Mike Clay 2020 NFL projection

[Sgt Schultz]

Just now, mrcompletely11 said:

vegas had their over under wins at 5

 

https://www.cbssports.com/nfl/news/2019-nfl-win-totals-vegas-released-totals-for-all-32-teams-here-are-our-favorite-picks-for-2019/

That's great, we don't need to play the season.  Most of the talking heads had it at negative 5.

Those same picks had Baltimore with 8.5 wins.  They had 14.  Buffalo with 6.5, they had 10.  Cincy with 6, they had 2.  Green Bay with 9, they had 13.  The Chargers with 9.5, they had 5.  The 49ers with 8, and they finished with 13.  Mark me down as unimpressed.

I have zero expectations for the upcoming season, and about the only thing that would surprise me is them having a shot at the playoffs in December.  But even so, a few injuries to key people around the league and a team somehow coming out of left field to gel and surprise people are not unusual circumstances.  It is pretty hard to accurately predict who will fill those roles in June.

[mrcompletely11]

1 minute ago, Sgt Schultz said:

That's great, we don't need to play the season.  Most of the talking heads had it at negative 5.

Those same picks had Baltimore with 8.5 wins.  They had 14.  Buffalo with 6.5, they had 10.  Cincy with 6, they had 2.  Green Bay with 9, they had 13.  The Chargers with 9.5, they had 5.  The 49ers with 8, and they finished with 13.  Mark me down as unimpressed.

I have zero expectations for the upcoming season, and about the only thing that would surprise me is them having a shot at the playoffs in December.  But even so, a few injuries to key people around the league and a team somehow coming out of left field to gel and surprise people are not unusual circumstances.  It is pretty hard to accurately predict who will fill those roles in June.

My point was about crappy teams.  They tend to nail those more times than not.  I suspect its much harder to pin down teams in the 7-9 win area. 

 

I just don't see any other scenario where we are not a bottom tier team and more importantly vegas agrees with me. 

[Carl Spackler]

Was Brian Burns really that bad against the run, or did we have garbage NTs and a coach who hates playing rookies?

[jfra78]

24 minutes ago, Carl Spackler said:

Was Brian Burns really that bad against the run, or did we have garbage NTs and a coach who hates playing rookies?

Being in a cast probably didnt help things

[Stingray3030]

3 minutes ago, jfra78 said:

Being in a cast probably didnt help things

For sure - and funny to blame a DE/OLB for being bad against the run.  I seem to recall most of our run leaks up the middle which is pretty tough to blame on the DE/OLB - especially in a 3-4.

I think the term "Above average" is bothering people too....literally means the top 16-30 DE's in the league.  This original post had KK 12th, Brown 34th, and Burns 39th.  It isn't really all that nuts that some think Burns will be 10-15 spots better than that.

All this about a 2nd year player too - I mean he is just as likely to see a big improvement as none being that young.  It isn't like I am predicting a significant improvement for a guy with 6-7 years of the same mediocrity. 

[AU-panther]

4 hours ago, mrcompletely11 said:

Wr rb.   Thats it.  Dline is well below avg

I didn't say Dline.  DI, as in defensive interior,  should be better than average.  Short and Brown should be better than average.  Kerr as rotational isn't bad either.

 

 

[Khyber53]

5 hours ago, mrcompletely11 said:

Which games do you disagree with?

I'm actually disagreeing with his entire methodology. Considering that the author is a Fantasy Football guy, I think he's basing scoring and capabilities much like they do players for pre-season fantasy publications -- heavy emphasis on prior performance for established vets, underplaying good players with less name recognition and vastly overrating the performance of offensive rookies taken in the first round. Now, while fantasy football can approximate what football boils down to, it just doesn't get the whole performance into play. 

Basically, when it comes down to it, his reasoning is all on paper and wayyyy too early to get worried about at this time of the year. We haven't even had training camps (we really don't even know for sure when or if we will have them at this time), we don't know if the lack of contact before the season will affect some teams more than others, and we haven't seen the handful of summer injuries or surprise retirements that always pop up.

As to the Panthers, I think we'll be better than he predicts, but that is just rank optimism on my part. As a Panthers fan, I'd be willing to bet I have (and you as well) have paid more attention to the changes happening here. To him we're a floundering organization that lost its entire coaching staff before the end of the season, it's potential HoF TE, it's definite HoF MLB, and it's probable HoF QB. We also lost a ton of high dollar defensive vets. Out of all of that, most of us can agree that only one, maybe two, of those losses are for the bad. And we're bringing in a coaching staff that has basically no pro tape for him to view, there's just not a lot of research for him to go on there. I think they'll be an improvement, but I'm just some guy on the internet with nothing better to do than offer my opinions.

 

[PleaseCutStewart]

7 hours ago, mrcompletely11 said:

Ah yeah dog.  This is some good  stuff.   A time killer for sure

 

https://g.espncdn.com/s/ffldraftkit/20/NFLDK2020_CS_ClayProjections.pdf

 

spoiler alert he has us pegged at 2nd worse with 4 wins.  Trevor Lawrence (or justin fields) come on down

 

 

So the win probability for us is less than 50% in every game, meaning we would be the underdog in every game.  Yeah.... Not buying that....

I think 6 wins is definitely possible - Raiders, Cards, Bears, Lions, Broncos, and Redskins are pretty weak teams. I think we also steal a division game.

I hope I'm wrong and we go 1-15 so we can get the #1 pick (since the odds of making the playoffs are slim to none), but I think our offense is going to surprise because they will actually not have an idiot at OC for a change.

[Rags]

With how this year has gone I refuse to make predictions for any team.

[AU-panther]

23 hours ago, PleaseCutStewart said:

So the win probability for us is less than 50% in every game, meaning we would be the underdog in every game.  Yeah.... Not buying that....

I think 6 wins is definitely possible - Raiders, Cards, Bears, Lions, Broncos, and Redskins are pretty weak teams. I think we also steal a division game.

I hope I'm wrong and we go 1-15 so we can get the #1 pick (since the odds of making the playoffs are slim to none), but I think our offense is going to surprise because they will actually not have an idiot at OC for a change.

If our offense is anywhere close to being remotely good it kind of debunks the idea that a team has to spend a lot of resources on an O-line to be good.

 

[Rags]

9 minutes ago, AU-panther said:

If our offense is anywhere close to being remotely good it kind of debunks the idea that a team has to spend a lot of resources on an O-line to be good.

 

Depends on the offense.

If it's a vertical offense like what we tried to run with Shula, you really want as many guys who can hold their own and get to where they need to be as long as possible.

For a more rhythm based, quick passing offense, like what we are persuambly gonna run with Teddy, you just want guys who aren't Matt Kalil or Byron Bell and are at least aware in passpro.

[mc52beast]

I’d be happy with the guy from North Dakota

[weyco2000]

On 6/12/2020 at 4:45 PM, Khyber53 said:

I'm actually disagreeing with his entire methodology. Considering that the author is a Fantasy Football guy, I think he's basing scoring and capabilities much like they do players for pre-season fantasy publications -- heavy emphasis on prior performance for established vets, underplaying good players with less name recognition and vastly overrating the performance of offensive rookies taken in the first round. Now, while fantasy football can approximate what football boils down to, it just doesn't get the whole performance into play. 

Basically, when it comes down to it, his reasoning is all on paper and wayyyy too early to get worried about at this time of the year. We haven't even had training camps (we really don't even know for sure when or if we will have them at this time), we don't know if the lack of contact before the season will affect some teams more than others, and we haven't seen the handful of summer injuries or surprise retirements that always pop up.

As to the Panthers, I think we'll be better than he predicts, but that is just rank optimism on my part. As a Panthers fan, I'd be willing to bet I have (and you as well) have paid more attention to the changes happening here. To him we're a floundering organization that lost its entire coaching staff before the end of the season, it's potential HoF TE, it's definite HoF MLB, and it's probable HoF QB. We also lost a ton of high dollar defensive vets. Out of all of that, most of us can agree that only one, maybe two, of those losses are for the bad. And we're bringing in a coaching staff that has basically no pro tape for him to view, there's just not a lot of research for him to go on there. I think they'll be an improvement, but I'm just some guy on the internet with nothing better to do than offer my opinions.

 

This^

Pretty much everyone on here was demanding changes, but only the changes they want. 

I think offensively we'll be explosive and as you pointed out, will have the advantage of a new system. Defensively we'll need a simple system designed for our rookies to understand quickly and be somewhat effective. 

Anything is possible, but hopefully Division games will be priority. 

[stbugs]

On 6/12/2020 at 4:45 PM, Khyber53 said:

I'm actually disagreeing with his entire methodology. Considering that the author is a Fantasy Football guy, I think he's basing scoring and capabilities much like they do players for pre-season fantasy publications -- heavy emphasis on prior performance for established vets, underplaying good players with less name recognition and vastly overrating the performance of offensive rookies taken in the first round. Now, while fantasy football can approximate what football boils down to, it just doesn't get the whole performance into play. 

Basically, when it comes down to it, his reasoning is all on paper and wayyyy too early to get worried about at this time of the year. We haven't even had training camps (we really don't even know for sure when or if we will have them at this time), we don't know if the lack of contact before the season will affect some teams more than others, and we haven't seen the handful of summer injuries or surprise retirements that always pop up.

As to the Panthers, I think we'll be better than he predicts, but that is just rank optimism on my part. As a Panthers fan, I'd be willing to bet I have (and you as well) have paid more attention to the changes happening here. To him we're a floundering organization that lost its entire coaching staff before the end of the season, it's potential HoF TE, it's definite HoF MLB, and it's probable HoF QB. We also lost a ton of high dollar defensive vets. Out of all of that, most of us can agree that only one, maybe two, of those losses are for the bad. And we're bringing in a coaching staff that has basically no pro tape for him to view, there's just not a lot of research for him to go on there. I think they'll be an improvement, but I'm just some guy on the internet with nothing better to do than offer my opinions.

 

Love your optimism but in the same way where you say he’s not familiar with our new guys versus Cam, Luke, Olsen, McCoy, Addison, etc., one could say that you are too familiar. We know as fans that we can value players way more than the rest of the league.

I think this type of offseason is really going to hurt us because we have so many new things. ESPN had a continuity review and we were dead last in just about everything. 47% of snaps returning and the next worst was 65%. 10 O/D returning starters when the next worst was 13 or 14. 1 returning coordinator (ST) and 1 of 20 or 21 returning assistants.

We have so much new and we are going to have a short offseason. That’s not a good recipe for winning games. I think our rookies will have to do a lot and without an entire offseason, I’d worry that they’ll hit the rookie wall harder. I like the rookies but they are rookies. Even CMC wasn’t amazing to start and there’s no rookie on his level.

I’m sure I seem like Debbie Downer but I don’t think the rankings having us near the bottom are out of whack at all. If we have any key injuries, our depth is suspect at best. God forbid we have 2016 OL injuries because Teddy will not make it. Also, what if Rhule and staff aren’t ready for the NFL game? If Snow’s D isn’t successful, Teddy is going to get sacked 80 times since he’ll be throwing 40-50+ passes a game. There’s a ton of unknowns and we have absolutely lost 2020 net NFL talent from a 5-11 team.

Also, look at the bolded comment. That’s pure homerism. Luke, Addison and Bradberry are big holes and that’s without arguing about anyone else. One, maybe two? Let’s be real and I know the D sucked. That’s why I think we are in for a long season and also why I would have rather rolled over $90M in cap the next two years (Teddy, Short and Robbie), kept our 3rd and 4th/5th round comp picks and gone hard after a franchise QB/OL/WR in the next draft with 10 or 11 picks.