LinvilleGorge

What if the situation is that the football people think Fields is a legit franchise QB prospect, but they'd prefer to pick an OT or CB they have graded higher? We know Tepper's philosophy. Coach, GM, QB. Everything else is a want. Those are the three needs.

At the end of the day, if you're taking big risks you're putting your job on the line. Coaches and GMs know this. They know the expectation of the job. If you don't build a winner you're gonna get fired. That's just the nature of the beast.

Congrats on making the whiniest post in this thread whining about whining.

I get that. And that's likely why he's pushing for Fields. He has said that there are three components to fielding a consistently competitive NFL team - coach, GM, and QB. He's pretty sure he's checked two of the three boxes but there's still a big question mark on the third. I don't think he would be pushing for Fields if we didn't really like him ("we" meaning the football people). Sure, we may have an OT or a CB rated higher than Fields. Great. But, an OT or a CB isn't one of Tepper's core components. If you don't have a franchise QB and you think there's a franchise QB available, you take the QB. Period. A Joe Thomas isn't carrying an average QB to the Super Bowl and neither is a Darrelle Revis. You NEED a franchise QB to consistently compete. A top tier LT or CB are nice pieces but you can build a great team without one. You can't build a great team without a franchise QB.

Yeah, that's not how things actually work. When you're signing the checks you have as much say as you want, for better or worse.

There's another option too. Don't force either and take the best path forward given the options available. IMO, if you don't have a franchise QB you can't pass on a franchise QB prospect. If that's what we think Fields is then by all means he should be the pick if he's there. Having Darnold here means we're not forced to throw him to the wolves if he isn't ready.

Because you didn't think he'd be there at #8 at the time. I said basically this same thing yesterday.

Ouch.

Going down to #15 without their 1st next year being involved is a no thanks IMO.

You want to pay a guy $17M in new money in the form of base salary this year to be a backup? Good grief.

FWIW, I think when all is said and done Newsome ends up being the best CB out of this draft.

A CB in the 1st wouldn't shock me. Everything about our defensive scheme last year was built around protecting our weakness in the back end. I read up on Snow after questioning his hire. What we saw was not his scheme. He was simply trying to scheme around what he had to work with and honestly, I think he did a pretty damn good job. One way or the other, I expect a CB in the first three rounds.

No one in the NFL cares if college kids are taking money under the table though. NCAA concerns aren't their concerns.

If it indeed happens I gotta think it is heavily related to off field concerns. Because honestly on the field, he looks like a guy who would be the first QB taken in many drafts.

I mean, potential off field issues and "processing issues" aside, Shanny sarcastically talked about everyone wanting a guy who can move like Lamar Jackson and throw like Drew Brees... hell, Justin Fields might be the closest to that I've seen. No, he can't quite move like Lamar or throw like Brees, but damn if he can't do both a helluva lit better than most.

I wouldn't draft Mac Jones with our 2nd rounder. *ducks and runs*

I was super intrigued by him. Then I watched that game this spring. I get that it was not an ideal situation with COVID and him only appearing in one game. But, damn. That really looked like a poor man's The Golden Calf of Bristol. Admittedly, that's why I didn't even bother digging into him more. If there had been more smoke about the Panthers being interested I would have but absent that smoke I just didn't care enough to do it

Now do Trey Lance.

It's odd to me to think that the Fields concerns are based on racism when one of the guys who has evidently leap frogged him is another black QB who has played the weakest college competition of all the top prospects with probably the second best comparative supporting cast vs. his opponents' and who pretty much looked like The Golden Calf of Bristol the last time we saw him on a college field. Just saying...

I still haven't really done any digging on Lance, but I definitely agree on having Fields behind Lawrence and Wilson. I was pounding that Wilson drum back in October.

The bad thing is that he had three years to adjust and hasn't.

That's one thing I can't account for. If we pass on him due to character concerns then so be it.

Except he's not basically a rookie. He's a guy who has played three [terrible] seasons in the NFL as a starting QB. He's probably started more games at QB in the NFL than any of the incoming rookies we're talking about have started games at QB in college.

It's a sunk cost. If you bypass what you seem a better option due to the sunk cost of a trade that involved relative peanuts when considering the importance of the QB position, then I think that's peak dumbassery. We had to strike out several times to arrive at Sam Darnold. We were hell-bent not to roll with Teddy. We did our homework and deemed that the QBs we valued at #8 wouldn't be there so we made what we deemed the best option available for us at the time. If it works out that we were wrong on how the draft board would fall and one of those QBs we did value at #8 is there, he should absolutely still be the pick.

Why?