kungfoodude

We aren't a terrible situation for Howell but I think his best bet for being successful long term is doing what he is now, riding the pine. If we want to being Dalton back for a couple of years and Howell can be had cheaply(4th round or lower) to sit behind him for that time, that's probably a path to success. Of the games I watched for Howell, he definitively showed he needed to be sitting and learning for a while.

Teammates like winning and being competitive. There is zero question at all that Russell Wilson is a better QB at his best than Justin Fields. Fields peak is closer to Russell's lower/mid level of QB play. The question is, if Wilson still has any left in the tank after Denver.

I did include 2nd and 3rd when I looked.

Fields takes care of the ball a lot more than Howell, however. We would need to know if Canales can break him of his Winston-esque gunslinger mentality. If we can't, that's going to be a problem

The difference is that it's clear that Fields is a big limiting factor in their offense. It's blatant when you watch the games. He's just limited in his capabilities as a passer. Russell shouldn't have those.....if he isn't washed up.

Well your football opinions are pretty awful, TBH.

I wasn't counting our home runs. Those everyone knows.

PFF is indicating that Fields is not the guy from the Steelers we need to trade for. Nope. He isn't the QB we need from them. It's the other QB they have with a much better career winning percentage, similar career QB rating and at times considered an elite player by much of the Huddle. It also happens he is in the last year of his deal. We need to go out and get.....

It would never be at the Lamar level just because Lamar is also an elite passing QB and Fields is a bottom tier passing QB. It would be a LOT of loading the box and daring him to throw against us, I suspect. It would be kind of fun to watch us load up heavy and just start mauling people. Probably not super successful ultimately but fun for a bit. Truthfully, he doesn't fit what Canales wants to do at all, IMO.

Our drafted WR closet has more skeletons than a serial killer. You missed Colbert. I guess one could argue Carruth but those circumstances were....unique. Oddly, we have had a couple of underappreciated 2nd rounders with solid careers. LaFell and Samuel. Not star players but good journeyman role players that were worthy of those picks in the end(mostly not for us).

He is likely to be on his last legs as the starter there. Tomlin has as much as intimated that. I would say he has maybe 1-2 games left before they roll out Russell.

I mean, I would be okay with Fields at the right price. You have to understand it is going to be a downgrade from Dalton in terms of the passing game. He would add an element of explosiveness to our already pretty decent running attack but he would aid in stunting the growth of our younger WR's, as he is a bottom quarter of the league passer. Just understand that choosing him as a future starter would be a pretty dramatic offensive limitation in the passing game. He is not likely to ever ascend above more than a slightly below average NFL passer at his peak. I mean, still way better than Bryce but....

I mean.....we also allow some of the most time to throw in the NFL. We are sort of asking them to work miracles.

I think a 4th is unlikely. Adams is a little different scenario price-wise because he had a very limited list of suitors. That always impacts trade value.

The offseason is gonna be interesting. They are gonna push him to restructure. I would say for his sake, he might want to play ball. If he doesn't and it keeps going this way, this will be his last stop in the NFL.

It's pretty early. I am encouraged by XL playing better and Coker should be getting more reps. He has been leaps and bounds away our most impressive rookie. It's a lot of "wait and see" overall. If at the end of this year at least two of these guys look like viable starters for next year and for reasons other than "don't have anyone else" that's a start.

You are inserting arguments I haven't made. The Chargers are definitively better but they were also far better than us last year. However, they ended up being a bottom 10 PPG and yardage defense in 2024. We were in the top 10 in YPG and bottom 10 in PPG. Harbaugh ball improved their defense and will likely(TBD) net improved W/L results this season, as well. I don't expect them to be a Super Bowl team in year 1. I don't expect playing a little smarter and beating Atlanta is going to catapult us to being a .500 team either.

We have at least 2-3 more years of top 10 drafting so we have to be sure to make those picks count. That's the sort of foundation that can get us to being a consistently winning team and possibly a contending team. Hopefully the 2024 draft went well. I am extremely skeptical of that one but if it did, that could very well be step 1.

Well they also started from a higher tier than we did in terms of overall talent. Also happened to hire competent people to build those teams. That's pretty questionable here. We should see what happened there first. You keep acquiring and stockpiling talent, you start to be surprisingly competitive and then you make ths big leap with a few key additions. We haven't even made the first of those steps yet.

So you still want to win a game or two more or are you planning on trotting out there, shaking hands at the coin flip and then going back to the buses? Just because I acknowledge we are years of building away from being above .500 doesn't mean I don't want to win. Did you stop wanting to win?

It's not premature because it was an example about changing the way you play to help the defense. That did happen there. Go re-read that. You inserted your own meaning.

Not a bad throw, bad decision and bad route. Mingo was open and that was the only real place to go with the ball, that ie throw it away. Well, same thing, really. But there were a lot of errors before that one that led to us being down in the game. I just personally would have kept rocking them because they were gassed.

My argument is play smart football and let the chips fall where they may. We don't do that enough. In this past game, I believe it was a contributing factor to the loss. Most of the rest of this season was going to happen, regardless. The biggest bump would have been never starting Bryce in the first place but what do you do? And, yes, some of it is the coaches fault. Canales is far from perfect. Evero isn't perfect either. As much as the players and FO tote the blame, those guys get it too. All that being said, 90% of our current situation is FO/Ownership driven. For the here and now, making massive defensive changes isn't going to matter enough to actually impact W's and L's, IMO. As the old X's and O's saying goes.....

That Harbaugh ball has also done very well in his previous NFL stops and in Baltimore. I'll take that over whatever you think is successful.

Hence why I say it came down to a few errors and some key mistakes. I will also point out on that first Dalton INT we were absolutely cutting through them in the running game. IMO, especially late, keep thumping them when they are the most tired. We aren't built to be a high flying offense, BTW. Literally we are not.