Sgt Schultz

I don't disagree with you on a couple of points. Darnold often sucked in his limited time last year behind a line that would have made Tom Brady retire immediately, and with an offense that generally regressed. Maybe the overall regression was on him, or maybe it was the game plans, maybe it was a scheme he is ill-suited for (likely), or maybe everybody just regressed, or, most likely, it was some combination of all of the above and then some. I also agree with not throwing more money into the abyss until we improve our OL to at least mediocre. Not only will we get another QB killed back there, but we need to figure out whether the other pieces are keepers or not. Right now, even CMC is in question since he has been out most of the last two seasons. The offense is generally a wreck. Not to mention, we have not proven any good at tossing money and ideas against the wall. The optimist will say Darnold has played on two gawd awful teams and taken beatings accordingly. Maybe if he is not behind an awful line he might improve. The realist says he has been beaten to death for four years, and at some point even if he was the second coming of Marino, he will have to be deprogrammed from the effects and rebuilt. That will take time and may not work. The pessimist notes the road is even tougher. He is has a gunslinger mentality and he will always make questionable decisions and take bad risks. Favre did, Romo did, Kelly did, and he does and on top of four years at the helm of doormat offenses, he is not worth the time. But, I agree, given all our problems, trot him out there in 2022. Not for his own rehabilitation, but to make sure the next guy has a fighting chance.

I'm not surprised by that. Everybody knew Lance was raw when he came out. The 49ers did a good job of taking the first step of getting him ready. Realistically, the job may have been bigger than one year, at least to do it right. So far, I think they have done it right so there is no point in pushing all the chips into the center of the table just yet.

Three long snappers complements the twin punter formation quite nicely. After a stuffed run, batted down pass, holding penalty, and sack it will keep the opposing punt return team on their toes. Opponents would never know which of the long snappers would line up over the ball and which punter the one over the ball will snap it to. It could be our most effective offensive play. Think of the versatility!

That was one of a couple of bad assumptions I read. Then add the assumption that Fitterer is the guy making the call on this.

I don't think the logic is that deep. 1) Who wants to be/remain a starter bad enough to disregard the fact there could be a coaching change after their first year? I don't think success is associated with this situation at all.

This confirms the existence of a Huddle's Prayer. "Give us this day our daily Watson thread."

I don't know about that, but the latest date for the next thread saying we are all-in for Watson is about 3 hours after this one leaves the first page of threads.

Other than that, the cap, the trade implications, and the fact we are more than a QB away from being a "contendah," he is perfect.

What would be more amazing would be having it fall that way and then we pick some undersized guy from Northeast Southwestern Louisiana Tech State who played G, C, MLB, but most importantly, he can kick.

I actually don't think that is an awful plan. If we were drafting somebody as a starter or the heir-apparent, it would be a wasted, if not counter-productive year assume Rhule gets the axe. But there is limited damage for a guy who expects to carry a clipboard all year. And given our QB depth chart heading out o 2021 is basically two guys who have very low expectations about seeing 2023, having somebody that will be around is not a bad idea. It also means that if things play out, we have two faces on the roster that are not there today. Given our QB play, that has merit.

This. Had we stuck to the plan to use Bridgewater to fill the gap and audition for the role, we'd be in a different position. I realize this place would have turned into Chernobyl had they brought him back for 2021, but 2022 was the decision year for him, the way his contract was structured. If I remember the details right, his salary would have been big, but his residual bonus relatively small (in the area of $5M). Then they got in a public pi$$ing contest with him and had to abandon that plan. That created an urgent need/panic for another QB. They compounded that by thinking we were only a QB away from showing something, but with our OL we were farther than that and we had a mass regression in 2021, anyway. Had we not felt the need to go tit-for-tat when Bridgewater complained publicly, we would be 1) sucking up his third year which was only intended to be used if he was the answer, 2) breaking in our new long-term starter, either via trade or the draft, or 3) shopping for a new placeholder with little cap money tied up in the position. Instead, we are sucking up a year of Darnold at $18.5M while trying to do what is behind door #2 or #3. And our options for #2 are not great, either because of what is available or what is available at a price we can afford. The old saying about what to do if you find yourself in a hole applies. Unless something falls in our lap, suck it up and put the next QB in a position to succeed by building the OL. That does not bode well for 2022, but IF the OL is addressed and gels, and IF CMC stays healthy, and IF Darnold upgrades his play toward mediocrity, maybe we can get to where we had hoped to be in 2021. Otherwise, hand the reins to someone else (at QB and probably HC) next year. But let's stop lunging at anything that could remotely be an upgrade, unless it does not distract us from trying to put a QB in a position to succeed. In fairness to Darnold, he may not have that in him, but in our current situation, he can't prove it even if he did. I see Kyber just posted some very similar thoughts.

PFF doesn't know what they are doing. They did not consider versatility in their ratings and we excel in versatility. I think we have players worthy of being on the list. The problem is our coaching staff put them in positions where failure was not only a likely option, it was pretty much inevitable. It's amateur hour on our sidelines.

I agree with you. Our offense specialized in 3 and outs, it seemed. Even if the defense got off the field, having to go out three plays and a punt later didn't do them any favors. Add it to the list of things that is pretty hard to gauge because the team was so inept in so many phases.

Philosophically, it is not as easy as one or the other. You have to look at the players involved, their cost, how fat or thin you are at the position, if you think they will still be productive in 3 years, injury concerns, what you honestly think you will get in return, etc. It is really a case-by-case basis. I'd generally prefer to hold onto our own talent, but that doesn't always make the most sense. This situation is more of a mess because our defense also regressed after about week three of last season. That makes it a lot tougher to evaluate.

Part of his success in San Francisco was he was simply the right guy for that situation at the time. They had a strong defense, decent offense with a good running game, and they were an experienced group. I'm not saying anybody could have gotten them to the level of success they had (Singletary could not as HC), but it was not a rebuild or even a huge retool. His demise there was more about Baalke and the York's thinking they didn't need him, and he was somehow beneath them. But, the question of what would have happened had he stayed and the team began to age out is a concern. Carroll certainly has shown diminishing returns as the initial group started to age out or move on. Harbaugh may not be the guy to build a team, but the guy who can take one that is mostly built, figure out the last piece or two of the puzzle, and get them to the next level. Those are usually very distinct talents. If he is the latter, I'm not sure our situation is for him. A lot depends on who we add this offseason and whether nearly the entire 2021 class year two slump was just a slump or something worse.

First, let me say that anybody on the roster is available for the right price. However (a word defined as "disregard everything before this word"), unless I have been eyeing a WR in the draft that had me drooling, what is the point? We would be creating a big hole that we struggled for years and multiple drafts trying to fill. Is DJ perfect? Nope. Can he be better? Yep, especially if we get somebody who can get the ball to him reasonably well. Like I said, everybody is available for a price. But, the price for somebody who is a good talent in a position we are not convinced we have a ton of younger talent already available, meaning I then have to try and replace him......well, that would be a bit on the salty side.

The guy that asked, asked if we had a source for that. I don't remember seeing one. If you have one, it'll answer his question.

It was a rumor making the rounds when they switched to the 3-4. I don't think I ever saw a source for it other people connecting dots that they decided to switch to the 3-4, Tepper was part of the Steelers who played the 3-4, therefore it had to be his idea. Who knows what really happened? My guess was when Tepper asked the obvious question about fixing the defense, and when there were no good answers to be found he brought up the idea of the 3-4. Given both felt their jobs were on the line, they took it as more than an idea. Never mind we didn't have the personnel to make that change and getting the personnel was going to take more than one offseason. But given Hurney, it is just as likely he thought that would impress Tepper and suggest the idea himself. There may have been more than speculation that the decision came out of those post-season meetings with Tepper, but I don't remember anything solid saying the decision came from Tepper.

I am not a Rhule apologist by an means and I don't see a lot of hope for this scenario ending well, but I will say this for the situation Rhule inherited: He cam into an organization that needed to be stripped down to the studs, which happens. Then he was dealt the "great pandemic offseason" in which to build a staff and team. That gets us to a fundamental question: Did he select coaches he worked with because that is who he wanted from past exploits, or did he select them because of the familiarity and difficulty of finding more qualified people? My own opinion, for whatever that is worth, was he brought people he was familiar with because they were part of "the program." The lockdowns were simply an impediment/excuse against hiring others with NFL experience. Given the zero expectations and an owner advertising this was going to be long, slow, and painful, things looked okay after year one. They even had a convenient scapegoat QB for logging 5 wins vs. 7 or 8. As it turned out, the QB was not the only thing limiting success. The coaches from "the program" also hit their NFL limits in year one. Which leads us to the same fundamental question two years later: Did he realize the coaches he brought in initially were not up to the task, or did the owner bring him to that conclusion? If they turn this thing around, I will gladly change my thinking about Rhule. But right now he is yet another college coach with "a program" or "a system" that either does not translate to the NFL or gets figured out by opposing coaches, and he does not know any other way. He now has to prove he can figure out another way and adapt to the NFL. I'm not betting on it, but stranger things have happened.

A lot of IFs in this equation. Too many to really break down the possibilities. It really all boils down to this. IF the tea leaves all lined up and we had nearly the best possible outcome, that shifts where the focus goes to try and reach the next level. IF an improved Darnold is decent enough to get us to 9 wins but no further, that should be relatively obvious. The only additional IF is whether the organization wants to get to the next level or it is content winning 7-11 games every year (2 either side of what was proposed). IF the answer to that last IF is they are satisfied being a consistent playoff contender/entrant but not getting to the next level, they run with Darnold. IF they want to get to the next level, they pull an LA Rams and try to trade for an existing QB that can get them to the next level, or a KC (and maybe SF) and trade up in the draft to grab whoever has caught their eye at the QB position and see what happens. Both models can work, one just potentially mortgages more of the future (if nothing else, it costs more of the salary cap) than the other. But again, all that is based on everything else aligning almost perfectly. Almost everything regressed last year. As BlitzMonster said, IF somehow all that happened my opinion of Rhule would change because it would mean he actually learned and adapted. Or he got extremely lucky, but if that was the case he should be buying lottery tickets while on that roll. I don't see that happening, but it is not an impossibility. Just highly improbable. Probably not as improbable as all the other IFs materializing, but improbable nonetheless.

OK, let's play his way: It wasn't a facemask. But it certainly was OPI. And for his own reference, I believe "grab and twist" are only two of the criteria. The whole thing is: No player shall grasp and control, twist, turn, push, or pull the facemask of an opponent in any direction. If they missed it, they missed it. I can see how they missed it because the play got behind the official on that side, so he was looking at their backs. Sometimes, that happens. But let's not look at the play and act like they saw it but nothing happened. They simply did not have an angle to see it.

If nothing else, you would like to create some churn in the depth chart below the starter. Every now and then, one of those guys gets to play enough and creates enough buzz that somebody will offer something decent in a trade in the hunt for their pot of gold....or pyrite. The Pats pulled that off several times. Everybody remembers the Cassel and Garoppolo, but they also peddled a couple of others for lower round draft choices. For highway robbery, roll back to 1989. Everybody knows the Cowboys took Aikman in the 1st round, but then in the supplemental draft they took Steve Walsh. Jimmy Johnson reportedly liked Walsh better (since he coached him in Miami), and there was some real debate about who would win the job. Aikman did, and a year later they peddled Walsh to New Orleans for a 1st, 2nd, and 3rd round pick in 1991. If that was not bad enough, they sent the 1st and 2nd to NE for the #1 overall pick that turned in to Russell Maryland. The 3rd turned in to Erik Williams. So, they turned a decent backup QB into first-class players at DT and RT. Taking Walsh did cost the Cowboys the #1 overall pick in 1990, but they also had the #17 pick which turned into Emmitt Smith. Someday, the Panthers, too will do something smart or have one of those "great dilemmas to have." I'll probably be dead by then, but eventually it has to happen.

That does kinda hurt the eyes to read, doesn't it?

We didn't really have Teddy as leverage. Yes, we still had him on the roster, but remember, after he criticized the Charlotte Camelot, we engaged in a public pi$$ing contest with him that left little doubt he was done in Carolina. At that point, everybody on planet earth knew he was not going to be a Panther in 2021. If I remember, the Jets were publicly saying they were on the fence about drafting a QB because (like us) QB was not their only need, and maybe not even their biggest. That was almost certainly BS to see if somebody would bite and offer them a king's ransom for the second overall pick or somebody would call them with an offer to "pry" Darnold out of their hands, at a premium of course, since they may still want him as their starter. Right about that time we walked onto the used car lot. That was our leverage. Essentially there were only two teams claiming they are interested in Darnold: them and us. Their interest was probably not real since Wilson was going to be sitting on the board for them, and our interest is only kicking tires unless the price is right. The only thing we had to offer if we HAD to have Darnold was enough for the Jets to decide not to keep him on the roster for roughly $4.75M (including the roster bonus) as a backup and then potentially lose him for no return at all after that. If what we ultimately settled on was their price for that, well, onto the next used car lot or the QB depth chart becomes PJ and Grier. That is an awful situation, but Darnold and PJ did not bring fear to opponent's hearts and it almost didn't matter, because our OL was still awful, too. So, we skillfully publicly torpedoed any idea we would just roll with Teddy. Ironically, Teddy's main complaints were likely correct. And we thought that if we just had a better QB we were a playoff team. The fact that our OL was awful and we still had other significant holes in the roster from tearing it down to the studs (and rightfully so) and starting overlooked, not only in this deal but on draft day, too. Not for nothing, but there were a lot of people on this board who thought if our QB was better than Teddy, we were a playoff team. So our brain trust was not the only delusional group. A year later, we are arguably in the exact same place. Darnold is a little cheaper than Teddy would have been in year 3 (had we opted to keep him), but nobody is even going to give us a 7th round pick or Darnold.

Draft, and draft the OL often. I see SI has mocked us taking Neal at #6, which I would be fine with. I'd also be fine trading down to the 9-13 range (the Ravens draft at 14 and reportedly looking heavily at OTs) if we can add a second round pick (which looks about right on the draft value chart). Yes, I know we need a QB. Yes, I realize it sounds like they love Pickett. I don't have nearly as high of an opinion as we hear they do. I'd take OL in rounds 1 and 2 if we trade down, but would consider a QB in round 2. But until we have an OL that prevents the opposing rusher to simply spring to out QB, it is a losing proposition. Here are our problems. We have one OL that we are sure of. We have two we drafted last year that may or may not be part of the future, either as starters or reliable as depth. We failed at learning much about them in their first year, despite having the opportunity to do so. That means we need between 2 and 4 starting OL, and we don't know what that number is. Trying to build an OL in one year is a fool's game. If we somehow drafted 4 starters this year and they stick, they all time out of their rookie deals at the same time. Now add that the odds of achieving that in one draft are also minimal. I'm open to drafting 1 FA, but they need to be under 30 and not somebody's cast off. We have not proven good at that, and if we are going the FA route, I don't want Rhule being the guy trying to identify who the FA is. I don't want versatility nearly as much as I want quality at a position.I No point in taking anybody at 30 or over because they are not going to push us over the threshold in 2022, so they need some longevity. We have too many needs/unanswered questions all over the roster to get carried away (which I think we did this past offseason). As for the QB, our depth chart is basically bare. I don't know any more about Darnold than I knew last year, due to the injury and our poor OL. But, after 4 years in the league being cannon fodder, I am not optimistic. That is a lot of baggage to overcome. Drafting a QB in round 2 or later (if we trade down) may put somebody on the depth chart, either above or below Darnold....or not. But at this point, if my fears about Darnold are correct, he is a backup which is probably not realistic after 2022. The long and short of this is because of our own incompetence in evaluating young players and our 2021 crop all appearing to regress (which is likely also our own incompetence, not theirs), my expectations for 2022 are what they were for 2021. I have no illusions we are a solid playoff team next year. If we don't show further incompetence (BIG if), hopefully we take the next step in 2023.....under Rhule or somebody else. Most likely it is somebody else, but if he corrects past sins, so be it.