not being a Calvin Johnson-like athlete. Obviously the Duck fan in me would be ecstatic, but so would the Bills fan...

There's absolutely nothing to be learned from this. Zach has played extremely well in Taylor's absence, but: Is only playing BECAUSE of that absence, and he was terrible here. Zach is on another team because he wasn't good enough to stay on our team. This isn't Wyatt Teller 2.0.

It's exactly this. Culture fit, lack of rap sheet, leadership qualities, intelligence, intangibles are all important parts of the process, but they very VERY rarely elevate a below-average athlete to being more than just an average player, at best. Not at all to defend or excuse his actions, but Jefferey Simmons vs. Ed Oliver is another example. Obviously Ed has turned out better than the Boogie situation thus far -- and again, Simmons is a POS -- but he's unequivocally the better and more impactful player. When the goal is to find the best football players, sometimes you need to take chances on talent...

With our glut of WRs and need at LB, I'm wondering if Shaq Thompson might be an option. He's obviously at the end of his career and the Panthers aren't winning anything this year. There's the obvious Carolina Joke/tie-in/McBeane connection, but they need WR talent almost as bad as we need off-ball LBs to support Bryce Young. Shakir and a 4th or 5th feels like a no brainer to both sides, to me...

I don't necessarily disagree with you, but to pretend like Dalvin Cook and Jonathan Taylor are apples:apples is laughable...

Has anyone pointed out (we're now well clear of 300 pages...) that us getting Hopkins would bring all of the previously stated benefits (and risks) but also keep all of our most significant Super Bowl competition from getting them? Of course he comes without risks. Justin Jefferson isn't getting cut tomorrow, nor is TJ Watt. At some point we're going to have to take a risk on a big move. Hopkins' performance last year suggests that he can maintain a high level of play for at least the next year or two, we should all be incredibly excited to even be in the discussion for this kind of move, let alone the odds-on favorites.

Regarding trading up/down or not... I think you HAVE to get another player you think can be a difference maker at a position of need... We need interior OLmen, LB and DL and there's a number still available at each position. If that means moving up because they fly off the board? Go do it. If they slide because other positions get drafted to where you can move back and still get one of those guys? Even better. But you cannot trade down to recoup a worse pick just to do that. In my eyes there's about 10 guys that we need to make sure we get at least one of. THAT'S the priority...

Just say no to Hyatt (okay, maybe in the 3rd...)

Agreed. The problem is the chance he falls all the way to us is virtually 0. We'd have to trade up, at least slightly, to get him. And then the calculus isn't just drafting a 1st rd RB when you've spent a 2nd the year prior and a 3rd the previous 2 years before that... it's also trading sparse draft capital during your championship window... Unless there's a Laremy Tunsil type situation this evening with him or we're able to turn an unneeded player into whatever it takes to move up, I don't see us moving up for Bijan being all that likely...

It's not a super hot take, but Jalin Hyatt -- unless he falls into an absolutely perfect position -- will be a massive bust.

If the Hopkins option doesn't win in a landslide we need to start a Gofundme for some lobotomies...

Chip left before Royce but he recruited him and they ran the same offense, so I don't think it's unfair. As for Freeman specifically, the dude broke every single one of Reggie Bush's HS records, was an animal in college and looked every bit like he should've been at least a solid contributor in the pros. I guess what you call what he is vs. should've been is both a sea of grey and somewhat unimportant, but suffice it to say that he, along with every other back that's come out of that audience, did not perform well at the NFL level, regardless of expected outcomes. (And this is coming from a HUGE Royce fan, fwiw...)

Take a look at my profile name dude, I'm very familiar with Chip Kelly and his RBs. You're leaving out Royce Freeman (massive bust), DeAnthony Thomas and 2 seasons of Josh Kelley at UCLA. The larger point is his scheme opens massive lanes for RBs that don't always require NFL-level eyes or agility. Do you read/listen to Rotoviz stuff? Dave Caban has done a lot of work on explosive plays and added explosive receptions to his model and it makes Evans look reeeeally enticing for his projected draft capital... Hopefully his phych evals and personality checks cleared cuz there's a potential beast in there...