Jay Roosevelt

I'll say 6/10. I don't know that we learned a whole lot about this team during preseason that we didn't already know. We didn't play the starters enough to really get a feel for what to expect. We had one good drive against the Browns, one 3-and-out and two 3-and-outs against the Texans. That's an extremely small sample size across 3 games regardless of performance. My camp/preseason takeaways: Jalen Coker might be the best WR on this team and is certainly no worse than #2. Nic Scourton is going to be a good player for us. Possibly very good. Bobby Brown was our best free agent addition. Jack Plummer isn't an NFL QB. Not even a practice squad guy. Having anyone other than Canales and Evero call plays was a really stupid and pointless idea. Our depth is largely non-existent, especially on defense. The three areas we actually DO have depth are on the OL, in the WR corp. and at RB. I can't fathom why Dan Morgan didn't do more to upgrade ILB during the offseason. We better hope Lathan Ransom steps up at FS because if he doesn't we have a massive hole. For all the hype surrounding Sanders/Evans, Tommy Tremble is still the best TE on the roster. I'm only slightly less enthusiastic going into the regular season than I was a month ago. I think our starters on offense are solid and we should be pretty good there unless Bryce totally regresses. On defense, we're probably bottom 3rd in the league if 100% healthy and significantly worse than that if injuries become an issue. We badly need at least two of our rookies to become high-level players early (ideally one of the pass rushers + Ransom) and at least 2 of our free agent additions (ideally Moehrig + Bobby Brown) to be significant upgrades over last year. Call me pessimistically optimistic

This. Plummer is hot garbage.

The reality will likely be somewhere in between. I don't expect we'll blow the doors off the NFL this year, but I don't think we'll be trash either. I see 7-9 wins.

I mean, for a late round pick it's fine but he's not very good. I don't know what he'd really bring to the table, TBH. If Evero didn't really have a spot for Jeremy Chinn (who I maintain has always been massively overrated by the Huddle) I don't see why he'd have a spot for Duggar.

I think it's more a lack of leadership than anything. Canales isn't a motivator; that was never the type of coach he was going to be. But when that's the case, you need a handful of those personalities on the team that can motivate the others. Not sure I see that many of those guys right now.

What happened to Sanders? It's like that injury against KC knocked him into a prolonged slump. Just hasn't been the same player since then.

I'd love to have Hendrickson, but a guy at his age isn't worth giving up what they appear to be asking. A 2nd-3rd round pick at least makes sense. Anything more is too much. If he was 5-6 years younger, sure. But at 31 and demanding a huge contract? Pass.

I had a collapsed lung after surgery a couple years ago. It's no fun, but he shouldn't miss a ton of time. The biggest thing might be getting his conditioning back once he's cleared to play.

I'm willing to give Evero some leeway given the lack of talent he has to work with. But I do tend to agree that the 4-3 would be preferable to his 3-4 scheme.

The only cool XL story I want to hear is about him catching the football and producing on the field.

The Colts might be debatable, but the Giants? Have you seen that roster? It's easily worse than ours.

Trying to shoehorn XL into a starting role when Coker is clearly our best option as WR2 is only going to end badly for XL. The best way forward is to let him develop at his own pace and play a specific role in the offense - deep threat, for example - rather than putting him in as the starter over clearly superior players. Right now XL is at BEST our 4th best WR, likely our 5th best (behind TMac, Coker, Thielen and Renfrow) and may even be end up being behind Jimmy Horn by season's end. Not Dan Morgan's best work, that pick. But trying to force it will only make things worse.

No way do we have the 32nd ranked roster. Not in a league where the Saints, Colts and Giants exist.

This. There just aren't any realistic options we can add at this point. Best we can hope for is for Trevin Wallace has a breakout year. And even then we're likely going to have to add another starter in the offseason.

Horn and Coker, yes. Moore? Meh. I think it'd be worth losing Moore to keep Renfrow.

I somehow forgot Ohio State in my previous predictions so I've updated it: Have to say, while I doubt it'd be a very competitive game, a Navy-Notre Dame matchup in the CFP would be pretty cool to see.

My CFP predictions. I hope I've got the new seeding rules right. Conference champions have the conference logo in the bottom corner of their box in their first game.

Absolutely not.

I can't see us keeping more than 6 WRs: 1. Tet McMillan (LOCK) 2. Xavier Legette (LOCK) 3. Adam Thielen (LOCK) 4. Jalen Coker (BETTER DAMN WELL BE A LOCK) 5. Jimmy Horn, Jr. (near-lock based on special teams value alone) 6. Hunter Renfrow (likely gets the nod over David Moore) What's going to be interesting is how they end up splitting the reps come the regular season. All six of those guys can contribute significantly. If I had to guess I'd say Horn likely gets the short end on game day, outside of being our primary returner.

I'm sorry, but this is not a "shocking" release. I half-expected us to cut him back in March after we signed Rozeboom. I'm a Trevin Wallace fan and think he can be a solid player for us, but he's far from proven. I also have serious doubts about Rozeboom, so I'm not saying ILB isn't a pretty massive need right now, but to act like Jewel being cut is some huge shock is a little weird, IMO. And I didn't even realize he was as hurt as he apparently is. I expect us to add another veteran before the season, but realistically this is a hole we're just going to have to work around until the offseason.

Not cheating here. My guesses... 1. Ryan Kalil 2. Ricky Manning, Jr. 3. Josh Norman 4. Mike Minter

Chau Smith-Wade pulling up to training camp like...

The Hornets were screwed when they lost out on the #1 pick. Outside of Cooper Flagg this was a terrible draft class full of risky prospects and red flags. Kon Knueppel likely won't ever be a superstar - or even a star, realistically - but he can be a solid contributor for a long time in the league. That's actually more than I think will end up being the case for many of these players.

Coverage skills I can understand, but you'd think solid tacklers would be less rare than they are. That's a pretty basic skill for someone to learn if they're playing defense, at any age.