Superman

Yeah, this is pretty basic. In fact, the article in the OP is about the designed run game, not about whether a QB should be able to operate as a pocket passer. It's about how this approach bolsters the run game and influences the defense, and it's pretty plain to see.

It seems like the point is to make kickoff plays so inconsequential that they can come back and say 'less than 1% of kickoffs is returned past the 25, let's just get rid of this play.' And if that's the case, just get rid of it now. Make the case that it's the most dangerous play in the game, and not worth the statistically rare but exciting big return, and eliminate the play altogether. At the same time, approve the proposal for a 4th and 15 to replace an onside kick, and you can actually recoup some of that excitement. Maybe more... there would probably immediately be as many 4th and 15 tries as there are big kick returns. And that would probably influence decision making at the end of games -- more 4th down attempts, more 2 point attempts, just generally more aggressive decisions to try to put games away, because a more legitimate alternative to the onside kick makes it easier for a trailing team to get the ball back.

This is where I don't know what to think. It's very possible that Strausser wasn't on the job in the last couple years, but the OL was still really good in 2019 and 2020, and they were good run blocking in 2021. So while it's likely that coaching played a big role in the regression, it's hard to pin the entire drop-off on the coaches. The Matt Pryor situation is shocking, he looked good in 2021 but was a mess last season, maybe due to body composition. And the other part is that I don't think there's any evidence for us outsiders that Sparano is/will be a good OL coach. I like his pedigree and background, but it's his first time in this role. He might not be any good. Hopefully he's great... Personnel-wise, I think we're probably okay, assuming everyone is reasonably healthy. Biggest questions are LT and RG, but Raimann came on as the season progressed, and I think Pinter has more than he showed in 2022. I'd like more competitive depth across the board, but we have a lot of young guys. The unknowns with coaching are more of a concern for me than the personnel right now. And I guess it's pretty hard for good players to make up for bad coaching, especially at OL. All it takes is one mistake by one guy, and the entire OL fails.

I agree.

It's the Commanders... They're probably trying to get him to pay back his vending machine credits.

I think they can do an injury settlement based on his roster designation, maybe that's the reason. Passing a physical is subjective anyway. He hasn't been all that great in recent years, but I'd take him as competitive depth at guard.

I asked because compuls1v3 said three bad years in a row is a problem. Going back to 2021, he was a top 10-15 OL, at worse, and he was injured. In 2022, he started out looking bad, but got better as the season went along, and I think he was above average overall. I think people tend to exaggerate the standard for highly paid players. We definitely need Nelson to play better than he did last year, but I don't think anyone should be expecting him to be gone after this season.

Do you think Quenton Nelson was bad in 2021?

Height isn't good, but his arm length is pretty good for an interior OL.

Herbert was near the top of the league in batted passes last year, and he's 6'6". Height is a factor, but it's not the only one, and it's probably not the most important one when it comes to batted passes. I have more questions about whether Young can see the intermediate middle of the field than I do about batted passes.

Yup, you're right. Here's the PFR snap count link for that game, showing Pryor at tackle for 61 snaps. https://www.pro-football-reference.com/boxscores/202210230oti.htm#all_home_snap_counts

I think this is a rough year for the Titans. They have some personnel losses, they're not great at a couple of positions, and at some point the Derrick Henry production is going to fall off (signs suggest maybe it's already happening?) Unless Tannehill goes off, or Levis is really good, I think they're a .500 team. The Texans are kind of unknown, any team can take a jump, especially with a new HC. But I don't see their roster being significantly better in any area from last season, they're just building right now. The Jags, I think, are for real. They've built a strong roster, and for the first time in a long time they have a good coach and a good QB together. They might have some weakness on OL, but I think they have the coaching staff to mitigate that. Bigger questions are on defense -- soft pass rush and questionable secondary. But they're still the best team in the division, IMO, and should be a 10 win team, with potential to win more if Lawrence really steps up as a franchise QB. You can probably pencil in a loss for the Colts in Jacksonville. I don't have high hopes for the Colts winning the division this year. Anything is possible, but our team probably isn't ready to compete at that level yet. Of course, there is no powerhouse team in the division, and the Jags won last year going 4-2 in the division, winning 9 total games.

There was also a rumor started by a disreputable former Colts blogger back in 2018. He claimed before the draft that Manning would be joining the team as President of Football Ops (or some similar title), Ballard would report to him, it was basically a done deal, and would be announced some time after the draft. None of that proved to be true. I think there was a lot of Manning/Colts stuff being made up back then. Even Manning/Broncos stuff. There was a rumor a while back that Manning was buying a minority stake in the Broncos as well. But every time anyone asks Manning whether he wants to join a team in an official capacity, he shrugs it off. So I think some of this stuff is just being imagined by curious people on the Internet.

To be honest that was my initial memory as well. I checked his snap counts and they all show at tackle, so maybe they just got it wrong. Also remember we moved Braden to guard for one game -- maybe the Denver game? -- and maybe Pryor was at RT and not RG? But you might be right. Ultimately, we agree, Pryor was terrible. I wonder what happened with him. I think he said he lost weight over the offseason to try to be a little quicker, maybe his body composition was the problem. But such a drastic drop off in one season is really strange.

It's good that he's gone, but he only played tackle for us last season.

Same, I don't think this move says much about positional strengths. That's generally the case with these deep roster churning moves in the offseason. I still think we need a move at OL.

Who knows? Just mentally accounting for them, assuming they have good seasons this year. And of course, any of our FAs could walk, even if they look good.

That changes pretty quickly once you account for Pittman and JT. Add in potential deals for Rigo Sanchez, Blackmon, Rodgers, and Pinter, and the money is basically gone.

To the bolded, no one will be, right? He's alone at the top of the mountain, in terms of overall athleticism. And I agree, Luck doesn't belong in the conversation. Culpepper tested better than I remembered. I'd say Culpepper, Newton, Griffin, Vick, Jackson, and I'd add Josh Allen as well (his numbers are quite there, but the way he used his legs right away in the NFL makes him a legit comp, IMO). And yeah, injuries is a major factor to consider. When your QB exposes himself in the running game, it increases the risk of getting hurt. And even if there isn't a severe injury, smaller injuries tend to add up and cause problems over time. I think I'd say 20% for Richardson right now. We haven't seen anything yet, so I'm basing this off of what he looked like in college. I'm fine with moving this way up pretty quickly, but first I want to see what he's doing with his fundamentals, and how it looks on the practice field. Then I want to see how the staff intends to use him this year, and what it looks like -- is he starting, if he's not starting are they working him in, can he handle the speed of the NFL, does he look overwhelmed in any way, etc. Edit: Meant to add Fields to that list of comps. And that speaks to how the coaches use Richardson, and how he looks. The Bears plan for Fields hasn't been great, IMO.

I'd include Trey Lance, he didn't work out but he's a very good athlete. His career has been marred by injuries so far, but with how little he played in college and how raw he was, it's an interesting comp. There's probably also a survivorship bias here. I bet there are some athletic QB prospects that don't readily come to mind because they flamed out so fast. I feel good about Richardson because I believe Steichen's plan for him will be well considered and executed, but he's a very high variance prospect.

And for two seasons, HOF OL Kevin Mawae was assistant OL coach. Before that, he was an offensive assistant at Arizona State, and before that he spent a year as the Bears assistant OL coach. I get the feeling Reggie wouldn't have agreed to be assistant WR coach, and probably let the team know. Similar to how they were trying to get Jeff Saturday to join the staff as an assistant, but he wasn't interested at the time.

I think 40% is aggressive, just based on how little we've seen so far and how far away he is. But I agree, he's a boom or bust type prospect.

I'm a huge Reggie Wayne fan. I don't think he's anywhere close to a promotion, and I'm not sure why it's exciting that he's supposed to have more input this season. I wasn't even that excited that he was hired, I would have rather had him working under a more experienced guy for a couple years, and it's not like the WRs were outstanding last year. I hope he's great and is here for a long time, even working his way up the ranks. And I hope the WRs have great production under his oversight. But there's a lot we don't know about his ability to coach in the NFL so far.

Proves two things to me. First, Irsay does have some level of self-awareness. I wasn't sure after he was talking about sausages, quartiles, and building rockets. Second, Irsay obviously reads his mentions on Twitter.