Captroop

He's a fine backup MLB. He's a great situational, spell, package MLB. He's just utterly outclassed when asked to be an every down linebacker. I hope we retain him, but he cannot be our starting MLB.

I'm strangely okay with it. Not super enthused about Rhule's third year, but I'm REALLY not up for another regime change. Maybe Rhule can learn from his mistakes. Maybe he can grow. Maybe we expect too much instant gratification to let a leader develop. It took Rhule one year to create the league's second best defense. Our offense was hindered by a garbage line and our franchise RB being injured AGAIN. If we invest in quality protection, maybe we can see a similar turnaround on the offense. Maybe not. But considering it looks like a done deal, and I personally have no control over it, given the choice between holding out hope, and endlessly spamming clown gifs, I'll go with the former.

This. This firing just means Watson ain't coming back to Houston. Doubtful he comes back to the league.

I want Sam for one more year. 1. I would much rather spend our capital addressing other areas rather than chasing our 3rd new off-season starting QB acquisition in as many years, who's going to have the exact same results behind the shambles of a line we've constructed. 2. If he does better, he might even have some trade value. Maybe peanuts. But hey, I'll take peanuts over nothing. 3. If he does great behind a revamped line, maybe we have a QB of the future. 4. If he does the same or worse, we're locking up a top 5 pick in a much stronger QB class. And cement Rhule's ouster. That's a win in my book.

Fitt's aggressive and savvy. I love his maneuvering in the draft and his "in on every deal" mentality. He hasn't hit on every one of his FA/trade moves, no. But at least he's making moves. And in spite of what the doom and gloomers think, we really haven't given up that much to make these moves. I'm not even completely soured on Sam. Henderson could end up being a steal. I'm fully on board with Fitt and am genuinely excited to see what he does this off-season.

Imagine you're an offensive line coach, and your resume includes the 2021 Carolina Panthers. Time to look into Dental school.

A franchise QB is the top of the football version of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs: https://images.app.goo.gl/F3cqxYt3DCKBsy5j8 Which is to say, once all the more foundational needs are in place, a franchise QB is what enables your team to reach the highest level of fulfillment. But using Maslow's hierarchy as an example, for us it would basically be like living in a palace, but you don't have any food and you're starving to death. The lower, more foundational levels consist of things like Team Identity, Coaching, Trenches, Play Calling, Skill Players, etc. If you've got all those other pieces in place, a franchise QB is what makes you a championship contender. We haven't built a foundation yet. Which is all to say it's simultaneously true that we need to find a franchise QB, and it's NOT what we should build a team around.

Okay. And the vast preponderance of very educated doctors disagree with you.

And if you die later from the direct, lasting affects of COVID infection months later, like pneumonia or lung disease, but aren't positive for COVID at the time, it's not reported as a COVID death. The door swings both ways if you want to play that game.

Watching this, I don't blame any QB on this roster for "playing scared." But on the plus side, it's also not as dire as it seems. This offseason doesn't call for a total rebuild of the offensive line, which I expected. I think we have the pieces in place on the ends. So that means we have 3 interior lineman positions to fill through the draft and free agency. That seems pretty doable. Better pass protection will create better passers. I truly don't think we've seen the potential of any QB on the roster this season.

Trick question. In order to react, I'd have to watch it.

...You literally quoted the post where I explained my position. Are you asking me if I'm advocating for "rights" for machines?

MLB. If we're a defensively minded team, we need a field general.

It's laughable you think Rhule could have even gotten that team and that talent to a super bowl.

Of all the things that speaks to Rhule's poor judgement and ego, it's that he thinks he could draw a line in the sand with himself on one side, and Cam on the other, and come out on the winning side with this franchise and fanbase.

Yup. He deserves better. That shot of him on the sideline. That's not the angry, "just give me the ball," Cam we all know. That's a man thinking, "this is pointless." You have to be a special kind of sucky to make Cam Newton disinterested in going back out on the field.

Ah, I see you also have eyes!

Yup, 18 of 22 means that indeed there were a lot of opportunists trying to get cash out of him. But 4 people saying they still want to take their sexual assault allegations to trial means he definitely did some bad poo.

I can't be the only person who thought of this, right?

Almost 20 percent of your drives start out hobbled by penalties. I don't think it can be overstated how important it is to resolve that issue and what a colossal failure in coaching it represents. It's stood out so clearly this season just how devastating those early penalties can be. When you're first and 15 or first and 20 in the shadow of your own end zone, it drastically reduces your playcalling options, which, more often than not leads to the bad situation compounding with a stuffed run, a sniffed out screen, a sack, or worst of all an interception. And it seems to ALWAYS happen in a critical situation, when we're still in position for a game-winning or tying drive, and the clock is winding down, and one of our fugging moron linemen flinches. I don't care who is at the helm. That poo should have been fixed in the first quarter of the season.

I don't know, man. It's gotten so bad, I've been spending time in the Tinderbox again.

Lately my thought process is... "A potentially great player was troubled on a bad, rudderless team? If he comes to a tight ship like the Panthers I bet he'll have the chance to shine!" "Oh, wait."

I'm fine either way. I've not experienced so many demoralizing, fandom-questioning losses as I've endured this year. So I certainly wouldn't shed a tear to see some of the vestiges of this period removed. On the other hand, I'm not thrilled at the prospect of a regime change that will set us back again while a new coaching scheme is rolled out. Say what you will, but a coaching change is a setback that you hope pays dividends later. So I'd almost rather see what Rhule can do with the offensive pieces needed to succeed. But I don't think he'll be around next year. Firing the OC is the first step in the regime change. And I have a hard time imagining it's the only move coming. I just think the decision was made not to can the whole staff, because it's bad optics to clean house while we're still - on paper anyway - in the playoff hunt.

Anybody can come off the bench and look stellar against a team that hasn't been preparing for them, or doesn't have a lot of film on them. Doesn't mean he's the answer. No one but no one would look good on this offense behind this line. QB hasn't been the problem, and frankly we don't have the ability to evaluate QBs given the current situation.