Spinning Tires: Steelers 2021 Offseason and Beyond...

[warfelg]

15 hours ago, Dcash4 said:

If these were the only two option, sure I would enjoy the extended window. But that’s where my problem with the view lies: those are not the only two options. It’s an unlimited number of things that could happen.We could get the number 1 pick next year and never make the super bowl again. We could make the playoffs this year and then be in the super bowl for 3 straight. We could take the #1 projected qb in a draft who ends up the worst qb in that draft. TJ could wake up tomorrow and say, I’m good, let’s call it a career. Minkah could Sean Spence in game 1. 
 

 

So here's my problem with taking option one: Because you think anything can happen there's no plan for the future.  It's my same issue with continual restructuring and just "oh let's put it all on this year".  You keep bringing up this "never know what the future holds"; well if you plan for it better then you know what it holds.

Like as of right now, we've pushed some dead money into 2022 by contract structures, the Steelers have even tried to talk Villy out of selling his house because they want him back.  So, yey, even more of this likely putting in void years, impacting future cap.  

Quote

There are far too many variables in the NFL for me to care about 5 years from now, or the projection of how we will be then. 7/8th of our team won’t be here then and that’s not a knock on our roster — it’s just how the NFL is. The 49ers thought they had a stud defense for years to come...then Bowman could never stay healthy, Willis retired real early, and Borland (?) retired after his rookie year out of fear for his health. You just have no idea what will happen. 

Teams that have that window have it because of their QB. And while having a top pick can help, there’s no guarantee and losing isn’t the only way to get it. Of the guys in my top 10 QBs (not in order): Brady’s a 6th round pick, Wilson was a 3rd, Mahomes was the 10th pick by a team who traded from 27, Watson was the 12th pick traded to from a team drafting 25 and the 3rd QB taken that year, Rodgers was 24th, Allen was the 3rd in his draft (taken 7th traded from 12), Dak was taken in the 4th, Lamar was 32nd and traded to get. The other two would be Stafford and Murray — finally: 1st round, first pick. It’s too big of a crapshoot to get that guy to hinge your decision on tanking a year in hopes that the future is brighter. 

So then why should any team think about building for the future.  Seriously.  If your opinion is that you should play for the here and now, then there's surely NFL teams that don't know what they are doing right?

Honestly, the Niners outcome is extremely rare, so sighting it as why you shouldn't worry about planning for the future is a bit of a 'bad faith' argument IMO because it uses one of the rare times that things like that happened.  But you also leave out that it was an offense built on a running game and when the QB was asked to throw he was bad, with 2 old WR's, an average OL, and average RB's.

Also let's pick apart your QB thing:

Brady - Came into a team that was defensive minded with a strong run game.  Go back to those early 2000's teams Pats teams and see what it was like with that.

Wilson - Came into a team that was defensive minded with a strong run game.

Mahomes - Top 10 pick, 2nd QB taken, sat a year, playing with the best offensive HC in the NFL.

Watson - 12th pick, one of the rare ones taken outside the top 10 that didn't go straight to a team that could do something without him.

**A side note on the "team originally drafting" doesn't really help things here because that means playoff team, which was strong elsewhere anyways, OR it means that the teams that moves up scouted and saw something other teams didn't**

Rodgers - 2nd QB taken, sat a few years behind Favre, needed a lot of things about his game rebuilt.

Allen - I'm actually gonna say this: You won't think of him as a top 10 QB this time next year.  2021 was more a outlier based on his history.  But even there, again a player that went to a team with a strong run game and a good defense.

Dak - No he didn't have a strong defense, but he had an elite run game to help him out.

Lamar - Strong run game and a great defense.

Stafford and Murray - Average defense and no run game.

So you go on this run about 1st overall picks not being top 10 guys, but fail to acknowledge the other things in these situations that went well for those QB's.  As of right now, we're not set up like those other teams.

Quote

The chances may improve to open that window, but it’s not a drastic change of percentage that it happens. Without the guarantee of sucking putting us in any better spot...I’d rather not suck. 

I'd rather not suck too, but it's gonna happen someday.

Quote

I’m not trying to disagree that we were some stud team through 12 weeks...but I hate this argument. What are you supposed to do? Not win the games? This is life in the NFL. Things happen. Should we put an asterisks by every team in the back half of the year that played us without multiple starters on the defensive? Should we take away a Bills win when DJ drops the second play of the game and instantly takes all the air out of the room? No. It’s the way of the world. Because you can say the same thing in reverse: the last 6 games were more an aberration than reality. You play the games you play and you win the games you win. The Dolphins had one really solid 3 game stretch last year. Should we think they suck because they only had 3 quality wins? 

I’m just not sure what that stretch of games proves. Were we the #1 team in the league when we owned the top record, no that’s now how that always works....but it’s also not like we were the 21st best team masquerading as a contender. We were a good, not great team. We had things work in our favor. We had things NOT work in our favor later in the year. It’s the NFL. One play changing the course of games is what happens. Should we go back and scrutinize the Chiefs 8 wins by less than 1 score? The Bills played 5 games against the Jets, Pats, and Denver...were they more of an 8 win team?

We went 5-3 against playoff teams in the regular season who won 4 playoff games combined. That’s not a trash team. It’s a good, not great team...which is exactly what we were. Playing out worst game in the playoffs has really destroyed what that team was in reality. 

I bring it up because the often used counter to we might not be good in 2021 is "we started 11-0".  Well put some context to it.  And you make the "21st best team masquerading as a contender".....actually that almost what we were.  Adjusting for schedule we were very much a pretender.  Do you honestly think last year was that good of a team?

Quote

As do I. But to summarizes my feelings. There no guarantee in the NFL about the future. The only guarantee tanking this year would give us is the guarantee of one bad year. So if we see an opportunity to make playoffs, I’m for it. Because we never know when we might be back again and anything can happen if you get hot at the right time. 

I love having these conversations put you are really ticking me off by saying what I'm advocating for is tanking.  I never said tank.  All I've said is there's gonna be a day where we are gonna have to correct the cap, have at least a year of being potentially bad.  We're such a flawed team top to bottom.  And honestly you throw that 'never know how long' out there; playoff droughts as long as the Bills or Browns is very rare.  For most teams it's about 3-4 years.  That's the great thing about the NFL and the hard cap salary structure, that teams have to lose players at the expense of other teams.  

I'm not advocating us to tank, I'm just saying move on from this era. I would have loved nothing more than to see this team keep the defense together, use the draft to put together a good run game, move on from Ben, and if we made the playoffs with Mason struggling, or were just average with Mason struggling, then you give up the multiple 1sts to move up for a QB.  Instead we've lost snaps on defense without replacements, we're bringing back an offense that struggles, and expecting it to be better.

Remind me the definition of insanity?  Is it doing the same thing and magically everything will get better?

[warfelg]

38 minutes ago, bigben07MVP said:

Please no.

"We need to get better in the run game"

 

Proceeds to run back the same line that struggled with a worse center.

[warfelg]

Honestly I wish Art would just stop talking.  He says so many good things, then the team doesn't follow through with those things.  Additionally, I'm ready for a new vision at the GM chair.  Someone that sees things differently.  What happened to the GM that let guys go 2-3 years too soon?  I feel like we're the team that now holds onto guys a year too long.

[Dcash4]

8 minutes ago, warfelg said:

You keep bringing up this "never know what the future holds"; well if you plan for it better then you know what it holds.

My problem is planning for a window outside of about 2-3 years. It's impossible to know what lies that far ahead when the average career of an NFL player is just under 3. 

Im not saying you DONT plan for the future. Bringing back JuJu who helps NOW and THEN is good usage of a signing. Same with Cam, Banner, etc. You're draft should be taking players who are more about fixing the following year rather than the current one....but to say, "I wanna be bad in order to reach for an 5-8 year window", that's making a plan to make a plan. It's kinda pointless. 

27 minutes ago, warfelg said:

So you go on this run about 1st overall picks not being top 10 guys, but fail to acknowledge the other things in these situations that went well for those QB's.  As of right now, we're not set up like those other teams.

I didn't fail to acknowledge it -- it wasn't the point I was attempting to make. It also wasn't about them not being top 10 guys, it's that they come from all over the place, are rarely the first QB taken in their respective drafts, and you don't need to own the top pick to get one. There's a plethora of factors that go into these guys (one of which, as you mentioned, is their surrounding), so the point was that you don't just need to draft high to get one that fits and succeeds - hence the reason I am against not trying as hard as you can in a present season. 

That is my core issue. You can plan all you want. You can get the #1 overall pick and take the #1 overall QB -- and he could suck in the NFL (or be Jared Goff, where he is good enough to play but not good enough to get you over a hump), regardless of what you put/have around him. And then all of a sudden -- all that planning is just planning some more in 5-8 years instead of having a 5-8 year window. The draft does not produce great QB's each year. The best QB's are not always the best QB's. That's what makes it hard for me to want to commit to a future plan with so little guarantee. 

And just in terms of the bold, I do think we are a lot closer than people want to believe. We are not 5+ years out. We might be, who knows what happens, but we have a pretty good core set up over the next 3 or so years. 

39 minutes ago, warfelg said:

Do you honestly think last year was that good of a team?

Yes, I think we were a good team. With a better offensive plan we don't land in disaster of a rookie DE running off the field yelling about how they knew what we were doing. Our defense was great until injuries piled up. And our offense was average-to-good until teams realized we had no zig after the zag. 

Maybe Im just a crazy guy yelling at the clouds, but I don't understand why people don't see just how much of a disaster our X's and O's were last year and how much better our offense can be with just a baseline of competence (which, unfortunately, I still don't know that we have that because I have no clue what Canada is at the NFL level). Our offensive coaches were caught with their pants down at the end of the season and their remedy was not to pull them back up.

43 minutes ago, warfelg said:

I'd rather not suck too, but it's gonna happen someday.

It for sure will, and when it does, it will happen naturally. You don't need to plan to suck. 

46 minutes ago, warfelg said:

you are really ticking me off by saying what I'm advocating for is tanking.  I never said tank.  All I've said is there's gonna be a day where we are gonna have to correct the cap, have at least a year of being potentially bad.  We're such a flawed team top to bottom

So tank was the wrong word to use, at least in your case, so apologies for that. But whenever $4M separates Ben for Mason and someone says they would rather go with Mason....That to me is consciously trying to not be as good as you can be (which reminds me of tanking). 

Mason sucks. It's pretty simple in my eyes. Im not selling Ben as a stud at this point, but I'll sell that Ben is far better than Mason. You and I have very, veryyyy different views of the cap and dead money, so everything we have done to this point doesn't bother me with a naturally growing cap and plenty of space for future flexibility in restructures and low year 1 cap hits. So to this point, I don't see us as any worse off WITH Ben in the future than we would be WITHOUT, but the present is drastically different. 

Quote

Just using this space to separate thoughts....

I'll end with this....if you think we are better off not maximizing the present in an effort to improve in the future I do not think you are wrong......but that doesn't mean you are right. There's 1,000 ways to skin a cat in the NFL with roster building. I just have a hard time seeing the difference between maybe winning 9 games with Ben and 7 games with Mason does to the future -- so why wouldn't I try to go for the 10th?

[warfelg]

18 minutes ago, Dcash4 said:

I'll end with this....if you think we are better off not maximizing the present in an effort to improve in the future I do not think you are wrong......but that doesn't mean you are right. There's 1,000 ways to skin a cat in the NFL with roster building. I just have a hard time seeing the difference between maybe winning 9 games with Ben and 7 games with Mason does to the future -- so why wouldn't I try to go for the 10th?

I’m just going to respond to this part because you seem pretty stubborn on everything else. 
 

Yes there are a lot of ways to rebuild in the NFL. Right now we don’t have a plan for any of them. And if you think NFL teams don’t plan years out then...yes this is an instance where you are wrong. 
 

To give you a major view as to why there’s a big difference between 7 wins and 9 wins:

This year the difference would be drafting 13 (7 wins) and 19 (10 wins). 
 

Personally I think the worst thing that can happen to this team is exactly what happened last year. Make it to the first round with double digit wins and then lose, locking in a pick in the 20’s, and end up overpaying an average QB because you think you are better than you are, and turn into the Vikings. 

[bigben07MVP]

This might cool off any first round talk for Williams. Etienne and Harris are a clear tier above him in my opinion. 

[warfelg]

Just now, bigben07MVP said:

This might cool off any first round talk for Williams. Etienne and Harris are a clear tier above him in my opinion. 

Yikes. Yea it’s kinda Etienne or bust unless we get a Harris time. 

[bigben07MVP]

10 minutes ago, warfelg said:

Yikes. Yea it’s kinda Etienne or bust unless we get a Harris time. 

I wouldn’t be surprised if Harris is a mid 4.5s guy, he doesn’t have breakaway speed either. But his vision, patience, and receiving ability are all superior to Williams. I’ve said before Leveon is the best comp for Harris. He’ll get a lot of 5-15 yard runs but it will be rare from him to bust off 30+ yarders especially in the NFL where every DB runs a 4.4.

Etienne is the only legit home run threat which is why he’s my favorite RB prospect. He broke the power 5 record for most 20+ yard runs (55). He’s a 4.39/4.40 guy. 

[AFF]

Any word if Tombert was there at UNC?

[Dcash4]

1 hour ago, warfelg said:

I’m just going to respond to this part because you seem pretty stubborn on everything else. 

Unless I have missed the guarantee that if we are bad/worse this year we will be good next year or if we are good this year that we will be bad next year -- then yes, I am comfortable being stubborn. 

1 hour ago, warfelg said:

Right now we don’t have a plan for any of them. And if you think NFL teams don’t plan years out then...yes this is an instance where you are wrong.

You don't think we have a plan? Not having a QB is not equal to not having a plan. You mentioned about having a solid team around the QB, how far do you think we are from that in a 2 year window? Maybe I am just way more optimistic, but I see 14 starting positions that I feel comfortable about on a 2-3 year period (aka: planning for the future), and that's prior to a draft where I assume 2 starters, next year's FA with money to spend, and a second round of drafting before we see our 2022 team. That's a lot of future ability inside a short window. 

And again -- I do NOT think teams DONT plan for the future....I don't believe they plan 5+ years out. I absolutely see a plan for this team in a 2-3 year window. Anything further than that I see as fruitless. 

Maybe its just optimistic, I don't know. But when I go line by line with this roster, I do not see a pit of talent (and I would ignore anyone that says the word depth). Obviously things have to go well in drafting, but that is true of any situation. 

1 hour ago, warfelg said:

This year the difference would be drafting 13 (7 wins) and 19 (10 wins). 

And with the unknown of the draft as well as the ability to move up if there is someone you are in love with....what are we talking about here?

1 hour ago, warfelg said:

Personally I think the worst thing that can happen to this team is exactly what happened last year. Make it to the first round with double digit wins and then lose, locking in a pick in the 20’s, and end up overpaying an average QB because you think you are better than you are, and turn into the Vikings. 

I for sure don't disagree, but I also don't view making the playoffs as a bad thing (and I don't necessarily think you personally do, but you seem to only want to focus on worst case scenario). One, it would mean our roster is wayyyyyy closer than the general consensus seems to be and two, it means we have a chance to win games. 

Kirk Cousins, Ryan Tannahill, and Jared Goff are guys you don't want....good enough to give you hope, but never enough to push over the hump. But since the percentage of guys better than them in the totality of the position are probably the top 5% and its so incredible difficult to project success at the position for a variety of reasons -- its why I don't worry about the difference between drafting 13 or 19+. Find a guy you love and go get him (that's not named Mason Rudolph). I don't understand hoping that player magically falls to your draft slot after a down year. The Chiefs wanted Mahomes, and they got him from 27 at 10. The Texans wanted Deshaun and went from 25 to 12 to get him. 

[warfelg]

8 minutes ago, Dcash4 said:

You don't think we have a plan?

Nope. And I can frame it with one question:

Whats the plan after Ben? Are we set up to be Bens team or a good QB team? Because those aren’t the same. 

[CKSteeler]

4 hours ago, warfelg said:

Additionally, I'm ready for a new vision at the GM chair.  Someone that sees things differently.

It's funny. Side-bustinglly funny that the people who complain the most about Colbert are the ones who still actually defend Mike Tomlin. Colbert is a far, far better GM than your boy Mike is a coach and he has given Mike Super Bowl caliber rosters that Mike has wasted. But you do you.

[Cbrunn]

4.5 doesn't push Williams down much for me at all ... Sub 7 3 cone and good vert shows the explosion 

With his contact balance and pass protection and pass catching 

Hopefully it makes it that much easier to get him 2nd Rd 

[Dcash4]

56 minutes ago, warfelg said:

Nope. And I can frame it with one question:

Whats the plan after Ben? Are we set up to be Bens team or a good QB team? Because those aren’t the same. 

That's two questions 😉

While I find this to be a having your cake and eating it too scenario....I will respond to your post with a post of your own. 

4 hours ago, warfelg said:

I would have loved nothing more than to see this team keep the defense together, use the draft to put together a good run game, move on from Ben, and if we made the playoffs with Mason struggling, or were just average with Mason struggling, then you give up the multiple 1sts to move up for a QB.

Because what you have already said that you would "loved nothing more than to see" you are getting. 

Run game: X's and O's aside, 3 of our 5 offensive line positions are in a better place as run blockers. Dotson is an upgrade to Feiler, a health Decastro is an upgrade to the injured one, and Banner back and healthy is a boost at RT to Chucks. I fully expect C (or LT) to be a first two round pick and immediately we have 4 out of 5 positions improved on the OLine -- all with multiple years left to build around (I see Decastro as an extension candidate). There's a very good chance we draft either a TE or a RB highly as well. Neither excite me because of the way the positions are in general, but with our WR core together -- check that good run game box as a realistic solution. And it doesn't have to take years to accomplish, and helps in a 2-3 year window. 

On defense: We have three all-pro players split between the three levels of the field. TJ and Minkah will be Steelers for life. Book that. Cam still has 2-3 years of being an extremely good player. As does Tuitt who will see another contract. Bush has all the qualities of a pro bowl player with a baseline of being good. Cam is solid and Edmunds is a strong role player. Maybe we take a step back this year from what our top, healthy squad was last year -- but you cannot tell me the baseline of a really good unit -- for years to come -- isn't there. Tinker and add in a 2-3 year window. 

Improved run game, maintained the core of the defense (things you said you wanted). You don't need the solution to the QB question this year if it's not there and reaching for that only limits the resources you have to build the team around that incoming player. That's why I say you want your cake and eat it to. You WANT the QB plan while you have the QB but you also WANT to build the team around for the next QB. Both take assets -- pick your poison. 

As I said before, project two starters (C and RB are my guess, and realistic based on all the mocks) this year, spend FA on CB/LT/TE as needed when we have the money next year, and use the 22 draft to either sell farm to get your QB or continue to add talent around a stopgap and sell in 2023. So as you mentioned with selling to get your next QB...I think we are set up very well for that. We have a young core, we have some really good players, and we will have the availability in 2022 or 2023 to make significant moves to get the QB. 

Hey look. I planned for the future, all inside of a 2-3 year window. 

 

[August4th]