Yoshinator

Been 5 minutes, can I make my pick? @NFLfan

Bengals forfeit their pick due to tigergate. Picking on wild Buffaloes which offends me because I'm from Colorado. Their pick goes to Denver and Denver gets back to back picks!

A lot of people don't know a lot about Pierce, but this is a nice pick. I was hoping to get him later in the draft. Good job!

Alright! Time to have some fun! The Broncos are ready to rock and roll!

@NFLfan The Broncos have the 234th pick now from the Detroit Lions in real life. They received it in the Trinity Benson trade. https://www.si.com/nfl/broncos/news/broncos-awarded-seventh-round-draft-pick-trinity-benson-lions Not sure if we'll do the full 7 rounds, but this is just in case.

Nice! This defense has the potential to be great this season!

Well Andrew didn't invite Grigson to his book club every Tuesday night, so they're even!

That's mostly based on Matt Ryan and the upgrade from Elighner. Remember, the true upgrade is Wentz to Ryan, which isn't huge. The Broncos are up there because of upgrading Lock to Wilson, and the Browns are up there because of Mayfield to Watson. Really only the Raiders and Dolphins are true FA upgrades in the top 5.

Another day yesterday, no FA signings. I feel at this point it's fair to say if Ballard doesn't do something that makes us definite playoff contenders by the end of the draft, then we should fire him immediately and promote Ed Dodds as our new GM. Morocco Brown can be promoted to assistant GM. It may not sound fair, but we are just wasting time at this point. We have had plenty of opportunities, and the effort and care for this team by Ballard isn't there. I think Ed Dodds would be an upgrade. The cherry on top of this would be if we traded a 3rd or 4th round pick for Devante Parker, when there have been 30 or so signable WRs in FA that we didn't get for free, and another 30 or so guys in the draft that we can get that are 6-8 years younger.

Colts Fans: If Ballard doesn't address the pass rush, I'm gonna lose it! Ballard trades for Ngakue and trades away Rock-Ya-Sin Colts Fans: If Ballard doesn't address the quarterback, I'm gonna lose it! Ballard acquires Ryan Colts Fans: If Ballard doesn't add any players in FA, I'm gonna lose it! Fixed it for you Let the man work. We can complain about the team he's built after he's built it. So when is that going to be, when he's forced to do it on draftday when it's basically mandatory for every team to participate? Oh wait, we don't have a 1st round pick there either, so looks like we're sitting out day 1 of the draft as well. At least we'll get the depth pieces we were supposed to get in FA (Ballard can't even do that for us unlike previous years).

Darius, get Ballard in a one-on-one meeting and tell him to sign some FAs!

The Broncos and Colts are my two teams, but this is very skewed. When you go from Elighner to Ryan, and Lock to Wilson, it definitely gives you offseason improvement because of the QB position. Likewise, the Falcons and Seahawks are on the very bottom of that list because of them trading them away. Most of the improvements from other teams is a bunch of small improvements besides the big FAs, however, most of those teams already had a QB in place. As I've said before, I like the Matt Ryan signing, but it's almost useless on its own unless you upgrade the team around him, and the draft by itself is not enough when you don't have a 1st round pick and every other team is upgrading through FA and the draft.

So 3 days with Matt Ryan and we signed nobody. Here comes day number 4. This is getting bad honestly. We open up salary cap, and nothing. Why are we opening up cap if we aren't signing FAs? Does Matt Ryan not attract FAs? Is Ballard literally low-balling every FA he is interested in at this moment? Is he just doing a mini-tank at this time, using Matt Ryan to appease the fan base? Or is it that he's stubbornly going against what 31 other GMs are doing, thinking his way is still the right way, when the results have been poor? Stop sinking this team Ballard! You don't even have a 1st round pick in the draft this year. Previous years you had either a 1st round pick, or you traded it away for a legitimate player, or you traded down and had multiple 2nd round picks. None of that is true this year. This year, our 1st rounder is gone. It is a sunk cost in Wentz and there is no value in it. We have only one 2nd round pick as well. Unlike previous years where we got Braden and Leonard, and Taylor and Pittman. You seriously think you will outdraft other teams in the NFL by such a wide margin that it not only makes up for a lack of a first-round pick, but the lack of signing anyone in FA as well? You are crazy Ballard! There is no way this ends well IMO, and it's going to blow up in Ballard's face once he sees all the weaknesses in the team after the draft and the beginning of the season. Expect a draft like last years, except without someone like a Kwity Paye that was a surefire top 20 player in most people's rankings.

I responded to @csmopar saying whose to say they didn't try. I was just making the point that the Colts FA interests are generally leaked when they fail, and I used Jones and Engram as the examples. I wasn't talking about signings before they happened, we are talking about two different things here.

If they would have tried, it would have generally been leaked in this day and age. We heard about Justin Jones and Evan Engram signing elsewhere when we tried to get them. That's it though. So I'm more led to believe other than Brandon Facyson, those are the only other FAs we've tried to go after so far, and neither signed because we didn't have Matt Ryan at the time.

We could trade for DeVante Parker, but it would be a bit frustrating if of all the WRs in FA and the draft, our choice to get a WR is to trade a mid-round pick for a 29 year-old Devante Parker. That's the only guy who is probably for trade that is obvious at this moment.

We'll probably draft a WR in the 3rd round and a TE in the 4th IMO. Maybe sign a veteran like Julio Jones who has chemistry with Matt Ryan as well. That's about all we can do at this point.

So Ballard opens up cap space yesterday and signs no one again. Two days after signing Matt Ryan and we sign no one around him. Will this be 3 days? Don't see what the point of trading for him is if we're going to have a worse team than last year around him. No 1st round pick either this year. Just watching all the FAs go and go and go. People bash Carson Wentz for how he did last year. I'm starting to have some sympathy for him, and my expectations for Matt Ryan are going to be down a bit quickly if we have a worse team around him than we do around Wentz. Most teams in the AFC are making moves to try and compete. We have a QB upgrade that will be 37 in May, and an EDGE upgrade in Yannick in return for trading away Rock. At least we moved up in the 2nd and 3rd round of the draft a bit, and gained a 3rd or 2nd in 2023, but we lost our 1st round pick this year. We can't fix this whole team through the draft through the draft with the picks we have. We also aren't signing FAs. I don't get the direction we are moving in. Are we tanking without admitting we are tanking? Is Ballard delusional enough to believe this team is good enough to compete and win the division? Is he just trying to save his job with the Matt Ryan signing at this point? I don't know. All I know is, this is a mediocre team, and Ballard refuses to improve it in any way right now.

31 GMs failed yes, however, 14 still made the playoffs, and that is the regular season goal, to get into the playoffs so you have a chance to win the SB. We have only done that twice since Ballard has been GM, and once was with Luck. That needs to be improved or Ballard has to go.

If we still had Luck, Ballard's strategy makes perfect sense. Without him though, we can't keep up with the AFC with that strategy, and we're a mediocre to bad team compared to that conference. So honestly, I just think it's a combination of no QB security for FAs, and the fact that Ballard is being cheap along with no current QB in Indy that is driving FAs away. It already happened with Justin Jones and Evan Engram.

I'm curious right now if it's Ballard or Irsay who got rid of Wentz. If it's Irsay, then he has done huge damage to this team over the last week and put Ballard in a horrible situation where his hands are tied and the Colts are a laughing stock to the fans, media, and players across the league that won't sign with us. If it's Ballard, then I'm about ready to fire him at this point. In that case, he would of released Wentz right before FA, counted on a plan that fully relied on luck to depend which QB would be available for you, sacrificed a week of FA (making the team worse by not being able to fill any needs except re-signing your own and a trade where we made our secondary a huge weakness in exchange for getting an EDGE), is still hesitant to sign or trade for a QB even after Watson was traded, and is still stubborn and bullheaded that he believes his way works when the SB last year and the current landscape of the AFC today shows that his way doesn't work. We probably can't even get a decent QB in the draft either because we don't have a 1st round pick (not that Ballard has attempted to draft a QB before the 4th round anyway). I would rather take a chance on a rookie GM at this point than Ballard if he was willing to learn from his mistakes and try a new approach. You can't teach an old dog new tricks apparently, and Ballard is stuck in his ways, which have become detrimental to this team, and have taken us from a high in 2018 to an all-time low in 2022. Sad to see this once great franchise that I rooted for since 1998 as a 10 year old kid become the dumpster fire it is today because of the last two regimes. It's ok though, we'll probably trade our 2023 1st round pick for Matt Ryan (who will turn 37 in May), and get another band-aid QB for a year or two and sacrifice the future at the one thing Ballard is actually good at (the draft). Maybe this will be a blessing in disguise. We'll go 5-12 or something, Ballard and Reich will be fired, we'll get a competent GM and HC for once, and we'll actually draft our QB like a normal team that tries win every year instead of going halfway on it (trading for wentz instead of stafford). The Bengals and the Rams showed two ways to make the SB (very different from each other), our approach isn't close to either team. A GM and HC change can't come soon enough...

For the right price yes. I remember he was out of the league quickly for a while. I'd take a shot at him for a non-guaranteed contract that we can get out of if he has an off the field issue (not by bad performance). He'd give us a shot at possibly filling the CB void that Rock-Ya-Sin left.

If we get one, Ballard gets some credit. I don't buy he'll sign any of them though.

This is why I don't ever give Ballard the benefit of the doubt. One step forward, two steps backward. Gets Yannick, and there's rumors we like Hayward for Gus Bradley's scheme, he would be a nice replacement for Rock, and he was inexpensive, and we don't get him. This was the CB that had experience with our scheme and DC already, and all he cost was money. I know Ballard normally does a bad job in FA, but this aggravates me after the trade since we could of signed him without much dropoff to Rock and would of had two players that fit Bradley's scheme, and Ballard didn't do it. Not like Hayward is a WR where we are waiting on a QB to get offensive players. Bradley and Yannick should of been an easy sell to Hayward to come here. If we can't convince anyone to sign, this is becoming a Ballard problem and no one else. He is making this team an unattractive destination with his decisions. No QB and a cheap GM = No FA's.

You generally say this every year, and every year it's not like Ballard does much more in the next couple weeks anyway. He'll end up signing a few lower tier FAs, they will probably make a minimal difference. Maybe a mid-tier one could do something at WR specifically. That is Ballard's history for us in FA. There is a sample size now. Only difference is that maybe we sign Mariota this year in FA and get a QB. There's a reason I wasn't on the board yesterday. I knew it would happen yesterday, and I know what will happen the next week or two. He does the same thing every year. I was more excited about the Braves getting Matt Olson to replace Freddie Freeman than I was to pay attention to us yesterday in FA. If we get a big name FA like a WR or so, it will be something rare Ballard does. However, we already know whether it's days or weeks, what will already happen most likely. So please don't give the one day excuse. This FA story has been played out many times, and everyone on this forum knows the ending.