7th Round (227th overall) - OL Lachavious Simmons, Tennessee State | Bears 2020 Draft

[soulman]

17 hours ago, Heinz D. said:

He's really good at pancaking terrible defenders. 

Ah ha, wondered if anyone else picked up on that.  He looked great steam rolling guys 50 lbs or more lighter than himself.  That's not gonna happen at this level.

What is see is a big strong OG prospect.  I didn't like what I saw of him at OT at all.  IMHO he's not quick enough or athletic enough for the edge or at least he isn't right now.  But I'm good with adding more of this type to that collection of FAs and PS guys we have now hoping that at least one eventually develops into either a starter or a front line backup.

Next year we'll have our picks back in the first three rounds and Pace can focus on OL upgrades then because as it stands we're stuck with Leno and Massie through 2020 anyway so let's hope Castillo can improve on what we got from them last year.  Clearly Nagy and HH were not on the same page as far as fitting the OL blocking scheme to Nagy's overall needs.

Edited April 26, 2020 by soulman

[Heinz D.]

1 hour ago, soulman said:

Next year we'll have our picks back in the first three rounds and Pace can focus on OL upgrades then because as it stands we're stuck with Leno and Massie through 2020 anyway so let's hope Castillo can improve on what we got from them last year.  Clearly Nagy and HH were not on the same page as far as fitting the OL blocking scheme to Nagy's overall needs.

It's clear Pace thinks the Castillo hiring will pay big dividends. I'm not so sure that's a very safe way to go about it, but here we are. I also wanted a guy who could potentially put Leno or Massie on the bench, salary be damned, but it appears that Pace is more afraid of looking foolish than he is of a repeat sub-par performance by the line. 

[soulman]

22 hours ago, Heinz D. said:

It's clear Pace thinks the Castillo hiring will pay big dividends. I'm not so sure that's a very safe way to go about it, but here we are. I also wanted a guy who could potentially put Leno or Massie on the bench, salary be damned, but it appears that Pace is more afraid of looking foolish than he is of a repeat sub-par performance by the line. 

Leno and Massie have both played well enough to have earned new contracts so Castillo's challenge is more or less to get them back to level they played at prior to 2019 and improve the overall schemes and cohesion of 5 OL and a TE.  I don't believe it's so much that we lack talent as it was that HH couldn't seem to get the OL to digest Nagy's scheme.  Or maybe Nagy's run schemes just plain suck.

Supposedly Castillo has far more experience in knowing how to build blocking schemes for this offense so we'll see.  For two OTs who were 7th and 4th round picks I don't know that we can expect much more than slightly above average work from them individually   IMHO the entire playbook for the running schemes has to be re-written.  Either these guys don't get it or it plain old doesn't work as written.

But here's the thing.  We may have to keep depending on Castillo or whoever is OL coach to keep developing players taken deeper in the draft.  Our goal to win big will keep us from drafting top OT talent in every draft provided we succeed.  In any given draft there are probably just 2 or 3 sure fire day one starters as NFL OTs and how many can handle LT right out of the box?

Day two guys can be very hit and miss.  Spriggs, the kid we picked up from GB was on our list to draft when GB jumped us and took him off the board.  Pace then traded back and took Whitehair and so far we've come out ahead.  But Spriggs was once seen as late 1st early 2nd talent so can Castillo somehow get that out of him?  If so he's our replacement for Massie next year and a swing OT this year.

[Heinz D.]

5 hours ago, soulman said:

Leno and Massie have both played well enough to have earned new contracts so Castillo's challenge is more or less to get them back to level they played at prior to 2019 and improve the overall schemes and cohesion of 5 OL and a TE.  I don't believe it's so much that we lack talent as it was that HH couldn't seem to get the OL to digest Nagy's scheme.  Or maybe Nagy's run schemes just plain suck.

Leno and Massie earned new contracts by being all right. And their contracts sort of reflect that. That doesn't mean we should have to settle for "all right", nor that we shouldn't be really alarmed when those previously sort-of-average guys have a series of blatant meltdowns on the field. Because that's exactly what happened to Leno. As to Nagy's run schemes--yeah, it's pretty obvious they just plain sucked. The offensive players had a closed door meeting with him, and what happened next? A blocking fullback! Pulling guards! Sweeps! And guess what? It worked. But apparently the fact it worked pissed Nagy off, because four games later he'd forgotten about everything he changed and we were back to those pathetic inside zone runs with Cohen again.

5 hours ago, soulman said:

But here's the thing.  We may have to keep depending on Castillo or whoever is OL coach to keep developing players taken deeper in the draft.  Our goal to win big will keep us from drafting top OT talent in every draft provided we succeed.  In any given draft there are probably just 2 or 3 sure fire day one starters as NFL OTs any and how many can handle LT right out of the box?

As to the bolded, we'll go just go straight off with the biggest problem with that declaration--it simply isn't true. And doesn't that declaration have a lot to do with the line you currently have anyway? And...even if we assume that statement to be right, shouldn't Leno's staggering breakdowns (from, let's remember, an "all-right" player to begin with) give us enough pause that we'd want to draft a potential replacement high? 

5 hours ago, soulman said:

Day two guys can be very hit and miss.  Spriggs, the kid we picked up from GB was on our list to draft when GB jumped us and took him off the board.  Pace then traded back and took Whitehair and so far we've come out ahead.  But Spriggs was once seen as late 1st early 2nd talent so can Castillo somehow get that out of him?  If so he's our replacement for Massie next year and a swing OT this year.

If Spriggs works out for the Bears it's going to be absolutely delicious. I will laugh my *** off. I'm pulling for the kid. It could definitely be that he finally succeeds, with the Bears...

Edited April 27, 2020 by Heinz D.

[soulman]

3 hours ago, Heinz D. said:

Leno and Massie earned new contracts by being all right. And their contracts sort of reflect that. That doesn't mean we should have to settle for "all right", nor that we shouldn't be really alarmed when those previously sort-of-average guys have a series of blatant meltdowns on the field. Because that's exactly what happened to Leno. As to Nagy's run schemes--yeah, it's pretty obvious they just plain sucked. The offensive players had a closed door meeting with him, and what happened next? A blocking fullback! Pulling guards! Sweeps! And guess what? It worked. But apparently the fact it worked pissed Nagy off, because four games later he'd forgotten about everything he changed and we were back to those pathetic inside zone runs with Cohen again.

As to the bolded, we'll go just go straight off with the biggest problem with that declaration--it simply isn't true. And doesn't that declaration have a lot to do with the line you currently have anyway? And...even if we assume that statement to be right, shouldn't Leno's staggering breakdowns (from, let's remember, an "all-right" player to begin with) give us enough pause that we'd want to draft a potential replacement high? 

If Spriggs works out for the Bears it's going to be absolutely delicious. I will laugh my *** off. I'm pulling for the kid. It could definitely be that he finally succeeds, with the Bears...

Let's be honest.  Leno was a 7th round pick for a reason, or possibly for several reasons.  We've surely gotten our moneys worth from that pick but at his very best he's an average run blocker and a slightly above average pass blocker.  I'm not advising we settle for that forever but for now we have to.

I will challenge you then to give me a list of rookie OTs who have immediately stepped into day one starting positions AND succeeded. Many who have played in college spread offenses have initially struggled making the transition to the NFL.   So I'll stand by my post.  Any sure fire day one starter at LT will almost certainly be a top ten pick.  RT guys will typically go later.  Late 1st round and 2nd round rookies are far more doubtful as day one starters and many wash out.  We've had our share of those as well.

My point is that as long as we're winning it will be tougher for us to draft that sure fire starting LT so as we did with Leno we had better be drafting as many OTs as we can in hopes we do get lucky with another later round pick just in case.   All of the top OTs in the 2020 draft were taken by pick #13.  Jackson at #18 is not a sure fire starter and Wilson at #29 will probably play OG in the NFL.  There was only one true OT taken in round two (Cleveland at #58) and I don't see him as a day one starting NFL LT.  Josh Jones who many wanted Pace to draft didn't go 'til pick #72 in round three.  Only two more OTs were taken in round three at picks #96 and #99.

Four OTs went in the first 13 picks and only five in the next 86 picks none of whom are sure fire day one starters.  I'm just dealing with the reality of how rare really good OTs are.  So we either have to get very lucky with a later pick or we may have to settle for slightly above average because we've been just about as bad drafting OTs as we have QBs.  Castillo is gonna have to earn his money with us.  JMHO

[Heinz D.]

11 minutes ago, soulman said:

Let's be honest.  Leno was a 7th round pick for a reason, or possibly for several reasons.  We've surely gotten our moneys worth from that pick but at his very best he's an average run blocker and a slightly above average pass blocker.  I'm not advising we settle for that forever but for now we have to.

Why? 

[soulman]

14 minutes ago, Heinz D. said:

Why? 

A) His contract.  $7.376 mil dead cap vs only $8 mil in salary. https://www.spotrac.com/nfl/chicago-bears/charles-leno-14657/

B) Lack of an NFL ready replacement.

We knew long before the draft that Leno and Massie contracts would make it impossible to just release them 'til at least 2021.

 

[Heinz D.]

18 hours ago, soulman said:

A) His contract.  $7.376 mil dead cap vs only $8 mil in salary. https://www.spotrac.com/nfl/chicago-bears/charles-leno-14657/

B) Lack of an NFL ready replacement.

We knew long before the draft that Leno and Massie contracts would make it impossible to just release them 'til at least 2021.

 

He could be the swing tackle if we drafted a better guy? And maybe competition at certain spots would be helpful, regardless? 

Edited April 28, 2020 by Heinz D.

[dll2000]

I still love that he has the cool sounding long name that his mom probably thought about for hours and then people call him Pig.  

LOL

[soulman]

1 hour ago, Heinz D. said:

He could be the swing tackle if we drafted a better guy? And maybe competition at certain spots would be helpful, regardless? 

Heinz, after the middle of round one I don't see even one rookie OT who could have come here and started. 

Leno is not J'Marcus Webb for cryin' out loud and Massie is not Frank Omiyale or Gabe Carimi.  They're both functional and usually dependable OTs and also who will most likely be starting this year so we should all just accept that.  If Pace thought he could have brought in a better OT via the draft he would've.  That guy didn't exist for us. Cleveland and Jones aren't seen as NFL ready guys.

Could we do better right now?  No  Any improvement will have to come internally for now.

Sorry but that's my story and I'm stickin' to it.

[dll2000]

16 hours ago, soulman said:

Heinz, after the middle of round one I don't see even one rookie OT who could have come here and started. 

Leno is not J'Marcus Webb for cryin' out loud and Massie is not Frank Omiyale or Gabe Carimi.  They're both functional and usually dependable OTs and also who will most likely be starting this year so we should all just accept that.  If Pace thought he could have brought in a better OT via the draft he would've.  That guy didn't exist for us. Cleveland and Jones aren't seen as NFL ready guys.

Could we do better right now?  No  Any improvement will have to come internally for now.

Sorry but that's my story and I'm stickin' to it.

Not true.  

I think Johnson could have taken a spot in year one in a fair competition.   I think a healthy Prince has a legit shot too. 

Leno and Massie aren’t awful, but they aren’t particularly good either.  Both have been awful in individual games.  

You could have had both Johnson and Prince.  Pace just doesn’t value OL highly for some reason. 

[dll2000]

2 minutes ago, dll2000 said:

Not true.  

I think Johnson could have taken a spot in year one in a fair competition.   I think a healthy Prince has a legit shot too. 

Leno and Massie aren’t awful, but they aren’t particularly good either.  Both have been awful in individual games.  

You could have had both Johnson and Prince.  Pace just doesn’t value OL highly for some reason. 

@soulmanAz said they had a first round grade on Johnson and have no idea why he fell. 

Edited April 29, 2020 by dll2000
Typo

[dll2000]

i think Pace could have taken two first round caliber players in Johnson (OT) and Johnson (Cb) in second.  
 

[dll2000]

Just now, dll2000 said:

i think Pace could have taken two first round caliber players in Johnson (OT) and Johnson (Cb) in second.  
 

He could have then traded up for Kmet and that would have been a heck of a draft IMO. 

[soulman]

19 hours ago, dll2000 said:

Not true.  

I think Johnson could have taken a spot in year one in a fair competition.   I think a healthy Prince has a legit shot too. 

Leno and Massie aren’t awful, but they aren’t particularly good either.  Both have been awful in individual games.  

You could have had both Johnson and Prince.  Pace just doesn’t value OL highly for some reason. 

So we disagree as well.  Time will tell of course but I'm holding my position.  Leno and Massie are the guys Pace intends to ride with.

IMHO the sheer amount of NFL experience both Massie and Leno have would outweigh any physical edge other Day 2 rookies may have.  Neither would be easily tradeable for more value than they provide here and then you also have $$$ committed to them as starters. So with all due respect I think you're dreaming to believe either would have been replaced by a rookie in 2020.

Alex Bars was considered a potential mid round pick prior to his injury in his senior year but couldn't pick up playing time over others last season.  Previous Bears OT picks like CWill and Carimi did not play well at all as rookies despite both being mid to late 1st round picks. I believe Jason Spriggs was also high on our board before GB jumped us for him.  He busted out in GB and we picked him up.  He may be as good now as any OT we may have drafted in place of Kmet and Johnson.  At least we'll find out and he didn't cost us a pick.

I believe Pace will draft a top ranked OT if he ever gets a shot at one but until then he'll keep doing what he's been doing hoping to develop at least one of our own from later round picks or by signing UFAs to try out.  If the OTs in the 2021 draft class look good that may be when he looks to draft one but it's way to early for that kind of prediction now.