Some perspective on next season that should have everyone very excited

[t96]

Obviously we all have playoff hopes and I'm pretty confident we'll win the division over the Aints and Falcons. That being said, there's of course a chance that there are some growing pains with the staff, roster and rookie QB and we wind up struggling a bit early on. The past 3 years come November/December we've pretty much been out of it and had nothing to root for or be excited about later in the season except for the draft. And then came all the bickering about tanking/not tanking.

This year even if we struggle early and playoffs look out of reach later in the season it's still going to be significantly more fun to continue watching our rookie QB's development later in the year. I'm probably not the only one who turned plenty of games off these past few years or went fishing or whatever instead of watching that crappy team. I can't see myself not enjoying every game this year as we get to watch and follow along a young exciting rookie QB and his development, even if he and the team do struggle early the upside and room to grow will be there. Something we haven't had at QB literally since Cam was a rookie.

[joemac]

We were literally playing for the division title the last couple weeks of the season last year....but yeah, I get what you're trying to say. 

[Jon Snow]

[t96]

7 minutes ago, joemac said:

We were literally playing for the division title the last couple weeks of the season last year....but yeah, I get what you're trying to say. 

Yeah but really just because of a fluky terrible division, many here wanted to tank and even with that run and nearly winning this trash division was anyone really truly excited about a potential playoff berth? We'd have just gotten smoked round 1 and probably wouldn't have been able to trade up to 1st overall and still wouldn't have a QB. And we may have kept Wilks which would've been a setback and not very exciting. 

[mccjeff]

It will be, let’s call it informative, to see how this plays out. Let’s say Dalton or the rook start the season and struggle/lose. At some point the new qb is playing and the team is all but eliminated from the playoffs. But Stroud/Young is starting to get a grip and play better. Will there still be a contingent losing their minds wanting to tank for picks instead of the qb winning “meaningless” games?