Bear Hands

Not to get too involved here but even in the context of the measured 20+ deep yard stats... Recent rankings (Deep Passing EPA) Bryce's Deep Ball EPA, adjusted clean pocket percentage was 34%, ranking 44th. The only QB with notable 2023 playing time behind him was Jeff Driskel, so only way to go is up folks. Interestingly enough, Purdy, Stroud, Tua, Stafford, & Goff were at the top. I imagine play design comes into play, but that 20+ placement is important and it's also telling, those were all 2023 playoff QBs.

I feel like Trevin is going to be set up for success here. He’s in a really good position

It's encouraging to see people are wanting to find the positives, but man, I'm tapped out trying to sift through anything from last year.

I’m by no means giving up on XL and we shouldn’t. But we seemed dead set on him no matter who was available. Ladd was surprisingly there, Mitchell too who were both consistently floated as 1st rounders. Xavier was around 60-80ish overall on many rumored team boards (per the athletic). Route running is a concern, short area quickness/ability to quickly separate was an issue. It was another instance where we had a bit of tunnelvision/wanted him no matter the case. I still feel McConkey, Pearsall, or even Polk were a bit better fits for what we needed, but can get on board with XL given the ceiling. Hope it works out.

Personally, 4-6 games will be telling to be able to contrast with last season and see how he generally looks. You’ll be able to get a sense of where he’s at/if this is a bust vs. recoverable situation.

what even is this crap?

Yosh is an underrated signing in my opinion. He and a guy like Christensen are both plus swing linemen for this line, which is critical in an eval year for a lot of offensive skill guys (QB included). If Icky is struggling or either him or Moton get banged up, Yosh has the starting experience to come in. He played respectable, not great, but respectable for GB last year and during the games where Love really got it going. Christensen we know is capable of playing decently. Heck, we thought he was a long term starter not long ago. Corbett at Center is the thing to watch. Many of us wanted a center in the draft (Frazier ) so we'll see if that works. It's hinging on him and then Icky's progression. If both move in the right direction, it should be at the least a top-15 unit. Maybe top-10. The other thing is that I'm fairly certain Bozeman called protections for Bryce. So will Corbett or are we going to let Bryce manage that? It would be prudent for one of our reporters to ask Canales what his system will allow and about presnap communication, because that's another area where Bryce seemed to have training wheels on last year.

How we doing today? Anyone wanna catch me up in 1-2 sentences? lol

He’s still going top-10 in most 1QB dynasty rookie drafts. I think how jaded the fanbase is may fuzz out his potential. The Texas boys have my interest.

lol. Not gonna lie, the idea of that playing on the home Jumbotron after turnovers would be the most phenomenal thing ever.

Diontae can hopefully get open quickly, we work to scheme Legette open, Tremble/Sanders is effective, Hubbard gets moving (with Brooks being phased as the centerpiece of our O by week 4-6ish). If those happen with a strong performing line, it's a good setup for Bryce. Lots of things needing to align. Every position group needs to make strides to get out of the cellar.

For this poster, he often wonders why they title so many pieces like this.

Young dude with some skills. Had a good stretch in the middle of last season, started 8 games, but then got outplayed and beat out by Vildor. Kind of reminds me of the level Daryl Worley was when we let him walk - still managed to make other teams and play significant snaps. And no joke, he was just signed by the Ravens today. That's the kind of level we're talking with this potential signing.

Yeah that's close to where I'm falling, I'll give him the start of this season to check where he's at. 4-6 games should give a sense of how things are shaking out. But you're right, we saw him play for a full season. Now that was in a bad offense & on a bad team, but we still got to see him at times for what he can be. His ceiling is an above-average starter if everything goes perfectly. And those types can win a playoff game, maybe get lucky and go on a run one year. But the thing is, I just never saw him do anything that was like, "oh damn, 1 overall makes sense, this kid was made to be a QB". He was either completely off or executed according to plan. Never went above or really created out of structure. That's the issue for me, we were sold otherwise in that regard. And even taking out the idea of finding another Cam, I just want someone to create as much as Jake did. A decent talent with below average tools simply isn't fun. Especially when he looks out of his depth. That's my bottom line - you need a certain baseline toolset and he's such an outlier, I'm unsure if he's at that required floor. His tools don't give you a plus in any of the big categories you look for these days: arm strength, size, intermediate accuracy, speed, elusiveness, vision, timing. He's got toughness, professionalism, & smarts, but I mean, that can only take you so far in sports. We'll have an idea fairly quickly if he's more than what we saw last year and can create something in the QC.

I like the pace of conversation on a message board compared to other platforms. I'm also not with it enough to grasp that discord stuff or whatever it is, and I'm not talking my sports fandoms on my IG (which is my only social media account). Now, if anyone uses Sleeper for Fantasy, that can get fun if you have an active league. I've got a 12-team dynasty of 30-somethings that's been going on for 5 years and we love talking football & smack. It's a group of Packers, Browns, Steelers, and Panthers fans.

I mean it was. And he's not on the PUP so it's actually a good indicator, he can be made active at any moment.

For Bryce, it's not a stat line I'm looking for, although advanced metrics can be good indicators for improvement. What I can't unsee are the Indy, Chicago, Jags and NO games last year. Those were specifically the ones you don't want to see from anyone at this level, at any moment. Completely stunted, can't move the ball, can't sustain drives or get points. He really needs to figure a lot out this year at that fundamental level. We'll be able to tell fairly quickly when things start up if he still looks like a fish out of water. I'm giving some slack going into the season, but it will apparent early IMO. It will be telling if he has the growth in him/what it takes to be at least an average starter. Patience is indeed a virtue, but last year was bad enough that there needs to be a certain bar that's reached.

Brooks is expected. He's moving along with his recovery. All fairly notable guys though: 1-Yoshi will be an important OL piece if we want to maintain a decent level of play if a starter goes out. 2-Wonnum is expected, recovering from his injury last season 3-Barno looks good in spurts as a pass rusher, hopefully he's not out long 4-Coker is the UDFA most probably want to see succeed at WR

Attempted rebuild #3 since 2018. Let's ride.

It’s definitely migrated from a central focus—things change. Also- Online forums/message boards are pretty much dead. Sports fans are some of the few people keeping them afloat and from drifting into the interweb’s great beyond. Consider us lucky haha

The last 5 years has taught us there’s always more room to fall lol, we keep retooling, but haven’t figured out how to climb back yet. Only time will tell.

Oh Lordy we’ve reached “at least we aren’t the Jets” territory. This is close to rock bottom lol

Crazy to think our last playoff win was the NFC Title game nearly a decade ago. Only a handful of dwellers have playoff win drought longer than us. Go Panthers!

I'm a Daniels fan. They made a really promising swing at QB. Also think they got great value in Newton at DT and then Sainristil and Sinnott. Solid solid draft. There's good pieces, but if I was a fan, missing the coaching hire along with the shear amount of former-Panthers they've brought in would make me nervous. There's no disputing we've been the real cellar of the league for a minute now so why reunite so many from that regime? They've also had some shaky picks (Forbes, Allen, Dotson, etc.)...just a real roller coaster there.

oh yeah they got Trent Scott from our discards too.