tukafan21

Being honest, I don't remember who the FA's were this offseason off the top of my head, but I remember there being a few other players I'd have rather given even a few more million to than him, because of his injury history. Also, my #1 option from the start was never to sign him (or anyone else), but it was to go after Hopkins to be our #1 on the outside, play TMJ/Mingo on the other outside, with Thielen in the slot.

Totally fair and I agree with you in a vacuum. My issue with him has never been signing him or the contract we gave him, but the opportunity cost of having that depth chart spot and money available for someone else, like Hopkins once he was available.

No, it's not about agreeing with me or not, it's that you kept pushing the idea of signing Hopkins once he was cut and can't get past that we never did. If there was even a 1% chance that we would have signed him, then sure, maybe I wouldn't take issue with you saying that. But once we had Chark, Thielen, TMJ, Mingo... we were NEVER going to even consider signing Hopkins, it wasn't even an option, the ship had already sailed without him. All offseason you've looked at building the roster like this was Madden, just go get everyone you want and disregard the real life implications of said desired moves, and it's been frustrating.

Yes, I get this, but my issue was that we all knew this and decided sign an injury prone player to fill our top outside WR position for the season when we didn't have any other proven outside WRs on the roster. That's all And again as I've said, I'd be completely fine with this WR room if it was a few years into Bryce's career. I just don't like it for his rookie year where developing him and building up his confidence is so key.

I think we all hope for that as well, but in a sport like football, I don't think you should be building out a team based on optimism and hope, it should be based in reality. And the unfortunate reality is Chark has been injury prone his whole career, so why did we build this WR room around the hope that he'll stay healthy for a change?

Okay, so everyone who keeps saying things like this with Chark not being our #1.... Please rank our WR's right now assuming full health for all of them and I don't mean in terms of career prospects/potential, I mean right now and what they can provide for us on the field. If you don't think Chark would clearly be the #1 WR on that list than I don't know what to tell you, but I think objectively everyone would say he'd top that list. Everyone keeps saying it's going to be a committee, which it mostly will be, but if Chark was fully healthy for the entire season, he'd 100% lead this team in targets, catches, and yards and I have no doubt in my mind about that, which is why I'd consider him our WR 1.

WR by committee doesn't work though if the committee can't stay on the field. Are you comfortable with a committee that week 1 might be Thielen, Mingo, Shenault, and this new guy from KC as the Top 4 WR options for our rookie QB? Hell... I'm not even sure having TMJ healthy for week 1 makes that an acceptable WR room for a rookie QB. If you told me Chark would play in 15 or more games, I'd have no issue with it, but I don't think he will. Hamstring injuries tend to linger and pop up as the season moves on, so for a guy who already has issues staying healthy, it's not a good sign for him long term this season.

Unless Mingo absolutely breaks out for a 1k type of rookie season, then yes, that would make it a disastrous deal because of the other side of the equation. As I've said, in a vacuum, the contract we gave Chark wasn't a bad one. The problem is that the money and roster/depth chart spot would have been better spent on someone more likely to play in more games. If this was year 3 or 4 of Bryce, it's a totally different story, but this year has 1 goal above all others, and it's the development of Bryce. To do that, he needs his weapons on the field, and we already have a questionable WR room, to have the top depth chart guy be someone with his injury history was never a good idea.

Guy, you need to stop with this nonsense, the fact that you haven't been able to understand this one yet is a bit baffling. Once we signed Chark and subsequently drafted Mingo, Hopkins was never even an option. Signing Chark was the mistake, because if he didn't, we'd then have had the roster spot and money to go after Hopkins, but that ship had long sailed by the time he was released by the Cardinals. You don't sign someone to be a starter, only to sign someone else for more money because you don't trust the guy you just signed to stay healthy, it doesn't work that way. The way it works is to just not sign the injury prone guy from the start, but they screwed that one up, so we're stuck with it.

I don't think there are. Until he got banged up, everyone was raving about how he's looked in camp and that Bryce and him were developing a nice connection and that he was looking like a great signing. Now that he's banged up, it's changed to "well we were always going to be a WR by committee so it's not THAT big of a deal" Thielen isn't an outside WR at this point in his career (and there isn't anything wrong with that, he'll be great in the slot for us). TMJ has been very up and down in his career and nobody knows what he'll end up being (if/when healthy). Mingo is a rookie so we were never going to bank on him being the primary outside WR option this year. Chark, when healthy, was going to be our clear cut #1 outside WR this season, hence why it's pretty safe to say the plan going into the season was for him to be our WR1, which I always felt was a bad plan with his injury history.

But only in a vacuum when looking at the contract given to him. The other side of the same coin is the risk of signing an injury prone player instead of someone with a better history of being able to stay on the field, which I don't think makes it a "low risk" signing when looked that way. And that's always been my hangup with the signing because of having a rookie QB that we want to set up for success, he needs his best WR options on the field.

I hate this argument, because being the #1 target on a specific play call doesn't mean they're the #1. If all our WRs were healthy for the entire season, as things stand right now (i.e. before knowing if TMJ or Mingo could break out and become the top option), Chark would be on the field for more snaps than any of our other WRs. THAT is what makes him our #1 WR, it's not about being the main target on any given play, it's that he'd be on the field more than any other WR. Plus, he'll line up almost exclusively on the outside, whereas Thielen will be mainly in the slot and both Mingo/TMJ are likely to take slot snaps as well. Regardless of how things shake out, it's clear that the staff's plan was for Chark to be the top WR in terms of the depth chart and snap share just based on the rest of the WR room. So whether or not he was going to be the #1 target in any given play is irrelevant, particularly if/when he's injured and isn't even playing, because then we don't have enough quality WRs to put on the field in his place anyways. Yes, I understand that this offense will be predicated on coverage and Bryce just making the smart reads as opposed to focusing on one WR as his top target, but that doesn't mean there isn't a snap share pecking order, of which, Chark was planned on being at the top of it.

Yes, I said it was a mistake the second we signed him, he's far too injury prone to make him our top WR option for a rookie QB. No problem with the player himself when he's on the field, but the problem is he's never been able to stay on the field. If he was already on the team, so be it, but to sign him as our #1 outside WR was a big mistake.

I'll admit I really don't know much about this guy other than the highlight clips out there, but am I the only one who feels like our fan base is getting a little too excited about him? It's not like KC is loaded with deep WR talent, if anything, they're pretty weak there. So if this is someone who wasn't going to make the roster of a team with questionable WR talent, why exactly is he someone we're trying to hype up for us?

I am all for signing Fournette, think he'd be a good thunder to Sanders' lightning. Especially since we better not be doing any QB sneaks with Bryce at his size, and we don't really have that big bruising back for those times we need less than a yard to convert.

To be honest, I think people are putting WAY too much into us being a base 3-4 defense. When in reality, I'm guessing we end up lining up in an actual 3-4 in probably 25-30% of snaps. Most teams run 3 WR sets now in a majority of their snaps, in addition to us having Chinn who is likely going to be considered a DB when he's on the field instead of a LB and have us more in a 3-3-5 most of the time with that 3rd LB being Burns who is really just rushing the passer anyways. 90% of the time (if not even more) when Burns lines up as an OLB, he'll be rushing the passer just as he would be if he was a 4-3 DE. I don't think he's waiting on Bosa because he knows he won't get that much anyways, I just don't think he's in a rush to sign a deal because he knows if he has a monster season and hits FA, we'll then have to make him the highest paid defensive player as someone else on the market would do it to get him. Which is why to me, we need to get deal done before the season starts, I think he's in for a 15+ sack season and if he's not locked up, we'll have to franchise him and/or give him a much bigger contract than whatever he's asking for right now.

The answer to this question will always depend on league format. If you're in a 10 team non-PPR league with standard rosters (i.e. 2 RB, 2 WR, 1 flex), I think Sanders is the only draftable Panther this year, only exception would be a late flyer on Mingo if you are set at WR and can take some lottery tickets that you can let sit for a month or so. But if you're in a league like mine, 12 team PPR with 2 flex spots, then someone like Thielen is 100% someone you should be targeting as your 4th or 5th WR, i.e. your top WR on the bench who becomes your starter during injury and bye week issues. I absolutely LOVE Thielen in that role, hell, in that exact role for me last year he helped me win my championship as I had some injury issues and he ended up starting almost every week for me during the season and then I got lucky and was healthy in the playoffs and he moved to my bench. In this offense, he seems like he's going to be Bryce's safety valve who is all but guaranteed 4-5 catches for 40-50 yards each game, with some where he gets some more than that and then adds around 6 TD's on top. That's a guaranteed 9-10 points per game in a PPR, which is exactly what you'd want from that guy that you use as a filler starter when needed, low ceiling but a high floor. Unfortunately for me, I'm in an auction league with a 11 Lions fans who all would have watched that last game. Before this game I think I was going to be able to get him for $1, now after they all watched Bryce target him in that game, I'm sure some people will bid him up on me after seeing that.

Why? Sure he had a few sacks and a handful of pressures, but with 120+ tackles, he's clearly an off ball LB, not a pass rushing one. We don't need any more of those right now, we already have Shaq and Luvu as starters with Deion and Kamu as backups, not to mention Chinn who will likely play some ILB at times this year too. Just because a solid player gets cut doesn't mean we need to try and sign them if they aren't a fit with our needs. If we're signing any cut players, it needs to be a pass rusher, CB, WR, or backup OL, not positions we already have some quality depth.

I wouldn't be happy if I was them either, I still don't understand trading him for a 4th rounder. Purdy is far from a sure thing and they're banking their future on him, as Darnold clearly isn't meant to be their future starter. I figured they'd keep him, even as as the 3rd stringer for now, to see if they can keep developing him in case Purdy isn't it. They really never gave him much of a shot, he always was going to need a redshirt season, then he gets the absurd rain game to open the season last year, gets hurt in game 2 and never plays for them again.

I'm not saying they don't have knowledge together, but Ickey playing next to BC for a full season and now 2 offseasons makes it tough to use his existing relationship with Zavala as a reason behind putting him in the spot. Their comfortable-ness with each other pales in comparison to what he'd have developed with BC over that time and in NFL offenses.

Do they though? I know this keeps getting brought up, about how they already have this connection on the field due to playing in college together. But I think they only played something like 5 or 6 games together as Zavala was hurt that season I believe and missed half of it. Yes, it's more than not having any familiarity, but I'm not sure 6 games in college 2 years ago really means much at this point.

Seems doubtful that he'll get cut tomorrow now, someone will offer at least a 7th rounder up to the Cowboys after the game he's had tonight, good for him and good on the Cowboys for how they handled this for Grier.

In no world is Johnson a candidate to be cut, traded multiple picks to move up and take him in the 3rd when they knew he'd also be a project, he's not going anywhere that quickly.

What?!?!?! It was a pass to the flats that Thielen then ran for multiple yards before being tackled.