Official NFL Free Agency Thread

[jdpanther5]

 

[DelhommesTheMan]

Weddle to the Ravens, let's move on now thanks

[CarolinaSunday]

 

[ctrcat]

Baltimore is expensive, a chithole, a long way from Cali, and they suck.  Well played Eric.

[Bartin]

4 years/$29M for Weddle.

That pretty well explains why weren't in it for him and Baltimore was probably the best option as a Panthers fan for him.

No reason to be upset about not getting him.

[Handsome Steve]

Man, is ANYTHING going to happen? I know it will, but man, it just kinda sucks to see all these guys that, at least to me, we had chances on going to other teams.

 

[NcPsa10]

18 minutes ago, DelhommesTheMan said:

Weddle to the Ravens, let's move on now thanks

According to Acee, Weddle wound up choosing the Ravens over the Cowboys, Raiders andSteelers.

[Growl]

1 hour ago, Cracka McNasty said:

I'm going to deconstruct your post point by point and provide counter arguments to what you've said in hopes of helping you see things from the other perspective:

1. Ted Ginn Jr., Michael Oher, Mike Mitchell, Kurt Coleman, Kyle Love, Dwan Edwards, Roman Harper, Drayton Florence, Joe Webb, Jericho Cotchery. All of the previously mentioned are Gettleman FA signings that have contributed significantly over the past 3 seasons to the panthers' success. Many are stop gaps, some are longer term solutions. All are contributors and played significant roles in our 3-peat of the NFCS. By signing these guys to short term deals that are cap friendly, we were able to draft BPA over the past 3 drafts
2. Spending high picks on Star, KK, and KB are all warranted based on their production on the field. I don't see how you could call those reaches. Drafting Ealy in the second was a value pick based on his pre-draft first round grade we had on him. We didn't know Hardy would go full retard, so that was a BPA situation. We didn't know KB would go down when we took Funchess, but he too was graded a first round talent and was believed to be brought in to be an eventual #2 next to KB. You're looking at the drafts with too much hindsight instead of what we knew at the time of the drafts. 
3. How did this cost us our seasons? We lost in 13 due to no goal line TDs and a hose job from the refs. '14 we were lucky to even make it to the playoffs with the cap strapped team we had in place and lost to the Seahawks were the better team, but put up a damn good fight. We lost due to poor play calling. '15 no one showed up for the Super Bowl on offense. That's Cam included. The Broncos served us up some humble pie, but when you have an all time great defense, you can do that. Kony Ealy (a "reach for need" pick according to your assessment of our drafts) would have been the MVP had we won.
4. We have done this. FA works two ways. Just because we aren't signing people doesn't mean we aren't getting better by subtraction. We got rid of Smitty (who wouldn't have produced for us without the fire of being released), Williams (got fat and complacent), James Anderson, Charles Godfrey, Pickles, Fua, Mcclain, Hangartner, Byron Bell - pretty much anyone drafted by Hurney not named Luke or Cam. those players weren't producing period, or weren't producing at the level they were being paid. So Gettleman let them walk (when he could, some based on need and position depth, others based on salary restrictions) and used the drafts to take BPA and it seems to have worked so far. I don't know what more you want other than a SB win, but in my opinion, it seems like the FO has done EXACTLY what you wanted here. 
5. First of all, of all the team isn't old. I don't know what you're talking about here. our core's age is well under 30. the oldest contributors on the team last year were Roman Harper and Thomas Davis. Find me someone better than TD even at his age and I'll anoint you new GM. Don't take my word for it though. Here is a link to our roster so you can look at the ages of everyone on the team.
6. In the past 10 years 6 teams have spent over $500 million in FA. They combined for 0 playoff wins. Denver is the exception to the rule, not the rule itself. The reason they were able to accomplish this was having an all time great QB fall into their laps which is a HUUUUGE bargaining chip when trying to grab FAs. Couple the low tax rates in Denver, legal marijuana (for dank downtime), and prestige of the most consistent franchise in football history. They haven't had consecutive losing seasons in over 40 years. Second best is at 24... It's a great organization and good players have wanted to go there. Not surprising.
7. Now you're just speculating. You don't know what they are going to do this year. No one does. But the way things are looking, it won't be as good as last year. They have already lost their starting QB, their backup QB, Starting RB, Starting LB, Starting DL, and are so strapped for cash they had to trade for Mark Sanchez and can't afford Ryan Fitzpatrick. Yes they still have Von Miller, but they lost a guy that eats some of his blockers, and Demarcus Ware just signed a contract extension that admitted him to being relegated to passing downs only. That defense will not be as elite as they were last year. That TEAM won't be as good as they were last year. Too many departures, but then again that's what happens when you mortgage the future, at least they got a Super Bowl out of it before it all imploded. 
8. And what's wrong with that? The guys on our rosters are known commodities. We know what we have with them. Who cares where they were drafted if they can perform? Draft position isn't the end all to be all, and just because they aren't a first round pick doesn't mean they can't contribute. There's only 32 first round picks each year, we can't stack the team with them. Bene was already producing the past two years but went down with an ankle injury towards the end of the season. He looks really good on the outside. Boston has shown promise as Harper's backup, he certainly brings more speed. Just because we didn't sign a big name FA doesn't mean we won't draft a guy we like in the secondary. We have depth available, and we most likely aren't done. Our GM isn't going to dole out a top 5 contract for a guy that isn't home grown. We still need to re-sign Starr, KK, Benjamin, Ealy, and a few others over the next few years. Throwing 12 million at Janoris Jenkins would have been retarded (the giants will regret this offseason). There's still plenty of guys available that can contribute in the secondary, and some of them are already on our roster. Just because they aren't household names doesn't mean they can't contribute. We don't need a superstar at every position. Every team has weaknesses because of the salary cap. It's our coach's jobs to make sure those weakness aren't exploited.  

 

Anyway, that's why I and many others disagree with you and think you're wrong. Waiting out FA has paid dividends in the years since Getts took over. We have won the division thrice and gone to the super bowl. I trust his judgement on the way the team is run over some random dude on the forum who wants to throw a ton of cash at big name FAs. Historically doing so does not work.

1. None of those players are long-term options, few have been here for more than a year as we brought them in, realized they were too old or too insufficient to do the job, and then moved on. Others, like Ted Ginn, have lucked into multiple season because no other respects their value, so they come here and drop passes for us instead. It all come to hedge the season before last, when we fielded a horrid team that got thrust into a tourney that had no business being in thanks to the sheer luck of playing in what was one of the worst divisions in league history.

2. All 3 players mentioned were need picks. Nobody used the word "reach" but you and the illiterate lizard earlier in thread.

3. It cost us seasons because a) it has cost us games. There's this cumulative effect that happens that when you lose enough games, or when you're star players can't overcome the growing deficiencies of the rest of your roster at the worst possible  Blaming officials is fun and I like to dabble in it  myself form time to time- but it's inexcusable if you have players out on the field who couldn't do their job as everyone but the men running their organization knew they couldn't.

4.what point are  even trying to make here

5. going into last season the Panthers had the second oldest roster in the entire league. for all the hypocritical trash talk this board slings out to other teams for "going all in, not prepping for the future" it's this team that is constantly throwing money at aged players, fulfilling the cycle of needing bodies at the exact same positions years in and year out. oh, and we settle for players who aren't very good, there's that too.

6. it's absolutely remarkable how year in and year out this board tries to paint last year's Super Bowl Championship Victor as "the exception, not the rule." 

7. yeah it's gotta be just awful adding a Lombardi to your trophy case with the knowledge that you may have to spend a season or two reloading when you could be on the brink of "maybe next year"  forever and ever

8. many of them can't perform hence the reason they were drafted so low and also hence the reason other teams don't want them. I for one am tired of having Cam have to pen up his frustration at mike remmers for doing something idiotic or watching Luke have to sprint across the field to have to make up for the mistake of the 20(insert a number here) variant of this year's aged wonder at CB

[Bartin]

8 minutes ago, Handsome Steve said:

Man, is ANYTHING going to happen? I know it will, but man, it just kinda sucks to see all these guys that, at least to me, we had chances on going to other teams.

 

It's pretty clear that, for better or worse, Gettleman is giving low ball offers to everyone we've been linked with. I wouldn't really get your hopes up with anyone in particular since it's highly unlikely that we will sign guys without competitive offers monetarily. It's been his strategy all along to never pay a lot in free agency and with several huge extensions coming down the line is not something I'd expect to change anytime soon.

We might as well get used to it.

[Handsome Steve]

Just now, Bartin said:

It's pretty clear that, for better or worse, Gettleman is giving low ball offers to everyone we've been linked with. I wouldn't really get your hopes up with anyone in particular since it's highly unlikely that we will sign guys without competitive offers monetarily. It's been his strategy all along to never pay a lot in free agency and with several huge extensions coming down the line is not something I'd expect to change anytime soon.

We might as well get used to it.

Yeah, I got the feeling this off season wouldn't be much different, but with us having a little more cap space and coming off a game that I need to forget, i was hoping for some good news when it came to Free Agency.

[Bartin]

2 minutes ago, Handsome Steve said:

Yeah, I got the feeling this off season wouldn't be much different, but with us having a little more cap space and coming off a game that I need to forget, i was hoping for some good news when it came to Free Agency.

Oh I agree. It finally felt like we were in position with some breathing room under the cap to make a semi-noteworthy move or two, but it appears Gettleman is sticking with his guns and I can't really argue given the success.

I have to admit that it's pretty funny that no matter how low we set our sights that Gettleman always manages to disappoint us. He's lowered the expectations of the fan base to the point that we dream about signing 3rd tier free agents and we are still aiming too high lol

[Handsome Steve]

9 minutes ago, Bartin said:

Oh I agree. It finally felt like we were in position with some breathing room under the cap to make a semi-noteworthy move or two, but it appears Gettleman is sticking with his guns and I can't really argue given the success.

I have to admit that it's pretty funny that no matter how low we set our sights that Gettleman always manages to disappoint us. He's lowered the expectations of the fan base to the point that we dream about signing 3rd tier free agents and we are still aiming too high lol

dude, I couldn't agree more! It's like I've been beaten down to NOT expect anything in the off season. I think for me, I still have a ton of pent up angst from the SB, so I'm grasping at straws to see something done. I know it was only one game, but it was THE BIGGEST GAME, and I never want to see us perform like we did that night. So not seeing any FA news and seeing the FA's we collectively wanted going to other teams is just annoying.

[Devil Doc]

Maybe a 3rd Tier Player to You... is a 1st Tier to Gettleman... he has stated before.. we don't want to coach players for another team. He starts small... gives players the Practice Squad Rotation a Couple Years.. Coach them, Train them... then we got a 1st Tier player that will play for us for 10 years for less than a 2 year FA Salary. Savings..

[ctrcat]

2 minutes ago, Handsome Steve said:

dude, I couldn't agree more! It's like I've been beaten down to NOT expect anything in the off season. I think for me, I still have a ton of pent up angst from the SB, so I'm grasping at straws to see something done. I know it was only one game, but it was THE BIGGEST GAME, and I never want to see us perform like we did that night. So not seeing any FA news and seeing the FA's we collectively wanted going to other teams is just annoying.

Cotchery sucked in the biggest game, and he's gone.  So it's not like we've done nothing.