We have a baseball one, why not a football one?
Free agency is up and running and it’s not going to stop until to (and through) the draft!
Tons of deals have gone down that I’m not going to list here, however it’s worth mentioning that the Texans have offloaded The Brockening to the Brownies. Texans can now trade for Tony Rom…uh oh he’s hurt. Browns have a competent (kinda) QB who I think just got a bad break for a year. Let’s see how wrong I am.
Who else do we want to comment on?
More important is that the Texans also traded a 2nd round pick to the Browns. The Brown essentially bought a pick.
Oh, hey mods…can you change the title to “thread”?
There isn’t some impending doom happening or anything…
Well that’s unusual. Has there ever been basically a salary cap for pick trade in NFL history?
Cutler and Jeffrey are both gone from Chicago. The Packers will miss their fourth best quarterback, but buhbye Alshon. You scared me, though not as much as Julio.
Sure.
Not from what I’ve read. There are actually rules against it. ESPN did a good write-up of it that basically said it’s toeing the line of legality, but OK because of the future picks included. Still interesting to have an NBA trade in the NFL…
I consider myself very level-headed, but I don’t understand what the Packers are doing. It’s fine that we don’t get FAs, that’s whatever. But they aren’t even trying to keep their own guys and we will be absolutely worse without them.
Patriots acted out of character by signing Stephon Gilmorefrom the Bills, one of the top-tier defensive FAs this year. Usually they wait until the top guys are gone and try to find value later when the prices are lower.
And there is all kinds of drama around backup Pats QB Jimmy Garropollo. Rumors are swirling that the Browns, recent recipient of a 2nd round pick plus Brock Osweiler, are looking to trade Osweiler again and put a package together to acquire Jimmy G. Jimmy tweeted the equivalent of “Thanks, bye” to New England, but then deleted it. Further reports indicate that the Pats and Browns have not been in contact (yet). Ooooh, such drama!
Pats also lost TE Marcellus Bennett to FA, but traded for TE Dwayne Allen from the Colts. I liked Bennett on and off the field, but he wants TE#1 money and the Pats won’t give that with Gronk still on the roster, so a good move overall, assuming Allen can stay healthy.
Losing Micah Hyde hurts. He’s been a great depth/nickel/dime guy and a stud on special teams. I’m sad to see him go, but can’t imagine $6m a year for essentially a backup. He earned his paycheck elsewhere. He was always a safety that could play corner, and that player just isn’t going to see the field as often with Burnett/Clinton-Dix on the team. I wish him the best, absolutely.
JC Tretter wasn’t going to stay - he wanted to play center, and Corey Linsley has that locked up, and on a rookie contract. If they could have found a way to keep him around to play guard, I would have been happy, which brings us to
TJ Lang. I want this big ol’ hunk o burning love back. Reports say he’s visiting other teams, but has an offer on the table. Seattle might be able to draw him away - they need an offensive line almost as badly as Minnesota, and John Schneider isn’t allergic to free agents as his mentor. With Tretter gone, there’s not a lot of depth there any more. I’m interested to see how his busted up ankle affects his market value.
Nick Perry got paid. He might have gotten a bit of a down home bonus, but he was given a prove it contract last year, and he proved it. Dude played with a club for half the season, and still led the team in sacks. He’s still pretty young and coming in to his own, hopefully. If not, the deal is salvageable after 2 years, which is better than I can say about Matthews’ contract.
Jared Cook? Pay the man. Perry got his, and Cook showed how ridiculous this offense can be with a top-flight tight end. He’s another “prove it” success story. He might command big money on the open market, so it will be interesting and nerve-wracking to see where he ends up.
Peppers is gone. Damn. I liked the goofy looking monster, both on and off the field. The fact of the matter, however, is that he’s balled out the last three years, but he’s also old. Maybe he’s one of those freaks that can play to 40 in today’s NFL (looking at you, Terence Newman), and I’m going to miss him either way, but I can’t find too much fault in not out-bidding Carolina.
And that leaves us with Eddie Lacy (for Packers free agents, which seem to be all Ted Thompson cares about) - weight problems, an injured reserve tag, and an inability to stay on the field, even with healthy, actually make me cautious. He might still be able to play; he might be finished. I’d be fine with a short, low cost contract, to give him one final chance. If anyone is offering him more than $3m a year, or more than 2 years? Bye. A ridiculous running back draft class outweighs the history and experience China Food Eddie would bring.
There are rumors Green Bay is courting Connor Barwin. I think it’d be awesome, but I’ll have to see how it pans out.
We did re-sign the punter though, so we have that going for us. Go team!
With the decimation of the DBs on the Packers, I was hoping he’d stick around, but he’s not really anything special. It’s his versatility that was a huge benefit. I too wish him the best.
I like Tretter a lot and if both him and Lang leave, it could be pretty rough. Jason Spriggs needs to develop, and there is nothing great about Lane Taylor or Don Barclay.
I like Perry, but I am worried he’s a one year wonder. But he is young, and pass rushers are at a premium, so I think he’ll be worth it.
Cook is a big Meh. He’s not a great blocker, and while he can be a force on occassion, he’s never lived up to the hype his athleticism brings him. No way they should pay him like a top 10 TE.
I was shocked he was as good as he was this last year. The Pack really need someone to step into his big shoes, because Matthews isn’t getting it done and Datone commits too many penalties.
I like Ty Montgomery, so Lacy would be sharing the load at best. Too many question marks for me.
I was kinda hoping for Chris Baker to come to the Packers, and I think the contract he got from the Bucs was a great deal. Now, I wouldn’t mind them taking a shot at Dontari Poe if he can be had on the cheap. But I think Lang is the big thing they need to do.
Yeah, right. 
Cleveland just cut RGIII to make room, btw.
I’d still bet on Jimmy going to Houston instead, conceivably Chicago, but there’s no fucking way Cleveland hasn’t been desperately calling about any possible option at QB, any of which would be an improvement for them.
Except Cutler. He just sucks.
Can’t believe the Browns paid Eric Zeitler $12 mil/yr to play guard. There was no way the Bengals were matching that. Whitworth was a better bargain for the Rams, but they suck too so I’m not sure how a 36 year old LT, as good as he is/was was worth $13mil/year either.
Martellus Bennett and Lance Kendricks - proof again that I am not cut out to be a NFL GM.
Scot McCoughlan is that you?
Patriots make another splash and trade for Brandin Cooks, speedy WR from New Orleans. I haven’t seen many NO games, so I don’t really know anything about him except he catches a good deep ball and runs like the wind. I got this from ESPN indicating that he’s in good company stats wise:
75 receptions, 1,000 receiving yards, and 8 receiving TD in each of the last 2 seasons:
Brandin Cooks
Odell Beckham Jr.
Antonio Brown
Obviously, he’s not nearly as good as Brown, but it seems he plays a different kind of game. I suspect the hope is that his speed will open things up more for Gronk and Edelman over the middle, in addition to being a legitimate deep threat that the Pats have not had for years.
The Eagles just ate $7 million in dead money to drop Chase Daniels and pay Nick Foles $11 million for two years as a back up? Whaaaa?
Wait, what?
After a quick Google…holy shit. It’s true! What in the fuck are the Eagles doing? Was Chase not playing nice with Wentz? A lot of people liked Daniels potential last year in a very Glennon-y way, wouldn’t be shocked to see him land in Cleveland, Houston or San Fran bringing him in to compete under a healthy contract.
Be back in a couple minutes with a Bears diatribe.
Hi all, haven’t been around much lately…but you know, it’s the NFL offseason. Time fo a break down on the big changes in Chicago.
First and foremost, bye bye Jay. **Cutler’s **time is finally over and it’s no shock to anyone. He leaves as pretty much the team leader in every meaningful passing stat, which tells you everything you need to know about the Bears. I’m mostly indifferent to it. I wanted Jay to succeed and I still say it was the right move to bring him to town and while he never got out of his own way, he also wasn’t the root of the problem in Chicago at any point in his tenure. As unpopular as he was he always took way more blame and never got any of the credit. It’s a shame he wasn’t good enough to mask the rest of the flaws in the organization. In the end I feel like his biggest sin was probably lack of preparation. I can’t prove it, but I think he was lax in the film room and just showed up and did his thing, he never went the extra mile, and the crappy and constantly changing offensive staff were no help. This ultimately meant that defenses eventually always solved him since there was never a plan B, we were playing checkers while defenses were playing chess.
So Jay is gone, and so is Alshon. Most of the Bears faithful on the internet or gnashing their teeth over the loss of Alshon but I’m pretty OK with it. He was never consistently healthy. The stat sheet doesn’t really show it since he didn’t miss as many games as it seemed, but there were a ton of games where he was banged up and gimpy and it showed when he was out there. Most all NFL players play dinged up and more often than not it doesn’t show…with Alshon, it always showed. On the field this isn’t great for the Bears, Alshon was arguably the best player on the roster and without him the new QB doesn’t have much to work with. The Bears have a nice running game finally and having the downfield threat is a necessary compliment.
Speaking of new QBs, the Bears cracked open the piggy bank to give **Mike Glennon **a 3 year, $45M contract to presumably be the starter. $15M a year is a lot, that’s what veteran starters make, or at least what they used to make and it’s more than Cutler was due to earn which seems kind of nuts. But a couple things are true, the cap went up and QB salaries are going to be crazy. Foles is getting $7M guaranteed to be a backup. There seemed to be a bidding war for Glennon and the Bears needed a QB, Glennon is the only one available that isn’t essentially a finished product.
I don’t know what we’re going to get out of Glennon, I have seen little to nothing of him play. His rookie stats compare favorably to Carson Wentz and a few other higher profile rookies and the Bucs were unwilling to trade him in spite of their having Jameis. That may not have been smart, but it does say that they really liked him. Definitely think that he deserves a shot.
I agree with the strategy under one condition, the Bears must draft a rookie in the first or second round. They need multiple at bats, because the odds aren’t good that Glennon is a long term answer, they aren’t zero, but you have to hedge that bet. I don’t know if it’s Trubisky at #3, or if it’s Mahomes or Kizer in the 2nd round, but they need to play 2 hands here.
For the rest of the roster, the Bears went out and grabbed a couple of 2nd contract WRs to replace Alshon in **Kendall Wright **and Marcus Wheaton. Both are mostly unproven and each has excuses for why they didn’t light it up in their first stint, but there’s little reason for excitement. I do think they complement each other and with **Meredith **(and maybe White) the wideouts are at least competent. Clearly the Bears will be a running team next year though. They added a TE in **Sims **who will complement that running game more than Zach Miller.
The Bears fared a little better on defense, even if they didn’t land the marquee guys. They addressed the secondary which was dismal last year with 2 big, physical DBs in **Amukamara **and **Cooper **and a veteran Safety in Quentin Demps. All are solid signings for medium money, I disliked Amukamara coming out of college and I still am skeptical that he can really cover anyone downfield but he’s an upgrade and hopefully we can scheme around his flaws.
For everything else, it comes down to getting healthy and staying healthy (and of course drafting well). We need to run the ball with **Howard **and **Langford **as well as we did last year and to do that we need to get healthy and stable on the line. The middle of the line with Sitton, **Whitehair **and **Long **should be back and really strong and Sims should help a bit on the edges. On the other side of the line they need McPhee, **Houston **and **Goldman **on the field and along with Floyd, **Hicks **and **Young **we have some horses. We should be competitive if we get anything consistent out of the passing game.
Been a while, will have to start drilling in on draft prospects soon.
Bennett is good, but he’s pretty much a post-up and move the chains guy who’s tough to tackle. Those are all great things but ultimately I think we was a little to deliberate for this Pats offense. Allen is a much better fit and is better when split out. Only question is health, and when he’s on the field he’ll do a pretty solid Aaron Hernandez impression.
So I’ve been reading some of the commentary on the Bears free agent moves and the consensus is all pretty negative.
Windy City Gridiron summarizes many of them here.
Couple themes. The Bears overpaid for a lot of these guys. Maybe true, but somewhat irrelevant in my view. They didn’t commit any long term money and they have the cap space to burn, it doesn’t help anyone to leave it unspent. If they’d have committed to long term deals, that’s a different story, but they didn’t.
It’s fashionable to criticize the Glennon deal it seems, but that’s hack journalism in my view. It’s all about the market and the QB market sucked so hard, you pay what it costs. Comparing this to Osweiler misses the point completely because there’s no future commitment to speak of. I don’t think the organization could manage a season with Connor Shaw as the “veteran” option. I don’t think we’re in a positon to be mortgaging the future for Garappolo, Romo or Cousins, we have too many holes. I’d rather spend short term money over spending draft capital under the circumstances.
They overpaid for Wheaton. Definitely true, but again probably of trivial concern. I’d have much rather had Pryor for similar money, that’s for sure, but the comparisons to Marshall are dumb on a lot of levels and I have no interest in Torrey Smith. Wheaton is probably the worst of the signings but we’re a bad team, free agents aren’t beating down the door. If we get 800 yards out of him I’d call this a major win. Compared to Robert Woods deal…we’re okay.
Sims got more money than anyone expected, but that’s a recurring theme in this free agency season. It speaks to how dismal the TE class is, much like the QB class.
So, even if the Bears overpaid on offense I think it’s hard to argue that they aren’t better on defense and they aren’t going to be handcuffed in any way. Cutler-Jeffery-Meredith-Royal-Miller is probably a little better than Glennon-Meredith-Wheaton-Wright-Sims but I bet we get more starts out of that latter group. And let’s face it, we needed change.