woahfraze

While it certainly is a gamble to take a guy with injury concerns, if that player is at a critical position (moreso in terms of positional value, not roster need), then it’s not necessarily an unforgivable sin to take that player if your medical staff thinks the player will make a full recovery. But RB isn’t a position that carries a ton of value. It’s not a QB, edge rusher or left tackle. So not a great look for Morgan when ignoring the context of the roster. When you add that in, the fact that we’ve got a player I think you could fairly characterize as “at worst serviceable,” and honestly more fairly describe as “median starting RB in the league” in Chuba Hubbard already in the backfield, and the decision to not just draft, but trade up for Brooks, becomes inexcusable.

I think Morgan has had the right general idea. The problem has been in execution. Bryce year 1, there were myriad issues from roster talent to coaching and scheme, but the offensive line was particularly glaring. So they went out and fixed the o-line by signing Hunt and Lewis. That fix actually seems to have been at least moderately successful. Last year, pass rush was a major issue. So they invested along the defensive line and at edge. The problem is, they either expended too many resources over correcting—partially because in free agency, when you’re a shitty franchise, you have to overpay to get talent in the door—or they didn’t make the right picks. It’s probably too early to pass judgment on the free agent class or draft picks as it’s only been one game. So we’ve got a small sample size and rookie edges may take time to develop. But if game 1 is any indication, they didn’t solve the problem.

It may not be entirely fair, as I think Morgan has not done a terrible job and Canales is trying to make chicken salad out of chicken poo, but I think everyone has to go. Morgan has had to build a roster while trying to clean up the disaster left by Fitterer, who routinely lost tons of value with the trades he made. He oversaw incorrect talent evaluations and made poor draft selections. And then he compounded these issues by mismanaging the salary cap with extensions, free agency signing, and other contractual decisions. I can’t imagine a poorer job of GMing. You’d think he’d have succeeded in at least 1 of these 3 areas. But the end result is a roster very talent poor across the board. With Tillis in the fold, Morgan has done a decent job on getting our salary cap in better shape such that we won’t be dealing with the same dead money hell a year from now that we’ve had the past 5 years. He seems to have whiffed on Leggette. But I think he’s done decently in the draft thus far. In free agency, it’s more of a mixed bag, but it’s hard to attract free agents to play for us without spending a lot of money given how dysfunctional the team is. So all in all, I think he’s been OK. What it really comes down to is how much of a hand he had in drafting Bryce Young. If he really was a dissenting voice in the room, then I might be inclined to give him more runway. If not, he’s got to go. We cannot know they. Only Tepper and the others in the organization know. As an outsider, I didn’t like the idea of promoting from within when the front office had done such a poor job. So without being able to know the answer to that question, I think he should get the axe in the name of creating organizational alignment with a new coach. Because…. Canales is not it. Yes he’s hindered by a limited roster, Bryce Young included. And this is coming from someone who probably falls middle of the spectrum between Bryce apologists and Bryce haters. I think with the right coach—one who opens up the playbook, one who runs tempo, one who lets Bryce rip it, and most importantly one who has the team prepared—that Bryce could be a serviceable starter. Basically, I could see us getting the Bryce we got at the end of last year on a consistent basis, rather than getting that for a few games here and there and then losing QB play the other 2/3 to 3/4 of the time. But Canales is not the coach that can make that happen. And while don’t want to make personnel decisions based off the sunk cost they is the trade and the number 1 pick, we should aim for a higher ceiling then that. With such a young and limited roster with so much turnover, you can’t punt the preseason. These guys need reps together. And you have to have the team more prepared. I know the coaches can’t make the plays for the players. It’s not Canales’ fault that Leggette can’t make an easy toe drag late in the 1st half and then Bryce fumbling on a scramble, which together derailed a drive that could have kept the game close. But it’s clear that he doesn’t get the most out of his players, in terms of their execution, and he certainly does not put them in the best position to win with his play calling. The 4th and goal call and preceding plays are probably the best example of this form yesterday. I don’t want to overreact from Week 1, but it’s really a gut punch after coming into the season actually having some hope. Not of the playoffs because I expected the defense to be pretty bad still, but to see such sloppiness and regression from the offense. I really was hopeful to see an offense similar to and building off what we had last season. So put me in the burn it all down camp. Hire a new GM, let him hire a coach whose football philosophies align with their own. Hire that coach from a winning organization/that’s demonstrated success. I know it’s not that simple. The Ben Johnson’s of the world don’t want to come here apparently. But Tepper’s got the money. Find the right philosophy in order to identify the right individual. And then throw the bag at them. Do whatever it takes. Unfortunately, I don’t know if there’s enough money in the world to make that happen. The franchise seems like career poison at this point.

I like what Morgan has done, but let’s not ignore the full context. Having your roster contain this percentage of contributors from the past 2 drafts also speaks to how talent poor we are overall. If our roster were already better, you wouldn’t see this many young players make the roster or if they did, be relied on to contribute in this way.

Where’s Tommy Tremble?

I’m not going to sit here and say he played “amazing” in this game against the Eagles, but you’re selling this performance short. Stats do not tell the whole story here. If Leggette doesn’t drop that late 32 yard pass, Bryce ends up with 223 yards and 2TDs and doesn’t end up with 2 additional incompletions after that drop trying to force things to the end zone at the end of the game. So that’s be 20-32 instead of 19-34, good for a 62.5% completion percentage. His YOA would be 6.96 and his QB rating would have been 91.2. And the story everyone is talking about after the game is how Bryce led a game winning drive to beat one of the best teams in the league, the team we did not know at the time would become Super Bowl champions. But none of that happened all because of an awful drop by Leggette, something totally out of Bryce’s control. Bryce played well that game.

Why are you so fixated on yards? Even if yards were a good judge of QB play, his low yardage totals in some of those games were partly a function of drops (looking at you Xavier Leggette…). I’m not advocating that Bryce was elite for the last half of last year, but the eye test certainly supported high level QB play for large stretches. He made a lot of high difficulty, put it on the money/drop in the bucket throws. He converted on 3rd and 4th down, kept drives moving, and put the team in position to win games. And it’s not on him that the defense blew it late after he led game tying drives, Leggette dropped a game winning TD, or Chuba fumbled the ball in OT. We could have finished the season close to .500 with wins against 3 playoff teams including KC and Philly during that stretch largely due to Bryce’s play. Has he sustained this level of play long enough to deserve an higher ranking? No. But for judging based in that stretch alone, he would. But whether he can perform more consistently at that level or build on that, and thus earns a higher ranking, remains to be seen.

We’ve invested enough money in the offensive line to justify a top or market free agent contract. The end of the year showed us that we have a unit that has developed good chemistry and can be really effective in both run blocking and pass protection. From a needs and capital allocation perspective, it makes much more sense to invest in the defense and another playmaker on offense. The offensive line should not be ignored this offseason, but the focus here should be to maintain/build depth in the position group rather than bring in a new starter.

Impressive catch by Coker.

Love it. Very nice 4th and 1 call. Falcons loaded up to stop the run on. Good fake. Easy pitch and catch.

Still should be a catch. On the regather into the chest (which you could possibly argue is really just part of the catch, not necessarily a bobble), Thielen still had two feet dragging when he got it into his chest.

The defense is absolute ass, but it was not even really bad defense on the last play specifically by the CB IMO. That was just an absolute dot by Penix. He did it twice in a row. Just got lucky on the first one that it was a tad long/a wierd “tie” with the CB on the catch.

I’m not saying culture is all that matters. But you just named: A 4th round pick (Amon Ra St Brown) Two 2nd round picks (LaPorta and Branch) The 20th overall pick (Ragnow) The 18th overall pick (Campbell) The 12th overall pick (Gibbs) The 7th overall pick (Sewell) The 2nd overall pick (Hutchinson) Two free agency signing (Montgomery and Smith) A player obtained in a trade (Goff) So only two players (Sewell and Hutchinson) where is losing ground in draft position from picking ~5 to ~10 would have mattered at all. All the rest were either the front office making the right choices with their draft selections or bring in veterans who fit what the staff wanted to do schematically, or the staff developing those players (FYI, it’s certainly a combination of those two things).

If you think that the Lions draft position had more to do with where they are as a franchise than Dan Campbell and the culture he has built, there’s nothing more to discuss with you. You just don’t get it. Our franchise isn’t in the toilet because we’ve ruined our draft position year after year. It’s because we haven’t had a Dan Campbell come in and implement a program and a culture of winning.

And look at what Darnold has done this year and how Mayfield has played in Tampa since leaving here. There is no way of knowing whether Herbert would have performed well here or if we would have ruined him.