Ballard

[Shadow_Creek]

I remember during the off season how CB signed the free agents and undrafted free agents to small contracts to prove themselves. i just wonder if everyone he signed makes the roster in 2018 or will this group we see on defense and offense have even newer faces come preseason next year.

[#12.]

A lot of turnover, I'm sure.  This team needs a lot of work.  That said, if Luck doesn't play this season, it will be difficult to attract free agents.  

 

I like most of everything Ballard has done, yet the team is still terrible.  It will take a few years to get the stain of Grigson off this team.

[Aluckiswolverine]

1 minute ago, #12. said:

A lot of turnover, I'm sure.  This team needs a lot of work.  That said, if Luck doesn't play this season, it will be difficult to attract free agents.  

 

I like most of everything Ballard has done, yet the team is still terrible.  It will take a few years to get the stain of Gtigson off this team.

I strongly agree but would also add Pagano to that sentence. 

[crazycolt1]

24 minutes ago, #12. said:

A lot of turnover, I'm sure.  This team needs a lot of work.  That said, if Luck doesn't play this season, it will be difficult to attract free agents.  

 

I like most of everything Ballard has done, yet the team is still terrible.  It will take a few years to get the stain of Grigson off this team.

I disagree. Free agents are money minded. If the money is offered Luck don't enter the picture.

Plus if Luck is shut down for the year stands to reason he will be 100% next season.

[#12.]

26 minutes ago, crazycolt1 said:

I disagree. Free agents are money minded. If the money is offered Luck don't enter the picture.

Plus if Luck is shut down for the year stands to reason he will be 100% next season.

They also want to win.  Poe turned us down and took less money, and that was with Luck.  As an 8-8 team with Luck, this wasn't a very attractive destination.  A 4-12 team with Luck's health in question?  

[ColtsBlitz]

2 hours ago, #12. said:

They also want to win.  Poe turned us down and took less money, and that was with Luck.  As an 8-8 team with Luck, this wasn't a very attractive destination.  A 4-12 team with Luck's health in question?  

The jags went 3-13 for the last 2 years and they got Campbell and Bouye. You can't tell me that was because they wanted to go to a team that can win. 

[IndyScribe]

49 minutes ago, ColtsBlitz said:

The jags went 3-13 for the last 2 years and they got Campbell and Bouye. You can't tell me that was because they wanted to go to a team that can win. 

Pretty much. Some players are in it only for the money and success is just a byproduct. Many veterans who have sniffed the playoffs or SB would be willing to take less for a chance at a ring, though.

[Finball]

Some want just money. Like Suh when he said pre-FA that he'll let his agent decide where he'll go next. Nothing wrong with that, though. Some might value winning/pedigree more. Jefferson took less to go to the Ravens, for example. Lang took about the same offer from the Lions instead of Seahawks because he's from Michigan. Akiem Hicks went to Chicago in 2016 over staying with the Pats because his mom lived there.

 

Luck being hurt all year surely wouldn't help but it wouldn't kill our chances either to attract good FAs.

[TheRustonRifle#7]

It is early but I feel Simon, Sheard, Hankins, Woods and Hunt have played well and will be here next season on Defense (all FA signings).  On offense, only Brissett and he was a trade.

[crazycolt1]

5 hours ago, #12. said:

They also want to win.  Poe turned us down and took less money, and that was with Luck.  As an 8-8 team with Luck, this wasn't a very attractive destination.  A 4-12 team with Luck's health in question?  

A 8-8 team with Luck would not stop a free agent from signing with the Colts. We signed 4 or 5 free agents this last off season didn't we?

The difference between a 8-8 team and  a 10-4 or 13 -3 team can be the addition of one or two players in the right positions.

Free agents sign with teams for different reasons. Winning is not the only reasons. There is money, location, family and maybe an ex coach could be some of those reasons.

[TheRustonRifle#7]

41 minutes ago, crazycolt1 said:

A 8-8 team with Luck would not stop a free agent from signing with the Colts. We signed 4 or 5 free agents this last off season didn't we?

The difference between a 8-8 team and  a 10-4 or 13 -3 team can be the addition of one or two players in the right positions.

Free agents sign with teams for different reasons. Winning is not the only reasons. There is money, location, family and maybe an ex coach could be some of those reasons.

Plus money talks....

[SaturdayAllDay]

19 minutes ago, crazycolt1 said:

A 8-8 team with Luck would not stop a free agent from signing with the Colts. We signed 4 or 5 free agents this last off season didn't we?

The difference between a 8-8 team and  a 10-4 or 13 -3 team can be the addition of one or two players in the right positions.

Free agents sign with teams for different reasons. Winning is not the only reasons. There is money, location, family and maybe an ex coach could be some of those reasons.

We signed a lot of players, but we also never ended up with our first choice. We signed Sheard/Simon after missing out on Nick Perry, we grabbed Hankins after losing out on Poe and John Jenkins, we lost out on Jeffery which lead to us grabbing Aiken. We got Schwenke instead of Zeitler. We let Butler walk and didnt resign him until no other options presented themselves, so you have to think they had someone else in mind. We signed Bostic/Spence after losing out on Paul Worillow.

We also brought in Zach Brown and he left without a contract (not sure if it was him or us though). For all the players we signed, we have just as many (if not more) that we reportedly pursued and lost out on. 

 

I agree that us being 8-8 shouldnt have stopped free agents from signing here last offseason, but clearly there is something about the Colts that makes the top guys choose almost every other team over us. It could be several different factors, but at the end of the day its the results that matter. We arent a great team for attracting free agents, and ending with a poor record this year wont help that. 

[richard pallo]

2 minutes ago, SaturdayAllDay said:

We signed a lot of players, but we also never ended up with our first choice. We signed Sheard/Simon after missing out on Nick Perry, we grabbed Hankins after losing out on Poe and John Jenkins, we lost out on Jeffery which lead to us grabbing Aiken. We got Schwenke instead of Zeitler. We let Butler walk and didnt resign him until no other options presented themselves, so you have to think they had someone else in mind. We signed Bostic/Spence after losing out on Paul Worillow.

We also brought in Zach Brown and he left without a contract (not sure if it was him or us though). For all the players we signed, we have just as many (if not more) that we reportedly pursued and lost out on. 

 

I agree that us being 8-8 shouldnt have stopped free agents from signing here last offseason, but clearly there is something about the Colts that makes the top guys choose almost every other team over us. It could be several different factors, but at the end of the day its the results that matter. We arent a great team for attracting free agents, and ending with a poor record this year wont help that. 

Maybe we just didn't offer them a better contract and/or they took more money.  We will never know. 

[crazycolt1]

4 minutes ago, SaturdayAllDay said:

We signed a lot of players, but we also never ended up with our first choice. We signed Sheard/Simon after missing out on Nick Perry, we grabbed Hankins after losing out on Poe and John Jenkins, we lost out on Jeffery which lead to us grabbing Aiken. We got Schwenke instead of Zeitler. We let Butler walk and didnt resign him until no other options presented themselves, so you have to think they had someone else in mind. We signed Bostic/Spence after losing out on Paul Worillow.

We also brought in Zach Brown and he left without a contract (not sure if it was him or us though). For all the players we signed, we have just as many (if not more) that we reportedly pursued and lost out on. 

 

I agree that us being 8-8 shouldnt have stopped free agents from signing here last offseason, but clearly there is something about the Colts that makes the top guys choose almost every other team over us. It could be several different factors, but at the end of the day its the results that matter. We arent a great team for attracting free agents, and ending with a poor record this year wont help that. 

Part of the problem of losing the players you mentioned was money. We are no longer going to get into cap space problems over signing free agents. I am quite sure some of those players you mentioned got paid more money to go somewhere else. If there is one positive thing that Grigson did bring to the Colts is how not to get into cap trouble.

[SaturdayAllDay]

16 hours ago, Shadow_Creek said:

I remember during the off season how CB signed the free agents and undrafted free agents to small contracts to prove themselves. i just wonder if everyone he signed makes the roster in 2018 or will this group we see on defense and offense have even newer faces come preseason next year.

At this point, I think the verdicts are:

 

Resign/Keep: Sheard, Simon, Hankins, Woods, Hunt, Sanchez, Rhodes, Bond

 

Let walk/Cut: Butler, Aiken, Bostic

 

On the fence: Mingo, Michael, Turbin, M Jones, Desir, B Williams, Moore. Depending on who is around to replace them this offseason, these guys may or may not stick around as depth. 

 

There are more guys that Ballard has brought in, but they are all bottom of the roster/PS guys that havent shown enough for me to make a verdict on. Those guys it all depends how they look in practice and how they progress so I will leave those to the people who know that info. 

 

We are going to see a good chunk of new faces on both sides of the ball, as not only will about half of Ballards signings probably not stick around, but there are players he didnt have a hand in signing that will need to be upgraded or outright replaced. 

[SaturdayAllDay]

21 minutes ago, crazycolt1 said:

Part of the problem of losing the players you mentioned was money. We are no longer going to get into cap space problems over signing free agents. I am quite sure some of those players you mentioned got paid more money to go somewhere else. If there is one positive thing that Grigson did bring to the Colts is how not to get into cap trouble.

Its part of the problem, but I find it hard to believe we didnt make similar offers for a good chunk of those players.

 

We were a top 2-3 contender for Jeffery, Zeitler, and Poe so its hard to believe we got that close to getting them without being in the ballpark of what they ended up taking. If we were offering less, it wasnt by much, and we could have easily matched if we really wanted the player. The question becomes whether or not they would have picked us if the contracts were exactly the same? i dont think so. I think Zeitler chose to stay close to Cincy for his family and picked Cleveland, Jeffery chose a better market/team in Philly and Poe reportedly turned down a bigger offer from us to go to ATL to try for a ring. All of them had secondary reasons not to pick us that had nothing to do with money. We might have offered less, but unless we offered noticeably more than everyone else, we probably werent getting them. 

 

For how much Worillow (1yr 3M), Brown (1 yr, 2.55M) and Jenkins (1 yr, 775k) signed for, I find it very hard to believe that was too much money for us. We could still easily afford all 3 with our current cap space, so why we couldnt get a single one due to money is perplexing.

 

Perry was really the only player we might have lost due to our lack of money, as we were kind of on the fringe of the teams he was choosing between. Even then I think he preferred to stay where he was so long as he got paid. We definitely werent going to pay 10-20% more than he got, nor would I want them to. 

 

You could say we didnt have the money for a few other players we were connected to but not in the running for (Bouye, Hightower, Jefferson). I purposely left those guys from my OP simply because I was focusing on guys i thought we were pretty close to getting and not just lowballing, to show that there are reasons other than money that lead to us losing out on good players. Money was almost definitely a factor for these guys. 

 

So while I do think money has been an issue, I think its only a small part of a much bigger problem. My hope is that coaching/scheme is a factor, so that if (when) Pagano and co. get the boot, maybe it will solve the problem a bit, along with our ample cap space.

 

Even with our cap being so high next year, id rather we not have to outbid other teams by 10-20% before we can get top players in the door. I want us to win some bids dollar for dollar because players actually want to come here, not because they reluctantly chose us for more money. 

[SaturdayAllDay]

1 hour ago, richard pallo said:

Maybe we just didn't offer them a better contract and/or they took more money.  We will never know. 

See my post above. 

[Superman]

2 hours ago, SaturdayAllDay said:

Its part of the problem, but I find it hard to believe we didnt make similar offers for a good chunk of those players.

 

We were a top 2-3 contender for Jeffery, Zeitler, and Poe so its hard to believe we got that close to getting them without being in the ballpark of what they ended up taking. If we were offering less, it wasnt by much, and we could have easily matched if we really wanted the player. The question becomes whether or not they would have picked us if the contracts were exactly the same? i dont think so. I think Zeitler chose to stay close to Cincy for his family and picked Cleveland, Jeffery chose a better market/team in Philly and Poe reportedly turned down a bigger offer from us to go to ATL to try for a ring. All of them had secondary reasons not to pick us that had nothing to do with money. We might have offered less, but unless we offered noticeably more than everyone else, we probably werent getting them. 

 

For how much Worillow (1yr 3M), Brown (1 yr, 2.55M) and Jenkins (1 yr, 775k) signed for, I find it very hard to believe that was too much money for us. We could still easily afford all 3 with our current cap space, so why we couldnt get a single one due to money is perplexing.

 

Perry was really the only player we might have lost due to our lack of money, as we were kind of on the fringe of the teams he was choosing between. Even then I think he preferred to stay where he was so long as he got paid. We definitely werent going to pay 10-20% more than he got, nor would I want them to. 

 

You could say we didnt have the money for a few other players we were connected to but not in the running for (Bouye, Hightower, Jefferson). I purposely left those guys from my OP simply because I was focusing on guys i thought we were pretty close to getting and not just lowballing, to show that there are reasons other than money that lead to us losing out on good players. Money was almost definitely a factor for these guys. 

 

So while I do think money has been an issue, I think its only a small part of a much bigger problem. My hope is that coaching/scheme is a factor, so that if (when) Pagano and co. get the boot, maybe it will solve the problem a bit, along with our ample cap space.

 

Even with our cap being so high next year, id rather we not have to outbid other teams by 10-20% before we can get top players in the door. I want us to win some bids dollar for dollar because players actually want to come here, not because they reluctantly chose us for more money. 

 

Just because we had the money doesn't mean we offered it. During free agency, there are a lot of unconfirmed rumors, you almost have to discard the majority of them. 

 

Poe is an interesting case, but it seems like they wanted to give him a 3-5 year deal, but not at the yearly average he was looking for. He was willing to do a one year deal, which is what he did with Atlanta. The Colts later turned their attention to Hankins, and got him for the reasonable 3 year deal they wanted. 

[SaturdayAllDay]

44 minutes ago, Superman said:

 

Just because we had the money doesn't mean we offered it. During free agency, there are a lot of unconfirmed rumors, you almost have to discard the majority of them. 

 

Poe is an interesting case, but it seems like they wanted to give him a 3-5 year deal, but not at the yearly average he was looking for. He was willing to do a one year deal, which is what he did with Atlanta. The Colts later turned their attention to Hankins, and got him for the reasonable 3 year deal they wanted. 

Yah that Poe one was really weird. Not sure why he didnt want a long term deal. I get that he thought he could increase his value, but I dont think he can do anything to get more than the 12M/yr we reportedly offered. I get the report could be wrong/false but given what we ended up giving Hankins its not hard to believe we made an offer close to what was reported. 

[BlueShoe]

21 hours ago, Shadow_Creek said:

I remember during the off season how CB signed the free agents and undrafted free agents to small contracts to prove themselves. i just wonder if everyone he signed makes the roster in 2018 or will this group we see on defense and offense have even newer faces come preseason next year.

 

His plan is working. He needed temporary players to buy time for a couple of drafts. We will likey keep a couple of these free agents for a little while. 

 

I don’t think Jim Irsay and/or Chris Ballard believed we would be competitive this season. They knew we needed to turn over the roster, and it didn’t hurt to evaluate Chuck for another season.

 

We are watching the Bill Polian philosophy at work here. Build through the draft and keep our own. We are at least another year (and another draft) away from being a contender. 

[bananabucket]

5 hours ago, SaturdayAllDay said:

 I think Zeitler chose to stay close to Cincy for his family and picked Cleveland

 

Where are you getting these ideas from?  Indy is significantly closer to Cinci than Cleveland is.

[SaturdayAllDay]

2 hours ago, bananabucket said:

 

Where are you getting these ideas from?  Indy is significantly closer to Cinci than Cleveland is.

Huh. So it is. Forgive me, not my country haha. I always seem to mix up where Cincy and Columbus are for whatever reason. My bad