tukafan21

Well for one, a big part of it being the worst unit is because the best player on the entire team has been hurt the entire season. The other is that we're lacking a top end edge rushing threat, adding Graham doesn't help there, there just isn't a Top 5 worthy edge rusher in this class. Yes, it would give us probably the best interior defensive line for the next decade and that would be cool to have. But I think we have far too many other holes that aren't already being somewhat patched up by the return of our best player healthy next season. If we miss out on T-Mac and could trade back while picking up an additional 1st in the trade, even next year, and get Graham, then I'd be much more on board. But even then, if we were to trade back, I think we'd be more in line to take a shot on one of the edge rushers. But for me, it's always going to be T-Mac over everyone else. We haven't had a true #1 WR since Smith and after QB and DE, it's our biggest hole right now. This not only solves that for the next decade, it solves it with a guy who is going to be a Top 5 WR in this league, don't over think it.

He hasn't caused any problems because Deion acts like he's another son of his and let's him do things that no other player in the country could get away with. If he was at any other school, he'd be just as good but he'd probably have a serious diva label on him, it's just ignored because the whole program is like that in Colorado. Deion catches him "stealing" shoes form his personal locker room and finds it hilarious and posts the video online for the world to see. He goes on podcasts during the season complaining that he's not the Heisman favorite, on his bye week he flys across the country to campaign for himself on the morning shows in person. You don't see that kind of stuff and see red flags for him when he's in the NFL and the HC isn't a man child surrogate father figure to him? He's also continuously said he expects to play both ways full time in the NFL, which if any team lets him do it, they're dumb and he's going to get hurt and/or struggle. Then if/when they don't and the team is struggling to score while he gets 5 gadget snaps a game, you think he's going to react well to that? Him and Shedeur have the biggest red flags for a first rounder since Manziel from that diva mentality standpoint, I'm not using a Top 5 pick on a CB that comes with that big of a risk when Johnson is an equal if not better prospect (and I've touched many times on never taking him over T-Mac as a WR either). And I've seen plenty of the "experts" who don't have him as the #1 prospect anyways. Many who do also talk about him as an "athlete" and that he'll be a CB who gets plenty of WR snaps as well, which again, I don't think is going to happen. The kid is an elite talent, it's why he was the #1 player in HS too, but at this point, he's just not the best WR and I don't think he's the best CB either (I do think he's 2nd). His past doesn't matter anymore. If you're taking a CB #1 overall or as the first non QB off the board, they have to be a STUD lockdown corner who might not even get many INTs because teams just won't throw that way, kinda like Revis or Asomugha at their peaks. That's not Hunter. I've likened him to Trevon Diggs, someone who is one of the better CBs in the league because he has the ability to lock his man down at times and makes a lot of great plays. But those great plays are because their game is predicated on taking risks, which in the NFL leads to giving up a lot of big plays as well. That's Hunter. If Hunter didn't take a snap on the offensive side of the ball, he'd be a great prospect and talked about as a Top 10 pick based on team needs for a CB. But he wouldn't be the #1 ranked prospect, he wouldn't be talked about as the first non QB to be taken. I don't see the few snaps you're going to give him a game on offense being worth jumping over better actual prospects at their positions while taking on the risks that come with him and the whole Deion world. That's what I mean by falling for the media hype, because I feel like the legend of Hunter has outgrown the real life NFL prospects Hunter.

Love the player, just not on a team who's best player is already a DT, for a team with as many holes as we have, that is just a poor allocation of picks/cap space to draft him right after paying DB.

You can see with this angle, he’s starting to lower his shoulder just as Lawrence initiated his slide, it’s real hard to not follow through with that hit with the speed these guys move at and not watching the play in slow motion So again, given his previous late hits, a suspension is probably warranted here, but if that wasn't the case, just getting tossed from the game probably would have been sufficient on this one. https://x.com/commishjared/status/1863303341201133601?s=46&t=LQU3yEizU6WVOcNoJTNyOw

It's not even as much as the "fake slide" argument as much as just the "late slide" argument in general, particularly with how fast these players move out there. When you're running full speed and know you're about to take 1 or 2 more steps before you initiate your tackle attempt, it's real hard to pull out of it when the QB slides at the last second. The game camera angle makes this hit look so egregious, but when you see the end zone angle from behind the defense, I'm much more sympathetic to it as you really see that he was really about to start his tackle when Lawrence decided to slide. This one I probably lean towards siding with the league because the defender was a repeat offender, but if I just saw that angle of the hit without that information, I'm not so sure I'd think a suspension was warranted, at least not a 3 game one.

The fact that you put any CB as the #1 overall prospect is just laughable That you compound the issue by not even putting the best CB in the draft in that spot just makes it worse. You do realize that Hunter literally isn't even a finalist for the Thorpe award that is given to the best DB in the nation, right? I would bet every dollar I have that Johnson will have a better career than Hunter and that T-Mac will end up better than both of them.

Right here you are LITERALLY saying he should be the top prospect because he is the best player in college football. He is LITERALLY not the best player in college football on either side of the ball, the ONLY reason he can be considered the best player in college football is LITERALLY because he plays both sides at a high level. He's not the best DB, he's not the best WR, he will NOT win the post season awards for best player at either position, he won't win the Bednarik as the nation's top defensive player. If you can't see how consistently calling him the best player in college football and using that as a reason for how you rank him, is explicitly using his 2 way play to justify your ranking of him, then that is a YOU problem.

You've brought up his 2 way play and doing things no college player has ever done, in every single thread about the draft. Don't try to say it's me who is pushing that agenda, that's just laughable. And he's not the best DB in the draft, he's the 2nd best behind Johnson, and that's not a knock on Hunter, saying he's not the best DB isn't saying he is a garbage player, he's still an elite prospect, just not as elite as others.

First, I disagree that he's the #1 prospect, I've said that numerous times, he plays 2 positions and he's not the best prospect at either of them. Second, you keep pointing to what he's doing in college about playing both ways as to a reason he's the #1 prospect, which again, as it's been pointed out to you numerous times, has ZERO bearing on his NFL prospects because he won't be a 2 way player. If someone isn't the best player at either position they play, why in the world should they be the #1 prospect in the draft? He's not a better CB than Johnson and he's not a better WR than T-Mac, so if you can't use his two way play as an argument (as he won't do that in the NFL), then why in the world should he be the #1 prospect in the draft? Do you not see why the math ain't mathing? And you keep saying all the experts rank him as #1, which just frankly isn't true, I don't keep notes of all the expert rankings, but a large number of them do NOT have him as the #1 prospect, for all the reason's I've stated. He's a generational collegiate talent, he's an elite NFL prospect, but he's not the #1 prospect at either position he plays. All 3 of those things in this previous sentence can be true, but you seem to think someone disagreeing with the last of the 3 is ridiculous because of the first two points. The fact that you can't separate those things and see them objectively, is why your opinions are invalid. You're the same person who screamed about Bryce being an elite prospect and drafting him would make us SB contenders last year, sorry if I'm not going to give you the benefit of doubt when it comes to your talent evaluations, especially when you keep pointing to his 2 way play in college when talking about wanting to draft him and ranking him #1 on your board.

That doesn't concern me as much with how few of those big bodies WRs there are in the NFL these days, at least of the elite WRs, most of them are more fast/quick than big. It's also why I want T-Mac so bad, he'd be a unicorn in this league right now with his size and skill combo. I actually think Hunter would make for a nice pairing with Horn because of that. Horn would be matched with the bigger/stronger WR of a team while Hunter would take on the speedier WRs. I see a lot of positives to drafting Hunter here, as a CB, but I see way too many downsides to want to take that risk with a pick we have to hit a home run with. I'm taking T-Mac and Burden over Hunter as a WR and I'm taking Johnson over him as a CB, 100 out of 100 times. Hunter is a legitimate generational collegiate talent, but the fact is that he's not the best prospect at either of his positions in this year's draft, combine that with other issues that come with him, and I'm just going a different way if he's on the board, let someone else deal with that headache that will follow him.

While this is true, I'm less concerned about him playing both ways from an endurance standpoint (although it's a very legitimate issue that would hurt him on both sides of the ball, especially late in the season). The real concern about him playing both sides is the physicality of the game at this level, especially with how slim his frame is, his career wouldn't last more than 5 or 6 years, if even that long. Playing 5 years full time on both sides of the ball is literally the equivalent to playing a 10 year career. If you think a 6'1" 185 lbs player can take the pounding of a 10 year career over the course of 5 years, stay healthy doing so, and still play at a high level for a number of years after that, then I have some oceanfront property to sell you in Arizona. You can't take a player in the Top 10 of the draft (or really anywhere in the first round) if your plan is to use them in a way that will make it near impossible for them to play the length of a 2nd contract in the NFL. The only way he plays both ways in the NFL is as a CB who gets 5-7 snaps on offense a game, half of which would just have him out there as a decoy to try and take the defenses attention.

Even if he loses his explosiveness that he used to have, he'll still be an effective slot WR with his crisp route running. He basically would be a shorter Thielen who turns into a great possession slot WR who can be a safety valve for a QB. Whether he wants to do that is another question, you play RB your whole life, when you can't anymore, you might just want to retire and enjoy life being married to a model, wouldn't blame him. But even with the beating his body has gone through, I think he'd be a more than effective slot WR in this league for years to come.

No, I don't shade Hunter, you just are too balls deep into him that you think any criticism of his NFL prospects that aren't as the #1 pick in the draft, is an attack on him. I only go after people when they do exactly what you do when you talk about wanting him, you talk about his two way play, how he's doing something nobody has done, how he's going to win the Heisman, blah blah blah. None of those things have anything to do with projecting him in the NFL, which is why I go after you when you say it, because it's nonsensical reasons for wanting to draft a player. I point those things out and then give football specific reasons for why I don't want him, why I want someone else like T-Mac. If you want to go ahead and talk about Hunter's positives as a CB, you'd be making valid posts, but you don't, you just talk about the media superlatives that have literally absolutely zero bearing on what he'll be able to do in the NFL. And I've told you this, time and time again, but you still can't or refuse to see/understand it. It's not that hard, stop talking about wanting him because of what he's doing in college by playing both ways, he's not doing that in the NFL. Every time you talk about him being the best player in college, you lose any credibility in this discussion as the reason he's the best player in college isn't something that he'll be doing in the NFL, period. In fact, it's a very real and legitimate reason I do not even have him on my draft board. I think he's a CB in the NFL and if the team that drafts him is losing and struggling on offense, he's going to become a problem in the locker room when he feels like he needs to be used on offense because of it. It's a situation that I want no part of when you combine it with my fear about his frame holding up at the next level long term, as well as that I think WR is a significantly bigger need for us than a CB.

Uh, I've never once said he isn't winning it, that if he does, it would be because of his two way play, not because he's the best player on either side of the bal, because he's not. and honestly, I'd probably give it to Jeanty over Hunter as well. What Hunter is doing is crazy, but he's not playing on either side of the ball near the level that Jeanty is, nobody is, Jeanty is by far the most dominant player on either side of the ball in the nation. If not for Hunter, he'd be running away with the award this year, but in the end, I have a feeling Hunter wins.

Being the best player because you play both ways doesn’t mean jack squat for playing one side of the ball in the NFL. It’s literally the definition of irrelevant unless you actually think he can play both sides of the ball, full time in the NFL, and not have his body completely break down within a few years, and do it at an all pro level. Not all experts have him as the top prospect, in fact, many do not These are all facts you can’t debate, sorry. If you want to talk up Hunter’s NFL prospect, feel free, because he’s a Top 10 draft pick. But stop saying nonsense about winning the Heisman having anything to do with his projections and draft stock, because it literally means nothing, like literally NOTHING. If a scout or front office exec in an NFL team’s draft prep said, “but hey, he won the Heisman so we should rank him better or look at him differently” they would get fired on the spot.

Hunter isn’t winning the award because of his defensive play, it would be because of his two way play. Woodson had 12 catches for 238 yards that year, he won the award for his defensive play, not his two way play. I guarantee he won’t win the Bednarik as the nations best defender, something Woodson won. The point was you made the argument of “winning the college MVP means nothing?” And you’re helping prove my point here, he’s winning it for his two way play, not his play on a single side of the ball. He’s going to play a single side of the ball in the NFL, so no, winning that award means nothing for his NFL projection as he’s not winning it for what he’ll do in the NFL. He’s not the best CB in college, he’s not the best WR in college, so why do you want to draft him over those players who project as better NFL players at those positions?

Maybe as a RB, but I always said that when his RB days are behind him, he’s going to turn into a great slot WR and stick around in the league well into his mid 30’s

Exactly what you just said is my point though, you've seen him "layer it all over the field" He can't drive the ball the way even average NFL QB's are able to do. It limits the routes you can run, it limits the throws he can attempt and make, and it can lead to turnovers if he tries the throw and the defender is easily able to jump it. I'll admit he's been playing better the last few weeks, but it's been against some of the worst pass defenses in the league and he still hasn't even been lighting it up, he's just looked competent. Looking competent this late into the 2nd season of the first overall pick isn't a good thing. We know what he is and what he isn't, get what we can, cut bait, call it a day.

Bryce just doesn't have an NFL arm, everything else aside, that will always limit what a team can be with him as their QB. His max upside if everything goes perfectly for him is like 25th best QB in the league, why continue to hurt the development of the rest of our offensive skill position players with a guy with a noodle arm who is never going to be an even average QB in this league? Trade him for the best offer, whatever it is, and move on from this awful trade/pick. Just of guys who should be playing for more than the next 5 years, he's not going to be better than Mahomes, Allen, Hurts, Herbert, Burrow, Lamar, Love, Tua, Stroud, Purdy, Dak, Kyler, Baker, Lawrence, Williams, Daniels, Nix, Jones. That's 18 better than him right there and it doesn't include Richardson, Darnold, McCarthy, or Penix who could all easily be better than him. It also doesn't include guys like Stafford, Wilson, Cousins, Geno, or Rodgers who are starters but likely not more than 5 years from now. What's the point in hanging onto a player like that with such a low ceiling and a floor so low that hurts the development of the rest of the young players, when we might be able to get a halfway decent trade package for him this offseason?

For us right now this season, Bryce. Who would I want as our QB1 next year? Jameis, 100% without a shadow of a doubt in my mind. I want to see us compete this year and grow, but I still want us to lose out. It's what is best for the future of the franchise, we need to get the best draft pick possible right now. If we win a meaningless game or two, we could fall from picking at worst at #5, probably 3 or 4, to falling all the way back to as low as 12ish. Jameis could get us that extra win or two that Bryce might not. Next year is about building up our players, particularly our young offensive weapons in XL, Coker, Brooks, and Sanders (hopefully T-Mac too). Jameis is a PERFECT QB for a team in that situation. For as weird as he is, he's a pretty good leader, which is needed with such a young team like that. He's also fully capable of making every throw possibly needed and isn't shy to let it rip. Sure he will lose you games with his interceptions and some bad decision making, but he's going to pepper our young players with targets at every level to help them speed up their growth. His blowing of games with bad throws won't hinder the development of our weapons, it will just cost us games. Then depending how the season goes, you either go all in for a long term QB solution or do it for a second season so you have a ready set roster loaded with weapons and just need to slot in a QB. If you do that for 2 years with Jameis to build up those young guys, you'd have XL, Coker, Brooks, Sanders all going into year 4 and hopefully T-Mac going into year 3. Spend the bulk of our cap space and draft picks on defense over those 3 offseasons and that is a SB caliber team right there that just needs a QB. That's when you make an all in trade like the Rams did for Stafford or Jets with Rodgers (albeit don't do it with a 40 year old). Or you give up whatever it costs to move up in the draft to get one of the top QB's in the class. Or you bring in a Free Agent like Russell who would thrive with a weapon set like that and if you've spent the 3 years building up the defense, that team is going to be in the SB discussion from week 1. If you're at a rock bottom place, like we are, this is how you build a SB contender in this league from that position. It's never going to be a quick fix with this many holes, you need to take a look at the long game. It's what the Lions did (albeit thinking Goff was their Jameis before he turned into their real guy) and they're now looking like they could be one of the best teams for a number of years. They built up their offense through the draft and FA from 2020-2023 getting Amon Ra, Jaemo, Gibbs, Laporta, and their whole OL except for 1 vet OT for a few years while their defense struggled. Then they spent a lot of draft capital and cap room on the defensive side of the ball over the last 2 offseasons. Sound familiar? That's basically what we just started doing this past year, so let's see it out. One more offseason of adding an elite offensive weapon (T-Mac) and then spend the rest on defense. Bring in a strong armed QB who might cost us games in the W/L column, but will speed up the development of our weapons, then go all in for the QB with a SB contender built out. I get that fans won't like losing games for a couple more years, but it's how you properly build up a franchise from the bottom.

T-Mac should be the pick if he's there, no matter anyone else on the board, and here's why......... I don't think any of the QB's in this class are can't miss prospects, we're still in a re-build, we can't afford to use a Top 5 pick on a questionable QB prospect, we need a can't miss star with this pick. If there was a blue chip pass rusher available, that would be the way to go, but there isn't, best DL available is likely the DT from Michigan. Johnson and Hunter are both elite CB prospects. But we already have Horn who is probably our best player outside of DB and because of that, I just can't get behind drafting a CB with such a high pick, which is the same reason I can't get behind any DT pick either, because of DB on the roster on a big contract. XL has potential, but even his max potential is likely as a really good #2 or a low end #1, not an elite outside #1. After him, all we have in the WR room is Thielen if he's even back, and Coker, who we all like as a prospect, but if he's your 2nd best WR under the age of 35 and with more than 1 year left on the team, then you have one of the worst WR rooms in the NFL, period. So if it's WR, it's T-Mac vs Hunter (as WR) vs Burden, and then again, it's an easy decision for me. Hunter and Burden are both going to be slot WRs in this league, the same way great WRs like Kupp and Godwin work almost exclusively out of the slot. Passing up on a true outside #1 in T-Mac, something we don't have and are near impossible to find anywhere outside of the draft, to take a player who will be a slot focused WR, just makes no sense from a roster building standpoint. T-Mac is 6'5" and 215 lbs and is anything but a slow plodding big WR, he has wheels (no, he doesn't have track speed, but he's going to run a sub 4.5 40 at the combine) and he has plenty of wiggle in his game post-catch to make defenders miss. He has hands like vice grips covered in glue and a catch radius that we probably haven't seen in the NFL since Calvin Johnson. He already runs a complete NFL route tree at all levels, he's just as good running a deep go route for a jump ball as he is catching a 2 yard slant and making defenders miss to pick up the first down. Don't over think it, you take the guy with legit Top 5 NFL WR talent at a position of serious need, more so than any other position of the available players at the top of the draft. Yes, I've openly admitted that I'm an Arizona alum, but it has zero bias in my feelings on this pick. I wouldn't even tell people that if I wasn't so sure about the player he's going to be at the NFL and why he's such a perfect fit for our needs. If he's gone, there are plenty of other prospects that I like, but I don't think any of them have the potential and the perfect fit for our needs as T-Mac does, my alumni connection or not.

The college MVP as you put it has literally 0% bearing on anything, more Heisman winners end up as nothing in the NFL, or just average players, than they do actual superstars. Just looking at since the turn of the millennium, there's only been 4 players who won it that I think you could say were legit superstars in Burrow, Cam, Lamar, and Henry. After that, the next best players are DeVonta Smith, Kyler, Baker, Bush, and Carson Palmer, with Jameis probably being the next one on the list. DeVonta could move into that superstar level, but 5 out of 24 winners turning into superstars since 2000 is a pretty bad number. So no, winning the Heisman has absolutely ZERO affect on a player's NFL prospects, and if you had to say it leaned one way or the other, based on recent history, it would lean towards being a better college player than NFL player. His on field production means a little bit, because obviously, if you can't produce at all, you're not going to be a highly rated prospect. But once you're putting up great numbers, the difference between a few hundred yards or a handful of TDs, is completely negligible and meaningless when it comes down to grading out prospects for the NFL (for example, T-Mac has more yards, Hunter has more TDs, and Burden has had a down statistical year, but I put zero bearing on any of those 3's actual stats when looking at them as NFL prospects). But that first one you mention, his film, is just a JOKE for you of all people to mention. All you ever talk about is his two way play, his stats, and his Heisman candidacy, NONE of which mean anything. You can't spend months talking about that stuff and then now try to say, "wait, how can you say his film doesn't mean anything?" Film is all that matters, and specifically, how it translates TO THE NEXT LEVEL... NOT... how many stats it helps you accumulate in college, because college stats are always just weird, it's the nature of the game at that level, you can compile stupid stats, but not be an NFL player and you can struggle statistically and end up a superstar in the NFL (again, look at Mahomes' college career, it wasn't all that great until his last year and even then he didn't get any Heisman votes anyways).

Every time Hunter comes up you talk about his college game, his college stats, his Heisman position, etc Not one bit of any of that matters, that's the point.

@CamWhoaaCam You love to reference college stats and Heisman positioning, but you realize that the following player......... 13-16 career W-L record, best season in college was 65% completion, 5k yards, 41 TDs, 10 INTs, 260 yards rushing, 12 rushing TDs, never had a single Heisman vote Is possibly the greatest NFL player of all time While the following player........ 48-7 career W-L record, best season in college was 67% completion, 3.2k yards, 32 TDs, 6 INTs, 900 yards rushing, 23 rushing TDs, and was a Heisman winner, Heisman 3rd place, and Heisman 5th place Is a player who only lasted 3 years in the NFL Right? That first player is Mahomes, the second is The Golden Calf of Bristol. Stop pointing towards college stats and Heisman positioning as arguments for how they project at the NFL level. Sure stats are fun to look at and can give you an idea about a player, but the college game is crazy, stats are very misleading at that level.