Panthers make a list (not a good one)

[The NFL Shield At Midfield]

how many teams hurting for DBs wish they would have drafted bene?  how many hurting for an interior pass rush wish they would have drafted kawann short?  how many teams wish they would have plucked turner out of the third or norwell out of the UDFA pool?  do you think anyone wishes they would have rolled the dice on kelvin benjamin earlier than the bottom of the first?  there are hits and misses every year.

[Woodie]

I know that our cap issues have been real, not exaggerated, but it seems like OT is the one area you can't gamble with a bargain bin signing. Then again, Remmers did a great job last season when he was inserted.

​The problem isn't that we gambled on the position, it's that we had no choice but to gamble.  Other than the high end tackles that were way out of our price range, there wasn't anybody that wouldn't have been just as much a gamble as Bell.

Too many people are looking at the results and making generic assessments of ignoring the position without realistically looking at what options were actually available.  Even if we weren't in such dire cap straits, there really hasn't been much quality available in FA.   

[LinvilleGorge]

how many teams hurting for DBs wish they would have drafted bene?  how many hurting for an interior pass rush wish they would have drafted kawann short?  how many teams wish they would have plucked turner out of the third or norwell out of the UDFA pool?

​Yep, the draft is a crap shoot in a lot of ways.  There are busts and steals every year.  Always have been, always will be.  You just have to do the best scouting job you can, build your draft board, and trust it.

[The NFL Shield At Midfield]

i hate to keep harping on bakhtiari but he only got into a starting role because bulaga tore his ACL too.  green bay didn't draft him going "this guy is going to be our opening day starting left tackle".

[tiger7_88]

Bryant McKinney was listed as a 2014 free agent. Trueblood was as well. Are they better than Bell? Who knows, but at least its competition. Bell was handed the keys to the castle after beating out a converted DT. Regarding Remmers, if I'm a GM staring at Bell and Chandler as my OT options then I am turning over every possible leaf to get some competition in here. I mentioned Remmers because a poster above said that Dave scouted him out and saw potential. It's water under the bridge now. I'm a huge Dave supporter, I just think he could have done more to create competition at the OT spots in 2013 and 2014.

​

McKinney was such a valued free agent last year, he's no longer employed.

Trueblood is utterly horrible.

Adding extra poo into a poo stew doesn't make it a delicious bouillabaisse.

And, again, its easy to say 'why didn't we add Remmers in pre-season' NOW.  In HINDSIGHT.  But, yet, he was still sitting their waiting for us on the STL practice squad when we needed him.  I wonder why that was?

[Toomers]

Bakhtiari was there in RD4 in 2013. Packers took him after our pick. Maybe Daryl Williams surprises. It's not an exact science. But he should have brought in some vet comp to push Bell last season. Bell got too comfortable.

​    I agree that he should have never went into a season with Bell and Chandler. I'm only responding to the questions about his drafting these last two years. The LT's weren't there. And Bakhtiari was a find by the Packers, but was he seriously on your list of targets. An undersized LT who struggled with pass blocking and fit a ZBS much better. 

 

   And adding any veteran help wouldn't change our current situation at all. Any of those scrubs would be gone, too,

[Woodie]

​Perhaps "stumbled upon" was a poor choice in words on my part.  But Dave didn't grab him off the Rams practice squad before the season started.  Chandler was injured so we needed a player with experience.  Remmers bounced around for a few years.  He may not have stum,bled upon Remmers, but he is lucky that Remmers came in here and performed the way he did.

​Yes, he was lucky that Remmers came in and played as well as he did.  But nobody in the entire NFL had any idea he was capable of playing that way.  If they did, he would have already been on somebody's active roster...heck, even the team he was on at the time didn't see that kind of productivity coming.  At that time of year, all you're going to find are scrubs available, so what Dave did is go out and find the best of the scrubs and hope for the best.  Fortunately for us, we got more than could have been reasonably expected. 

[Woodie]

Hell I don't know, Bryant McKinnie? Eric Winston? Trueblood? A vet LT to at least keep Bell honest would have been nice. We had to start a Canadian project at LT on national TV against the Steelers. That could have gotten Cam killed.

​And other than name recognition, none of them offered anything more than Bell.  To be honest, even Bell isn't as bad as Bell played last year.  By no means is he any good, but the problem was more than just him.  Until Norwell was ready, we didn't have anyone beside him that could hold their own either.  You can cover for one OL spot, but for most of the year we had too many holes to mask just one. 

[Woodie]

Bell was handed the job. There were no repercussions if he sucked. He was starting the next week regardless.

​I don't disagree, but there just wasn't anyone available that was any better.

[SCP]

​I don't disagree, but there just wasn't anyone available that was any better.

There were vets that could have pushed Bell. Sorry ass Jeremy Trueblood could have pushed Bell for cheap.

[t96]

There were vets that could have pushed Bell. Sorry ass Jeremy Trueblood could have pushed Bell for cheap.

​If you're talking about using roster spots for motivation then that's a whole different thing. Because there wasn't a soul out there for the taking that was actually better than Bell. Sure we could've signed some scrub vets and said you better step up Bell or they'll get it, but it wouldn't have helped. Bell's problem wasn't his effort or motivation. The guy was passionate and was giving it all, even becoming a vocal leader (oddly enough). He just wasn't good. Nobody DG could've brought in would've changed that.

 

[Woodie]

Bryant McKinney was listed as a 2014 free agent. Trueblood was as well. Are they better than Bell? Who knows, but at least its competition. Bell was handed the keys to the castle after beating out a converted DT. Regarding Remmers, if I'm a GM staring at Bell and Chandler as my OT options then I am turning over every possible leaf to get some competition in here. I mentioned Remmers because a poster above said that Dave scouted him out and saw potential. It's water under the bridge now. I'm a huge Dave supporter, I just think he could have done more to create competition at the OT spots in 2013 and 2014.

You implied that Remmers just fell in Dave's lap by sheer luck, and I said he scouted and evaluated him, so actually went out and found him.  At no point did I say he saw potential, my implication was that he was the best of what was available...in other words, the least smelly crap in the bowl.

And just because you recognize a players name doesn't mean they are still any good or even fit our scheme.  It's one thing for an unknown to slip through the cracks, but very rarely does a known commodity slip through unless the whole league pretty much agrees they suck.  And as veterans, they would have still cost more than a little...not to mention their asking price would likely be more than the vet minimum.     

[SCP]

​So, your answer is a bunch of guys who didn't play for anyone in 2014.  They're all free agents right now.  Why isn't anyone banging down their doors begging to sign them to a contract?

Yes, the Farmbeast experiment didn't work, but at least he was an unknown with some possible potential.  The guys you mentioned are all known quantities, and are known to not be any better than what we already had.  Again, there weren't any decent FA options to sign, and no LT worth drafting.  It's not like there's a starting quality LT isle at Target, for fugs sake.

Again, any one of those deadbeats would have been more competition than what Bell ultimately faced to win the spot. He was gifted a spot and had no fear of losing his position. He literally stood flat footed on plays and watched guys run by. You don't do that kind of crap if you are worried about the guy behind you taking your job. I don't see why none of you guys can understand what I am saying here. We had PATHETIC offensive tackle depth and it was ignored. It could have been upgraded from poop to piss poor on the cheap.

[SCP]

​If you're talking about using roster spots for motivation then that's a whole different thing. Because there wasn't a soul out there for the taking that was actually better than Bell. Sure we could've signed some scrub vets and said you better step up Bell or they'll get it, but it wouldn't have helped. Bell's problem wasn't his effort or motivation. The guy was passionate and was giving it all, even becoming a vocal leader (oddly enough). He just wasn't good. Nobody DG could've brought in would've changed that.

 

I'm talking about going into an NFL season with Bell, Chandler, Foucault, and Garry Williams as your OTs. That is indefensible. You put those four on a FA list and they are below every free agent that was available prior to 2014. Youngblood sucks and he would have been a better option than Bell and Foucault. Again, it's spilled milk now. We are in a slightly better spot this year. At least we have a couple of guys that have played the position in the NFL.