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Daimyo · 01-21-2001, 10:01 AM

The 2017 Richmond Archetypes Season in Review

Expansion Draft and Free Agency

The expansion draft is uneventful as usual, but I do manage to grab a decent run-stopping DE with my first pick. For the rest I look simply for good value players so as not to eat into my cap space with guys who won't amount to much more than dead weight anyway. As I enter into my first free agent period, the first thing i notice is the abundance of quality QB's at the top of my scout's list! There are two I mark as having both enough talent and youth around which to build my franchise. Luckily the one I want is ranked lowest of the four by my scout, so I figure he has a good chance of being left for the last ten weeks. With that in mind, I decide to look at other positions for my franchise's first FA pickup. I quickly find a great run-stopping DT and a nicely balanced G. I bid on the DT first... and loose. I go after the G... and he decides to play elsewhere for less money. At this I see that the two older QB's I didn't want have already been snatched up. A lot of attention is now suddenly being given to QB Snyder (the one I want less anyway). Fearing that once Snyder is picked up, my guy will become the next hottest item up for bid, I decide to swoop in and rescue him from free agency torment with a nice four year, $66mil ($5mil bonus) contract offer. He graciously accepts. It is more than I had hoped to pay, but a good $20mil less than the total contracts of the other three QB's. No impact players are left at the beginning of the second half so I decide to wait until week 19 and grab any good bargains. My three second half FA's are all second year guys signed in week 19 or so. I'm sure with my lack of overall talent they'll start for my first few years but hopefully won't be more than backups in two or three years.

Amateur Draft

There are actually several great players at the top of my scout's recommendation list for this draft. There are two great DE's, a future QB star, several good OL prospects, a really nice cover cornerback, a RB with about half his abilities maxed (including BA speed and potential YPC), and several other top ten quality picks. In a normal career of mine, I probably would take one of the DE's or OL's and try to build my team slowly. In this challenge, however, the first season's score counts just as much as any other season's so I decide to take the guy I think will give me the most wins now. So with the first pick in the 2017 amateur draft, The Richmond Archetypes choose Austin Coleman, 6-1", 224 lb running back out of Arkansas-Pine Bluff. His scores are 100, 32(54), 100, 56(100), 58, 47(85), 52, 100, 48. Not the prototypical 1st pick RB, but his BA speed, YPC, and Carrying all go to 100 and those are the three most important stats for and RB IMHO. I just hope the uniformity of his non 100 scores isn't an indicator of him being a bust!! I finish out my draft with a decent WR in round two, a decent DE in round three, a pretty good C in round four. This draft was great at the top, but not very deep at the bottom and thus my remaining picks aren't really of any worth I think. I fill my roster up to 70 players, hope for some breakouts and head to camp.

Preseaon

Luckily none of my picks busted (the RB lost a single pt of BAS and YPC only!) but no breakouts either. Actually in my hundreds of seasons playing FOF2k1 I don't think I ever had a real breakout player and I've only had maybe one or two real busts. Occasionally I have guys who change some or all of their stats, but never by more than 5-10 points. We go 2-2 in exhibition with no major injuries EXCEPT both my punter and kicker are out with injuries!! I almost never have one of my kickers out... let alone both of them! So I head to the free agent market and pick up replacements and head into the regular season.

Regular Season

We lose our first game 41-17 to Minnesota. Coleman got 86 yards on only 13 carries (6.6 avg) which makes the owners happy. Starting QB Nelson only made 6 passing attempts before getting pulled. He was 5/6 for 53 yds with no TD's or int's before being pulled. His replacement managed only 14/30 for 198 yds and TWO int's... At least the offense looks like it has some potential if Nelson could play the full game. He doesn't show any lasting injuries which makes the coaches extremely happy and optimistic for the next game.

This week New England comes to town and we win 24-14. WOOHOO! Coleman is really looking to be the real deal! He burned NE for 198 yds on 26 carries (7.6 avg) and two TD's. Nelson played the full game this time getting 20/30 for 181 yds with 1 TD and 2 interceptions. In light of Coleman's performances in the first two games its easy to overlook the four interceptions. Even though this is Nelson's 6th year in the league he never started a game before this season and only played in two. So despite his all-pro ratings we may be in for an adjustment period with him.

The Eagles come to Richmond this week for an early season NFC East matchup. We win 32-20 to put us at 2-1 and atop the NFC East after three games. Coleman again has another extremely efficient game coming up with 71 yards on only 13 carries (5.4 avg). I don't understand why he has gotten so few carries in two of our games, but at least he is certainly making the most of them! Nelson plays pretty well as well with 18/30 for 190 yds and one TD. The team is really starting to become cautiously optimistic at this point. We're happy to be 2-1, but feel we could have been 3-0 had Nelson played the whole game against the Vikings. In an interesting note, our replacement kicker suffered a concussion in this game. I guess the position is just cursed for this team. Our top CB sprained his knee, but is expected to play in the next game.

This week brings are second NFC East challenge. This time we pack our bags for Jersey to play the 1-2 New York Football Giants. The Giants barely nudge us 20-17. Coleman picked up 73 yards on 18 carries (4.0 avg). Nelson again only made 6 attempts before leaving the game with a hyperextended elbow. He shows questionable for next week but the hated Redskins are coming to town and we can't let him miss the first game in what should become a hotly contested regional rivalry.

Against any other team we probably would have let Nelson sit out a week to heal, but this is the Redskins and we feel a game like this is important to help us establish our franchise's identity. I just noticed my replacement punter was injured in the last game and will be out 3-5 weeks for arthroscopic knee surgery. Wow.. maybe there is something to this curse. Washington takes round one 20-3. Coleman got 51 yards on only 10 carries. Efficient, but we need to get this guy more touches. His playing time is set to 6 which I think is pretty high for a rookie. Nelson has a poor game only getting around 120 yards passing, no TD's and one interception.

This week 1-4 Carolina comes into Richmond. We feel we really need a win right now to get this season back on track, but unfortunately still fall 23-17. Coleman only managed 49 yards on 18 carries (2.7 avg) in the game. Nelson only completed 42% of his passes. Yet we still lost by less than a touchdown. This team still has reason for optimism, but the media and fans are already starting to loose faith for this season.

We get a rematch with the 2-4 Giants at home this time and we take this one 21-20 on an Austin Coleman 46 TD yard run with 4 minutes left. Coleman finished the game with 108 yards on 17 carries and 2 TD's. Nelson passed for a TD, but also had three interceptions. He also passed for over 200 yards for the first time this season. After this win we are 3-4. If you told the coaches they would be 3-4 at the beginning of the season they would have been pleased. But now, we have the feeling that we could have been much better. Still we're only 1.5 games behind Arizona for first place in the division and we haven't played them yet so we still have a chance at the playoffs. However, six of our first seven games were at home so we could also still be in for a long season and high draft pick.

We get to travel to Miami this week to face the 4-2 Dolphins in this inter-conference matchup. The team plays hard, but still falls 31-13. Coleman gets 64 yards on 13 attempts (4.9 avg), but Nelson really drags the team down with his 4.4 yards per attempt and one interception without a TD. Maybe this team's expectations got too high after our decent start. Nelson has been playing through a bit of injury with his hyper-extended elbow and he finally looks to be 100%.

At the halfway point we sit at 3-5. This is much better than we expected at the start of the season, but we still feel disappointed as this team could have easily been at least 4-4 had Nelson not suffered through various minor injuries. This it’s the halfway point, lets look at some key stats from this season so far and grade the team by position.

Key stats for first half of Season

QB - Nelson - 108/197, 1161 yards, 4 TD, 9 int, 62.1 rating (33rd among qualifiers)

RB - Coleman - 129 attempts, 706 yards (1st in league), 5.4 avg, 7 TD (2nd in league)

OT - Kenny Cedeno - 2 Fumble Recoveries, 15 KRB, 46.8 B%, 3 SkA

LB - Kerry O'Neal - 60 tackles, 2.0 sacks, 1 blk, 1 hurry, 1 int

DE - Johnnie Burgess - 34 tackles, 5.0 sacks, 2 hurries

No DB over 23 PDQ (only O'Neal has an interception on the whole team!!!)

Back to the games.
Today the five and two, division leading Arizona Cardinals come into the Richmond Coliseum (still taking bids for sponsorship rights). At 3-5 we need to really go 7-1 to make the playoffs. With only 2 home games left (including this one), we really can not afford to lose here, but we do… 24-17. Coleman gets 57 yards on only 7 carries (8.1 avg) and Nelson again stinks the place up. Management has repeated given the coach instructions to give Coleman more carries and so far we have been ignored. At this point he only has 136 caries (about 15 per game). If he doesn't have 275 by the end of the season (20 per game from here on out) a different man will be coaching the Archetypes next season.

This week is our bye week. For their sakes, the coach and offensive coordinator better design some more plays for Coleman

We travel to Philadelphia. With the playoffs essentially out of the picture for us, we just hope to make it through the year without major injuries. Of course, it would be nice if Coleman could league in rushing so maybe we could get our attendance to increase. Anyway, we win a shootout with Philly 34-31. The coach must have finally gotten our message as Austin Coleman gets 176 yards on 24 carries (7.3 avg) and 1 TD. Nelson completes less than 40% of his passes for 202 yards and 2 interceptions to go along with two TD's. He made almost as many bad passes (10) as completions (12). Nelson better be glad Coleman has carried us to a 4-6 record to cover up for his (Nelson's) terrible season.

This week we travel to 6-4 Dallas and we win 26-23. Perhaps I had given up on this team too soon. Still at 5-6 we would need to win our next 5 games to get into the playoffs. Coleman rushed for 73 yards on 18 carries (4.0 avg) and 1 TD. Nelson actually played well going 20/33 for 204 yards with 1 TD and no interceptions. Our kicker really won this game for us going 4/4 on FG's and 2/2 on PAT's.

This week we travel to division leading Arizona. At 7-4 they are a full two games ahead of us. Of course, a win would close that to just one game with four remaining. But since we lose 14-21, we fall to three games out. In one of the biggest games in this young team's history, you would think the coaches would try to get the most out of their young, emerging superstar. Well… not our coaches.. they gave Coleman the ball seven (7!!!) times for 17 yards (2.4 avg). He did get 2 receptions for 19 yards and a TD. Nelson passed for 150 yards, 2 TD's and an interception and led the team in rushing with 59 yards. At this point ownership is incredibly doubtful that Coach Bernstein will be back. The next four weeks will really make or break him depending on how hard the team plays in light of playoff elimination.

This week we travel to Greensboro for probably our second most important rivalry as our franchises will forever be tied together. Greensboro is 7-5 and we would like nothing more than to defeat them and kill their playoff ambitions! Unfortunately they have other thoughts on the matter and smoke us 16-3. Coleman had a terrible game getting only 3 yards on 11 carries. Nelson wasn't much better after leaving the game with a concussion after just 12 attempts for 90 yards passing.

Dallas comes calling at 7-6 and defeats us 13-10. We sure haven't been playing this playoff spoiler roll very well. Coleman gets 106 yards on 26 attempts (4.0 avg) as well as 4 catches for 20 yards and one TD.

We travel to England this week to play Manchester. Well its probably not Manchester, England, but we tell our players it is so they feel like it’s a special game. Apparently it didn't work as they defeat us 14-7. Coleman rushed for 40 yards on 15 carries.

We end our season against the much-hated Redskins on their home field. They defeated us earlier in the year on our home field and we really need this game. At 5-10, right now we care more for a pride than the higher draft pick a 5-11 record would net us. But I guess higher draft picks aren't so bad we tell ourselves after loosing 17-10. Coleman manages 120 yards on 20 carries but can't find the endzone. Nelson completes almost 65% of his passes for 191 yards, 1 TD, and 1 int.

Season Recap

So we end the season at 5-11. Lets have a look at the stats for the whole season

QB Randal Nelson - 225/421, 2411 yards, 5.72 YPA, 11 TD, 14 INT, 65.3 QB Rating
We still feel FA pickup Randal Nelson is a great prospect for the future and that this team can only go as far as he takes us. That said, we expect huge improvements from him next year and plan to give him better receivers to help him as best we can.

RB Austin Coleman - 257 attempts, 1302 yards, 5.0 avg., 9 TD
First overall pick of the draft Austin Coleman had a great season. His numbers, especially touchdowns, suffered in the second half but we still view him as the main reason we were able to win even five games. I see Nelson's improvement as the key to our future, but Coleman is definitely the guy who will carry us there. Coleman seems to be a big play RB who needs lots of carries to get his yards consistenly. I would have liked to have seen what he would have done with 300 carries.

WR Carlton Barber - 62/131 catches, 800 yards, 12.9 avg. 3 TD, 9 drops
My second round pick should make a good second WR, but really needs to raise his catches, lower his drops and find the endzone more to be relied on as a primary receiver. I doubt he has the talent to do so and perhaps a lot of Nelson's troubles can be blamed on the poor received corps.

LB Kerry O'Neal - 110 tackles, 36 assists, 4 sacks, 1 int
As a player acquired in the expansion draft he really played above his ratings this season as the anchor on a poor defense. Still you have to give him his props for the tackles and sacks. He has one more year left on his contract and I doubt I will resign him after it expires unless he is willing to take a large cut in pay.

Team stats

Rushing: 4.4 / 3.4 / 3.7
Passing: 5.7 / 7.3 / 6.6

We had a great running game and a pretty good rushing defense, but were extremely poor both ways in passing. We also finished near the bottom in turnover margin with -11.

Chicago defeated Colorado Springs 13-10 for their second FOF Superbowl vistory.

Player Awards

Austin Coleman - Offensive Rookie of the Year, 2nd Team All-Pro Running Back

Kerry O'Neal - 2nd Team All-Pro Linebacker

[This message has been edited by Daimyo (edited 01-23-2001).]

[This message has been edited by Daimyo (edited 01-23-2001).]

01-21-2001, 10:01 AM	#2
Daimyo College Starter Join Date: Oct 2000 Location: Berkeley	The 2017 Richmond Archetypes Season in Review Expansion Draft and Free Agency The expansion draft is uneventful as usual, but I do manage to grab a decent run-stopping DE with my first pick. For the rest I look simply for good value players so as not to eat into my cap space with guys who won't amount to much more than dead weight anyway. As I enter into my first free agent period, the first thing i notice is the abundance of quality QB's at the top of my scout's list! There are two I mark as having both enough talent and youth around which to build my franchise. Luckily the one I want is ranked lowest of the four by my scout, so I figure he has a good chance of being left for the last ten weeks. With that in mind, I decide to look at other positions for my franchise's first FA pickup. I quickly find a great run-stopping DT and a nicely balanced G. I bid on the DT first... and loose. I go after the G... and he decides to play elsewhere for less money. At this I see that the two older QB's I didn't want have already been snatched up. A lot of attention is now suddenly being given to QB Snyder (the one I want less anyway). Fearing that once Snyder is picked up, my guy will become the next hottest item up for bid, I decide to swoop in and rescue him from free agency torment with a nice four year, $66mil ($5mil bonus) contract offer. He graciously accepts. It is more than I had hoped to pay, but a good $20mil less than the total contracts of the other three QB's. No impact players are left at the beginning of the second half so I decide to wait until week 19 and grab any good bargains. My three second half FA's are all second year guys signed in week 19 or so. I'm sure with my lack of overall talent they'll start for my first few years but hopefully won't be more than backups in two or three years. Amateur Draft There are actually several great players at the top of my scout's recommendation list for this draft. There are two great DE's, a future QB star, several good OL prospects, a really nice cover cornerback, a RB with about half his abilities maxed (including BA speed and potential YPC), and several other top ten quality picks. In a normal career of mine, I probably would take one of the DE's or OL's and try to build my team slowly. In this challenge, however, the first season's score counts just as much as any other season's so I decide to take the guy I think will give me the most wins now. So with the first pick in the 2017 amateur draft, The Richmond Archetypes choose Austin Coleman, 6-1", 224 lb running back out of Arkansas-Pine Bluff. His scores are 100, 32(54), 100, 56(100), 58, 47(85), 52, 100, 48. Not the prototypical 1st pick RB, but his BA speed, YPC, and Carrying all go to 100 and those are the three most important stats for and RB IMHO. I just hope the uniformity of his non 100 scores isn't an indicator of him being a bust!! I finish out my draft with a decent WR in round two, a decent DE in round three, a pretty good C in round four. This draft was great at the top, but not very deep at the bottom and thus my remaining picks aren't really of any worth I think. I fill my roster up to 70 players, hope for some breakouts and head to camp. Preseaon Luckily none of my picks busted (the RB lost a single pt of BAS and YPC only!) but no breakouts either. Actually in my hundreds of seasons playing FOF2k1 I don't think I ever had a real breakout player and I've only had maybe one or two real busts. Occasionally I have guys who change some or all of their stats, but never by more than 5-10 points. We go 2-2 in exhibition with no major injuries EXCEPT both my punter and kicker are out with injuries!! I almost never have one of my kickers out... let alone both of them! So I head to the free agent market and pick up replacements and head into the regular season. Regular Season We lose our first game 41-17 to Minnesota. Coleman got 86 yards on only 13 carries (6.6 avg) which makes the owners happy. Starting QB Nelson only made 6 passing attempts before getting pulled. He was 5/6 for 53 yds with no TD's or int's before being pulled. His replacement managed only 14/30 for 198 yds and TWO int's... At least the offense looks like it has some potential if Nelson could play the full game. He doesn't show any lasting injuries which makes the coaches extremely happy and optimistic for the next game. This week New England comes to town and we win 24-14. WOOHOO! Coleman is really looking to be the real deal! He burned NE for 198 yds on 26 carries (7.6 avg) and two TD's. Nelson played the full game this time getting 20/30 for 181 yds with 1 TD and 2 interceptions. In light of Coleman's performances in the first two games its easy to overlook the four interceptions. Even though this is Nelson's 6th year in the league he never started a game before this season and only played in two. So despite his all-pro ratings we may be in for an adjustment period with him. The Eagles come to Richmond this week for an early season NFC East matchup. We win 32-20 to put us at 2-1 and atop the NFC East after three games. Coleman again has another extremely efficient game coming up with 71 yards on only 13 carries (5.4 avg). I don't understand why he has gotten so few carries in two of our games, but at least he is certainly making the most of them! Nelson plays pretty well as well with 18/30 for 190 yds and one TD. The team is really starting to become cautiously optimistic at this point. We're happy to be 2-1, but feel we could have been 3-0 had Nelson played the whole game against the Vikings. In an interesting note, our replacement kicker suffered a concussion in this game. I guess the position is just cursed for this team. Our top CB sprained his knee, but is expected to play in the next game. This week brings are second NFC East challenge. This time we pack our bags for Jersey to play the 1-2 New York Football Giants. The Giants barely nudge us 20-17. Coleman picked up 73 yards on 18 carries (4.0 avg). Nelson again only made 6 attempts before leaving the game with a hyperextended elbow. He shows questionable for next week but the hated Redskins are coming to town and we can't let him miss the first game in what should become a hotly contested regional rivalry. Against any other team we probably would have let Nelson sit out a week to heal, but this is the Redskins and we feel a game like this is important to help us establish our franchise's identity. I just noticed my replacement punter was injured in the last game and will be out 3-5 weeks for arthroscopic knee surgery. Wow.. maybe there is something to this curse. Washington takes round one 20-3. Coleman got 51 yards on only 10 carries. Efficient, but we need to get this guy more touches. His playing time is set to 6 which I think is pretty high for a rookie. Nelson has a poor game only getting around 120 yards passing, no TD's and one interception. This week 1-4 Carolina comes into Richmond. We feel we really need a win right now to get this season back on track, but unfortunately still fall 23-17. Coleman only managed 49 yards on 18 carries (2.7 avg) in the game. Nelson only completed 42% of his passes. Yet we still lost by less than a touchdown. This team still has reason for optimism, but the media and fans are already starting to loose faith for this season. We get a rematch with the 2-4 Giants at home this time and we take this one 21-20 on an Austin Coleman 46 TD yard run with 4 minutes left. Coleman finished the game with 108 yards on 17 carries and 2 TD's. Nelson passed for a TD, but also had three interceptions. He also passed for over 200 yards for the first time this season. After this win we are 3-4. If you told the coaches they would be 3-4 at the beginning of the season they would have been pleased. But now, we have the feeling that we could have been much better. Still we're only 1.5 games behind Arizona for first place in the division and we haven't played them yet so we still have a chance at the playoffs. However, six of our first seven games were at home so we could also still be in for a long season and high draft pick. We get to travel to Miami this week to face the 4-2 Dolphins in this inter-conference matchup. The team plays hard, but still falls 31-13. Coleman gets 64 yards on 13 attempts (4.9 avg), but Nelson really drags the team down with his 4.4 yards per attempt and one interception without a TD. Maybe this team's expectations got too high after our decent start. Nelson has been playing through a bit of injury with his hyper-extended elbow and he finally looks to be 100%. At the halfway point we sit at 3-5. This is much better than we expected at the start of the season, but we still feel disappointed as this team could have easily been at least 4-4 had Nelson not suffered through various minor injuries. This it’s the halfway point, lets look at some key stats from this season so far and grade the team by position. Key stats for first half of Season QB - Nelson - 108/197, 1161 yards, 4 TD, 9 int, 62.1 rating (33rd among qualifiers) RB - Coleman - 129 attempts, 706 yards (1st in league), 5.4 avg, 7 TD (2nd in league) OT - Kenny Cedeno - 2 Fumble Recoveries, 15 KRB, 46.8 B%, 3 SkA LB - Kerry O'Neal - 60 tackles, 2.0 sacks, 1 blk, 1 hurry, 1 int DE - Johnnie Burgess - 34 tackles, 5.0 sacks, 2 hurries No DB over 23 PDQ (only O'Neal has an interception on the whole team!!!) Back to the games. Today the five and two, division leading Arizona Cardinals come into the Richmond Coliseum (still taking bids for sponsorship rights). At 3-5 we need to really go 7-1 to make the playoffs. With only 2 home games left (including this one), we really can not afford to lose here, but we do… 24-17. Coleman gets 57 yards on only 7 carries (8.1 avg) and Nelson again stinks the place up. Management has repeated given the coach instructions to give Coleman more carries and so far we have been ignored. At this point he only has 136 caries (about 15 per game). If he doesn't have 275 by the end of the season (20 per game from here on out) a different man will be coaching the Archetypes next season. This week is our bye week. For their sakes, the coach and offensive coordinator better design some more plays for Coleman We travel to Philadelphia. With the playoffs essentially out of the picture for us, we just hope to make it through the year without major injuries. Of course, it would be nice if Coleman could league in rushing so maybe we could get our attendance to increase. Anyway, we win a shootout with Philly 34-31. The coach must have finally gotten our message as Austin Coleman gets 176 yards on 24 carries (7.3 avg) and 1 TD. Nelson completes less than 40% of his passes for 202 yards and 2 interceptions to go along with two TD's. He made almost as many bad passes (10) as completions (12). Nelson better be glad Coleman has carried us to a 4-6 record to cover up for his (Nelson's) terrible season. This week we travel to 6-4 Dallas and we win 26-23. Perhaps I had given up on this team too soon. Still at 5-6 we would need to win our next 5 games to get into the playoffs. Coleman rushed for 73 yards on 18 carries (4.0 avg) and 1 TD. Nelson actually played well going 20/33 for 204 yards with 1 TD and no interceptions. Our kicker really won this game for us going 4/4 on FG's and 2/2 on PAT's. This week we travel to division leading Arizona. At 7-4 they are a full two games ahead of us. Of course, a win would close that to just one game with four remaining. But since we lose 14-21, we fall to three games out. In one of the biggest games in this young team's history, you would think the coaches would try to get the most out of their young, emerging superstar. Well… not our coaches.. they gave Coleman the ball seven (7!!!) times for 17 yards (2.4 avg). He did get 2 receptions for 19 yards and a TD. Nelson passed for 150 yards, 2 TD's and an interception and led the team in rushing with 59 yards. At this point ownership is incredibly doubtful that Coach Bernstein will be back. The next four weeks will really make or break him depending on how hard the team plays in light of playoff elimination. This week we travel to Greensboro for probably our second most important rivalry as our franchises will forever be tied together. Greensboro is 7-5 and we would like nothing more than to defeat them and kill their playoff ambitions! Unfortunately they have other thoughts on the matter and smoke us 16-3. Coleman had a terrible game getting only 3 yards on 11 carries. Nelson wasn't much better after leaving the game with a concussion after just 12 attempts for 90 yards passing. Dallas comes calling at 7-6 and defeats us 13-10. We sure haven't been playing this playoff spoiler roll very well. Coleman gets 106 yards on 26 attempts (4.0 avg) as well as 4 catches for 20 yards and one TD. We travel to England this week to play Manchester. Well its probably not Manchester, England, but we tell our players it is so they feel like it’s a special game. Apparently it didn't work as they defeat us 14-7. Coleman rushed for 40 yards on 15 carries. We end our season against the much-hated Redskins on their home field. They defeated us earlier in the year on our home field and we really need this game. At 5-10, right now we care more for a pride than the higher draft pick a 5-11 record would net us. But I guess higher draft picks aren't so bad we tell ourselves after loosing 17-10. Coleman manages 120 yards on 20 carries but can't find the endzone. Nelson completes almost 65% of his passes for 191 yards, 1 TD, and 1 int. Season Recap So we end the season at 5-11. Lets have a look at the stats for the whole season QB Randal Nelson - 225/421, 2411 yards, 5.72 YPA, 11 TD, 14 INT, 65.3 QB Rating We still feel FA pickup Randal Nelson is a great prospect for the future and that this team can only go as far as he takes us. That said, we expect huge improvements from him next year and plan to give him better receivers to help him as best we can. RB Austin Coleman - 257 attempts, 1302 yards, 5.0 avg., 9 TD First overall pick of the draft Austin Coleman had a great season. His numbers, especially touchdowns, suffered in the second half but we still view him as the main reason we were able to win even five games. I see Nelson's improvement as the key to our future, but Coleman is definitely the guy who will carry us there. Coleman seems to be a big play RB who needs lots of carries to get his yards consistenly. I would have liked to have seen what he would have done with 300 carries. WR Carlton Barber - 62/131 catches, 800 yards, 12.9 avg. 3 TD, 9 drops My second round pick should make a good second WR, but really needs to raise his catches, lower his drops and find the endzone more to be relied on as a primary receiver. I doubt he has the talent to do so and perhaps a lot of Nelson's troubles can be blamed on the poor received corps. LB Kerry O'Neal - 110 tackles, 36 assists, 4 sacks, 1 int As a player acquired in the expansion draft he really played above his ratings this season as the anchor on a poor defense. Still you have to give him his props for the tackles and sacks. He has one more year left on his contract and I doubt I will resign him after it expires unless he is willing to take a large cut in pay. Team stats Rushing: 4.4 / 3.4 / 3.7 Passing: 5.7 / 7.3 / 6.6 We had a great running game and a pretty good rushing defense, but were extremely poor both ways in passing. We also finished near the bottom in turnover margin with -11. Chicago defeated Colorado Springs 13-10 for their second FOF Superbowl vistory. Player Awards Austin Coleman - Offensive Rookie of the Year, 2nd Team All-Pro Running Back Kerry O'Neal - 2nd Team All-Pro Linebacker [This message has been edited by Daimyo (edited 01-23-2001).] [This message has been edited by Daimyo (edited 01-23-2001).]