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02-08-2014, 08:27 PM
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#1 | ||
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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FOF7: Until I Get Distracted
I've finally got a little time over the next few weeks to do some FOFling, and I decided to make a run at a dynasty. There will be the best of times and the worst of times. Fast times and slow times. Strange and arbitrary house rules. Quests that pop up out of nowhere. Offhand references to "my spreadsheets," because hey, Excel is fun, bros.
Maybe we'll learn a little something about the game. Maybe we won't. Eventually this thread will die a sudden and unexpected death. (I think this acknowledgement makes it a sudden and expected death, but who's keeping score?) Ok, enough of that. |
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02-08-2014, 08:58 PM
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#2 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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First off, we're taking over the real roster Chargers. I've simmed through the first season and punched my way through the Staff Draft, hit the recommend button on ticket pricing, and we're sitting at FA1:1 with a draft class in front of us and a bevy of choices.
Random House Rule #1: We're gonna be Manti's fictional GM besties and never let him play for another team. No real reason for this one other than he's a pretty good player in this career, and I wanted to put "Manti's fictional" in this thread for the extra Google ranking points.  So yeah, why not? We made some major staff changes at the beginning of this offseason. This was mostly the result of Mike McCoy, Ken Whisenhunt, and well, pretty much everybody being generated with poor ratings in this universe. The cool thing is this gave me a chance to create real synergy between my quarterback and my head coach.  With Phil Rivers and Jack of the River, this dynasty will never run dry... *high fives self* No really though, Del Rio has some pretty dang good stats and we were lucky to get him at the 27th pick in the Staff Draft. The rest of our new group of coaches: Offensive Coordinator - Joe DeCamillis  He's got elite playcalling and good development and scouting stats. Another guy we're probably lucky to land. I also wonder if his extremely low intelligence has some secretly awful effects, or if it just means all his brain points are going directly to footballin'. Defensive Coordinator - John Pagano  We kept Pagano because his playcalling was good. Doubting that decision now with the screenshot. Is this the man to develop Manti? Asst Head Coach - Mad Cow Bennett  Because Mad Cow. Just a really well-balanced young guy who just got generated into the universe. I am guessing we're looking at a future head coach here. Strength Coach - Kent Johnson I'm not screenshotting a strength coach. I have some limits. He's maxed in Strength Training and like a 25 in Conditioning. I think that means we'll have injuries. |
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02-08-2014, 09:07 PM
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#3 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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We're going to be playing with 100 injuries and 50 combine accuracy.
We've currently got 40 guys under contract and very little cap space. Here's the roster snap: Code:
My early read is that we need more offensive talent. It's probably easy to say WRs, but we really could use help anywhere. That's probably where we'll focus in the draft. |
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02-08-2014, 09:34 PM
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#4 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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Something I just noticed that I think you'll like...
 The X-Factor is really pinning its ears back in this universe. Cats and Dogs, living together. Philip Rivers running a 4.33 forty. He has a 49 Scramble Frequency, but he ran for a 8.32 avg on his 47 carries last year. I do think that the dash is correlated to some kind of scrambling effectiveness rating, even if it doesn't necessarily mean the guy is always going to take off. We are probably going to run the ball a lot anyway. In some weird universe quirk, Phil Rivers might be a good fit for what we're going to do. In a less weird quirk, his passing bars are kind of shitty and he generated 23 turnovers last year. |
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02-08-2014, 10:12 PM
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#5 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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Random House Rule #2: No trading of future picks. If I have a boner for some stud QB at the top of the draft, I have to have enough current year assets to go get him.
We're currently sitting at #7 after a 6-10 season on AI control. There is indeed a studly looking QB near the top of the draft. Here's a snapshot of the first page:  Both Price D-Linemen look very good. RB Brant Foulke looks very good. ILB Dustin Tenneson looks like a no-doubter. That's four guys. QB Dusty Bingaman looks like this:  So super high bars, super high bureau rating, good combines, an underrated interview, and a very high 42 Sol score with 24 Intelligence. As Sundown said to Maverick, "It doesn't get to look any better than that." He also said "We could've had him man." Chill out Sundown, we will fire when we are god damn good and ready. (Just a quick pause, but they make a movie about fighter pilots where literally one African-American gets more than two seconds of screen time and they name him Sundown? I know we're all a bunch of PC nancyboys now, but dang, the 80s.) So that's five pretty good players. WRs Bill Pearson and Carlton Gillman look solid. Pearson has a 4.30 forty and Gillman has a 19 bench. The 49 Pos score for Pearson raises some serious questions for me about him being a Top10 kind of talent, and a Hard to Read interview basically takes him out of our mix. Gillman's profile looks a lot safer... 4.40/19/6.84/56 in the key combines. That's a 60+ guy at the very least I'm thinking. I'll screenshot him if we get close to taking him on draft day. The quick look at available guys makes me think we'll get a good player if we stand pat at #7. It's good to know we've got some different options as we think through how to remake this team. Rivers has two years left on his contract at 13-15m, but he's literally got only 1.2m in bonus money attached to him. We could cut bait with no real penalty. I'll have to think on that. |
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02-08-2014, 10:53 PM
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#6 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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The more I look at the roster, the more I realize we only have a handful of guys I'd really like to build around.
FS Weddle ILB Teo (Obviously) LT Fluker A few other guys are pretty solid. But this roster has some bloated veteran salaries and I'm just cutting some of them to clear some space to go after key pieces. I think we want to run a 4-3. I don't have any particularly great reason for this, but I've had solid success running one lately and I think I understand the path to having a good one. Part of that is getting at least one really good DE, and Anthony Spencer is floating out in the FA pool, along with a few other guys who would be really solid adds for us. We go from 13m to 30m in cap room by cutting guys like Freeney, Clary, our 4m punter Scifres, and a few other guys. The defense I would like to build is going to have quality DEs (or at least one stud), coverage LBs, and as much talent in the secondary as I can afford after that. Offensively, we need a lot of things, but free agency doesn't have any answers for us. There's a very talented Jimmy Graham out there, but I'm not sure I can do much without some WR help. We're down to 31 players and have 41m in cap space. And we get a 4th and a 6th for LB Melvin Ingram, whose pass rushing skills don't really match what we're trying to do. |
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02-08-2014, 11:31 PM
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#7 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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DE Anthony Spencer wants 4/66. That's a pretty big bite for us. He's an 8th yr guy. I think we'd definitely do this and more if he was a 5th or 6th yr guy. We'll think on it.
Carlos Dunlap and Lamarr Houston look like pretty good alternatives for half the cost. We also see a few LBs who can help us, and maybe a cheap safety or two. Ok, I'm gonna get through FA and see who we get. |
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02-09-2014, 12:22 AM
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#8 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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We went to 4/72 for Spencer. He signed in Washington for 4/74. Frustrating.
Lamarr Houston signed before his listed stage, so we didn't have an offer in. Guess I should just make offers from the jump in SP. We did get some other goodies. We signed all these guys to flat contracts. TE Jimmy Graham - 4 x 10m DE Carlos Dunlap - 4 x 8.6m LB Jo-Lonn Dubar - 3 x 6.16m FS Chris Clemons - 2 x 2m FS Steve Gregory - 1 x .9m The Graham signing means we will give serious consideration to releasing Gates. We basically turn a 12th yr, 8m Gates into a 5th yr, 10m Graham. But maybe we have the space after the draft to be sentimental and keep Antonio around. Dunlap is like the light beer version of Spencer. We're hoping he's not the O'Douls version. Dunbar is an overpay for a good fit coverage LB. The safeties are depth with good zone bars, but Clemons might start for us. |
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02-09-2014, 02:54 AM
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#9 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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Ok, I figured it wouldn't be any fun for me to write a dynasty where I sign free agents and trade up to take stud QBs in the draft. (And the asshole Raiders wouldn't drop down to 1.7 for all the current year picks I had to offer.)
The top of the draft goes pretty much as expected: Code:
And we're staring the two WRs we talked about earlier in the face. Gillman is the one I'd take here, and I'll put a screenie up.  He's even 6-2 and stuff, which has some rounding error of importance. I think we're gonna take him. My only hesitation at this point is whether to take Gillman here or to drop down to the middle of the round and take a no combine guy who looks pretty intriguing.  Whitfield has a monster Sol score, which coupled with the no combine thing makes him pretty interesting to me. My scout seems to think these pretty good bars are accurate as well. He's the 5th best receiver in the class, so my guess is he'd go in the 20s or later. If I drop to 1.15 or 1.20, I can probably pick up another pick or two to get the kinds of guys I want. So Gillman, a pretty sure fire 60 WR, or Whitfield, an intriguing and probably 60ish guy in his own right, and an extra pick. Ugh. We're going Gillman. He's two years older, which I don't love. But, he's got a monster Route Running bar and a monster Endurance bar, and more than anything we need a talented guy who's going to suck up targets and be on the field. I may regret this one. Whitfield goes to the Bears at 1.18. We look up at 2.9 and it feels like there's not a whole lot left to get excited about. We take the best center on the board.  Collier should be solid for us. It was honestly this or a FB. The FB was still there in the 3rd. I'm not sure that means the right response was to take him, but we did it anyway. FB Ken Schau is a Charger. Code:
I think I should have done a little more for the O-Line now that I'm looking at our roster before FA2, but whatever. |
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02-09-2014, 11:54 AM
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#10 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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We make a few more signings in FA2. We knocked our Film Study down to 30 minutes and gave those 2 extra hours to Team Functions in the TC settings. We've got a veteran QB who knows 13 formations, and we brought in a bunch of new faces. We need all the help we can get to build some cohesion with these guys. We also took an hour from run plays and moved it to pass plays. I've just never seemed to see a meaningful impact from reducing run plays time, even in an offense where we run quite a bit. I'm sure there's something subtle happening there that doesn't jump out in the overall stats, but I'm comfortable making the transfer.
Here's the roster: Code:
We made some real strides on the offense. We bring in TE Graham, the rookie WR Gillman, the rookie center Collier, and we even picked up a few solid guards in FA2 who should fit well for us. We also found a way to keep Gates around, mostly for sentimental reasons. I'm going to edit one of my usual offenses and rec the formations to see if we can get some more 2TE sets going. The defense I don't feel great about. There was a moment where I took a look at our team in late FA2 and realized our CBs were just complete crap. We brought in Vontae Davis and Chris Culliver, two guys with a real claim to complete crappiness themselves in this universe, in a desperate attempt to be something better than awful. That's going to hurt us though. We have too many safeties, but no corners. And our DTs are a disaster. It could be a pretty weak unit for us. I don't think we have any particularly interesting depth chart battles this year. I'll try to keep an eye on the rookies for boom/bust stuff after the first couple of preseason games. |
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02-09-2014, 12:23 PM
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#11 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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Rookie Rating Moves
WR Gillman 46/68 - 45/62 (-6): We still feel good about him. C Collier 36/56 - 45/70 (+14): A great bump for a definite starter now. FB Schau 41/64 - 37/57 (-7): Ouch. Still looks solid though. DE Dresselhaus 20/36 - 21/41 (+5) RB Dixon 36/44 - 40/47 (+3) LB Boyce 18/28 - 19/30 (+2) SS Fiset 27/32 - 31/41 (+9) TE Crigger 27/47 - 33/47 (0) QB Malone 12/40 - 12/45 (+5) Not too bad on the whole. As is often the case in my drafts, we got a few later round guys with some nice bumps, but they're so crappy to begin with that it doesn't really mean much. Drafting curiosities with funny combine stuff can make you feel good when you run changetracker, but most of these dudes are never going to be as good as what's typically floating in FA2 in a lot of MP leagues. I like to draft though, and the +Future changes make me feel all warm and fuzzy. Gillman's -6 is slightly concerning. I'm actually hoping this dynasty will help me figure out how concerning these moves are. But we'll take this guy:  |
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02-09-2014, 01:13 PM
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#12 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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I'm probably going to sim through the actual games pretty quickly. I'll try to give some summary information on each quarter of the season to give some flow to things.
We're going to run an offense that runs the ball quite a bit and generally throws short passes. I'm finding I'm throwing too many picks with some of the deep passing stuff that worked in 2k7, but I never figured out many of the extra little tricks that Ben E Lou and others had to optimize that kind of attack. I'm sure there's a way to make it work, we're just going to focus on cutting down the turnovers for now though. We're also running a 4-3 defense with very little blitzing. No secret knowledge there. It's just a non-aggressive in most situations set that seems to perform in line with the talent on the field. I'm going for predictability over any uber-strat there. First Four We open with an ugly win against KC where we get two pick-sixes. We get spanked against Seattle and Rivers has a 0-5 TD-Int ratio right now. (This prompts me to go check out rookie QB Dusty Bingaman from the draft. He's a 28/84, no doubt stud. Of course the genius Raiders AI has him sitting behind a 42/54 John Skelton right now.) We lose to Cincy and Rivers throws 3 more picks, all in the 4th quarter. It may run a 4.3 forty in this world, but he's still got that little something. Miami destroys 34-3, even though we hold them to 241 yards of offense. 3 defensive TDs for them carry the day. Rivers throws three more picks. He has a dizzying 1-11 TD-Int ratio and a 46.4 passer rating. Record: 1-3 2nd Four We drop another one to the Jets. We lose to Denver 26-20, and Rivers is actually pulled in the middle of the game. We beat Buffalo with a really strong defensive performance, holding them to 179 yards of offense. We claw back another one against New England, 27-13. (A winning streak!) Record: 3-5 3rd Four We lose 10-6 to an awful Oakland team who is still starting John Skelton. We hold them to 188 total yards of offense. We dominate KC in their place, with Rivers finally posting a rating above 100. We lose to St. Louis. We lose a close one to Indy. Record: 4-8 4th Four We get dominated by SF. Oakland, with Dusty Bingaman now starting, edges us 27-24 in our place. We beat a decent Arizona team. We somehow beat 1st place Denver in Week 17. Record: 6-10, 2nd Place (Woohoo!) Code:
The defense was actually very good. DE Dunlap had a really sneaky 12.2 PrPct, ranking better than anyone else in the league, despite only having 6.5 sacks. He only played in 12 games because of a separated shoulder at the end of the year, but he was basically everything we wanted from that signing. My concerns about this side of the ball look pretty stupid now, as these guys played very well. The offense on the other hand. I mean wow. 37 turnovers, good for worst in the league on that front. Rivers throwing 23 picks and fumbling 11 times. We absolutely sucked. I'm not sure we can bring him back at 15m with this awful fart of a season lingering in the air. I'm not sure we could be this bad again, but we're going to have to do something about our QB situation. It looks pretty doubtful that Ryan Matthews is our answer at RB as well. I'm used to seeing much better production from that spot. I guess we'll rebalance those TC settings too. Yikes. |
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02-09-2014, 01:36 PM
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#13 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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San Francisco beats Denver in the Bowl.
Jimmy Graham is named All-League Second Team Tight End. He actually had a very good season somehow, amidst all the other crap on that side of things. WR Jaylen Whitfield, our other potential draft target with the trade down, was solid for the Bears, catching 32/56 for 426 yards and a 7.61 ypt. We roll the season over and Gates retires. At some point, much like the real Chargers, we're going to have to figure out our stadium situation, but I just can't bring myself to ask the fans for money after that debacle. Defensive Coordinator John Pagano has a year left on his deal and we decide not to extend him. We had a really good year as a defense in '14, part of me wants to see if making a change to a seemingly "better" guy moves the needle in a negative way. I'm basically going to look at unit-specific coaching cohesion in the least rigorous and smallest sample way possible, but hey, I'm looking bros. Mostly because it's hilarious, we nab an available Bill Belichick to be our Defensive Coordinator. Miami poaches Asst HC Mad Cow Bennett to be their DC two picks later, which pisses me off. We'll get the Mad Cow back some day. But while we're sticking with hilarity, we grab former Bears QB Rex Grossman to fill our now open Asst HC spot. I know this seems strange for a team looking to cut down on turnovers, but, eff it, we're going deep. We've got the 11th pick in the draft. Probably means it will be even tougher for us to get a reliable-looking QB but we'll see what happens. Hitting the button to start FA and reveal the draft class now. |
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02-09-2014, 06:12 PM
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#14 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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 Well, we get part of our "wish" I guess. There are no QBs really. (There's one guy, Carl Collier, but our staff doesn't really seem to like him.) There are, however, an abundance of young RBs. We will certainly have an option to add an RB at our draft spot, if that's how we want to try to improve. The QB thing is going to be our real tension this offseason. We may not love QB Carl Collier, but the fact that last year's 2nd Round pick, center Carter Collier, has been a bit of a breakout, makes me want to ride the hot hand stick with drafting Colliers. Our punter is also named Courtney Collier. LET'S KEEP THIS IN THE FAMILY. Seriously though, with a Carter and a Carl Collier, our QB would have to have his full Carl Collier name on the back of his jersey right? And again, Collier would be taking snaps from Collier. No you're right, it's too much. We'll figure something else out. |
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02-09-2014, 08:13 PM
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#15 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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A little more time on this and I'm tempted to give 2nd year QB Will Malone a chance at starting for us this year. We took him last year in the 7th round, mostly because he had combines that hit a lot of the old benchmarks from 2k7. A 28 Sol, which was basically the cutoff for decent. A 4.56 dash, which is actually pretty good for a QB in FOF7. A 10 bench, which again, was certainly on the lower end of things but above the cutoff for "probably bad" in the spreadsheets. A 98 jump and a 65 Pos are both below the line so to speak, but I'm seeing the Pos score as less of a limiting factor than it was in the past. You can go below the 68/69 line and still see good guys. (For anyone not following, I'm referencing research about combines that was posted in the Strategy forum about 2k7 combines.) Anyway, he was intriguing enough to take a flyer on, and then he went +5 in his first camp.
Here's a screenie:  So yeah, I get it, he doesn't look that impressive. But for the purposes of following an interesting guy and poking at some things that seem to be new trends in the game, I think he might be pretty perfect. I like that he boomed a little last year. I really like the 90 Scramble Frequency, as it just seems like the high scramble guys are taking off instead of making bad throws. I basically get the sense you're trading QB runs for low percentage pass attempts, and I've seen good QBs with big scramble bars play really effectively in the new game. And his 4.5something dash as a rookie tells me he might actually be pretty effective when he does take off. So what's the downside? A 28 Sol (at least as a rookie) and 31 Intelligence, those could mean a lot of things. It's pretty safe to say that he won't be elite or even good at Avoiding Interceptions. He's probably somewhere between below average and a tick above average. His passing bars, unless some serious creeping is coming, are also pretty crappy. So we'll be putting an undeveloped semi-rookie with crappy passing bars and an at best average ability to take care of the ball on the field. It's tempting mostly because free agency is flush with WR talent, and releasing Rivers and his $15.75m salary probably frees us up to sign two good, immediate starters at other spots. And frankly, I do think Malone can give us everything Rivers gave us last year. There are probably three options: 1) Release Rivers. Hand the keys to Malone. Use the extra resources to inject more talent into the roster. 2) Release Rivers. Sign a 47/47 Matt Ryan in free agency. He's asking for 5/85 and really hasn't been that good in this universe. 3) Release Rivers. Do all the things from option #1. Try to find a way to move up a little and draft QB Carl Collier and create the Colliest team ever here in SD. I think we're going to roll with Malone. I think it's the best play when you add in all the little things like seeing what we can do with a high scramble guy and exploring his rookie year boom in ratings a little. Now hopefully we can bag some FA goodies to put around him. And edit to add... as silly as it sounds, I'm also intrigued by Malone BECAUSE of how crappy his red/green bars look. This guy has the same Future rating as a lot of guys with much more impressive bar profiles. That usually means something about a QB's Avoid Ints rating or an RB's Avoid Fumbles. Please remind me I said this when he throws 30 picks this year... Last edited by MalcPow : 02-09-2014 at 08:17 PM. |
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02-09-2014, 09:01 PM
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#16 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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We have a nice little Free Agency. Again, all flat deals for these guys:
RB Lesean McCoy 64/64, 4 x 8m WR Percy Harvin 64/64, 4 x 8m WR Mike Wallace 54/54, 4 x 6m CB Alterraun Verner 68/68, 4 x 8m It was kind of the year of the 4x8 deal for us. We've got 39 guys under contract now heading into the draft, and we'll have another 11m left to fill out the roster after our picks sign. All of these FAs are 6th or 7th year guys, so we may not love the last year of these deals, but I'm hopeful they'll be productive. The McCoy signing also makes drafting an RB a lot less of a priority. Gonna crank up the draft now... |
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02-09-2014, 10:05 PM
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#17 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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2015 Amateur Draft
Code:
Well, Collier goes 3rd, which probably would have taken everything we could offer to get there. Oakland takes a stud Guard at 1.5, which I kind of want to make fun of but we probably would've taken him if he fell to us. We're kind of looking at two guys.   We still need to address the O-Line with a few picks in this draft. And McElroy is basically the highest raw bureau rated defender on the board here. We have some safeties, but they're all getting a little older. We could do worse than a solid 60 type guy who will fit for awhile with a good zone bar. We take McElroy. When we look up at 2.10, I feel a lot like I felt in last year's draft. There are some guys I kind of like, but it's at least even money they fall another round. We trade down to 3.1 and pick up 4.2 for our trouble. Then we go Guard and Tackle with our two 3rds. It doesn't really get the blood flowing too much, but we needed some guys at these spots. And G Moe Burton and T Moe DeHart both have some potential. It does seem like there's good OL value in this part of the draft. Something to follow. We get a sampling of defensive depth after that. Code:
That little run of OL guys should produce a starter or two at the very least. And McElroy has a place on day one. Nothing sexy, but we probably did our kinky stuff in FA this year. |
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02-09-2014, 10:42 PM
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#18 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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Kendall Reyes holds out as we enter late FA. He was actually sneaky good last year and he's a perfect fit for the kind of physical guys we want on our DL. I try to offer him a 5x5 deal that is relatively close to his ask, but he rejects it. I'm not sure I want to pay more for a guy like this. We don't really have to, but I'm not looking at a lot of other great ways to spend the money at the moment.
We end up signing him to something that looks more like 5 x 6, but with a lower bonus. I don't love the deal, but it makes him a fairly easy cut if we see better ways to spend the money. I'm not sure he should have preferred this to our first offer, but I'm not going to tell these little men how to think. We pick up a few more scrubs to fill out the team, including Christian Ponder as a mentor for Will Malone. Yes, we've got Grossman and Ponder in his ear. What could go wrong? We extend FS Eric Weddle through what will be his 12th season. There's a good chance that's his last contract, and we'll be paying him 7.5m over each of the next four years. We will probably give him the Teo treatment and find ways to keep him around until he retires. We move a couple of our draftees to new positions. ILB Chipokas moves to WLB. DE Cook moves to DT. DE Roger is bulking up ahead of a move to DT. We're still extremely thin on the interior DL, and this is just trying to patch that up a little. I restore our TC settings to the default. Here's the roster as we head into the preseason... Code:
It's pretty clearly our most talented team yet, but we're handing the keys to a 16/44 QB. We'll see how that works out. |
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02-10-2014, 12:05 AM
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#19 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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1st Four
We beat Oakland 16-3 in our opener at home. Malone 19-33, 181, 1-0. Skelton starting over Bingaman again for the Raiders. (Come on.) We lose to Minny on a 4thQ punt return. We beat the Jaguars 22-14, outgaining them 521-135. We beat Pittsburgh 37-31, on a 66 yard McCoy run near the beginning of OT. Malone is completing 60% of his passes and he's got a 5-3 TD-Int ratio right now. He and McCoy (457 yards, 5.38 ypc through 4 games) have been a revelation in the rushing attack, as we're averaging 183.5 per game right now. Record: 3-1 2nd Four We dominate Baltimore 30-0 in their place. We beat a mediocre Browns team. We get our biggest win of the year over Denver, and we jump them for first place in the division. We overwhelm Oakland (John Skelton version) 44-14 and Will Malone goes 19-22 with 3 TDs and no picks. We look exceptionally good right now. The defense is doing some silly things, like holding opposing passing attacks to a 4.71 ypa. That can't hold up, but it's fun to see. Record: 7-1 3rd Four We beat a good Cincy team, but they outplay us. We beat KC 37-13, outgain them 543-226. We finally lose, 23-13 in Chicago, but the defense still holds them to 240 yards. We bounce back and beat a really good New England team in their place, 26-21. I've spent a good portion of this season waiting for the other shoe to drop, but it's clear we're pretty good. Regardless of what happens from here, I think I see some things that are really working for us. Record: 10-2 4th Four Heh, and then we get our asses kicked in Detroit and Malone throws 3 picks. Ok then. He also picks up some knee tendinitis, which is one of those with no risk of reinjury. Denver beats us in their place to pull within a game of first. Green Bay beats us and we've lost three straight. We can still clinch the division and even a cheap bye week with a win at 5-11 KC. We get it done with a 27-14 solid performance. Record: 11-5 Playoffs We get a bye and end up hosting a 12-5 Cincy team we beat earlier in the year. We actually play a pretty clean game and Will Malone is the POG in a losing effort. We get edged out 31-27 as the Bengals move the ball pretty well against us and convert their red zone chances into TDs. I'll post our summary and then give some commentary. Code:
Ultimately, we got much more out of Malone than we had any right to expect. I had some idea that we might see something like the high ypc and the rushing effectiveness (although he put the ball on the ground quite a bit). But he was a very good passer as well. I'm not really convinced he's some kind of super-masked guy or anything. This is a really talented offense, with 50 and 60+ rated guys at almost every position. A mid-40s rated QB actually seems to be a solid average guy in the new game's universe. I think this was a function of a solid guy being surrounded by a lot of really good players. He ends the year a 27/44 to our staff. I don't really know what to say about our defense. Some of the magic left us at the end, but tops in the league in ypa allowed and yardage allowed. Carlos Dunlap and Kendall Reyes both had top ten PrPcts, but that could also be a function of our complete lack of talent at DT. Maybe Belichick just knows how to build a defensive gameplan. Good year in the end. I did not expect a bye week with Malone at QB. I am guessing his general lack of ceiling will keep us from really being dominant, but I think it might be fun to try to win a title with him. That may be random house rule number three (I think we are only on three at this point...). |
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02-10-2014, 12:25 AM
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#20 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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New England beats Seattle in the Bowl.
We get no love in the Season Awards. KC's RB Owen Vance, this year's 1.1, wins OROY with a 1500 yard season. Welcome to the AFC West party pal. Oakland QB Dusty Bingaman does end up throwing 300 passes, and he's pretty atrocious. Maybe this is one of those scouting things in the new game, where the guy I see as 46/85 is really... what, 46/65? He should be playing. I may have to trade for John Skelton just to help right the universe. Peyton Manning retires after 18 seasons. Here's hoping that takes Denver down a notch in the division. Mad Cow Bennett gets promoted from DC to Head Coach in Miami. I guess we may not get him back some day. That's a pretty rapid rise young Mad Cow. Nobody from our staff gets poached and we like this group. |
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02-10-2014, 01:11 AM
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#21 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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Kind of cool little detour while I'm clicking around...
 The "two Moes" both make The Green Page. These guys were the guard and tackle we took with our two 3rd rounders last year. Burton is listed at 61/75 and Dehart at 37/58, and both started all 16 games last year. Dehart had a little bit of trouble in pass protection, allowing 11 sacks, but he's got some growth left. Burton might be a blossoming stud. Not a shock to see our divisional buddies Bingaman and Vance up at the top as the last two 1.1s. And T Weston O'Keefe being at #5 does make me wonder if I should have taken him over S McElroy. Probably a mistake to question anything relating to our pass defense after this past year though. Last edited by MalcPow : 02-10-2014 at 01:13 AM. |
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02-10-2014, 01:35 AM
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#22 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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There are things you notice when you slow down a bit to write a dynasty. We've rolled over into free agency now, where we've basically done a really good job of adding talent in the two offseasons we've been through. Especially last year, where I think we really made our team a lot better, bringing in basically four 60ish players on moderate contracts. Anyway, here in 2016, the pool looks really thin. The available guys are either just not as good, or clearly a little older. A 12th year DeMarcus Ware is the headliner.
That's obviously a good thing for challenge purposes. Although it does feel a little like we really took advantage of the situation when times were good. I might not feel this way when all those guys we signed last year take nosedives in camp. I think the end result here is that we probably won't be playing in FA this year. We need to give raises and extensions to Fluker and Teo. We'll probably call it a night and look at the draft and stuff tomorrow. |
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02-10-2014, 05:30 AM
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#23 |
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College Prospect
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Louisburg, KS
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Update to ratings progression?
__________________
TRA, the Royal Ape |
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02-10-2014, 02:29 PM
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#24 | |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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We're picking 27th this year, but here's a look at the top of the draft.
 WR Ezra Carpenter looks incredible, with a 4.29 dash and basically red combines across the board. A quick look from extractor has the spreadsheets liking three other WRs quite a bit as well. And two of them look like they might have a chance to get to us. We don't really "need" a WR at this point, but I feel like our offense last year proved the concept of just having a lot of quality on that side of the ball as a necessary foundation. A younger guy who we can pair with Gillman as Harvin and some of the other guys age would be a very good investment. My guess is we'll be looking at a less exciting pick at 1.27 though, which feels a little like Guardsville. I feel like ideally we can bring in a DT with some actual promise. That will probably take both of our DEs down a notch when it comes to PRPct, but it will probably make us better too. I think talent is generally down in the new game. I could be wrong, but a guy in the 60s just feels like a much better and more rare player in this version. This applies even further as you go down the scale, where a guy in the 40s might actually have some solid starter value. As it applies to 1st round picks though, I think it has my sights set very comfortably on landing high probability 55-60ish guys. I'm just not sure there are more than 10 guys better than that in most draft classes. And I'm definitely not seeing high quality guys slipping out of the first round. I could be persuaded that the smart money is in trading into a place to get one of those Top 10ish talents every year, and then filling with role players in the later rounds. Maybe we should never make a 2nd/3rd round pick, and simply use those to upgrade our top guy each year. We got lucky this past draft with two OL guys at 3.1 (almost a 2nd) and later in the 3rd, but I'm almost certain the best looking value through those areas is once again going to be OL. It just seems to be the case in all the drafts I've seen. I'm not sure we can keep winning if we're taking LBs at 1.25 and stocking up on C/G/T immediately after that, especially if FA turns into a mix of old and mediocre. Just some things to carry over to MP maybe. For all I know, the AI is drafting better than we are in MP leagues, and there is actually better talent available later. Quote:
I'll probably do something post-preseason that gives an update on this stuff. It's a little bit of a pain, at least how I'm doing it, but by that point everyone on the roster should be a name we've at least heard about a little. Malone is still showing as 27/44, with nothing impressive about his bars. We'll probably screenie him post-preseason as well, since he has emerged as a star in this little saga. |
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02-10-2014, 08:17 PM
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#25 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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We extend Teo on a 4x6. We extend Fluker on a 5x9. Teo was probably a little less than I expected, Fluker was probably a little more. Both of these guys are in their 4th years. We used the fact that we've got some current year flexibility to lock them up at flat rates that should be better in the future. I guess it's safe to say Fluker is going to be one of "our guys" as well. So we're up to Teo, Weddle, Fluker, and Malone who we are more or less hoping to keep as career Chargers. More or less. I reserve the right to find new arbitrary heroes for the people of Southern California.
We've got just enough cap space left over to bring back a number of our contributor types in FA. We add some role depth in LB Donta Hightower and CB Sam Shields on deals less than 2m per year. But we head into the draft with basically our team from last year, and 43 players under contract. |
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02-10-2014, 09:24 PM
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#26 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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Amateur Draft 2016
Code:
I had basically resigned myself to the fact that we weren't going to do anything too cute, even though I'd already professed some sentiment toward trading up as a strong play in the new game. Anyway, I just hit Begin Draft and cranked the speed up to Fastest. I go to take a look at the top of the draft and I see WR Ezra Carpenter went at #18. This guy is just such an obvious stud that I'm kicking myself for not paying attention and trading up when he fell into the teens. Here's a screenie:  I know we're using more than just combines in FOF7, but dang, this guy is incredible. VU from our scouts as well. Interesting to see him on their roster at 33/68 right now during the draft, I'm guessing he's got even more Future in the tank. Oh well. Two of the four WRs we liked did make it all the way to 1.27. And the 2nd best OLB in the class somehow slipped all the way here as well. Screenies for all of them...    That's probably the order I see them in as well. Paterno has a little more combine upside than Stephens because of the Bench (but they are eerily similar), and Stephens has the better Pos. Paterno is a little closer to my flavor, but these guys are both great picks for us here. We could use an LB like Winslett and I'm a little surprised a guy with his raw bureau grade is sitting here. (I do use the raw bureau grade as a kind of, "Ok, who is the best player on the board, regardless of position" check.) Winslett is the top non-kicker available by that information, and he has a little separation from the next guy. We're going to take Paterno. I think both guys will be good. But Stephens has the VO. Paterno has some PR skills. It's the little differences here. LB Winslett goes with the next pick to Chicago, who I feel like has made at least two very good picks of guys we wanted in this career. WR Stephens goes at 2.6 to St. Louis. We've got three targets we'd like to nab with our next three picks. We end up taking them in this order based on how many guys were still available above them at their position, but I might be most happy about DT Latimer.  Yes, we proved our point and took a Center with our 2nd rounder. But he should be a solid player, and I wouldn't be shocked to see us playing him at Guard quite a bit. Dietrich was clearly the best player on the board here, and the guy with no chance of making it to round 3.  Jack is just a guy who the spreadsheets generally liked, probably because he looks "good" across the board, but he doesn't have anything spectacular going for him. It's definitely not a position of need, but I'm basically high fiving myself if I see non-OL guys that look interesting in these rounds.  We really needed a DT and I interviewed a good number of the guys with good bench scores and strength bars. I like to collect physical guys up front, preferably with the strength and punishing combo, but just strength is fine too. The VU from the scouts is a cherry on top. I don't think this guy is going to be a monster or anything, but he might have a little slice of 60+ guy probability. Regardless, we're so hilariously bad at the position that we're getting an instant starter in the 4th. I might have written him off in the past because he's not really going to be a run stopper, but I've had success with guys that have this profile. We take WR Tristan Rubio, a guy with some return skills in the 5th. We take a QB with a 4.31 dash and a monster scramble bar in the 6th.  He almost definitely won't amount to anything, but if we're riding this dash and scramble angle a little, this guy fits it to a T. And we burn our last pick on the highest rated no combine DT, just taking a flyer at a position where we need warm bodies. Code:
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02-11-2014, 12:01 AM
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#27 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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SLB Jo-Lonn Dunbar is holding out. He thinks he made a real difference on our defense last season and I think he's probably right. He's got the right mix of coverage bars, Zone in particular, that I'm reasonably convinced are really important for our successful 4-3 scheme. He's actually asking for a contract that reduces his cap hit and extends him for two more years at a really reasonable rate. Well, ok then buddy.
We go with the default TC settings again. Here's our roster snapshot heading into the preseason. We'll do some changetracking stuff at the end of the preseason. Code:
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02-11-2014, 01:04 AM
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#28 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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Ok, here's our staff's look at the changes from this year. The big crusher is DE Carlos Dunlap doing a -12. That might take the wind out of our defense. I really do think the 4-3 defense needs that anchor pass rusher at DE who is a difference maker. SLB Jo-Lonn Dunbar also does a -13 on the heels of his hold out and extension. I feel a little hoodwinked now. Weddle drops a -5 on us as well. The defense could take a step back.
Code:
Ok, and since that looks like a bit of a disaster, here's a screenie with all the ratings movement info I have. The CurChg and FutChg columns are from this year. The 15Chg columns are changes from '15 to now. The 14Chg columns are from '14 to now.  |
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02-11-2014, 01:14 AM
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#29 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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I think we've done ok drafting. We've definitely hit on a few guys. Unfortunately, some of our veterans are going to crap just when are young guys are coming closer to full development. C Carter Collier, G Moe Burton, and T Moe Dehart are all looking like really nice OL picks from the 2nd/3rd rounds. Last year's 2nd round C Nolan Dietrich looks like he's following right in their footsteps as well.
RB J.R. Dixon was a great late round pick. FB Ken Schau, who we took in the 3rd, has dropped quite a bit in ratings but is still a valuable player. WR Carlton Gillman, our very first 1st rounder, has been basically all we could have expected, settling in at 66/66 right now. Our 1st rounder this past year, WR Asher Paterno, just basically held serve to stay at 48/78 through his first preseason. That would be a homerun for 1.27. DT Dwayne Latimer just went +5 as a rookie. 1st round S Mike McElroy from '15 has held steady and sits at 54/64 right now. Frankly, all of our other defensive picks have sucked. I'd like to think part of that is related to my targeting of certain bars and roles for these guys, but we just haven't had as much success with the D. I guess we'll have to judge by the results on the field. |
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02-11-2014, 02:24 AM
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#30 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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1st Four
We beat a post-Manning-retirement Denver team, 21-0. The defense dominates but LeSean McCoy has a stress fracture in his leg that knocks him out for 6 weeks. We then beat Atlanta but lose RB J.R. Dixon to a Calf Strain. We're going to be two deep with street FAs in the backfield now. We get some revenge against the Cincy team that knocked us out of the playoffs with a 17-3 win. Houston edges us 30-27. It's Malone's second 3 pick game of the year. Uh oh. Record: 3-1 2nd Four We hold on in a tight 20-14 game over Indy. We beat a Dusty Bingaman-led Oakland team. We have an impressive offensive showing against a weak Denver team in their place. We fumble 6 times and lose 4 of them against Tennessee. We still win as Malone throws for 4 TDs and the offense puts up 35 points. We have a two game lead in the division. We look like a good team but our turnovers are a little out of control. Record: 7-1 3rd Four We beat up a 1-7 Jacksonville team. We top KC to take a commanding four game lead in the division. We get a solid win on the road over a good TB team. We lose a tight one in New England, 27-23. This is the point where we kind of stumbled home last year. And three of our last four (and going back a couple, five of our last six) games are on the road. We've got a two game lead for the #1 seed and a three game lead for the division, but a lot of weird cap can happen on the road. 4th Four We lose 35-31 in New Orleans and we lose WR Harvin for the rest of the regular season. We squeak out a bizarre 6-5 win over KC at Arrowhead, clinching both the division and the #1 seed in a weak AFC. We grind out a win in our last home game over Carolina, 20-13. We close out the regular season on a good note, beating Oakland in their place, 44-20. I'll offer more commentary after we see what happens in the playoffs. Record: 13-3 Playoffs Malone throws 3 picks, including a pick-6, but we stay in it and beat Miami 24-14. We gain 483 yards on the day, which is promising, but four total turnovers has us showing our likely fatal flaw as well. We also lose WR Gillman, likely for the rest of the playoffs. We put together a really nice win over Pittsburgh in the AFC Championship Game. 27-10 final score, but it was never close, and we outgain them 424-199. We will face a San Francisco team that won the Bowl in '14 and '15 in this career, and they'll be trying to make it three of four. We're listed as 5 point dogs in early betting. Will Malone plays well and we gain 415 yards. Nick Novak misses three field goals, including one in OT, and we lose a heartbreaker, 13-10. Novak was incredible all year long, going 42/43 during the regular season on field goal attempts. It just all came apart in the Bowl. Kind of unreal. Code:
The defense was every bit as good as last year, and even better in some ways. That yardage against total is a single-season record for this young universe. DE Carlos Dunlap went out and put up a 11.2 PRPct after his preseason nosedive, so it looks like he's still got enough left in the tank. An observation on the defense, I think a large part of our success is coming from a pretty big bump we're getting to our Secondary's Cohesion from Weddle. This is his 10th season with the team, and we've got the 2nd best Cohesion mark in the league for our defensive backfield. Well that and maybe it does make a difference having a Top7 ILB in the middle of our 4-3 defense with Teo. Malone was very solid. He's just about fully developed now at 41/44 and hopefully that will help clean up some of the turnover issues. TE Jimmy Graham had a monster 1000 yard season to lead our team in receiving. It seems odd that it would happen in a year where we added even more WR talent, but we'll take it. |
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02-11-2014, 02:50 AM
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#31 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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Wow. We get some real love from the awards this year.
All-League Second Team TE Jimmy Graham All-League Second Team C Carter Collier All-League Second Team G Moe Burton All-League Second Team T D.J. Fluker All-League Second Team K Nick Novak 5 guys on the 2nd Team? I'm impressed at least. We roll over to the new season and get high scores in everything but Roster Strength. We've been graded out at anywhere from 30-34 over the last few years. I know QB Malone probably gets weighted pretty heavily in that, but this is a pretty good roster otherwise. Interesting little quirk. QB Mentor Seneca Wallace retires. His advice took us further than Ponder's did. We finally submit a stadium renovation plan. We basically go for broke with a maxed out stadium and offer to foot half the bill. I haven't been paying much attention to the financial stuff. Maybe something like this gets me fired eventually. *shurg* Asst HC Rex Grossman gets poached by the Jets to go be their OC. Later Sexy Rexy. We double-down on awful former QBs and replace him with Tarvaris Jackson. Yes, really. No other changes to the staff. We rec ticket prices and notice our attendance sucked last year, even with the best team in our conference and a second straight AFC West title. Definitely feeling good about ponying up to max out Qualcomm Stadium with that knowledge. We'll see what the draft looks like tomorrow. We seemingly have a lot of holes on defense, but we just put up one of the best statistical years in this league's history on that side of the ball. Conclusion... I don't really know what I'm looking at yet in FOF7. |
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02-11-2014, 02:13 PM
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#32 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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We've got the 31st pick this year. Here's the top of the draft.
 There look to be 3 QBs with some serious studliness to them at the top of the draft. It's probably worth following these guys a little. They all look like 1.1 picks.  Ross Craig is the highest rated of these guys. He's an obvious monster and probably will be the 1.1 in this draft unless something insane happens.  Stephenson is the 2nd highest rated, and he's a pretty obviously elite guy as well.  Cole Kelly is third guy by bureau rating, but he looks like a 1.1 type guy for me. In a lot of ways, he's like a supercharged version of Will Malone. He's got the big scramble bar. He's got the 4.5 dash. Except he also appears to have the skill bars of a very good QB. We could probably do silly things with this kind of guy. There's no way we can get to the top 3/5 with our picks though. And I know, we made a blood oath to get Will Malone a ring or something. It's crazy to see three guys this good in an FOF7 draft though. QB talent seems to be down generally, where a guy like a 41/44 Will Malone is actually pretty viable. All three of these guys look like 70+ players. Those are legit, never-take-a-snap-for-another-team-no-matter-what-guys in the new game. My head is going to explode when Oakland (with QB Dusty Bingaman in place) takes one of them at 1.3. Another general trend I'm seeing here, mostly because I feel like we are weak at the position, but this universe is light on CBs. I'm not sure we've had a clear 60+ guy in any of the drafts so far. I've been feeling like we're in rough shape, and I just realized that our guy Alterraun Verner is the 6th best CB in the league at 68/68. It might just be my mistaken impression of old ratings levels, but as mentioned earlier, I feel like 60 is the new 75 or something. This draft has one CB on the first page who looks like he is at least a 60+, Jaden Kyrouac. The odds of him getting anywhere near a place we could trade to are basically zero though. We'll have to keep an eye on things here. Maybe we can keep doing what we're doing without too much corner talent. Last edited by MalcPow : 02-11-2014 at 02:16 PM. |
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02-11-2014, 06:15 PM
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#33 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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Free Agency is even more of a wasteland than it was a year ago. There isn't a single player above 55 at a skill or non-OL/FB/K/P position. Basically a guard or two, some guys in the kicking game, and uninteresting positions. The best players at places of value are 50ish, and half of them are past their prime. Again, I think it's great. We were probably going to have to put in a house rule against certain free agents if we were able to keep signing guys like we did early.
We have some money though, and with 43 guys under contract, I may look to get a jump on some extensions. Heh, QB Will Malone wants a 5 year, 63m deal. That would solve our "too much money" problem for sure. 12m/yr for our 41/44 curiosity? He has performed ok obviously. And the Quarterback Coterie has him with the second best seasons for QBs in both their 2nd and 3rd years. We've won games. I get it. Starters want to be paid in this game. This would certainly commit us to our quest of following Mr. Malone and his particular skill set for a good number of seasons. We lock him up at 5 x 12.5. Which is just stupid. But ok, ok, it'd be no fun to manufacture my way to a stud QB and a Tom Emansky run of back to back to back FOF championships. We extend TE Jimmy Graham and WR Carlton Gillman. We also extend DE Carlos Dunlap and get some savings. LB Donta Hightower is a perfect fit for us and he's cool with an extension that keeps him at basically 2m a year. These guys are both getting a little older, but I'm not going to mess with guys that fit this well for us. Luckily, we're now out of money and can skip to the end of FA. Very smooth. |
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02-11-2014, 08:42 PM
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#34 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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2017 Amateur Draft
We make the call at the top to trade FB Schau and DT Roger for Dallas's early 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th rounders. Schau is a good player and a solid draft pick for us, but he has been sucking up passing targets and not doing much with them. As a multiple year starter, he also wants to be paid in his next contract. DT Roger has crept a little bit to a 47 Future, but he's a physically weak player and not a great fit for our interior. We may not get great value, but there's probably a little addition by subtraction. Code:
The three QBs go in the top 5. (We did offer our 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and our two 4ths to move up to 1.5 for QB Cole Kelly when he was still available. The Cowboys laughed at us and took him.) Two more QBs, neither of whom I was that impressed by, went 6th and 7th. So 5 QBs in the top 7 picks. 2017 is going to be a case study of some kind. So now here we are at 1.31. Some portion of this is I'm sure a relic of 2k7's imbalance toward receivers, but my spreadsheets have the next three best guys available as WRs. And the excitement they feel about SE Bill Monroe is a little awkward and unseemly. I guess I can talk myself into the fact that both Harvin and Mike Wallace are aging and might take nosedives at any point. We've already proven (I think) that a QB like Malone needs a depth of weapons around him to be successful. Here's Bill Monroe:  It's still just impossible for me to pass on WRs with a 4.3 dash and a monster Big Play bar. I may be the guy charging my cavalry at the machine gun nests, but it's all I know, dammit. At 2.31, we come face to face with another fact of life. My current top 4 targets: FB, C, FB, RG. There's a slightly interesting LT and an RB I kind of like a little further down the list. I feel pretty strongly that the RB would probably slip to us in the 3rd, but we want to take guys we like. Welcome aboard RB Gary Heim!  QB Rodney Galloway has some WillMalone+ things going on. He's got the high scramble bar, his dash is fairly close, and he's got some better bars. Not the least of which is Sense Rush, which I'm a little sensitive to with Malone's fumbling issues. This is solid value for us vs taking another guard.  We fill out with more OL and fit guys after this. Code:
We drafted a kicker to replace Novak. Not because we're so vindictive about all those misses in the Bowl. No really. Nothing to do with it. The guy went 42/43 in the regular season. Of course we wanted him back. I swear. We also find out that our Stadium Vote failed. Code:
Well at least it was a really close vote. We will ask for a non-max stadium next offseason. More than anything, we just need some new turf. I don't want this place turning into a complete injury-generating hellhole. |
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02-11-2014, 11:49 PM
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#35 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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Here's our roster ahead of the new season...
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And here's the changes from before the preseason...  I had a slight mishap where I apparently had some SP settings set to let the AI do stuff when I ran the Training Camp stage. That resulted in the AI position-changing a number of guys, mostly the cosmetic kind of RCB to LCB type stuff. It was still a little irritating. Anyway, the changes takeaway... Malone takes a bump to 48/48. Here's what he looks like on the eve of the season...  He has filled out ever so slightly, but he's the same guy we know and love. He's just being paid a lot more! You'll also note he has "Significant" Seasonal Rust. Apparently starting every preseason game is not enough. We had our starting QB setting at 3 and our exhibition playing time setting at 55%. I'm really not sure what happened here, he played in every game. So a number of slight mishaps and irritations in this post. One thing that's not so bad is the ratings changes of our rookies. As seen above, a number of those guys went +5 or higher, including 1st rounder, WR Bill Monroe. With the slips from some of the veterans, I think we're going to start Monroe and last year's 1st, Asher Paterno, with Gillman playing the #3 WR role. We still have Harvin and Wallace for depth, but I want to see what the shiny new (apparently?) 70+ WRs we got at the back of the last two 1st rounds can do. We get big drops from LeSean McCoy and Jimmy Graham, but I think both are still going to be productive. DE Carlos Dunlap took another dive, -8 this time and all the way down to 39/39. It didn't seem to matter much last year, but he has to be approaching some kind of breaking point. Basically everyone on our veteran-heavy defense slid a little actually. We'll see if Belichick can somehow beat father time with these guys. Typing it all up, I'm not sure we should be messing around with our offensive cohesion and everything else by starting the young WRs. That said, these guys just look so damn good. We can adjust if we get off to a slow start. And the rust thing is killing me. This might be the year where a bunch of weird things work against us. And edit to add: Rookie QB Rodney Galloway did a +6 and has a 76 Sense Rush bar. You've been warned, Malone.  Last edited by MalcPow : 02-11-2014 at 11:54 PM. |
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02-12-2014, 01:23 AM
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#36 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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2017 Season
1st Four Malone shakes off the rust with a 20-6 win in KC. We win again in Dallas, but Malone is sacked 5 times and throws a pick-six. (I am definitely trending negative on how I write about the guy who nearly won us a Bowl last year. What a fickle bitch I am, damn.) We lose to Pittsburgh at home despite outgaining them by a big margin, some key turnovers make the difference. Malone has knee tendinitis. (Sit him!) We play well and beat an undefeated Miami team. Record: 3-1 2nd Four We swap Carlton Gillman into the starting FL spot over the rookie Bill Monroe and the team responds with a great performance and a 30-3 beatdown of NJY. We get another clean game and good offensive showing in a 36-21 win over Denver. We beat Buffalo 31-17. We win a shootout against a Nick Foles-led Patriots team 32-26 in OT, putting up 620 yards of offense. Record: 7-1 3rd Four We give one away in Oakland with a bunch of fumbles. We lose to a Chiefs team we've dominated over the years, 21-20, and we lose Teo for the year. Probably our least replaceable player, yikes. We lose our third straight, 23-21 to Washington, and get thoroughly outplayed. We score 17 points in the last 1:28 against Indy to somehow end this skid. We also lose another starting LB, as Jo-Lonn Dunbar gets hurt. We've got a one game lead in the division, but the tie-breakers aren't really great for us. Things were looking good at the halfway point... Record: 8-4 4th Four We lose 20-16 in New York and drop into a three-way tie for the division, where we currently stand in 2nd due to tie-breakers. We explode out of nowhere for a critical home win over Oakland to reclaim sole possession of first place. Malone goes 25-29 with 4 TDs. Ok, then. We keep it rolling, 38-13 in Philly. We squeak out a brutal 12-7 win in the snow in Denver. We win our third straight AFC West title, and once again earn a cheap bye as the #2 seed. Probably our best offense, but far and away our shakiest team. I'll give more commentary after the playoffs but our defense was already getting old, losing Teo made us downright mediocre over the second half of the season. Record: 11-5 Playoffs I forget if Jekyll or Hyde was the good one, but we just completely destroy the Jets, 42-3, in the divisional round. No turnovers and we hold them to 200 yards in the sort of defensive performance we've been used to until the last eight games or so. We've lost a pair of CBs over the last couple games though, and we'll be going on the road to face a very good Cincy team with street guys active. I honestly don't know what to think. We blow their doors off, 41-7. Malone is basically perfect again. The defense forces 5 turnovers and three pick-sixes. Well, ok, that's good work fellas. We get a rematch with San Francisco in the Bowl. They are trying to win a really effing impressive four of five Bowls. We jump all over them early. The defense plays stout. And our run of looking like the '27 Yankees continues with a near-flawless 34-3 annihilation. We outgain them 426-164. It was 24-0 at the half and they had only two first downs at that point. Will Malone wins the Bowl MVP with a very steady 18-29, for 194 and 2 TDs. The defense flipped a switch in the playoffs allowing 200, 265, and then 164 yards in the Bowl. Nothing really changed between the unit that did this in the playoffs and the one that kind of sucked ass for most of the second half of the year after Teo went down. It probably helped that our offense only turned the ball over once in the postseason. To put things in perspective, the D scored 4 TDs and only allowed 13 points over our three game march to the title. Them boys is hot. Last edited by MalcPow : 02-12-2014 at 01:27 AM. |
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02-12-2014, 01:52 AM
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#37 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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Code:
Looking back, this probably does still look like our best team, just because the offense was so much better. We took care of the ball so SO much better this season, with only 18 turnovers. It's incredible to think we went 13-3 a year ago with 30 of them. Malone had his best season to date, even if he had a slightly higher rating in '15. In addition to cutting the picks down, he ran for 728 yards and 7.58 per attempt. I'm not ashamed to admit I watched the Bowl in Solevision (ok, I am a little ashamed), but Malone's 51 rushing yards there extended a few early drives and were crucial to the first few TDs. In addition to his Bowl MVP, he was also named the All-League Second Team QB. Pretty impressive for a 7th round crapsack we gave the starting job to as a semi-comedic experiment. I'm not gonna kid myself though, we got extremely hot at exactly the right time. A three game postseason run of outscoring our opponents 117-13 takes a little magic. Other Awards consideration: All-League First Team G Moe Burton All-League Second Team S Eric Weddle Burton is sporting a 100 Run Blocking bar at the moment. And he followed up a 12 pancake campaign last year with 8 of them this year. Kudos to him for doing most of it with a strained hamstring as well. Weddle had 5 picks, 18 PDs, and an 86.1 PDPct. He also racked up a bunch of tackles after Teo went down, giving him a pretty impressive statistical year in his 11th season. Speaking of Teo, I'm realizing that because we put him on IR after his injury, he did not get a ring. It's a little funny at least. We'll be glad to get him back next year. The postseason dominance aside, we were a different defense without him. One thing of note, our pass rush really suffered this year. DE Carlos Dunlap still put up a very good 9.1 PRPct, but in looking at his in game Ratings History, it's clear that his real degradation has come to his Endurance. He's down to a 18 after being in the 50s a few years ago. I'm assuming that means we're giving more plays to our crappy backups, or, at the very least, Dunlap's effectiveness is significantly reduced in certain circumstances. We probably need to find a way to swap in a new primary rusher next year... No idea how we'll do that... |
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02-12-2014, 02:09 AM
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#38 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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We once again get hit with a 35 Roster rating after rolling the season over. I'm sick of this shit, Herb. We demand a little respect. Put the chalk down and check your contacts buddy, this team just beat the rest of the league with its own limbs in the playoffs. Maybe bump things up to the mid 40s.
We'll do the new season stuff tomorrow. I'll tease it by sharing that Belichick just went out on top and retired with one more ring. Feel free to drop a line if you are reading and enjoying. Or if you just want blow off some steam toward Herb. He's listening.  Last edited by MalcPow : 02-12-2014 at 02:13 AM. |
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02-12-2014, 02:20 AM
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#39 |
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Head Coach
Join Date: Sep 2004
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Other than the 3 super rookie QBs, how does the distribution ratingwise look in the league? I *think* you mentioned this briefly before, but figured I'd ask again to see how exactly Malone stacks up
__________________
2006 Golden Scribe Nominee 2006 Golden Scribe Winner Best Non-Sport Dynasty: May Our Reign Be Green and Golden (CK Dynasty) Rookie Writer of the Year Dynasty of the Year: May Our Reign Be Green and Golden (CK Dynasty) |
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02-12-2014, 07:05 AM
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#40 |
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n00b
Join Date: Jan 2014
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Im reading and enjoying.
Amazing how much graphics and info you put int the thread, its better than sportscenter! If I may I have 2 questions- Being totally new to FOF Im learning everything from scratch. Ive found changetracker but couldnt make it to work with FOF7, select league box is empty. Any tips? Man Im so jealous of your spreadsheets. Are those , or similar ones, available somewhere for download? Cheers! |
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02-12-2014, 11:41 AM
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#41 | |
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Pro Starter
Join Date: Jan 2011
Location: Madison, WI
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Quote:
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02-12-2014, 02:33 PM
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#42 | |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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The league has two QBs in the 80s, our good friend in Oakland Dusty Bingaman at 87/87 and last year's 1.1 Ross Craig, at 65/85. There are 5 more guys in the 70s (these are all future ratings btw), Rogers, Flacco, Russel Wilson, and Chad Stephenson and Cole Kelly (the other two top QBs from last year's draft class). So 3 of the top 7 QB Future ratings came from last year's class. There is no one from 61-69, and there are 14 guys between 50-60. At 48, Malone is the 23rd highest rated QB in the league, and he's a tick behind his backup Rodney Galloway, who's checking in at 14/50 right now. We obviously don't have a huge sample in this career, but it does seem like the game-generated drafts spit out a kind of studs and scrubs distribution for QBs. There are clear 1.1 types, and then there are some solid starters in the 40-55 range. A good number of guys seem to start out looking that way, and the majority of them bleed their way down to nothing. I think the gap we're seeing here between 60 and 70 might be a thing. I'll keep an eye on it. It does seem like the money play (if you can't land a stud) is to find the 45-55 guy who doesn't throw picks and has a high scramble bar. Working theory at least. Edit for the screenie:  Last edited by MalcPow : 02-12-2014 at 02:36 PM. |
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02-12-2014, 04:24 PM
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#43 | |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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Quote:
Yeah changetracker is dead I believe. I'm basically doing a print to text file of the roster Scout Overview screen after TC and then after the preseason. I'm then copying those into excel, doing some data cleanup, and using some lookups to create a comparison. It might be worth creating something that automates the excel portion of those steps, but I'm just dicking around by hand for now. And my "spreadsheets" are just a slightly more automated version of info like this: Some Combine Benchmarks (and Drafting Thoughts) - Front Office Football Central. Some stuff has changed, but those are still useful guideposts I think. |
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02-12-2014, 06:05 PM
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#44 |
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n00b
Join Date: Jan 2014
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cool, thanks!
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02-13-2014, 12:53 PM
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#45 | |
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Torchbearer
Join Date: Sep 2001
Location: On Lake Harriet
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Quote:
Seems unfair, though I bet he imagines he has one. |
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02-13-2014, 06:00 PM
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#46 | |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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Quote:
I have a feeling this will be the high water mark of jokes on this front. It certainly won't be the last. We'll see what happens. I'm going to let the game come to me and take what the defense gives us on Teo cracks. In other news, we have our first three players elected to the Hall of Fame this offseason: 100% - Tony Gonzalez 86% - Champ Bailey 82% - Jared Allen Manning and Brady are both retired now, so we know they'll be joining the party at some point. Tony getting the 100% is probably worth a hearty applause or something.  We submit a renovation plan. Our turf is already down to Fair and Parking Lots are Poor. Awesome. After Belichick's retirement, we go out and hire Tom Quinn as our new DC:  He's been working for the Giants recently. That's all we know. He is likely Irish. We ordered another case of Jameson for "minicamps" just to be safe. We're sitting with 44 guys under contract right now. I'm debating whether to franchise C Carter Collier before rolling things over to FA and revealing the draft class. We have some young (and cheap) quality depth on the roster behind him, but the 68/68 Collier is the 5th best C in the league and he's been with us since our first draft. I think we have to let him go. Or at the very least see what he wants in FA. It bums me out though. |
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02-13-2014, 08:50 PM
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#47 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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We roll over into FA and here's the top of the draft:
 DE Colin Arton looks like an absolute beast. We'd love to have him but don't have the slightest whiff of a chance at getting him.  It's always nice when a guys has basically maxed bars and your staff takes a closer look and says he's Underrated. QB Jake Beuter looks like our requisite 1.1 talent.  But QB Tim Middleton has a huge Sol score and might just be one of those really solid guys who plays like an elite QB because he doesn't throw picks.  Needless to say, we've got no chance at any of these guys. And call me crazy, but it does look like there might be another solid crop of WRs, one of whom could once again fall to us at the bottom of the 1st round. My gut would be that we need to address the defense somehow, but we'll take what's there and be happy it's not another O-Lineman. In FA, we don't really the cap space to do anything about it, but there are two Top 5 picks from the 2014 draft available as young, excellent starters. One is an RB and the other is a DE. They're out of our price range, but it's a shift from the empty talent abyss of the last couple FA classes. Looking at our roster, the age of the defense really stands out. We took FS Mike McElroy with our 1st in '15. We got a little bit of a breakout/good fit from DT Dwayne Latimer with our 4th in '16. Everybody else is an older guy from the initial roster (SS Weddle and to some extent MLB Teo) or an early veteran FA sign (DE Dunlap, CB Verner). And all those guys are starting to see drops. DE Dunlap especially has taken a beating the last two years, and I'm not expecting him to bounce back as a 9th year player. Our other end is a 46/46 Kendall Reyes, and he has a 5 Endurance. My basic conundrum here is that I think we need one good DE and one good CB to make this defense work. Our DE, Dunlap, is probably about to suffer his deathblow. And our CB, Verner, is in his 9th season as well, and while 60/60 isn't too shabby, he took a -8 last year and probably has another one coming. We have 8m in free cap space. We have our 7 picks that would take us to 51 guys on the roster. So that 8m is somewhat available. Looking ahead, we are going to need to do some extensions, probably after the preseason when we might be able to clear more cap space renegotiating or releasing guys who nosedive on us. A couple of our good draft picks, like our two Moe offensive linemen, appear to want some real money to extend with us. That may not happen and we might just be in some perpetual state of taking OL guys with our 3rd/4th round picks and cycling them over and over again. In some other lucky universe, we'd have this 8m and a really good fit DE or CB would be waiting for our money in FA. Carlos Dunlap's not walking through that door though. Well he is, but not the good version of him from 2014. |
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02-13-2014, 09:56 PM
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#48 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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C Carter Collier signs a 4yr/33m deal with TB. Just too much when we've got two good Cs coming up behind him. RB J.R. Dixon also gets a little more money to go play somewhere else. Two of our better picks, but the budget's tight and we just have replacements ready and waiting.
We don't do anything but bring 9th year veteran CB Sam Shields back to do some nickel and dime work. Draft coming shortly, might have an idea to address the D. |
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02-14-2014, 05:39 PM
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#49 |
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High School Varsity
Join Date: Jul 2012
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I really love that Dinasty! You got your own scrambling Brady in late round!!
I'll stay tuned!! Don't stop! |
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02-14-2014, 08:42 PM
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#50 |
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College Benchwarmer
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: San Diego
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Amateur Draft 2018
Ok, we assume we've got no chance to get one of the top talents at DE or CB, and we're right as we watch those guys go off the board in the top 7 picks. Code:
But I'm realizing we might have a chance to address CB at least. In addition to seeing a number of WRs available at the bottom of the 1st the last few years, I feel like there's been some Safety talent as well. In this case, we've got two safeties we're looking at who might be light enough to make a move to CB and help us manufacture an asset that seems exceedingly rare.   We interviewed Juchartz and the result probably makes us like him a little better. Winslett is rated a little more highly though. I don't think we need to take either of them right here, but I'm also not sure either makes it all the way to 2.32. I'm going to see what our current year trading limitations let's us do and try to get in a position to get both of these guys. We drop from 1.32 to 2.10 (picking up a 4th) and then get a little nervous and pull the trigger on Winslett there. (I'm pretty sure he would've fallen further.) We then get even more nervous and trade up from 2.32 (with 3.32, 5.32, and 6.32) to 2.16 to land Juchartz. So we get both of these guys, and we still have 4.11, 4.32, and 7.32 to pretend like we're doing other stuff in this draft. Code:
We actually do get some mildly interesting guys. Mitchell Kramer is 6'3" and 272 lbs... I'm not sure he's much good but he does spark the thought that maybe the path to our above average DE is via an LB conversion. Exciting times picking at the bottom of round 1. We also hear: Code:
So in four years we'll have new grass! Very nice to see that by reducing our ask from like $350m to something like $40m, we were able to swing maybe 3k votes over to our side of things. I QUESTION THE POLITICAL MODEL THAT UNDERLIES EVERYTHING IN THIS GAME. |
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