Journey to Ring 3: Club Evaluation & Building Another Champion

[diamondbull424]

4 hours ago, DreamKid said:

We should all be thankful for Steve Smith. This will actually reach EDC, Harbaugh, and Roman/Culley. Hope it induces changes too.

I know many have shifted to also blaming Culley and I’m not NOT putting blame on him, but I would just like to remind everyone how when Marty Mornhenweg was our offensive coordinator, with Greg Roman on staff, our run game was producing the 31st worse rushing attack in the league prior to Lamar taking over (and I’m guessing the team went with Roman’s SF offense instillation with Marty calling the plays).

So my point of this is to say, Roman has ALWAYS been known for a strong rushing attack as an OC, right? Yet when he was Assistant HC for this squad on the offensive side (similar to Culley) and collaboratively developing that offense... the run game was still struggling.

I say this because I think these offensive passing flaws should fall on Roman first and foremost. Whether an offense is a collaborative process or not, the OC is the guy who has the final say.
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So personally I won’t castigate guys like Culley or Urban for flaws Roman has shown at every stop previously. Ideally we fire Roman for some hip young offensive mind, but as I’m sure that won’t be the Harbaugh way... so I’m okay with Culley and Urban throwing their hat in the ring as OC. Not saying Culley hasn’t blame, but this should be Roman’s axe to bear entirely considering his track record IMO.

However what we know of Culley is Andy Reid kept him on his staff for 17 years, then McDermott for two. We know both of these coaches have good taste in coaching minds... and Culley has only moved on from those teams to upgrade his role. So the best of the NFLs best HCs clearly think highly of him... and if he doesn’t get the Texans job tomorrow (which I don’t believe he will), then I’m down to see what he’d offer as an OC in developing our passing attack.

[DreamKid]

6 minutes ago, diamondbull424 said:

but I would just like to remind everyone how when Marty Mornhenweg was our offensive coordinator, with Greg Roman on staff, our run game was producing the 31st worse rushing attack in the league prior to Lamar taking over (and I’m guessing the team went with Roman’s SF offense instillation with Marty calling the plays).

Oh, I remember that. Ryan Jensen and Austin Howard left, who Roman funneled a lot of runs though, and our rushing attack collapsed. The "Lamar Effect" zombie'd our run game and made it viable once more. The chemistry Gus Edwards had shown with Lamar in practice immediately got him reps when we made the switch too, and obviously that's when he emerged as well. 

[baltimoreRebel]

44 minutes ago, wackywabbit said:

Corey Davis is a name I've been targeting for months, but TBH he should be plan B, IMO. Let's go for the big fish in Allen Robinson.

Every single team in the NFL but us can find and develop stud WRs with mid round draft picks. It's just us (and the Eagles and the Patriots) who can't. We can solve all our other problems (like O-line) with draft picks. But we just can't, go through another draft with "wE hAvE ReCeIvErS wE lIKe In EvErY rOuNd" and walk away with a special teams/niche player. The big takeway I have 24 hours postmortem on the season, is that the best WR on the market has more value to us than any other team in the league. Go ahead and take Orlando Brown or Stanley or whatever else (besides Lamar) that we could spend money on, it won't add as much value to this team as finally getting us that real go-to #1 receiver.

I think we hit on Hollywood. I think adding a big time receiver to take attention away from him will only benefit him and the entire offense. 

The WR position needs to be revamped in this team. Duvernay showed some promise this year and he's a Swiss army knife when it comes to sneaky screens and putting him in positions with space. Boykin can still develop but he disappeared far too often this year. 

Allen Robinson is a guy we'd all likely want to have but he will break the bank somewhere and we simply can not afford it. 

[RavensfanRD]

1 hour ago, coordinator0 said:

I feel like it's fairly unlikely a move is made with Roman. There are too many built-in excuses for this being a non-traditional season that Harbaugh can and will use to keep the status quo. 

 

Don't speak this tragedy out loud. Allow me to have hope that the right thing will be done.

[wackywabbit]

Just now, baltimoreRebel said:

Allen Robinson is a guy we'd all likely want to have but he will break the bank somewhere and we simply can not afford it. 

We can't? 

I mean, if we win the Earl Thomas grievance, we will be 6th in the NFL behind the Jags, Jets, Colts, Pats and Football Team in cap space next year. On top of that two of our top 4 cap hits next year (Campbell and Williams) are expiring. Cap space is always an overrated talking point and yes it's a multi-year thing. We have to pay Lamar, but this is probably the ideal offseason to extend a franchise QB, with COVID implication artificially lowering revenue. If we want to, we can absolutely get A-Rob. Cap is not the limiting factor there. 

[baltimoreRebel]

Just now, wackywabbit said:

We can't? 

I mean, if we win the Earl Thomas grievance, we will be 6th in the NFL behind the Jags, Jets, Colts, Pats and Football Team in cap space next year. On top of that two of our top 4 cap hits next year (Campbell and Williams) are expiring. Cap space is always an overrated talking point and yes it's a multi-year thing. We have to pay Lamar, but this is probably the ideal offseason to extend a franchise QB, with COVID implication artificially lowering revenue. If we want to, we can absolutely get A-Rob. Cap is not the limiting factor there. 

Factor in that Yannick is likely being re-signed and there's Lamars contract coming up, Andrews too. A lot of unknowns. I'd rather pay less for Davis as we need a big body and hope to hit in the draft. 

Don't get me wrong. I won't complain if we sign Allen, I just wouldn't count on it. 

[ThatJaxxenGuy]

If we don’t do something about this Roman system I’m not in on buying a pricey receiver. Our receiver group is uninspiring but man our plays look amateur and 14-18 mil on salary cap for a guy who’s going to block and catch for 900 yards is just too much. 

We need a revamped offence. If we go try to beat the drum again on power running with Lamar next year I’m going to be totally unimpressed as a fan. We had the one Dimensional mind blowing run game and it got our butts kicked three years in a row. I don’t think beating our head against the wall is going to work for a fourth year straight.

[wackywabbit]

1 hour ago, ThatJaxxenGuy said:

If we don’t do something about this Roman system I’m not in on buying a pricey receiver. Our receiver group is uninspiring but man our plays look amateur and 14-18 mil on salary cap for a guy who’s going to block and catch for 900 yards is just too much. 

We need a revamped offence. If we go try to beat the drum again on power running with Lamar next year I’m going to be totally unimpressed as a fan. We had the one Dimensional mind blowing run game and it got our butts kicked three years in a row. I don’t think beating our head against the wall is going to work for a fourth year straight.

We won't. The thing to remember is that we do NOT have idiots running this team. Say what you want about the past year, but they attacked a problem from last season, and, despite an incredible amount of turmoil during the season, they solved it. They solved the Titans offense, and heck the Bills' as well. Greg Roman doesn't need to be fired for me to think we are making radical changes to the offense and focusing on "solving" the passing game.

Even with the offense we had this year, someone would have said Hollywood wasn't worth the first round draft pick, until they saw the postseason. Our "move the chains" target was Mark Andrews, who in the postseason had 17 targets for 69 yards. Imagine those looks going to an actual elite receiver and Andrews being the "he's wide open for a big play" guy. That's what we need regardless of scheme.

Edited January 18, 2021 by wackywabbit

[diamondbull424]

2 hours ago, baltimoreRebel said:

Factor in that Yannick is likely being re-signed and there's Lamars contract coming up, Andrews too. A lot of unknowns. I'd rather pay less for Davis as we need a big body and hope to hit in the draft. 

Don't get me wrong. I won't complain if we sign Allen, I just wouldn't count on it. 

Corey Davis market value appears to be at around $10-11m, I’d easily rather spend double that knowing we’ve fixed the WR position with a near elite WR talent. Davis has disappeared far too often throughout his pro career in the regular season and postseason for him to be a relied upon option.

I mean in 6 playoff games he’s averaging all of:
4.8 tgts, 2.5 recs, 27.7 rec. yds, 0.5 TDs.

Perhaps if it were just low volume because of his offense, that’d be one thing... but his YPT numbers, his catch% numbers, are all not good. The last two playoffs, he’s had little excuse that wouldn’t also be relevant here. He’s gone against #2 corners more often than not, he’s got a quality QB to deliver him the ball. And the situation with his brother, while very sad and unfortunate, isn’t something that might not also haunt him here.

Conversely, while Robinson hasn’t reached the playoffs often for as large a sample size, he’s averaging:
10 tgts, 8 recs, 99 rec. yds, 0.5 TDs

Add in the fact that Robinson has gone over 1000 receiving yards in back to back seasons with passing offenses that have gone for 3573 yds and 3925 yds respectively. So he isn’t just putting up numbers in a high volume attack either.
——

I agree about not wanting to break the bank for Allen Robinson, but beyond that, especially if we can sign him for under $20m, I think he’s shown that he’s got the track record to be well worth it considering the overall market value of the position. He’s basically Larry Fitzgerlad-lite. Just imagine if you added a WR onto this current playoff unit that went out and added 100 yds receiving and a TD between these two games, we’d probably be playing next week.

Opportunity cost wise, I would rather have Allen Robinson than have Corey Davis and Judon/Ngakoue... I could more easily trust this organization to create a draft plan that emphasizes getting elite trench players within a draft like this.

This isn’t to say I wouldn’t want Ngakoue back on a reasonable deal, especially if we can’t acquire AR12, but he just hasn’t done enough to present greater value than what a true top target could do for Lamar... as well as for Hollywood and Andrews. They would all see less bracket coverage/attention and that would increase the explosiveness of this passing attack- regardless of if the loser Roman is brought back or not (though hopefully not.)
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In addition to the above, I would trade a 6th round pick to the Eagles for Zack Ertz and offer him an extension to his deal. He’s making $8.25m in 2021, but has two years left at no salary. We failed at trading for him in-season due to his injury (and boy would that have helped this team), so I’m thinking if he agrees to an extension/restructure of something like 3 yrs/$20m deal. It’s a TE friendly offense and that deal would provide rough market value for the position with regard to an aged vet. The team would hold his rights for 3 more years so outside of retiring, if he wants to play it would be to his advantage to accept slightly less than market value to come here, be local to his $1.25m condo in Philly, etc.
——

So the offense with the above moves made going into the draft would look like:

QB- Lamar; Huntley
RB- Dobbins; Gus, Hill, Ricard
TE- Andrews, Ertz; Boyle
WR- ARob, Hollywood; Boykin, Duvernay, Proche
OL- Stanley, Bozeman, Mekari, Powers, Brown Jr; Bredeson, TCC, Phillips

Defense would presumably look something like:
DL- Campbell, Williams, Wolfe; Madubuike, Washington
LBs- Queen, Harrison; Fort, Board, Alaka
Edge- Bowser, Ferguson, Ward
Safety- Clark, Elliot; Hooker
CB- Marlon, Peters, Smith, Young, Averrett, Marshall

ST:
PK- Justin Tucker
LS- Morgan Cox
P- Sam Koch
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The above would mostly be my plan for building this team. It would leave us with two very obvious draft needs at safety and pass rusher, while we’d also want to add an elite IOL piece with some swing tackle versatility as well. Anything else would be purely BPA selections. Also I didn’t list everyone on the roster, just the people that I think should have a good grasp on making the final roster in my above scenario.

I also think it’s about time to start bringing in competition for Koch. Cutting him wouldn’t really save us a whole lot of money, but more so for the performance aspect.
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Edited January 18, 2021 by diamondbull424

[AngusMcFife]

1 hour ago, diamondbull424 said:

I also think it’s about time to start bringing in competition for Koch. Cutting him wouldn’t really save us a whole lot of money, but more so for the performance aspect.

Is Kaare Vedvik available?

In all seriousness, Ravens punt coverage was near the top of the league this year. According to DVOA it was 5th. I've been harsh on Koch in the past, but he was very effective even if he doesn't have the booming leg anymore. 

[diamondbull424]

41 minutes ago, AngusMcFife said:

Is Kaare Vedvik available?

In all seriousness, Ravens punt coverage was near the top of the league this year. According to DVOA it was 5th. I've been harsh on Koch in the past, but he was very effective even if he doesn't have the booming leg anymore. 

True. Though I’m not saying we should replace him. Just that bringing in some new punters is something we should look into, since Koch is on his last legs.

Personally I want him around for when the team wins the SB next year. Let him ride off into the sunset with Campbell.

[baltimoreRebel]

Anyone else think Doug Pederson is a good fit to run the offense? I liked the little I saw from him and Jalen Hurts. 

Him and Harbaugh do have the Coach Reid connection. 

Edited January 18, 2021 by baltimoreRebel

[coordinator0]

https://dawindycity.com/2021/01/18/chicago-bears-allen-robinson-tweet-baltimore/

[M.10.E]

Defense: Let Judon and Yannick walk. Neither deserve the price tag they are going to get. Sign Bowser if it's a solid deal. Draft EDGE in the first couple rounds. Re-sign Ward/McPhee/Wolfe. Bring in a 3rd safety (maybe that's Kearse). 

Offense: This team has to get better at throwing it. No if's and's or but's about it. Stop plugging JAGs on the line and expecting good protection against playoff teams. Time to actually invest in the offense. It's extremely hard to put together 10+ play drives consistently and score TDs. We have to have a lot more chunk passing plays next year. Need to drill it in Lamar's head to make quicker decisions with the football and that checking the ball down is okay.

Edited January 18, 2021 by M.10.E

[ThatJaxxenGuy]

1 hour ago, M.10.E said:

Defense: Let Judon and Yannick walk. Neither deserve the price tag they are going to get. Sign Bowser if it's a solid deal. Draft EDGE in the first couple rounds. Re-sign Ward/McPhee/Wolfe. Bring in a 3rd safety (maybe that's Kearse). 

Offense: This team has to get better at throwing it. No if's and's or but's about it. Stop plugging JAGs on the line and expecting good protection against playoff teams. Time to actually invest in the offense. It's extremely hard to put together 10+ play drives consistently and score TDs. We have to have a lot more chunk passing plays next year. Need to drill it in Lamar's head to make quicker decisions with the football and that checking the ball down is okay.

We need to learn how to not play against the sticks. The amount of 2nd and 12s, 3rd and 14s we had where it seemed like the play was just “Lamar do something” was nauseating to watch. 

Lamar can work in a spread em our system. If we go QB power right football and this rudimentary pass game again then I will say no longer are we “the best place for Lamar to succeed” and instead would graduate into actively damaging his development.

Lamar can read a defence fine, he can go through progressions and make accurate, decisive passes. 

On defence I’m concerned about our OLBs. Bowser hasnt developed into a playmaker. Judon is a beast but he’s more in the mould of a Jarret Johnson than an Elvis dumervil and deserves more money than we wil give him. Yannick was exciting but he’s really only got one move it seems like which is to just run past his guy.

As well we need to get the Earl contract of our books and do something about the cap space Tavon Young eats in the injury tent every year. I think our inside LBs are set (write it down, Harrison will have more long term success than Queen). Otherwise we could use some athleticism at safety.

I don’t know. Feels like we played above ourselves again this year. Every team remaining has multiple elite weapons on the offence and a solid offensive line. This roster has a lot of holes but we’re lucky to have a great QB and head coach.

 

Edited January 18, 2021 by ThatJaxxenGuy