[MIJB#19]

General Manager Notes: 2123 Off-season recap

Boy oh boy, did our off-season not bring much to desire for.

Free Agency
We saw TE Francisco Andersen leave for Chesapeake, maybe he can mimic his third down yards too short tradition there. G James Tucker signed with Snapfinger, I hope they are prepared for his trademark offside penalty on the first drive of the game. DE Glen Kafka has left for Outer Banks and S Kim Fox moved on to Moontown. The other unrestricted free agents (G Alfred Pearsall, LB Ezekiel O'Neal and DE Sebastian Preston) did re-sign with us. Additionally, we signed C Abel Brandon and S Donnell Brennan. Brandon was supposed to become our new backup center, but he fell apart in pre-season and we cut him at mid-pre-season. Brennan did make the team as our new kickoff return specialist.

The Brennan signing was the initiating move to release long-time veteran WR Maurice Sweeney. He was our kickoff returner for 8 seasons, but lost the active roster spot already, as RB Rickey Jorg took over and now Jorg steps back to the KR2 role, with Sweeney no longer good enough to even be a backup.

The draft saw us grab a pick G Marcos Perez (at 1.12), TE Brayden Flylum (at 1.24), DE Chase Joseph (at 3.5), LB Adrian Lofton (at 3.10), S Tristan McCormick (at 3.29) and CB Eric Sanders (at 4.16). We traded our 5yth, 6th and 7th round picks for a 2125 5th round pick from Hanalei. Lofton, McCormick and Sanders failed to make the regular season roster. Lofton and Sanders were major disappointments after the re-evaluation at mid-pre-season. McCormick didn't even make the pre-season roster as I decided he wasn't going to be enough of an upgrade over what we already have on the team. Did any undrafted rookies survive the cut waves? Yes, exactly one did: RB Courtney Jackson.

Not making the team were undrafted rookies QB Julio Brecht, FB Myles Beers, TE Nathaniel Wiggins, P Ezekiel McElroy (this kid was the biggest drop in pre-season on the team), DE Riley Herring, DE Archie Carter, DE Eric Freeman, DE Alfredo Livingston, LB Brant Kiefer, special teams LB Curtis Mooberry and CB Javier Hartman.

Which actually brings us to our 53-men roster for 2123, as I've already made up my mind on them. And some of these players are sort of a disappointment, because pre-season re-evaluation was one of the worst for my team I have seen in decades. I mean, sometimes an old team sees a bunch of veterans drop hard, but this season a lot of promising players took hard to comprehend hits after several previous pre-seasons without any signals of being misses. Our QB2 Al Schneider took a hit, as did our RB2 Glyn Sloane, WR Rufus Montgomery, backup RT Ryan Fulcher, special teams ace LB Luther Goffee, CB Asher McElroy and both S Cesar Welch and S Peter Hinsley. But these all still made the team.

Where are we at now? Here are our 53 players.

Quarterbacks
60/60 QB Renaldo Wilson
35/35 QB Al Schneider
05/05 QB Curtis Ginwright

Backfield
55/55 RB Rickey Jorg
45/45 FB Richie Hartman
40/40 FB Marc King
30/40 RB Courtney Jackson (rookie)
30/35 RB Glyn Sloane
25/25 RB Preston Tanner

Tight Ends
45/60 TE Brayden Flylum (rookie)
40/40 TE Kyle Baker
30/40 TE Sedrick Hill
30/30 TE Perry Bussey

Wide Receivers
55/55 WR Roman Randle
50/50 WR Rufus Montgomery
45/45 WR Rodolfo Lane
40/40 WR Tyrone Dillon
10/10 WR Blake Begay

Offensive Linemen
75/75 G Greg Brizzolara
75/75 LT Barry Finley
75/75 LT Dan Clancy
50/70 G Marcos Perez (rookie)
45/45 C Tracy Stewart
35/45 G Parker Prior
40/40 G Alfred Pearsall
25/35 RT Ryan Fulcher

Defensive Linemen
80/80 DT Tyrone Dillon
55/55 DT Jeremiah Cortez
50/50 DT Rodney Gagliardi
50/50 DE Phil Wakefield
45/45 DT Neil Burton
35/50 DE Chase Joseph (rookie)
40/40 DE Roger Graf
40/40 DE Sebastian Preston

Linebackers
60/60 LB Sam Hastings
60/60 LB Cristian Beyer
55/60 LB Travis Cantu
40/40 LB Jorge Mayes
35/35 LB Ezekiel O'Neal
20/20 LB Luther Goffee

Secondary
70/70 CB Andre McAninch
50/50 CB Zachary Blair
35/35 S Max Junker
35/35 CB Asher McElroy
35/35 S Cesar Welch
30/30 S Jimmie Coxwell
25/25 CB Marquis Wolf
25/25 S Peter Hinsley
25/25 CB Billy Cochrane
25/25 S Donnell Brenner (fa signing)

Special Teamers
85/85 K Jeffery DeGroot
60/60 P Devon Middleton
20/20 LS Roderick Kaeding

Not too much additional fluff insight for the moment, maybe later, or maybe not at all. Pre-season was tough, as it made us drop some promising rookies that completely fell apart and saw our future starting quarterback take a big step back to career backup material. But, we're probably set for a better season that we had last season. I think TE Flylum is an upgrade over TE Andersen, as is G Perez over G Tucker. We'll manage in the secondary, flipping around a bit to make the loss of S Fox doable and bring in S Brennan, who isn't just a kickoff returner, but also an interceptions mojo improvement for the unit. DE Joseph turned out to be first round pick material, so that's a nice find too to bring to our rotation into the role of DE Kafka.