Superman

I have no opinion on the GAS stuff. Proprietary metrics that are only published sparingly have no value to me. As for his pass rush, he just looks like he knows what he's doing. He's strong and balanced, great hand usage, good great motor.

Regarding RAS, I don't like his testing. It's basically 'he's tall and ran a good 40.' No agility numbers, bad explosive numbers, no bench press, and even his 40 should be influenced by his low end weight. He also doesn't have impressive length, although that's not a RAS metric. I'd give him a RAS incomplete. You said he doesn't look like an elite athlete, and I agree. He ran a good 40, and that's it. He's definitely well refined technically, his hand usage is super impressive. Can't argue with the production, either. But I think his RAS score needs to be contextualized.

Did Ballard tell Bradley to run two coverages 70% of the time with zero disguise looks? If so, then Bradley might qualify as a scapegoat. If Bradley gets fired, it will be deserved, based on merit.

A scapegoat is someone who is blamed for someone else's mistakes. If someone gets fired for not being good at their job, they aren't a scapegoat. IMO, Bradley does not qualify.

I gave several reasons why I didn't think the Sneed deal was happening. None of it was hard to figure out.

Sneed's agent to the Titans: 'You know the Colts are prepared to send the Chiefs a 2nd rounder and offer $20m/year, you don't want to see this guy in your division do you?'

I'd like to see what this looks like over the last 3-4 years. It seems like players are coming back faster from Achilles injuries. When we signed Fisher, I was very bearish on his ability to be ready early in the season, pointing to this specific study. Fisher got hurt in the conference championship, and I think he only missed the first two games of the next season, so eight months? I think his lateral movement suffered, but for such a big person to recover from an Achilles in that short time frame is super impressive, and it indicates that the procedures and protocols have improved in recent years. There have been other players who have recovered quickly as well. Not predicting anything for Flowers, just saying I think it's possible the recovery times for Achilles injuries has trended shorter since 2018 when this study was done.

I wanted to start a QB discussion thread at some point in the dead time of the offseason. Herbert is one of the guys I want to talk about. To answer the OP, he’s not the problem. Doesn’t mean he’s a perfect player, he has some growing to do in certain areas, but the Chargers have been poorly run and poorly coached for a long time. Holding him responsible for their issues doesn’t make a lot of sense to me.

Well I think he's benefited from being the consensus top guy so far. Him vs Nabers, I'm kind of torn tbh. But in his case, why mess around with the pre draft stuff that we all know has only a loose translation to what happens in the NFL? I still think the film shows an obviously impressive prospect, and unless you think his workout numbers were going to be shockingly pedestrian, I don't think it matters. It's hard to imagine a scenario where he drops out of the top 6, IMO, even if four QBs are in play. By the way, I think there's some value in not spending a bunch of time training for measurement drills and workouts. I would rather a player focus on improving his real football skills, and maybe even letting his body recover during this "off-season" period. It can potentially get him ready for the season, and maybe even help him avoid the rookie wall. I love the pre draft stuff, and being able to compare the measurables. But I also think it's fundamentally flawed in certain ways, and I'm interested in new ways of looking at this time of year. For someone like MHJ who can point at the tape and say 'yall know who I am and what I can do,' the pre draft stuff might even be counterproductive.

What does one have to do with the other? If he doesn't live up to the hype, it won't be because he didn't do any testing.

Not a lot for the trade. I wonder what the contract winds up being.

Understood. In a vacuum, any of those players being signed doesn't necessarily bother me. It's the totality of resources allocated to those players, and our biggest defensive weaknesses likely were not improved.

Be careful before they figure out a way to clone him and sign him again...

Yeah, this is my biggest disappointment with what Ballard did this offseason, so we obviously disagree. But just philosophically, I think the earlier point being made was that paying a premium for run stopping DTs is not the recipe for building a good defense. And I think that's demonstrably true. To the bolded, ehh... Not gonna split hairs, but I'm not thrilled about that reasoning. More importantly though, it's the $13m for two backups, PLUS the $13m for Stewart, PLUS $10m for Franklin... $36m/year on these guys, and the kicker is that we're probably still not going to be good at rushing the passer or covering the middle of the field. Oh, and we brought back Taven Bryan as well, probably just because you keep complaining about him, LOL.

Yeah, the agents had an idea what the market would bear for these guys. But I was talking about players the Colts would like to build around, not 30 year olds on their third contract. Moore, Stewart, did not make it to market before their second deal. I acknowledged this, but there can still be some self awareness. How about just look back historically at how often free agents fail to live up to their new contracts. Or how often they get released after two years. This is not me saying 'Ballard is smarter than us.' I'm saying we collectively should learn from our own past mistaken ideas about how free agency works. If you were banging the drum for JC Jackson, it would seem like you'd recognize that free agency can be treacherous. But I think that level of self awareness is rare. I brought it up because we're talking about a GM being hesitant to bring in a new guy at a high dollar amount, vs keeping the guy he knows at a high dollar amount. I think it helps explain why Ballard is very judicious in free agency, and I think most GMs operate the same way. In 2023, only 27 free agents signed for $10m/year or more, and 22 of them went to a new team. The top two were QBs. The strong majority of what's going on in free agency is the mid tier stuff that Ballard has used, although I agree he could use it more. I agree with all of this. But maybe Ballard's limited use of free agency is the reason his batting average is pretty good. Still, that probably means he's leaving some meat on the bone.

Prioritizing stopping the run over pass rush and pass coverage is problematic. And you can be good against the run without paying a premium for a non pass rush NT.

I appreciate the clarification, because I think the topic gets muddy and people wind up talking past each other. I don't disagree with the bolded. I think you get mid tier free agents on two year deals, three at most. And some of those other guys were just a matter of circumstance -- they probably hoped for more than one year out of Rivers, Funchess, etc., even if they only signed for one year. I get it, there are plenty of free agents that it would have been nice to have. And like I said earlier, at the right time, for the right player, it's okay to pay the premium. Spending $13m/year on Stewart vs $17m on Huff (although I'm not sold that Huff is the right player) is not what I was looking for. He did it with Buckner, but that's one guy, four years ago. I'm on the record, I think he's too rigid. But I don't necessarily think right now is the right time for this team.

I don't think that's the point. What the Colts have almost always done with upcoming free agents is extend them before they hit the market, which typically puts a cap on the player's contract value. It also allows the team to spread out the cap hits more effectively. Outside of Pittman, the players that the Colts really want to build around do not reach free agency, so there's no opportunity for the rest of the league to overvalue them in the market. I don't think it's about the investment they've already made into the player. I think it's about having a player they want to retain, compared to replacing him with a player they don't know in the hopes the new player will be as good or better, and probably for more money. I do think it's limiting, especially with how rigid Ballard seems to be at times, but I don't think it's arrogance or confirmation bias. Setting aside the QB position, I think the biggest flaw in the strategy over the past few years has been the quality of drafting. Speaking of arrogance, I think a good exercise for fans is to look back at the free agents we wanted the Colts to sign who actually reached the market, and see just how often those players failed to work out on their new teams. We remember wanting Charles Leno, but how many people criticized the Colts for not signing Alejandro Villanueva? How many people called Ballard cheap for not signing Allen Robinson? Who wanted JC Jackson? And who understand the cap ramifications, and pays attention to them on a year to year basis? We're fans on a message board, so it's fine, but it feels like a distinct lack of self awareness to say that an NFL GM who believes free agency is overrated is "arrogant." I think pretty much everyone agrees that free agency is overrated, until it's the player you really want your team to sign.

I have to call this out because it seems like a significant misrepresentation. I don't think people blamed Reich for a lack of explosive pass catchers. I think people blamed Reich for an overall poor offense that lacked rhythm and identity, especially in 2022. Also, you're saying you think Steichen will be changing Ballard's mind on this, to what extent do you really think the HC plays a role in the kind of WRs that are brought in? I agree, but I don't know that you let really good players in their mid 20s walk in free agency to accommodate players that aren't even on your roster yet. I think you keep drafting and trying to hit at the positions at which you want to improve. And when those players hit their late 20s and 30s, maybe you let them walk, but hopefully you have already improved at the other positions. I think this is a really hardworking way to invalidate the front office. There are lots of good players at "premium" positions who were drafted outside of the first round, LT included. Sneed would have made everyone happy, and he was a 4th rounder. When your main strategy is to draft and develop good players -- and I'd argue that's every team's main strategy, with a few, short-lived exceptions -- it's a success when you hit on a mid round guy and he becomes a starting caliber player, especially at a critical position. That's not a flawed process, IMO.

This is where I kind of lose the narrative. He does use the mid tier. Davis this year (I'm not a big fan, but that's squarely mid tier), Ebukam last year (along with other specific needs, like Gay and Minshew), Gilmore in 2022, etc.. It's not just Bakers and Browns. In the three year period where I think we should have had a window -- 2019 to 2021 -- he did even more of this. In 2021, AC retired, he signed Fisher (not my favorite, but he wasn't as awful as recent discourse would suggest), Te'vi, and Davenport, along with guys at other positions. In 2020, Rivers, Rhodes, and traded for Buckner. In 2019, Funchess, Houston. Does none of that qualify as plugging holes with good talent? You keep saying the bolded, but it seems like the 'sets his value and won't budge' angle applies most directly to top tier free agents.

I think you're wrong on this. Ballard is definitely more conservative than a lot of other GMs, but now and historically there have been plenty of good teams that do not play in the rich free agent waters. I also think you're focusing on the top end of free agency, which is mostly where the 'outbidding' you reference would come into play.

I meant to mention this. I give Ballard some grace because Campbell got hurt, but a lot of good WRs went in the second and third round in 2019, and we didn't any of them. Lockett doesn't fit, drafted in 2015. Also, philosophically, I think there are different views of X, Z, slot guys than you want to acknowledge. There's no reason a slot guy can't be your most dynamic receiver, and I think big slot is used all around the league in the best offenses. I think even the most dynamic Z guys play more slot than most people realize. I know there's an ideal prototype, and some players only fit one spot (Pittman is an X, he plays big slot also but I don't think he adds a lot of value there), but this is all pretty fluid, IMO. My point is that I'm okay with projecting a slot guy as your dynamic receiving threat, if you have a plan and can pull it off. It's just an unconventional way of getting there. I think the X is more abundant, and the Z comes at a much higher premium. This is the year where we're in good position to get a potential Z, but I still don't think it happens, and a part of that is Ballard's philosophy with draft capital. We'll see.

No, I think this is simple: The devil you know. Not saying it's right, but explaining why I don't think A and C are at odds with each other. And then, historically, we know that players who change teams in free agency do not live up to their contracts. So he'd rather keep the guy the team is familiar with, that the coaches know how to use and motivate, than replace him in free agency for a potential improvement that's probably marginal at best, or a failure at worst. There's also a cap management benefit to extending Franklin vs signing Luvu, particularly when you have a strict cap management philosophy. And while I don't have a huge problem with Ballard's free agency philosophy, I do think at times it gets applied more rigidly than I think it should. At the right time, for the right player, it's okay to pay an extra 10% for the chance to improve your roster.

You're right about TY, but they drafted Campbell and Pittman in back to back years, in the second round. You might disagree with their evaluation of those players, or their intended roles, but they had specific intentions for those players. And both were slowed by injuries -- MPJ in 2020, and Campbell for sure in 2019 and 2020. More on Campbell... I think it would be good to revisit the opening game in 2020 to see what the intention was with Campbell. I feel like you kind of marginalize him as "a slot," when slot receivers have been used for dynamic production for a long time now. To me, it seemed like Campbell was going to be a huge part of the offense in 2020, and then he got hurt on the opening drive of the second game. Again, you might have preferred a different strategy, but I don't agree that this is an indication of Ballard not valuing dynamic receiver play. That's odd. He's meant to be a downfield receiver, he runs more go routes than anyone else in the league. But his QBs have been Matt Ryan and Gardner Minshew. Pierce might not be the guy we need him to be, but I think that's what they had in mind by drafting him.