Offseason and Draft Assessment

[Black&BlueBubba]

1 hour ago, YETI said:

FS couldve been addressed in FA or the draft. Hurney neglected it

It’s not over yet.  Relax.  Take a Valium and check back in a month.  Then you can get pissed.  

Mid you remember last year we got CJ after the draft.  I was thrilled.  Then I watched how we used him. Ugh. 

[kungfoodude]

1 hour ago, MHS831 said:

Exactly--Gaulden was chosen with the caveat that he would be a project and not see the field much in 2018. However, we had no choice but to force him into duty at times.  He is never going to be a star, and I think they are moving him to nickel anyway. 

That is my butthurt with Gaulden and Little, taking project guys in a position of need. Gaulden was a major overdraft and I just can't get behind giving up that third to move up for Little. I really hope we hit on Little or we are really going to rue passing on these safeties. 

[Tepper's Chest Hair]

3 hours ago, heel31ok said:

Maybe so but it still is a cause for concern...

I am not disagreeing there.  Its definitely a concern.  I just don't see it as a "fire Hurney" concern.  We had a TON of holes.  Only one hole really existing at this point, without giving up future picks/giving out horrible contracts we can't get out of..to me.  Is good.

It would have needed perfection to fill every single hole we had.  Was Hurney perfect?  I don't feel he was.  But I feel he was very good over all.

[BrianS]

I don't understand all the butt hurt over the cost of moving up to get Little.  Everyone looks at that "draft value" chart and says "Hurney gave them 100 points of value too much".  What no one seems to comprehend is that those values are not exact, and they are not "static" like that once the draft starts.  There's also no guarantee that anyone will want to trade with you.

Perhaps we needed to give up a little extra because the team we were trading with looked at their board and wasn't sure they could still get one of their picks in our slot.  There are so many moving parts to it.  It's not just "Here's the exact numeric value of your pick, trade with us."

We don't know "why" it might have cost a little extra to move up.  It did.  But the bottom line is that Hurney *DID* read the draft correctly.  There was a run starting on Tackles.  He knew we needed one.  He suspected there would be a tremendous drop off if he waited.  Thus, he paid a little bit of a premium to go up and get the guy he believed in.

That's a solid GM move.

[yasuhara2241]

I will give my thoughts on the draft and then some of the 2019 season. 

Draft: I am very excited about this draft class. Were there moves I would have made differently? Absolutely! But I am no draft scout just a fan that reads from draft websites and watches youtube videos. 

I am extremely excited about the Burns, Little and Miller picks. They were all on my wishlist for the Panthers.

EDGE: I really wanted some speed and bend around the end and we got that with Burns and Miller. Since both Addison and Irvin are on 1 year deals, we had to draft for the present and future for this position. 

OLINE: I was higher than a lot of people with Greg Little. I liked him because he is a LT. Most of the other guys were either Guards or RTs. I know everyone was saying Moton can be our LT, but most likely D. Williams will be gone next year so if we could get a LT in this draft and keep Moton where he excelled at RT that is best case scenario. For the present, either Moton or Williams could play LG (preferably Williams in my eyes). That would give us an offensive line of Little, Williams, Paradis, Turner, Moton. This is would be a definite upgrade from last year. Also Daley would be a good development swing tackle. 

Backup QB: Going into the draft I didn't want to draft a QB until the 4th round. My thought was that there wan't any player that I felt that there wouldn't be any players selected before that would be a significant difference from the backups that we have. That being said Will Grier seems to have a lot of potential and I like his deep ball and anticipation throws. I also like to have some fresh players in the QB room. 

Backup RB: Both Scarlett and Holyfield are physical runners. Scarlett a little more explosive but both don't go down at first contact. I really don't put much into the evaluation of RBs because we are still going to use CMC the majority of time but depth is good and also ones that don't fumble a lot! 

WR: I was hoping for Harmon since he was dropping but it seems like we had been targeting Godwin since he is also a returner. 

Going Forward: Basically this has been talked about too much but the 2 main positions that we are missing are FS & 3-4 DE. I do wish we could have addressed that in the draft but in any draft we can't get all positions. My biggest complaints would be Scarlett instead of Omenihu especially since we ended up getting Holyfield undrafted. I do feel like there are plenty of FS out there so I am not as concerned with that. Get Tre Boston here!

 

[Matt62881]

8 hours ago, Toomers said:

Then maybe he shouldn’t have been signed in the first place. 

 And any draft pick could provide what Shaq does. For 8M less. What has Shaq done in his career that can’t be easily replaced?  

I really think we will be pleasently suprised with shaq playing rolb full time or ilb2 in the 34 and with Ron controlling the D, same goes for Poe and Ron calling the shots. Remember the difference of keeks going from olb to his natural ilb position?

[Matt62881]

If we can get a FS that is high iq and can play sideline to sideline we could stay in a base 34 alot and change assignment s on the fly given the athleticism of our lbs and the ability for them to drop and cover . Really just need the pass rush to get consistent pressure and our back end speed guys to make sure we dont get beat 20+ yds down the field.

[Toomers]

49 minutes ago, Matt62881 said:

I really think we will be pleasently suprised with shaq playing rolb full time or ilb2 in the 34 and with Ron controlling the D, same goes for Poe and Ron calling the shots. Remember the difference of keeks going from olb to his natural ilb position?

I remember it took about 5 minutes to tell what type of football player Luke was. It’s taking 5 years and still multiple excuses to find out what Shaq is? And 9M. For the same story we heard for the past three off-seasons. Just wait.....

[ThPantherFan]

18 hours ago, GoPanthers123 said:

according to reports he feels great and motivated as never before.

Cam's said that each year.  Let's see.