RR's press conference today

[outlaw4]

I'll play devil's advocate just to annoy people.

There are only so many roster spots on an NFL team. Most positions will have at least one backup in order to cope with any potential injuries. A team can still trudge forward if the players going down are across the entire team. It's another story when it's focused on a unit. Consider that at this juncture, Norwell is the only player that has remained a constant and with our luck this season, he may not survive either. Everyone else has either moved or has gone down at some juncture. We had two backups go down on Sunday and had to put in Tyler Larsen at center, a guy from the practice squad, because Chris Scott was too busy filling in for Trai who had to fill in in a spot he hadn't played since he was a teenager.

I'll leave it at this. I was one of the people that said in the offseason that I was concerned about our depth with the O-line. I was concerned that even one injury could derail the offense. Even so, the magnitude of issues is all but incomprehensible. Is it a conditioning issue? The grind from last season's playoff run? Some voodoo magic? 

[truthjuice]

16 minutes ago, BIGH2001 said:

Well you would think that once you experience a "position catastrophe" you would sign some.quality depth and make damn sure that it doesn't happen again.

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My mother always told us to never make the same mistake twice. The front office and HC probably missed this. 

[Davidson Deac II]

53 minutes ago, BIGH2001 said:

Well you would think that once you experience a "position catastrophe" you would sign some.quality depth and make damn sure that it doesn't happen again.

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Quality depth is an illusion when you are down third string at any position in the NFL.  

[Mr. Scot]

From yesterday's snap counts (courtesy of Voth)

Ryan Delaire - 21 snaps

Shaq Thompson - 17 snaps

 

Delaire was just coming off IR, by the way. He generated no stats.

 

 

 

Tell me again that Rivera is good at gameday roster management.

[BIGH2001]

Quality depth is an illusion when you are down third string at any position in the NFL.  

The problem is we dont even have a backup at left tackle and our starting right tackle shouldn't be starting at all. Sure you cant go 3 deep with starters but you can at least assure that your starters are decent so that you aren't going into the season having to play the equivalent of Byron Bell at Nate chandler at the tackle position if one starter goes down.

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[mc52beast]

So we're blaming our inability to win close games on our injuries... not sure if I've ever heard that one before.

[Saca312]

2 minutes ago, stbugs said:

Honestly, I wasn't that concerned on the depth. I think one more guy would have helped, but I loved Gradkowski at C/G, Scott had a lot of experience at G and Williams has actually shown now that he could be an above average RT and he was depth at the start. I didn't expect all the injuries, including so much shuffling in game. Not just one player going out, but multiple in a few games.

I was at training camp at the start of August and I remember Kalil hurting his shoulder. I believe I posted about it here. He and TD were going at it during a drill and Kalil went off pissed. I think his shoulder has been bothering him all year. TD walked all the way across an empty field to check on him. I thought he was going to be out for a bit. I wonder if we've been hurting at C all year and that's made Turner/Norwell have to help out more inside than outside? Having had to play our 4th center of the year on Sunday didn't help either, nor did losing Oher.

Our OL missed 4 games last year (Norwell 3, Kalil 1) at the positions they started the year. The other 3 played all 16 at their intended position. This year our opening lineup started 3 of 11 games at LT, 11 of 11 at LG, 8 of 11 at C, 11 of 11 at RG and 3 of 11 at RT. So, 4 games last year where the opening lineup was not the starter at their correct position out of 80 games. This year, that jumped to 19 out of 55 and is going to continue to get worse.

Maybe our luck ran out. Super Bowl hangover indeed. Penalties losing games. Missed kicks losing games. Multiple pick 6s losing games. Bad play calls taking us out of FG range multiple times losing games. Horrific turnover margin in the first 6 games losing games. Giving the ball back to the other team instead of going for the win losing games. On and on. So many bounces went our way last year that aren't this year.

This reminds me so much of the drastic difference in our 2003 and 2004 season.

2003, the cardiac cats lived up to their name, with the sheer amount of close games that the Panthers could clutch out.

2004, injuries piled on and on, and we missed the playoffs narrowly.

2015 we had a lot of close games honestly, but we clutched them out.

2016 injuries piled on and on, and likely missing the playoffs.

I just feel that we have some sort of injury superbowl curse or something. It's insane.

[Saca312]

1 minute ago, mc52beast said:

So we're blaming our inability to win close games on our injuries... not sure if I've ever heard that one before.

That's on coaching for the most part, but you're blind if you can't see injuries are having a huge effect.

2004 season ring a bell? Or were you not a fan at that point?

[BIGH2001]

17 minutes ago, Saca312 said:

That's on coaching for the most part, but you're blind if you can't see injuries are having a huge effect.

2004 season ring a bell? Or were you not a fan at that point?
 

 

04 was different since we lost far and away our most dynamic playmaker in the first game. Other than Stephen Davis who was already pretty old I don't remember volume of injuries being the problem that year.  Besides goings stepped up fine.

2004 would be the equivalent of us losing cam for the season in game 1.

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[truthjuice]

19 minutes ago, Promethean Forerunner said:

Dude, WTF... should we cut DBs and WRs just so we have 7 back ups for each starter? Get real man.

Shut up. What are you talking about? I never said any of that. We don't have quality. Take it or leave and yes, it's Gettlemans fault. You're gonna accept it because tonight, I'm not in the mood to go back and forth. 

[Navy_football]

6 minutes ago, Saca312 said:

This reminds me so much of the drastic difference in our 2003 and 2004 season.

2015 we had a lot of close games honestly [that were blowouts and the coaches sat on huge leads allowing comebacks], but we clutched them out.

2016 injuries piled on and on, and likely missing the playoffs.

I just feel that we have some sort of injury superbowl curse or something. It's insane.

Fify in 2015

[a girl is no one]

2004 would be the equivalent of us losing cam for the season in game 1.

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With the hits Cam took in game 1, it can be argued that we kind of did lose him then. If anything, it had some type of effect on him this season. The way that game went down, especially in regards to the officiating and "missed opportunities", set the tone for the season.

[pantherclaw]

These weekly threads.now show how.many know so little about a game they watch. 

I understand that a lot of fans are this way, but to have so many openly speak about things they simply don't grasp, is such a waste of time. 

 

 

[BIGH2001]

Ugh, again. Our starting 5 going into the year was 22-2 before the Super Bowl since Remmers, Norwell and Turner all became starters around Kalil and Oher was in the 17-1 run. This OL was ranked #5 in 2015 by PFF. Stop trying to compare our starting 5 to Byron Bell and Nate Chandler, it's just a plain terrible comparison.

The most OL any team carries on the 53 is 10 players, basically a back up at every spot. We've had to play 10 even though we started with only 9 on the 53. That wasn't just a couple plays here and there. We've had 7 different guys start 3 or more games and Scott has started 1 game and played significant time. Larsen just got called up and played most of the game against the Raiders.

Do people really think the amount of OL injuries we've had is normal and wouldn't have an impact? Look at what injuries did to Minnesota. Aren't they 1-5 in the last 6? Rodgers got destroyed a few years ago with his OL fell apart due to injuries.

The fact that our below average RT the backup plan for an injury to our LT is the problem. Once the Oher domino fell the entire line was in shambles because of the weak link on the left side. It shouldn't be that way.

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