SBBlue

I knew Robbie was in the slot a lot, I didn't realize he had more than twice the reps there than DJ.

Until someone posted it here, I had forgot that Moton has done a brief stint at LT in 2018. I was curious how he did. Could Taylor Moton become the Panthers left tackle permanently? (247sports.com) "second year player Taylor Moton earned the nod to play left tackle for the Panthers, moving over from the right side where he had played the first two games of the preseason at a high level. The results were outstanding: Moton's play at left tackle was the highlight of a Panthers offensive line performance that allowed zero sacks, allowed only a single pressure on Cam Newton, and helped the running backs run for 99 total yards. Pro Football Focus gave Moton a grade of 74.5 for his performance, the fourth highest on the team in Friday night's preseason victory. On his very best snaps, Taylor Moton almost looked like Jonathan Ogden" Now its dejvu all over again: Will the Carolina Panthers Move Taylor Moton to Left Tackle? - Sports Illustrated Carolina Panthers News, Analysis and More "When asked what would cause the Panthers to move him over to left tackle, Rhule responded: 'If he's the best available.' "

Really no surprise there.

Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.

I think Rhule believes this too, which is why we are taking big risks with Darnold, trading down to acquire more talent, and moneyballing the oline to put resources in the D and O weaponry. He's trying to win now. If Darnold, the Oline rookies, Horn, Reddick, and Perryman stay healthy and ball out, we're a winning team.

I agree. That said, if Perryman gets hurt, which he tends to do, who's next...Fisher? Burns, as awesome as he is...is not strong against the run. Safety doesn't look awesome either. Teams find weakness and exploit them. It is reasonable to expect the D to improve over last year. But last year we expected the offense to look pretty good and the D to decline. The O did look pretty good, until we got to the RZ or the 4th quarter, or the last 4 games, where the wheels fell off. Some things just happen and just don't make sense. All we can hope for is that management makes the correct calculated moves and coaches get the best out of these players. And from what I've seen Rhule>RR and Fit>>>>>>>Hurney.

lol Sophie's choice...

They aren't going soft this year again. Horn , Bouye and even Taylor are man/press corners. Adding Reddick, Fox, Jones and Dixon is going to help get to the QB. Its clear from what he has said and from what we have acquired that we are going to tighten up, probably on 3rd and 4th downs. Perryman will help with the run D problem....he needs to stay healthy though, he has an injury history and we have a deep drop off in talent when he's out. That would shock me. The D played far beyond expectations last year, shutting out Stafford and limiting Rogers. Improving in key metrics with rookies after loss of some of our best vets. Rhule has carried Snow everywhere with him and he turned around those teams with great D's. Baylor and Temple were not offensive powerhouses. I would be surprised if Snow goes soft again this year. Even if the D doesn't perform, I'd be surprised if Rhule let him go.

I agree. As bad as we were against the run, it improved from 2019, even after the loss of Luke, Bradberry and loading up the the D with rookies. It was bad, but once again we improved from 2019 in this category as well. We declined against the passing game, whether you measure by yards, tds or 1st downs. Considering our secondary was a bunch a rookies with Boston at safety, in a division with TB, Matt Ryan and Drew Brees 2x and Matt Stafford on the schedule, it is amazing we weren't dead last. Expecting the D to do better with rookies replacing Luke and Bradberry is a very high bar, I was expecting it to be worse, but in key categories like rushing yards and 1st downs we actually IMPROVED with rookies. People seem to forget how bad the 2019 RR run defense sucked.

And a lot YAC.

When you're outmanned, you don't play man. We didn't have the manpower to play tight coverage. We do now.

So I was thinking maybe the saints get burned by not having cap space roll over. Nope. We have about the same roll over. The more I learn about this, I think the Saints do this right. Maximize salaries, keep good players. Restructure/reduce when you need space. There' s almost always an nonperforming player or someone willing to restructure.

I've been thinking about this. Our YBC dropped off a cliff last season. We had been top of the league for years all the way to 2019. Then in 2020 we were bottom of the league. Was it the new scheme, oline performance, Davis run path choices, or some combination? If it was oline, or scheme, we may have a problem.

Hurney's management methods from the 1990s got him fired. He was not a good manager, which is why he was fired twice and isn't one now. Fit>>> Hurney 2.0 > Hurney 1.0 ==

Didn't anybody warn them. Don't do it! Its a mistake!

This. It may be a record contract, but it actually lowers this years cap hit. Saints operate as if the cap will rise and they design and restructure contracts to kick costs out to future years. Its hard for players to demand higher contracts when you're up against the cap and in fact it allows you to make Brees the "highest paid" quarterback or Michael Thomas the highest-paid receiver or Jahri Evans the highest-paid guard or Jimmy Graham the highest-paid tight end or even Jairus Byrd the highest-paid safety at the time of their contracts. They are handsome contracts, but the guaranteed money is not always the "highest" and they are structured to distribute the cap hit to out years.

Yeah the saints method for handling cap is brilliant and assumes the cap goes up. All-Pro T Ryan Ramczyk, Saints agree to blockbuster contract extension (usatoday.com) Most people miss that even as they signed Ramczyk’s record contract, they restructured his 2021 salary cap hit. He was due 11 against the cap due to his fifth year option, but the new deal saves cap space this year.

How the Saints cleared $111 million in cap space and what it means for 2022 - New Orleans Saints Blog- ESPN $23.925 million cleared by Brees’ retirement and ‘pay cut’ Brees was scheduled to count $36.15 million against this year’s cap, including a salary of $25 million and $11.15 million in dead money from previous signing bonuses. He then had another $11.5 million in dead money scheduled to hit the books next year after his contract ran out. If the Saints wait to file Brees’ retirement paperwork until after June 1, they can split the dead money charge over two years ($11.15 million this year and $11.5 million next year). The problem is that if they wait until June 1, they have to count Brees’ salary on their books until then. So Brees agreed to a “pay cut” to the veteran minimum salary of $1.075 million for this season, lowering his cap charge to $12.225 million until June 1 and $11.15 million after June 1. $35 million cleared by releasing or trading players Released: Alexander 13.4 Jenkins 7 Easton 5.875 Sanders 4 J. Hill 2.605 Morestead 2.5 Traded: Brown 5 Replaced with players making 660-780k Where the magic happens: 52 million cleared by restructuring contracts Let’s say a player is scheduled to have a $10 million salary and a $10 million cap charge this season, and he has three years remaining on his contract. If you change that to a $1 million salary and a $9 million signing bonus, then the bonus can be counted as $3 million over each of the next three years. Suddenly you’re paying the player the same amount of money in 2021, but his cap charge drops from $10 million to $4 million. Take this method a step further by creating fake contract extensions scheduled to automatically void before they become reality. The Saints made waves on Sunday by doing this with quarterback Taysom Hill’s contract -- giving him fake salaries of $35 million per year from 2022 to 2025. Hill will never see that money, but teams sometimes make those salaries exorbitantly high because an NFL rule says players can’t renegotiate a higher salary within 12 months of their most recent renegotiation. Jordan 9.525, Thomas 8.7, Hill 7.75, Peat 6, Oneymata 4.34, Davis 3.91875, Jenkins 2.9, Lutz 1.74

"I would not be surprised if Brian Burns was a 16, 17 sack guy this season." Darius Butler on his best bet for DPOY

Yes. Howeer, we have new olineman and we hope to take advantage of Darnolds range, which will take more time for those plays to develop. It SHOULD be a better situation for Sam, but we really don't know what we're looking at yet. We've tried to moneyball the line. A lot of people think that is a bad plan. I'm more wait and see, and give the new guys a chance.

I get you. That's the title of the article, and Greg did have mixed feelings. And the thread has some good discussion on retiring numbers and some nice stuff about Greg. Now, you have to cut a little slack since we're in the dead-zone between OTA's and camp.