[MIJB#19]

General Manager Notes: Draft 2122, no draft without trades!

The 2122 draft has finishes while the off-season continues. RB Jackson Powell is still without a new team, despite that his exorbitant salary demands have decreased to $50M over 3 years. I'm not surprised no other team has made him an offer yet, his agent is a moron. So is WR Ramon Randle's agent. They have turned down no less than 4 contract offers from us, but they declined and now Randle's decision is to hold out. Awesome.

Not accounting for rookies, we added up to 50 players signed, with new contracts for restricted free agents RB Preston Tanner, C Tracy Stewart and LB Luther Goffee, and a new 3-year deal for unrestricted free agent S Cesar Welch. We also filled some gaps on the team with veteran free agents. FB Marc King will step in as our new elite special teamer from the backfield. He's actually a better blocker than FB Rich Hartman as well, which is both a bonus and a luxury problem. RT Randy Fulcher is a smart underdeveloped run blocker, we signed him mostly to mentor our first round pick (more on that later). S Jimmie Coxwell is another special teams guy, but his run stopping and zone defense are good enough to be on the active roster. King signed a cheap 3-year deal, the other two a 2-year veteran minimum deal.

Our six draft picks have arrived at Oranje Haven to be further evaluated. We stood fast at the 1.13 spot, picking the top player going into the draft LT Barry Finley, although early signs are that Snapfinger's 1.9 pick defensive end Cade is a once every decade kind of player. We also remained at slot 1.20 taking LB Travis Cantu. Then at spot 3.7 we picked LB Bryson Wilmer, but we soon after traded him to Toronto for pick 3.29 and their 2123 3rd as I felt that it would be one linebacker too many. At slot 3.20 we picked RB Rickey Jorg, he will battle with second-year RB Glyn Sloane for playing time and he also hopes to become our new kickoff returner. But so does S Devan Gagliardi, our 3.29 pick, we will likely switch him to cornerback for his man-to-man and bump and run skills. We traded picks 4.20, 5.20 and 6.20 to Harlem for their 3rd in 2123 and the 7.3 pick. We used pick 7.3 on G Parker Prior, a pass blocker that was already on our board for pick 4.20 had we kept it. And at slot 7.20 we took WR Teddy Whitfield, a big-play route runner, a kid worth trying to develop in the wings for a future WR3 role.

With 56 players signed and almost $30M in cap space, we're not quite done yet. As mentioned already, WR Roman Randle is holding out and we'll have to invest at minimum $5M of that to re-sign him. I suspect we're going to need most of the remaining cap space to extend contracts of other young starters as Randle isn't the only one from our strong class of 2119 is in the last year of contract. S Kim Fox could be on the bubble as already is G James Tucker. LB Sam Hastings is trickier as is TE Francisco Andersen. The last three have quite the too much for what they have been worth demands. DT Neil Burton has turned into a bit of a first round bust, but at least his contract demands are more in line with his ability and performance. We also have to make a choice on long-timers LB Jorge Mayes and G Alfred Pearson, veteran DE Glen Kafka, rotation players LB Ezekiel O'Neal and CB Marquis Wolf, backups TE Kyle Baker and TE Perry Bussey. And last but not least, there's this best in business guy that is also in the final year on an already expensive contract, K Jeffery DeGroot wants to be the best paid kicker in IHOF history.

So yeah, that $30M in cap space will be gone pretty soon. Hence, G James Tucker is on the trade block, he's not going to get paid by us, most likely, but if he stays without a new contract, he still will be a starter this season. Something similar applies to TE Francisco Andersen and LB Sam Hastings, although I do hope to find a middle ground in contract talks. But we won't start talking until we've reached mid-pre-season, which obviously also applies to all the other aforementioned soon to be free agents.

We're currently in the process of adding our roster up to 60-something players with undrafted rookie free agents. The list of players we made an offer too was quite small. We might als still want to acquire a mentor quarterback for QB Al Schneider, while we could als use some mentoring help in the linebackers group. More on that - and other stuff - later once we know which undrafted rookies have signed with us...