Sandy's 2023 Mock Off-Season, Vol 1 (New Year edition)

[MaximusGluteus]

23 hours ago, vegas492 said:

This Skrowinski guy....I haven't watched him yet.  But I love me some offensive linemen tape.

But I thought I did read about him.  I seem to recall that some website thought his best position may be guard.  Did you run into any of that?

While we like drafting tackles to play guard....that's later round stuff, not first round stuff.  

From what I've watched, I would be more comfortable with him at guard at the next level because I think he would get eaten alive by NFL edge rushers.  He looks heavy-footed and his hand usage is atrocious.  He ends up with his arms around defenders A LOT, which is going to translate to tons of holding penalties in the pros if he doesn't clean that up.  He looks like more of a mid-round guy at best to me.  Maybe I'm missing something (I certainly don't claim to be an expert), but I try to watch all the offensive snaps from games against the best competition, and so far I just don't get the hype.

Edited January 6, 2023 by MaximusGluteus

[Sandy]

Hey, thanks all for the feedback. I appreciate y'all taking the time to read it.

A few notes, and responses to some of the comments I've read:

This one came out a little awkward in spots because I started it before the win streak..and as I added elements like create a Rodgers trade or pick a replacement DC, they became a lot less likely over the last four weeks. I will have another mock draft around the Super Bowl that will go an entirely different route.

As for the trade capital comments - assuming we just won a SB, Rodgers and Bakh's value should be very high. I also see the Raiders and Jets as soon-to-be desperate franchises that will sacrifice for near-term success. Or I could be grossly overwhelming their trade value.

Skoronski is a good athlete, smooth and fluid. Short arms like Bulaga, which are the only reason he's not a top five pick. I see him as a high floor player who could stick at tackle but can fall back to guard. 

 

[Old Guy]

Does anybody know if Skoronski is related to the Packers player from the Lombardi era? 

EDIT: Yes, his grandfather is Bob Skowronski who played LT for the Packers and a part of 5 championships during the Lombardi era. 

Edited January 6, 2023 by Old Guy

[MaximusGluteus]

14 hours ago, Sandy said:

Skoronski is a good athlete, smooth and fluid. Short arms like Bulaga, which are the only reason he's not a top five pick. I see him as a high floor player who could stick at tackle but can fall back to guard. 

I'll try to watch more film on him today/this weekend and see if I'm blind or missing something.

 

EDIT:  I watched every Northwestern offensive play from their games against Ohio State and and Penn State this year. 

I still don't see a first round pick.  I don't see a smooth or fluid athlete.  He looks like he's wearing cinder blocks on his feet.  His footwork isn't bad per se, but his feet or so damn heavy that it seems to limit him.  He's not that great in space, his recovery skills are ok but nothing special, he's only ok at sustaining blocks, and he's not dominant in any way.  He doesn't win much against better players and stalemates a lot in general.  He leans too much and is a waste bender.  His pass blocking is nothing to write home about but for the most part he makes it work (at the college level, anyway).  His combo blocking is hit or miss and he doesn't always take great angles working to the second level.  And it's a damn good thing his arms aren't longer or he'd have people in bear hugs every play and would be a walking holding penalty.  I don't know where he learned that hugging is a good blocking technique but he needs to clean that **** up ASAP because it's not going to fly in the NFL.

If he's the best OL in this draft than this might be the worst OL class in history.

 

Again, I'm not an expert and I didn't stay at a Holiday Inn last night, so take my evals with a big grain of salt.

Edited January 6, 2023 by MaximusGluteus

[mikemike778]

Spending 12m over two years on Minshew is just spunking money away for no reason. If we did something like this (trade Rodgers and Bak), we need to roll over over as much cap space to 2024 as possible. I get to trade Rodgers we need one more year of restructures and voiding but this needs to be the last year. If we do trade Rodgers then a lot of the off-season planning needs to be around future cap maintenance. Need to be very careful who we sign, restructure and so on. If in doubt, go light on a position with a rookie and roll the cap over so we can finally end the cycle of having to restructure/void to pay for last year's restructuring and voiding.

 

 

 

 

[mikemike778]

On 1/1/2023 at 7:37 PM, PackFan13 said:

We won't win the Superbowl but wishful thinking. If we did, not sure why you wouldn't run it back..

 

Also if we did win the super bowl, I put around 0.1% percent chance Rodgers is traded.  Never say never but seems the least likely possibility by a distance.

Impossible to second guess him, but you would think it would give him a chance to retire on a high a chance he might not get again. If he didn't retire he would almost certainly play for the Packers next season. Team that has won the super bowl with a legendary QB doesn't change QBs afterwards willingly and pretty sure he would want to come back here if he was going to keep on playing.

 

[Sandy]

On 1/6/2023 at 6:56 AM, MaximusGluteus said:

I'll try to watch more film on him today/this weekend and see if I'm blind or missing something.

 

EDIT:  I watched every Northwestern offensive play from their games against Ohio State and and Penn State this year. 

I still don't see a first round pick.  I don't see a smooth or fluid athlete.  He looks like he's wearing cinder blocks on his feet.  His footwork isn't bad per se, but his feet or so damn heavy that it seems to limit him.  He's not that great in space, his recovery skills are ok but nothing special, he's only ok at sustaining blocks, and he's not dominant in any way.  He doesn't win much against better players and stalemates a lot in general.  He leans too much and is a waste bender.  His pass blocking is nothing to write home about but for the most part he makes it work (at the college level, anyway).  His combo blocking is hit or miss and he doesn't always take great angles working to the second level.  And it's a damn good thing his arms aren't longer or he'd have people in bear hugs every play and would be a walking holding penalty.  I don't know where he learned that hugging is a good blocking technique but he needs to clean that **** up ASAP because it's not going to fly in the NFL.

If he's the best OL in this draft than this might be the worst OL class in history.

 

Again, I'm not an expert and I didn't stay at a Holiday Inn last night, so take my evals with a big grain of salt.

I'm much more of a data/cap crunching guy than a talent evaluator, but I don't see heavy feet at all. Definitely prone to the hold right now but his hands are incredibly strong. 

I project about a 8.5-8.8 RAS at tackle, maybe around 9.6 when converted to guard.  If you coach the holds out of him you have yourself an excellent oline prospect.

Could be wrong as well - this early in the draft process it's still mostly a crap shoot. For all we know he tests more poorly than expected and slides out of the first.

 

Edited January 8, 2023 by Sandy

[Sandy]

On 1/7/2023 at 2:02 AM, mikemike778 said:

Spending 12m over two years on Minshew is just spunking money away for no reason. If we did something like this (trade Rodgers and Bak), we need to roll over over as much cap space to 2024 as possible. I get to trade Rodgers we need one more year of restructures and voiding but this needs to be the last year. If we do trade Rodgers then a lot of the off-season planning needs to be around future cap maintenance. Need to be very careful who we sign, restructure and so on. If in doubt, go light on a position with a rookie and roll the cap over so we can finally end the cycle of having to restructure/void to pay for last year's restructuring and voiding.

 

 

 

 

Completely the opposite from a cap standpoint actually.

In this scenario, if we move on from Rodgers, Bakh, Amos, Lowry, Lewis, Cobb, Reed and Crosby all in the same offseason, we're eating more than $83m in dead money in 2023 alone. This is a huge victory for future caps. This mock actually paints an incredibly rosy cap picture for 2024. I also don't see what we'd be trying to save cap for?

It sounds to me you dislike more where the league is going. Love it or hate it, but pushing money to future years is now the standard. This is one genie that won't be put back into the bottle unless the NFL makes some new rule (that the players union would have to be compensated grandly for).

As for signing a backup quarterback, this is absolutely what should happen after Rodgers moves on. We have no idea that Love can handle a 17 game schedule, and any first-year starter should have some level of competition behind him that he should be looking over his shoulder about.

On 1/7/2023 at 2:07 AM, mikemike778 said:

 

Also if we did win the super bowl, I put around 0.1% percent chance Rodgers is traded.  Never say never but seems the least likely possibility by a distance.

Impossible to second guess him, but you would think it would give him a chance to retire on a high a chance he might not get again. If he didn't retire he would almost certainly play for the Packers next season. Team that has won the super bowl with a legendary QB doesn't change QBs afterwards willingly and pretty sure he would want to come back here if he was going to keep on playing.

 

Like I was saying in the mock draft, he might also feel he has nothing left to prove in GB and might ask to go somewhere warmer and closer to home for his last couple of seasons. 0.1% sounds a bit dramatic.