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Old 02-28-2008, 07:17 AM   #1
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
FOF 2007 - The Highlander Challenge

The Highlander Challenge

It’s been a while since I played a public, documented, solo FOF career. I thought I would give it a shot once again. I will again make a try to come up with a set of rules that make the game a long-term challenge for me – what I want is for the game to be interesting to play, challenging to win, but allow me to play “all out” within the rules that I have adopted up front. You may have heard me refer to this as a holy grail… it’s tougher than it seems.

So, my current thinking is that I’ll try a set of rules where I am allowed to do lots of different things – but none of them more than once per season. Thus, the play-on-words title of the challenge, which I hope won’t be lost on quite everyone.


So, here are the limitations for the career. In any given season:

-there can be only one unrestricted free agent signed to a one-year contract
-there can be only one unrestricted free agent signed to a two-year contract
-there can be only one unrestricted free agent signed to a three-year contract
-there can be only one unrestricted free agent signed to a four-year contract
-there can be only one unrestricted free agent signed to a five-year contract
-there can be only one unrestricted free agent signed to a six-year contract
-there can be only one unrestricted free agent signed to a seven-year contract
-there can be only one year on any new offer made to a restricted free agent
-there can be only one renegotiation before the season starts
-there can be only one renegotiation toward the end of the season
-there can be only one trade, either within the current draft or AI-initiated

Yes, I include my own out-of-contract players among the limits for FA signees. I am also aware that the ability to sign contracts for longer than three years generally means committing either huge money or else stuffing huge backends to the deals forcing a release some way through – so in essence, it will be very difficult for me to keep players around in this career, I expect. That is absolutely by design – the worry I’m targeting here is that I generally find it far too easy to just re-sign lots and lots of decent role players for minsal or a bit more year after year – and all of my solo teams turn into cohesion monsters as a result.

So, basically – my rookie draftees are mine through their rookie contract and for whatever I can sign them to as restricted free agents – meaning that I can get an easy four years out of most of them who turn out to be worth keeping. Past that, I will have a pretty limited ability to keep players around.

I’m also limiting my ability to sign undrafted rookies here. I’ll have to bend these rules as I initially build a team (empty cupboard will demand it) and fill in with one year rookies, but my intention is to have these limits apply to those players too.

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Old 02-28-2008, 07:47 AM   #2
kurtism
High School Varsity
 
Join Date: Mar 2001
Location: Noblesville
The Kurgan approves.
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Old 02-28-2008, 06:45 PM   #3
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
Startup

I am starting with a career that I seemingly abandoned some time ago, where I have possession of (in an NFL-mirror universe) the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. No particular reason why that I know of – they were willing to take me, I reckon, so they must have been bad. It’s the start of the 2023 season, and I have cut everyone who was under contract. We still have $93m of the $169m salary cap available to use this year, so we have the ability to use our limited FA powers to try to get a few foundation pieces into place, perhaps.

Some bending of the long-term rules will be required to field a team in these first years, and I guess the thing to do is essentially load this team up with gobs of undrafted free agents. I don’t want to have a 30-player exodus after they all switch from 4th to 5th year player status, though, so I will probably need to “phase in” the rules a bit.


So, in our first free agency, here are the initial players we pursue – easy to list by years:

1YR – DT Mitch Busby, $7m
2YR – CB Paul Woods, $14m
3YR – QB Chester Caruso, $12m
4YR – OT Pat O’Neill, $16m (6m bonus, even salary)
5YR – WR Melvin Hevey, $32.5m (7.5m bonus, even salary)
6YR – WR Jake Stuart, $123M (13th yr guy, won’t see the back end)
7YR – LB Gilbert Wilkerson, $118M (basically 4yr, $19m)

If we land them all (no reason to think we won’t) we will have three important offensive slots filled (QB-WR-WR) and a few key guys elsewhere. Filling in with nothing but rookies and maybe a few chemistry foundation guys is going to mean this team will be bad – but we won’t be starting from absolute zero, at least. My goal here is to make the out-years interesting… I already know that any set of rules make it fairly interesting to build a team. I want these rules to make it interesting to keep the team together – so the sooner we are basically up and running the better, I think.

I have to up my offer to CB Woods to land him, but that’s okay – I don’t think we will even approach the cap these two years. I don’t know if he’s a long term commitment for us, but he’s a pretty solid player at a tough-to-fill position, so this makes sense for now. I’m trying not to completely throw away these first few years.


I toy with the idea of going out and landing a bunch of high personality chemistry types to build a foundation – but candidly I think that focusing in chemistry in this career will make it more time-consuming than I want. Plus, I don’t want to be in the spot of wasting precious FA contracts on these guys – so they’d be out the door in a few years anyway. Nope, I’ll keep it simple… we will surround this year’s crop of free agents with rookies and just take it from there.
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Old 02-28-2008, 06:46 PM   #4
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2023 Draft

We hold pick #4 overall, and then it appears that we don’t eve have our picks in rounds 4, 5, and 6. That is unfortunate… might need to do some dealing just to get some guys onto the field out here. More rule bending indeed.

I decide the best remedy here is to deal down in the draft, forego the one big splash player, and pick up multiple picks. So, we do – from 1.4 to 1.17 and getting the top five picks from San Diego in the deal. That should help us, even though we won’t get the impact DE that would likely have awaited us at pick 1.4.

Code:
Pick Pos Name Grd Adj Dash ST BP Agil Bjump PS Dev O/U Pre Post 1.17 DE Arnold Ingram 6.0 6.6 ---- 33 -- ---- ----- -- 54% VU 49/63 2.07 DT Bo Bolsins (DE) 5.9 6.4 4.93 38 32 7.58 9-05 -- 33% NA 23/47 2.15 S Chuck Kemnitzer (CB) 5.6 5.3 4.36 26 21 7.50 8-01 47 58% UR 36/55 3.05 LT Junior Pruett 5.1 5.6 5.44 39 39 7.64 8-08 -- 27% NA 31/58 3.18 WR Warren Dickens 4.5 4.7 4.58 31 15 7.20 9-00 56 20% NA 24/49 4.17 C Phil Brennan 5.3 4.6 5.05 39 30 7.94 7-07 -- 17% NA 19/55 5.16 S Jessie Blythe (CB) 4.1 3.8 4.61 39 21 7.58 8-05 39 17% NA 20/57 7.06 WR Rich Richmond 4.2 4.4 4.55 16 8 7.06 9-00 52 37% VU 17/40

Well, it turns out we do get a pretty solid-looking DE out of this draft after all – not one the the elite players I saw at the top of the heap, but a guy who ought to be very good for us, I think. In a QB-weak draft, the one guy I was watching got snapped up at the top of round two, wiping out my theory of grabbing a QB-of-the-future in round two. Instead, I’m switching to basically BPA now for our next picks.

We target another pass-rushing defensive lineman in round two, and then a safety who will presumably be better suited to play as a cover corner. I am hoping to see a combine stud OG slip to our round three pick, but he goes just ahead of us – probably for the best that we focus on hard-to-fill positions anyhow. Tackle is much harder to fill, and we get a guy in round three who looks like an excellent pass blocker.

Nothing too spectacular from here on out – drafted a number of guys we didn’t interview, which is troubling but also a reflection of our less-than-stellar scout, in whom I don’t place a ton of faith. I’d like to think we got some late-round steals… but then again I always think that at this point.
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Old 02-29-2008, 06:13 AM   #5
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
Deciding on a Style

On defense, I already know what I want to do – I’m trying to learn more about using the 3-4 front, so I’m going to use my pretty vanilla 3-4 defensive setup. That means that we already have our entire DL set of starters in place with two rookies and one veteran DT. We do have three starting LB jobs to fill from the free agent pile, though – we’ll get by with whomever we land there.

On offense, I have two veteran receivers, two rookie receivers, and not a sole at RB. I think we are going to be passing the ball a good deal, and I expect that I will set up a sort of downfield derivative offense to start things off. I might seek to make extra use of multi-WR sets – our QB Caruso knows 15 formations so we ought to be okay running a lot of 3-WR and 4-WR sets, I think. I’ll look for some RBs with the ability to make things happen from out of the backfield.
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Old 02-29-2008, 06:15 AM   #6
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2023 Camp

Okay – I’m going to do this a little bit unusually. I’m going to run through camp without signing the rest of my roster. That way, all these hanger-on veterans will be gone, and right after training camp we will go out and fill up with rookies. That way also, I don’t have any particular insider access to whether the young’ns I’m filling up with are creepers or whatnot. I don’t want to inadvertently gain by going out and picking up all these rookies. So – we head into training camp with just 15 players. Down the line, I will make this a more standard process, this is a one-time hiccup.

Tampa Bay Player Report (TB 2023a - TB 2023b)

Name
Pos
Team
TB 2023a Current
TB 2023a Future
TB 2023b Current
TB 2023b Future
Overall Current Change
Overall Future Change
Caruso, Chester
QB
Tampa
40
49
45 (5)
50 (1)
5
1
Dickens, Warren
FL
Tampa
24
49
28 (4)
46 (-3)
4
-3
Hevey, Melvin
FL
Tampa
54
54
54 (0)
54 (0)
0
0
Richmond, Rich
SE
Tampa
17
40
18 (1)
35 (-5)
1
-5
Stuart, Jake
SE
Tampa
52
52
45 (-7)
45 (-7)
-7
-7
Brennan, Phil
C
Tampa
19
55
25 (6)
54 (-1)
6
-1
Pruett, Junior
LT
Tampa
31
58
35 (4)
59 (1)
4
1
Ingram, Arnold
LDE
Tampa
49
63
54 (5)
66 (3)
5
3
Busby, Mitch
NT
Tampa
54
54
45 (-9)
45 (-9)
-9
-9
Bolsins, Bo
RDE
Tampa
23
47
28 (5)
52 (5)
5
5
Wilkerson, Gilbert
SILB
Tampa
56
56
56 (0)
56 (0)
0
0
Kemnitzer, Chuck
LCB
Tampa
36
55
40 (4)
58 (3)
4
3
Blythe, Jessie
RCB
Tampa
20
57
22 (2)
50 (-7)
2
-7
Woods, Paul
RCB
Tampa
56
56
51 (-5)
51 (-5)
-5
-5

Okay – a lot of downgrading going on for our veterans, no shock there. But it does look like we got hits on both of our young pass rushers, and our top cover man – all were nice camp bumpers. Mixed bag, but I can’t be too surprised that we saw erosion among the older players – thought honestly I wasn’t expecting quite as much from nearly everyone. And, to little surprise, no major breakouts from our later round players.


So, we build up to 46 players (no need to do more than that here) and are ready for season one. I leave LB Wilkerson in the SILB slot, and I fully expect him to post an ungodly sum of tackles this season. Longer term, his perfect role might actually turn out to be somewhere else – he’s an excellent pass rusher but also pretty good in coverage, so maybe at the strong outside slot? Past that, there aren’t really many tough calls to make here. This is going to be a very shaky team, I suspect.
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Old 02-29-2008, 07:45 AM   #7
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2023 season

Benchmarks:

Roster Rating – 1 (last)
Cohesion – 52-56-57-52 (last in all)


My predictions:

Gilbert Wilkerson makes first team LB with 130 tackles
Chester Caruso posts roughly 20 TD and 20 Int
Converted QB Jackie Hoffman posts almost 1,000 total yards
We finish 2-14 and secure a very tidy draft slot for next season


Season narrative:

I don’t expect much at all, needless to say – so I’m blown away when we hang up 37 points in our opener to get a win. Turns out it was aided by a defensive TD and a few fluky plays, but we did mange 386 yards of offense – so maybe we aren’t a 2-win team after all.

We get to 3-1 in the early season, and I am totally alarmed. This was supposed to be a long-term build. We can’t already be there! Here is the summary at the halfway point… I don’t know what to say…

Code:
Front Office Football 2007 2023 Summary for Tampa Bay Buccaneers Year 2023 Record 5-3 Winning Pct. .625 All-Time 117-163 Winning Pct. .417 Playoffs 0-2 Playoff Visits 2 Bowl Wins 0 Head Coach Matt Curtis Record 5-3 Winning Pct. .625 Off. Coord. C. Spencer Def. Coord. Z. Huntley Tampa Bay Buccaneers Team Rank Rushes per Game 29.9 12 Rushing Yards 126.5 8 Yards Per Carry 4.23 12 Pass Attempts 28.5 28 Completions 16.6 29 Completion Pct. 58.3 21 Passing Yards 210.0 22 Yards Per Attempt 7.37 7 Yards Per Catch 12.63 6 Total Yardage Gained 325.4 15 3rd Down Conversions 40.0 12 (T) Points Per Game 23.5 9 Pass Rush Pct. 21.3 7 Pass Defense Pct. 52.9 18 Turnovers 11 10 (T) Turnover Margin +7 5 (T) Opponents Team Rank Rushes per Game 30.6 26 Rushing Yards 124.9 25 Yards Per Carry 4.08 16 Pass Attempts 31.6 11 Completions 19.3 11 Completion Pct. 60.9 17 Passing Yards 230.4 22 Yards Per Attempt 7.28 27 Yards Per Catch 11.97 28 Total Yardage Gained 342.5 23 3rd Down Conversions 38.6 13 Points Per Game 22.3 24 Pass Rush Pct. 21.7 24 Pass Defense Pct. 67.4 26 Turnovers 18 3 (T) Week Team Versus Oppnt 1 37 CAR 25 2 25 JAX 21 3 17 SEA 27 4 31 at ATL 17 5 21 at MIN 32 6 23 NOS 21 7 17 at DET 25 9 17 GBY 10 10 CHI 11 at CAR 12 at LRK 13 at WAS 14 IND 15 at NOS 16 at TEN 17 ATL Passing Pos Att Comp Yards Y/Att TD Int Rate 14 C. Caruso QB 228 133 1680 7.37 14 10 83.6 **Team --- 228 133 1680 7.37 14 10 83.6 $$Opp --- 253 154 1843 7.28 9 10 78.5 Rushing Pos Att Yards Y/Att TD Fum 5 J. Hoffman RB 121 456 3.77 1 1 47 T. Duncan RB 86 421 4.90 5 1 14 C. Caruso QB 27 124 4.59 0 5 **Team --- 239 1012 4.23 6 9 $$Opp --- 245 999 4.08 10 12 Receiving Pos Targ Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop TD 81 M. Hevey WR 64 37 547 14.78 8.55 1 5 88 J. Stuart WR 60 36 496 13.78 8.27 2 2 18 W. Dickens WR 38 20 302 15.10 7.95 0 4 86 R. Richmond WR 24 12 133 11.08 5.54 2 0 Defense Pos Tack Asst Sack Hurr Ints Defn PDPct 93 G. Wilkerson ILB 50 17 0.0 1 3 3 80.7 25 P. Woods CB 38 17 0.0 0 3 1 72.3 36 T. Kaplan S 37 13 1.0 1 0 6 84.7 91 M. Busby DT 34 10 3.0 9 0 0 81.3 56 W. Simmons OLB 32 8 1.0 0 0 1 68.2 99 B. Bolsins DE 26 13 4.0 6 0 0 81.4 33 C. Kemnitzer CB 18 3 0.0 0 1 3 77.6 98 A. Ingram DE 17 6 2.5 10 0 0 82.0 35 R. Shapiro CB 16 2 0.0 0 1 1 80.5 74 B. Connell DT 14 4 2.0 1 0 0 79.5 45 G. Sanderson S 14 4 0.0 0 1 5 88.2 96 D. Kerry DT 13 5 0.5 2 0 0 82.5 55 V. Hubbard OLB 13 5 0.0 1 0 1 72.9 95 A. Herndon OLB 13 5 1.0 0 0 0 77.2 53 J. Marcheck ILB 12 3 0.0 0 0 1 70.0 26 V. Martin S 10 5 0.0 0 1 1 82.2 39 T. Hopkins CB 8 2 0.0 0 0 0 72.4

Just to be clear about the nature of this team, let me betray my previous intentions, and post what my scout thinks of this team:

Code:
Front Office Football 2007 Tampa Bay Buccaneers Roster, Scout Overview Player # Pos Start Exp Current Estimate Future Estimate Cntrct Caruso, Chester 14 QB QB 7 47 50 3 yrs Jacobs, Glenn 9 QB 1 12 32 1 yr. Harvill, Nick 15 QB 1 11 35 1 yr. Duncan, Trevor 47 RB 1 13 17 1 yr. Hoffman, Jackie 5 RB RB 1 11 22 1 yr. Dole, Emmanuel 42 FB FB 1 14 24 1 yr. Horowitz, Jimmie 28 FB 1 9 16 1 yr. Horibe, Korey 82 TE TE 1 10 17 1 yr. Jamieson, Tommy 87 TE 1 9 17 1 yr. Hevey, Melvin 81 FL FL 5 54 54 5 yrs Dickens, Warren 18 FL 1 32 46 4 yrs Stuart, Jake 88 SE SE 13 45 45 6 yrs Richmond, Rich 86 SE 1 19 35 3 yrs Brennan, Phil 54 C C 1 29 54 4 yrs Grant, Tyrell 61 LG RG 1 12 26 1 yr. Money, Steven 75 LG LG 1 12 29 1 yr. Thierry, Jack 60 LG 1 10 22 1 yr. Pruett, Junior 64 LT LT 1 37 59 4 yrs O'Neill, Pat 73 RT RT 5 52 52 4 yrs Clevenger, Britt 77 RT 1 12 25 1 yr. Collier, Colin 16 P 1 26 43 1 yr. Cooper, Carlton 17 K 1 28 35 1 yr. Ingram, Arnold 98 LDE LDE 1 60 66 4 yrs Henson, Nolan 79 LDE 1 9 18 1 yr. Bolsins, Bo 99 RDE RDE 1 30 52 4 yrs Tovar, Frank 70 RDE 1 10 18 1 yr. **Kerry, Daniel 96 RDT RDT 1 11 16 1 yr. Busby, Mitch 91 NT LDT 5 45 45 1 yr. Connell, Billy Joe 74 NT 1 10 34 1 yr. Wilkerson, Gilbert 93 SILB MLB 7 56 56 7 yrs Marcheck, Jesse 53 WILB 1 9 24 1 yr. Strickland, Gabe 52 WILB 1 6 18 1 yr. Weintraub, Daryl 50 MLB 1 8 30 1 yr. Simmons, William 56 SLB SLB 1 8 17 1 yr. Hubbard, Van 55 SLB 1 7 16 1 yr. Herndon, Aaron 95 WLB WLB 1 9 17 1 yr. Kemnitzer, Chuck 33 LCB LCB 1 51 58 3 yrs **Shapiro, Russell 35 LCB 1 15 34 1 yr. Hopkins, Trent 39 LCB 1 12 27 1 yr. Woods, Paul 25 RCB RCB 6 51 51 2 yrs Blythe, Jessie 46 RCB 1 24 50 3 yrs Dodge, Paul 43 RCB 1 11 23 1 yr. Kaplan, Terrance 36 SS SS 1 12 18 1 yr. Biru, Ronnie 23 SS 1 11 23 1 yr. Martin, Van 26 FS FS 1 13 35 1 yr. Sanderson, Greg 45 FS 1 12 30 1 yr.

Just so you’re seeing what I’m seeing – that’s an awful lot of guys with current ratings of 10 or so… and many of them are starters. S Terrance Kaplan is rated 12/18 by my scout, and he’s posting a PD% of 84.7 (without even being puffed up by interceptions) – I can’t even get that out of my 75/75 top draft pick in most leagues! Hell, my $9 million cornerback Woods across the field from this guy has three picks and he’s sitting on a PD% of 72/3 – and this is a pretty solid 51/51 veteran. What gives?

I assume this is substantially sample size at work – but I have had tons of empty cupboard teams start out barely able to remain competitive. I guess the handful of free agents here are really making a huge difference, after all.


Okay… things come back to earth in the second half, as we really get swallowed up by the league. We finish at 6-10 for the year, which is much more like what I had been expecting. Not that I’m happy to lose games – I just wasn’t sure what the hell was going on in the early going there. I’m writing it off as an encouraging, but nonetheless fluky, run of good luck.

Here’s the year end summary printout:

Code:
Front Office Football 2007 2023 Summary for Tampa Bay Buccaneers Year 2023 Record 6-10 Winning Pct. .375 All-Time 118-170 Winning Pct. .409 Playoffs 0-2 Playoff Visits 2 Bowl Wins 0 Head Coach Matt Curtis Record 6-10 Winning Pct. .375 Off. Coord. C. Spencer Def. Coord. Z. Huntley Tampa Bay Buccaneers Team Rank Rushes per Game 27.5 18 Rushing Yards 113.9 17 Yards Per Carry 4.14 11 Pass Attempts 31.4 21 Completions 17.6 26 (T) Completion Pct. 55.9 26 Passing Yards 229.7 13 Yards Per Attempt 7.31 9 Yards Per Catch 13.08 2 Total Yardage Gained 329.1 11 3rd Down Conversions 42.2 7 (T) Points Per Game 19.1 20 Pass Rush Pct. 18.8 20 (T) Pass Defense Pct. 49.5 23 Turnovers 27 16 (T) Turnover Margin +1 11 (T) Opponents Team Rank Rushes per Game 31.7 29 Rushing Yards 128.6 27 Yards Per Carry 4.06 21 Pass Attempts 30.0 3 Completions 19.2 10 (T) Completion Pct. 64.0 30 Passing Yards 239.5 25 Yards Per Attempt 7.98 31 Yards Per Catch 12.48 30 Total Yardage Gained 357.4 30 3rd Down Conversions 42.2 29 Points Per Game 24.4 28 Pass Rush Pct. 21.6 26 Pass Defense Pct. 63.5 24 Turnovers 28 16 (T) Week Team Versus Oppnt 1 37 CAR 25 2 25 JAX 21 3 17 SEA 27 4 31 at ATL 17 5 21 at MIN 32 6 23 NOS 21 7 17 at DET 25 9 17 GBY 10 10 14 CHI 24 11 14 at CAR 45 12 29 at LRK 35 13 30 at WAS 24 14 7 IND 13 15 0 at NOS 20 16 3 at TEN 28 17 21 ATL 24 Passing Pos Att Comp Yards Y/Att TD Int Rate 14 C. Caruso QB 500 280 3664 7.33 24 16 81.9 **Team --- 503 281 3675 7.31 24 17 80.9 $$Opp --- 480 307 3832 7.98 27 16 93.5 Rushing Pos Att Yards Y/Att TD Fum 47 T. Duncan RB 180 750 4.17 6 3 5 J. Hoffman RB 176 728 4.14 4 4 14 C. Caruso QB 45 213 4.73 0 10 **Team --- 440 1822 4.14 10 27 $$Opp --- 507 2058 4.06 19 23 Receiving Pos Targ Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop TD 81 M. Hevey WR 157 90 1383 15.37 8.81 11 8 88 J. Stuart WR 114 60 959 15.98 8.41 10 6 18 W. Dickens WR 78 38 457 12.03 5.86 2 5 86 R. Richmond WR 55 27 336 12.44 6.11 6 1 82 K. Horibe TE 21 16 150 9.38 7.14 2 2 Defense Pos Tack Asst Sack Hurr Ints Defn PDPct 93 G. Wilkerson ILB 114 39 1.0 1 4 5 78.1 25 P. Woods CB 65 28 0.0 1 3 7 75.0 36 T. Kaplan S 61 27 1.0 2 0 8 82.4 56 W. Simmons OLB 59 15 2.0 0 0 4 68.3 91 M. Busby DT 55 18 5.0 12 0 0 81.8 99 B. Bolsins DE 49 28 6.0 16 0 0 81.3 98 A. Ingram DE 40 19 7.0 15 0 0 82.0 33 C. Kemnitzer CB 39 7 0.0 0 2 10 79.1 74 B. Connell DT 38 12 2.0 2 0 0 79.6 55 V. Hubbard OLB 30 14 0.0 1 0 2 72.7 96 D. Kerry DT 27 11 1.0 2 0 0 81.6 39 T. Hopkins CB 26 4 0.0 0 3 0 78.9 26 V. Martin S 26 12 0.0 0 1 2 79.5 53 J. Marcheck ILB 24 6 0.0 0 1 2 73.9 95 A. Herndon OLB 24 8 1.0 0 0 2 78.9 45 G. Sanderson S 24 6 0.0 0 1 6 81.8 50 D. Weintraub ILB 18 4 0.0 0 0 0 66.6 35 R. Shapiro CB 16 2 0.0 0 1 1 80.5
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Old 02-29-2008, 07:46 AM   #8
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
Season observations:

Six wins greatly exceeded my thinking, so that’s nice to see. Investing early in QB-WR-WR seems like a pretty good way to go for immediate returns, I’m thinking. It’s alarming to me that this team’s running game was this effective – better than league average in yards per carry. Our running backs are total stiffs, and the run blocking scores of our starting five linemen are, left to right: 8-20-34-24-48. This is not a team that fields a terribly imposing lineup in that regard. I’m sure the gameplan is making some difference, but that seems like a lot to be coming from one source.

I would like to see this LB corps start to come together – just adding even marginal talent there should make a big difference. I think we are really all set with respect to the defensive line already – the biggest question for us is probably whether Bo Bolsins ought to move back to play NT – but I think he is locked in as an outside rusher, even up at 319 pounds of whatever he is.

Eventually, we will need to decide what to make of guys like S Kaplan – I don’t see any way that a guy rated 12/18 or whatever, even if he is some sort of slight creeper, is a long-term investment for us. But as we look to patch up wide open roster slots, maybe we don’t need to feel pressure to hurry up with our strong safety right away, if we can re-sign this guy for a couple more years. Who knew?
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Old 02-29-2008, 12:27 PM   #9
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2024 Offseason

Okay, the biggest question is – will WR Jake Stuart retire? Of does he have a 14th season in him? Answer – B. He’s back.

Past that, not much to note. We have 14 guys signed, as NT Mitch Busby is the one guy whose contract expired last year. We are open to a new deal with Busby for next year – he was solid for us, I think, and ought to re-sign fairly affordably.

We head into free agency with a lot off holes to fill, obviously – I’m thinking that my top veteran needs are linebacker (maybe two of them) and perhaps at offensive guard. My thinking is that, as usual, we can pick up a passable RB in the draft, and perhaps a project QB as well. I think we do need some depth at DB, and I’m open to going either way there, veteran or a top draft pick. I like CB Kemnitzer a lot as a future #1 cover corner, but we need at least one more guy back there with some pure coverage skills, as I don’t think Jessie Blythe has much more in him than as a supporting player. We’ll see about other void positions like TE and FB… maybe a late round draft pick can get us over the hump there.

Here are my FA targets:

Reneg – CB Paul Woods, 4yrs $20m
1YR – RB Lincoln Palermo, $1.7m
2YR – DT Mitch Busby, $4m
3YR – RG Kenny Bell, $14.4m
4YR – SLB Christian Seals, $26m (10m bonus, even salary)
5YR –
6YR – CB Louie Sawyer, $34.5m (10.5 bonus, even salary)
7YR – TE J.C. Atwell, $106m (essentially 3yr, $6.7m)

RB Palermo is a 9th year guy with over 10,000 yards rushing under his belt already, but he’s a mentor and has pretty good skills for our system, so I think this makes sense, even if he slides 5 or more points in camp. I put in to re-sign DT Busby, but I don’t want to commit longer term there. G Kenny Bell is an 8th year guy, and should really shore up the right side of our line.

LB Seals looks perfect for the strong side, and as a 5th year guy I’m fine paying up for him. CB Sawyer is a coverage stud, and I hope he becomes a fixture for us, even though this is pretty big money. The deal with TE Atwell is basically to get three decent years from a productive veteran in his declining years.

I leave the 5-yr slot open… and may use it after the draft if we still have a gaping hole somewhere. But for now, I know all these are need areas, and will be glad to land a bunch of immediate contributors.

Alas – I miss on LB Seals, as he immediately re-signs with the Rams. My backup plan is another pretty good fit at LB in Mack Quinn, who takes our offer for $23m, but without much bonus. My plan will now be to slot Quinn inside where he is best suited, and maybe move Gilbert Wilkerson outside. Anyway, we land our six revised targets, and shore things up in several slots.
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Old 02-29-2008, 12:27 PM   #10
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2024 draft

I again am tempted to pull a trade-down in round one and pick up some extra picks, just to accelerate the filling-in process. There’s a seeming cant-miss QB in this draft, but I don’t expect to see him at pick 1.6, so I’ll likely be looking at a deal-down once again.

Well, I’m shocked to see the top CB in this draft slide to my pick, and even though I have made a commitment of free agent dollars there, this guy is simply too good to let slip by. Billy Shea is a five-red prospect, and you don’t see that too often. Especially at a tough spot like CB, and sitting at pick number six. Wow. No dealing down for us, this guy is a stud.

We still have spots to fill, of course. I’d like to do another trade-down, but the value of an early 2nd round pick just isn’t all that much. So, instead, I bring aboard a pretty impressive-looking DT whom I think can become a serious starter for us as well. Yes, this isn’t the ideal short-term move as I have a veteran there already, but I think this is a solid long term add at yet another tough position, and that has real value.

Code:
Pick Pos Name Grd Adj Dash ST BP Agil Bjump PS Dev O/U Pre Post 1.06 CB Billy Shea 7.3 7.5 4.34 44 21 6.84 9-04 60 30% VO? 46/78 2.06 DT Amos Wilkerson 5.7 6.2 4.87 35 31 7.41 7-07 -- 23% UR 24/60 3.06 RG Maurice Donhoff 5.4 5.1 5.11 17 33 7.62 8-07 -- 14% NA 23/55 4.06 QB Bill Wilkins 4.9 5.6 4.80 41 13 7.56 8-04 54 17% NA 11/54 5.06 FS Morris Billodeaux 4.0 3.8 4.71 37 10 7.53 8-03 49 39% NA 18/57 6.06 WLB Heath Palm 3.9 3.7 4.60 29 14 7.58 9-02 16 47% NA 18/32 7.06 SLB Pete Reese 3.8 3.6 ---- 28 -- ---- ---- 36 56% VO

Our later picks cover need positions – we get a solid pass blocker to add to our left side line, and a (hopefully) playable backup QB. The last two picks give us a couple of guys to throw out there into the outside LB roles, but not likely long term starters.

Signing CB Sawyer and now drafting Shea gives us some extra depth at CB, and I think the fair thing to do is to move 201 lb corner Paul Woods over to play as a safety, where he will step in ahead of last year’s surprisingly nice young player, Terrance Kaplan.

So – I once again fill up to 46 players, re-signing only as many of last year’s after-camp signees as are needed to get us to a legal overall roster.

I take one last look for a free agent worth plunging in on a 5yr deal for, but come up mostly empty – I think perhaps I waited too long here. Instead, I just put out a 5yr offer to a decent but not exciting 3rd year outside linebacker Donovan Mathews, who can probably play the weak side for us for a few years – it’s a 5yr deal, but in practice will only work for three.
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Old 02-29-2008, 12:31 PM   #11
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2024 Camp

So, we get to training camp, moment of truth for our young guys. My main hope is that CB Shea really lives up to those massive combines, and not down to my scout’s VO grade. We have hopes for other rookies, but he should be a franchise-defining player, I think.
Tampa Bay Player Report (TB 2024a - TB 2024b)

Name
Pos
Team
TB 2024a Current
TB 2024a Future
TB 2024b Current
TB 2024b Future
Overall Current Change
Overall Future Change
Caruso, Chester
QB
Tampa
49
49
51 (2)
51 (2)
2
2
Jacobs, Glenn
QB
Tampa
13
30
16 (3)
31 (1)
3
1
Wilkins, Bill
QB
Tampa
11
54
16 (5)
52 (-2)
5
-2
Duncan, Trevor
RB
Tampa
13
17
14 (1)
17 (0)
1
0
Hoffman, Jackie
RB
Tampa
11
21
11 (0)
21 (0)
0
0
Palermo, Lincoln
RB
Tampa
45
45
37 (-8)
37 (-8)
-8
-8
Dole, Emmanuel
FB
Tampa
14
22
16 (2)
22 (0)
2
0
Horowitz, Jimmie
FB
Tampa
9
17
10 (1)
16 (-1)
1
-1
Atwell, J.C.
TE
Tampa
45
45
40 (-5)
40 (-5)
-5
-5
Jamieson, Tommy
TE
Tampa
11
18
11 (0)
17 (-1)
0
-1
Dickens, Warren
FL
Tampa
32
45
36 (4)
45 (0)
4
0
Hevey, Melvin
FL
Tampa
54
54
54 (0)
54 (0)
0
0
Richmond, Rich
SE
Tampa
19
33
21 (2)
33 (0)
2
0
Stuart, Jake
SE
Tampa
45
45
36 (-9)
36 (-9)
-9
-9
Brennan, Phil
C
Tampa
31
54
37 (6)
54 (0)
6
0
Donhoff, Maurice
LG
Tampa
23
55
27 (4)
58 (3)
4
3
Grant, Tyrell
LG
Tampa
12
26
13 (1)
25 (-1)
1
-1
Thierry, Jack
LG
Tampa
11
23
14 (3)
23 (0)
3
0
Bell, Kenny
RG
Tampa
62
62
58 (-4)
58 (-4)
-4
-4
Pruett, Junior
LT
Tampa
39
57
43 (4)
57 (0)
4
0
Cooper, Carlton
K
Tampa
30
35
29 (-1)
34 (-1)
-1
-1
Collier, Colin
P
Tampa
31
46
32 (1)
45 (-1)
1
-1
Henson, Nolan
LDE
Tampa
9
16
10 (1)
16 (0)
1
0
Ingram, Arnold
LDE
Tampa
64
68
70 (6)
70 (2)
6
2
Busby, Mitch
NT
Tampa
45
45
45 (0)
45 (0)
0
0
Wilkerson, Amos
NT
Tampa
24
60
28 (4)
60 (0)
4
0
Bolsins, Bo
RDE
Tampa
33
54
36 (3)
54 (0)
3
0
Tovar, Frank
RDE
Tampa
11
19
13 (2)
19 (0)
2
0
Hubbard, Van
SLB
Tampa
8
16
9 (1)
16 (0)
1
0
Reese, Pete
SLB
Tampa
17
27
20 (3)
28 (1)
3
1
Wilkerson, Gilbert
SILB
Tampa
56
56
53 (-3)
53 (-3)
-3
-3
Marcheck, Jesse
WILB
Tampa
11
26
12 (1)
25 (-1)
1
-1
Quinn, Mack
WILB
Tampa
52
52
52 (0)
52 (0)
0
0
Weintraub, Daryl
MLB
Tampa
8
26
10 (2)
26 (0)
2
0
Herndon, Aaron
WLB
Tampa
9
16
11 (2)
17 (1)
2
1
Mathews, Donovan
WLB
Tampa
25
33
28 (3)
33 (0)
3
0
Palm, Heath
WLB
Tampa
18
32
21 (3)
32 (0)
3
0
Sawyer, Louie
LCB
Tampa
54
54
53 (-1)
53 (-1)
-1
-1
Shea, Billy
LCB
Tampa
46
78
45 (-1)
78 (0)
-1
0
Blythe, Jessie
RCB
Tampa
27
45
30 (3)
45 (0)
3
0
Kemnitzer, Chuck
RCB
Tampa
51
61
57 (6)
62 (1)
6
1
Biru, Ronnie
SS
Tampa
13
24
14 (1)
24 (0)
1
0
Kaplan, Terrance
SS
Tampa
16
21
17 (1)
20 (-1)
1
-1
Woods, Paul
SS
Tampa
50
53
52 (2)
52 (-1)
2
-1
Billodeaux, Morris
FS
Tampa
18
57
21 (3)
48 (-9)
3
-9
Martin, Van
FS
Tampa
14
32
16 (2)
31 (-1)
2
-1
Sanderson, Greg
FS
Tampa
13
30
16 (3)
30 (0)
3
0

Okay – the good news, we can pick it out. CB Shea holds even at 78 potential, which should make him a top tier cover man. We’ll take it. DT Wilkerson also only holds, and that is a little disappointing. Here’s the rookie report, easier to assess:

Code:
Code:
Pick Pos Name Grd Adj Dash ST BP Agil Bjump PS Dev O/U Pre Post 1.06 CB Billy Shea 7.3 7.5 4.34 44 21 6.84 9-04 60 30% VO? 46/78 45/78 2.06 DT Amos Wilkerson 5.7 6.2 4.87 35 31 7.41 7-07 -- 23% UR 24/60 28/60 3.06 RG Maurice Donhoff 5.4 5.1 5.11 17 33 7.62 8-07 -- 14% NA 23/55 27/58 4.06 QB Bill Wilkins 4.9 5.6 4.80 41 13 7.56 8-04 54 17% NA 11/54 16/52 5.06 FS Morris Billodeaux 4.0 3.8 4.71 37 10 7.53 8-03 49 39% NA 18/57 21/48 6.06 WLB Heath Palm 3.9 3.7 4.60 29 14 7.58 9-02 16 47% NA 18/32 21/32 7.06 SLB Pete Reese 3.8 3.6 ---- 28 -- ---- ---- 36 56% VO 17/27 18/28


So, looks solid at guard where Donhoff is a boom, and we might actually have something in the combine skipper LB, too. Not too bad.
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Old 02-29-2008, 12:32 PM   #12
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2024 Season

Benchmarks:

Roster Rating – 7 (30th)
Cohesion – 52-54-50-53 (last in all)


My predictions:

Lincoln Palermo posts his first sub-1,000 yard season, but leads the team in rushing
Chester Caruso posts roughly 25 TD and 20 Int
Billy Shea posts at least 6 picks in his rookie season, making a rare CB case for DROY
We finish 5-11, slipping from last year’s record, but looking a bit better underneath


Season narrative:

Well, LB Gilbert Wilkerson gets hurt in preseason, and reinjured in our opener, and will miss most of the season. Ouch – on a thin team as is, we really can’t take that.

We do manage to win in week two, and then after two close losses, again in week five. A 2-3 start with only one blowout isn’t that bad.

At 3-7, we lose QB Caruso, and need to call on the rookie, which won’t end well, I’m sure. Wilkins manages 300 yards and a TD in his debut, but it’s on 20-of-44 passing, and boosted by one long breakaway catch, so he’s playing it pretty safe and we lose 17-10.

We coast into the offseason with only 3 total wins – a bit disappointing overall.

Code:
Front Office Football 2007 2024 Summary for Tampa Bay Buccaneers Year 2024 Record 3-13 Winning Pct. .187 All-Time 121-183 Winning Pct. .398 Playoffs 0-2 Playoff Visits 2 Bowl Wins 0 Head Coach Matt Curtis Record 9-23 Winning Pct. .281 Off. Coord. C. Spencer Def. Coord. Z. Huntley Tampa Bay Buccaneers Team Rank Rushes per Game 25.3 23 (T) Rushing Yards 102.6 21 Yards Per Carry 4.06 15 Pass Attempts 36.8 5 Completions 20.6 12 Completion Pct. 56.1 22 Passing Yards 264.7 4 Yards Per Attempt 7.20 10 Yards Per Catch 12.83 2 Total Yardage Gained 354.3 5 3rd Down Conversions 43.6 1 (T) Points Per Game 18.0 26 Pass Rush Pct. 16.9 30 Pass Defense Pct. 33.9 32 Turnovers 40 31 Turnover Margin -21 32 Opponents Team Rank Rushes per Game 32.1 31 Rushing Yards 134.1 29 (T) Yards Per Carry 4.18 22 Pass Attempts 28.8 1 Completions 19.1 8 Completion Pct. 66.5 32 Passing Yards 232.4 23 Yards Per Attempt 8.08 32 Yards Per Catch 12.15 31 Total Yardage Gained 359.1 31 3rd Down Conversions 44.3 30 (T) Points Per Game 27.8 32 Pass Rush Pct. 19.9 14 Pass Defense Pct. 66.3 27 Turnovers 19 31 (T) Week Team Versus Oppnt 1 18 at NOS 34 2 19 at KCY 17 3 22 at MIN 24 4 17 at WAS 21 5 31 DAL 17 6 14 at ATL 31 7 0 PHI 13 9 17 at NYK 31 10 37 NOS 31 11 15 CAR 34 12 10 SDO 17 13 10 SEA 37 14 7 at DEN 27 15 27 ATL 35 16 27 OAK 45 17 17 at CAR 31 Passing Pos Att Comp Yards Y/Att TD Int Rate 14 C. Caruso QB 429 253 3294 7.68 22 19 81.8 3 B. Wilkins QB 156 76 938 6.01 5 5 65.0 **Team --- 588 330 4235 7.20 27 25 76.4 $$Opp --- 460 306 3719 8.08 29 10 103.1 Rushing Pos Att Yards Y/Att TD Fum 21 L. Palermo RB 211 871 4.13 3 6 5 J. Hoffman RB 137 575 4.20 2 8 14 C. Caruso QB 33 141 4.27 0 3 **Team --- 404 1642 4.06 5 25 $$Opp --- 514 2146 4.18 22 23 Receiving Pos Targ Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop TD 81 M. Hevey WR 167 94 1572 16.72 9.41 6 7 88 J. Stuart WR 124 66 880 13.33 7.10 14 5 86 R. Richmond WR 95 54 702 13.00 7.39 7 6 18 W. Dickens WR 77 44 493 11.20 6.40 1 1 85 J. Atwell TE 47 23 269 11.70 5.72 2 3 21 L. Palermo RB 26 20 140 7.00 5.38 2 3 Defense Pos Tack Asst Sack Hurr Ints Defn PDPct 94 M. Quinn ILB 127 23 1.0 0 1 4 69.8 25 P. Woods S 108 41 0.0 1 1 4 76.0 91 M. Busby DT 52 13 3.0 2 0 0 82.1 48 B. Shea CB 49 11 0.0 0 0 10 73.7 53 J. Marcheck ILB 47 9 0.0 0 1 3 76.1 33 C. Kemnitzer CB 47 12 0.0 1 1 4 71.8 57 P. Reese OLB 46 21 1.0 2 1 3 75.3 99 B. Bolsins DE 45 13 2.5 10 0 0 82.2 98 A. Ingram DE 43 19 2.0 13 0 0 82.5 59 D. Mathews OLB 35 10 4.0 10 0 0 79.9 40 L. Sawyer CB 32 10 0.0 0 1 2 73.8 38 M. Billodeaux S 29 17 0.0 0 1 3 77.7 50 D. Weintraub ILB 28 13 0.0 0 0 1 73.8

So, a little disappointing in the W/L margin, but not a shocking season.

A –21 turnover margin is a mark of a very young team – tough to win many with a mark like that, I expect.
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Old 02-29-2008, 12:32 PM   #13
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2024 Coda:

My late-season reneg is to add another year onto the deal for RT O’Neil – not terribly exciting, but I didn’t have a lot of options.

At season’s end, we are nearly shut out from league honors once again – but WR Melvin Hevey manages to pull down second team mention for his outstanding 1572-yard season. That’s all we get, and deserve.

I think the thing to do here is sit on the offense more, rein in the passes, and try to control the game better on offense that way. We’ll see what happens with personnel – we’ll surely lose WR Stuart, and I’m not sure if we really have three quality WRs for a downfield-first attack.

We’re on our way. Before long, we will start shedding all these hanger-on players, and will be fully under the rules that I really have in mind. Building is always interesting to me – what I hope is that this team is still interesting to play five more seasons down the road.
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Old 02-29-2008, 05:35 PM   #14
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2025 offseason

Okay, two years deep, the team is starting to take shape. I think we are going to try to get more conservative on offense this season, and try to keep a little of the pressure off the defensive side of the ball. This is the last year of QB Chester Caruso’s current contract – and we probably have a reckoning coming up fairly soon with him. He’s a 9th year guy, so he probably has another few good ones in him – but would we prefer to go young there as this team is building, so we have “our guy” in place once we arrive? Or is Caruso our guy? Candidly, I don’t think he’s ideally suited to the short passing game, so I’m open to moving on at QB either this year or next.

Interestingly – we have no retirements. That means that WR jake Stuart is indeed back for a third year with us. He’s obviously going to drop off in ratings soon (in camp), and he was not very efficient last season – 880 yards, but on only 7.1 yards per target. I suspect he is on our “bubble” for this season, possibly depending on whether we bring aboard a new starter-ready player there.


I bring in a new coach (better in staving off injuries, a big deal for this thin a team) and a new scout (weakness is at OL, where we are pretty well off now) – and we are ready to get into the material evaluation of our situation. I want to take a few minutes and walk through things as they stand. I’ll use the scouting changes as free agency begins as a way to talk about each position group, and also to see how development is coming along with our younger players.
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Old 02-29-2008, 05:36 PM   #15
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
Tampa Bay Player Report (TB 2025a - TB 2025b)

Name
Pos
Team
TB 2025a Current
TB 2025a Future
TB 2025b Current
TB 2025b Future
Overall Current Change
Overall Future Change
Caruso, Chester
QB
Tampa
51
51
50 (-1)
50 (-1)
-1
-1
Jacobs, Glenn
QB
Tampa
20
31
19 (-1)
28 (-3)
-1
-3
Keane, Peter
QB
Tampa
6
19
7 (1)
20 (1)
1
1
Wilkins, Bill
QB
Tampa
25
52
24 (-1)
49 (-3)
-1
-3
Duncan, Trevor
RB
Tampa
14
17
15 (1)
17 (0)
1
0
Hoffman, Jackie
RB
Tampa
14
21
14 (0)
21 (0)
0
0
Palermo, Lincoln
RB
Tampa
40
40
40 (0)
40 (0)
0
0
Dole, Emmanuel
FB
Tampa
17
24
16 (-1)
21 (-3)
-1
-3
Horowitz, Jimmie
FB
Tampa
12
16
13 (1)
17 (1)
1
1
Atwell, J.C.
TE
Tampa
40
40
40 (0)
40 (0)
0
0
Jamieson, Tommy
TE
Tampa
13
18
15 (2)
18 (0)
2
0
Dickens, Warren
FL
Tampa
44
45
40 (-4)
43 (-2)
-4
-2
Hevey, Melvin
FL
Tampa
56
56
55 (-1)
55 (-1)
-1
-1
Richmond, Rich
SE
Tampa
23
34
21 (-2)
30 (-4)
-2
-4
Stuart, Jake
SE
Tampa
36
36
36 (0)
36 (0)
0
0
Brennan, Phil
C
Tampa
43
54
43 (0)
54 (0)
0
0
Donhoff, Maurice
LG
Tampa
31
59
33 (2)
61 (2)
2
2
Grant, Tyrell
LG
Tampa
13
25
13 (0)
25 (0)
0
0
Thierry, Jack
LG
Tampa
18
24
20 (2)
25 (1)
2
1
Bell, Kenny
RG
Tampa
58
58
58 (0)
58 (0)
0
0
Pruett, Junior
LT
Tampa
49
57
47 (-2)
56 (-1)
-2
-1
Cooper, Carlton
K
Tampa
31
31
31 (0)
31 (0)
0
0
Collier, Colin
P
Tampa
35
45
41 (6)
49 (4)
6
4
Henson, Nolan
LDE
Tampa
10
15
9 (-1)
13 (-2)
-1
-2
Ingram, Arnold
LDE
Tampa
74
74
76 (2)
76 (2)
2
2
Busby, Mitch
NT
Tampa
45
45
45 (0)
45 (0)
0
0
Wilkerson, Amos
NT
Tampa
32
60
32 (0)
60 (0)
0
0
Bolsins, Bo
RDE
Tampa
42
54
45 (3)
57 (3)
3
3
Tovar, Frank
RDE
Tampa
13
19
14 (1)
20 (1)
1
1
Hubbard, Van
SLB
Tampa
9
16
9 (0)
16 (0)
0
0
Reese, Pete
SLB
Tampa
22
28
23 (1)
29 (1)
1
1
Wilkerson, Gilbert
SILB
Tampa
53
53
54 (1)
54 (1)
1
1
Marcheck, Jesse
WILB
Tampa
15
25
17 (2)
26 (1)
2
1
Quinn, Mack
WILB
Tampa
51
51
50 (-1)
50 (-1)
-1
-1
Weintraub, Daryl
MLB
Tampa
11
25
10 (-1)
20 (-5)
-1
-5
Mathews, Donovan
WLB
Tampa
33
33
32 (-1)
32 (-1)
-1
-1
Palm, Heath
WLB
Tampa
21
32
21 (0)
32 (0)
0
0
Sawyer, Louie
LCB
Tampa
53
53
53 (0)
53 (0)
0
0
Shea, Billy
LCB
Tampa
59
78
58 (-1)
78 (0)
-1
0
Blythe, Jessie
RCB
Tampa
32
45
30 (-2)
39 (-6)
-2
-6
Kemnitzer, Chuck
RCB
Tampa
61
61
64 (3)
64 (3)
3
3
Biru, Ronnie
SS
Tampa
14
24
16 (2)
26 (2)
2
2
Kaplan, Terrance
SS
Tampa
18
21
20 (2)
24 (3)
2
3
Woods, Paul
SS
Tampa
52
52
53 (1)
53 (1)
1
1
Billodeaux, Morris
FS
Tampa
25
48
24 (-1)
43 (-5)
-1
-5
Martin, Van
FS
Tampa
18
31
17 (-1)
28 (-3)
-1
-3
Sanderson, Greg
FS
Tampa
15
30
15 (0)
29 (-1)
0
-1
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Old 02-29-2008, 05:36 PM   #16
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
Quarterback – Caruso solid veteran, Wilkins standard slipping youngster. Need = HIGH
Running back – Palermo passable veteran unsigned, nothing special elsewhere. Need = HIGH
Fullback – Nobody on roster has any real future. Need = HIGH, but urgency low
Tight End – Atwell passable veteran but sliding. Need = HIGH, but urgency low
Wide Receiver – Hevey very good, two young supporting guys solid. Need = HIGH
Interior Linemen – Donhoff developing, Bell solid, C Brennan marginal. Need = LOW
Offensive Tackles – Pruett is okay, O’Neil not shown but solid. Depth a need. Need = MEDIUM
Defensive Line – Ingram and Bolsins look great, DT mix solid. Need = LOW
Inside Linebackers – Wilkerson and Quinn solid starters, Marcheck shaky depth. Need = LOW
Outside Linebackers – Mathews adequate starter, Palm and Reese low-end. Need = HIGH
Cornerback – Two good young starters, very good bench, position looks great. Need = NONE
Safety – Woods okay veteran, Kaplan growing but angry, Bilodeaux hurt. Need – MEDIUM

Overall – my top needs for good, young players would be at QB, WR, and OLB. We have several areas where upgrades would be very welcome, but we are sitting at #2 overall in this draft and I’m thinking this is our chance to land our QB of the future. If that fails, we may look to once again move down and pick up some extra picks so we can again inch a bit closer to having a truly legitimate roster.


Okay, I have a look around at the free agent market, and start making my plans. Since we are basically past the period of suffering from the effects of the initial player cuts to clear out the roster, affordability is really zero concern this year. If we wanted to, we could spend very liberally right away. I could see that making sense if there were an impact player at, say, WR or RB who could make a major difference for us.

The obvious move with our early season renegotiation would be to extend QB Caruso, whose deal ends after this season. But I am fixated on the combine-skipper monster QB in this draft, and I really think that the uber-RB might go at #1, meaning we can stay put at pick #2 and get the star QB we really need. So, I instead decide to try to work out a long term deal with out top young DE Arnold Ingram, to lock him up for a long term deal now, rather than waiting until his rookie contract ends.

Well, my top FA target becomes really easy to spot – 5th year WR Jeff Deberry is rated 62/62 by my scout, and has excellent skill in getting downfield – he looks like a perfect candidate to come aboard and starts for us at split end. This guy looks like a serious impact player, and a perfect fit for our offense. He is looking for a 4yr contract, so I’ll try to work with that timeframe too – that seems to be the best way to go after a guy we really really want.

Reneg – DE Arnold Ingram – 5yrs, $59m extension, now signed through 2029
1YR -
2YR –
3YR – DE Randal Franklin, $4.8m
4YR – WR Jeff Deberry, $40m (8m bonus, even salary)
5YR – LB Drew Leal, $35.5m (7.5m bonus, dummy year at end)
6YR – SS Roy Fritz, $64m (12m bonus, one dummy year at end)
7YR – RB Rico Everett, $66.3m (basically three cheap years)

My thinking here is to leave the 1 and 2 year free agent contracts unused in these early stages, and try to pick up a 2nd or 3rd year player with them after the draft – where I will have a guy I can re-sign as a RFA for at least one extra year. Always shooting the angles, I am. My fallback position would be to re-sign RB Palermo, even though I think that our new pursuit Everett is a better fit for us, and is definitely younger.

We have to up our bonus amount to get WR Deberry, but he finally agrees, as does everyone else pretty much without incident or much competition. S Roy Fritz looks to be a pretty serious impact player for us, too. LB Leal projects as our SLB starter, and also becomes a pretty solid chemistry anchor for us too (I seemingly just can’t help myself).
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Old 02-29-2008, 05:41 PM   #17
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2025 draft

Sitting at pick 2, I am drooling over the top QB here. Archie Downs from LSU has near-topped ratings in most everything, and my scout said that was conservative (UR). He tested 47, but skipped the combine. He is #1 on the “big board” behind a monster RB, whom I obviously hope goes #1. There are two standout receivers in this draft, but if the QB goes at #1, my guess is we can trade down a few slots and still nab one of them to bring along.

1. Baltimore - Downs, Archie, QB, Louisiana State

Well okay then, that ends that. Should have seen it coming, actually. We trade down from 2 to 5, and pick up Pittsburgh’s next three picks in the swap – so we will again have a chance to really fill in some gaps in the roster here. Turns out both WRs are still available when we select – but I’m limited to my one trade, and I already made it. So we grab our guy.

Code:
Pick Pos Name Grd Adj Dash ST BP Agil Bjump PS Dev O/U Pre Post 1.05 WR Bryant Czyz 6.3 6.6 4.44 38 19 6.74 9-01 70 22% AS 42/75 2.01 SLB Devin Winfield (SILB) 5.5 5.3 4.70 33 21 7.07 8-11 30 35% VU 22/62 2.05 DE Edwin Blackburn 5.4 5.9 4.79 23 29 7.32 9-03 -- 54% VU 28/33 3.02 RG Shannon Madison 5.4 5.1 5.14 30 27 7.78 8-01 -- 38% NA 29/58 3.05 WR Kendrick Lindsay 4.8 5.0 4.42 24 13 6.96 9-00 57 28% VU 20/28 4.01 FB Kent Raven 5.1 4.1 4.77 20 23 7.20 9-04 33 25% NA 27/53 4.05 TE Chester Kanell 5.0 4.4 4.80 39 25 7.63 9-00 38 22% NA 23/58 5.02 RB Albert Newton 4.7 5.0 4.73 27 16 7.22 9-05 15 41% NA 31/47 6.01 FB Pat Copeland (TE) 4.4 3.6 4.79 25 25 7.51 8-10 29 21% NA 15/47 7.02 DT Walter Upshaw 4.0 4.3 4.94 25 35 8.41 8-04 -- 38% NA 29/36

My thinking at LB here is that Winfield looks like a solid run-stopper, so he will go inside, and we will probably move our veteran Gilbert Wilkerson to the weak-side pass rusher slot, where he could be a serious impact player. DE Blackburn just seemed like too much value to pass up, at a tough position to fill.

G Madison and WR Lindsay both look like they have starter potential, though I don’t know where WR Lindsay is going to get playing time – he figures as maybe our #5 or #6 guy for this year.

After that, a parade of semi-skill position players, as we fill up the FB and TE contingent pretty quickly here. RB Albert Newton looks like a standard utility-back for a short-passing offense, as he can pick up blitzes, make something happen on a short pass, and maybe carry the ball a bit. DT Walter Upshaw just seemed like gold at the end of the draft, with good combine scores saying he may have a real future as a pass rusher.

Including all our rookies, we are at 42 players – so fulfilling my pledge, I’m only re-signing RFAs to get us up to 46. That means a fair number of guys will be gone. Plus, we still have two of our contracts that may be signed, so I’m getting closer and closer to playing fully within my intended rules now. I do decide it’s time to let go of WR Jake Stuart – he was likely just to impede the playing time of one of our younger players anyhow in the #2 SE role, and he’s just not a great fit for the short-passing offense we plan to rig up this year.

My two-year FA contract goes to speed-back Todd reed, a surprising castoff who looks to have some skills, but did admittedly only post about 2.4 yards per carry in limited duty last season. C Jamie Downs gives us a pretty usable interior lineman (possibly a starter for us) and an affinity, and he gets our one year offer. Our RFA re-signings are QB Glenn Jacobs, SS Terrance Kaplan, and our incumbent punter and kicker.

With that, we are to 47 players (with S Billodeaux heading to injured reserve) and I pretty much feel like we have our roster pretty adequately covered. We really did fill in just about everywhere this year, and I don’t think we have a single slot where we don’t have installed a decent veteran or a rookie about whom I’m hopeful.
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Old 02-29-2008, 05:44 PM   #18
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2025 training camp

I’m just going to post the highlight segment, for simplicity’s sake:

Code:
Top Ten Most Likely Busts: Name Team Pos Change Wilkerson, Gilbert Tampa WLB -12 Downs, Jamie Tampa C -9 Quinn, Mack Tampa WILB -9 Atwell, J.C. Tampa TE -7 Winfield, Devin Tampa SILB -7 Pruett, Junior Tampa LT -6 Kanell, Chester Tampa TE -5 Copeland, Pat Tampa TE -4 Madison, Shannon Tampa RG -3 Raven, Kent Tampa FB -1 Top Ten Most Likely Breakouts: Name Team Pos Change Dickens, Warren Tampa FL 9 Lindsay, Kendrick Tampa SE 7 Blackburn, Edwin Tampa RDE 5 Richmond, Rich Tampa SE 4 Caruso, Chester Tampa QB 2 Billodeaux, Morris Tampa FS 2 Upshaw, Walter Tampa NT 1 Busby, Mitch Tampa NT 1 Cooper, Carlton Tampa K 1 Bolsins, Bo Tampa RDE 0

So, we get a big jump out of our 3rd round WR Lindsay, and also from Dickens and Richmond, making our WR position a complete embarrassment of riches. WR Czyz was a –1 in camp, biot great, but he still looks like a major star in the making to me. DE Blackburn jumped up, as I expected.

The big drop from LB Wilkerson is troubling, but he’s basically here for two more seasons and that’s it anyhow. Seeing the rookie Winfield drop 7 points is very disappointing – I thought I was landing a future 100-tackle guy there, but I guess not. G Madison was a guy I expected to bump, too, but he disappointed too.

Well – we will certainly have a lot around QB Caruso to make this passing attack work this year. We even have a whole new cadre of backfield mates for him, with more skill than we’ve ever had there before.
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Old 02-29-2008, 05:48 PM   #19
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2025 season

Benchmarks:

Roster Rating – 72 (11th) <-- wow
Cohesion – 62-65-61-61 (bottom quartile in all, but not dead last in anything)


My predictions:

Chester Caruso posts roughly 25 TD and 15 Int
Our pass rush elevates to being above league average, maybe a PR% of 22
We post 7 wins and actually look like a pretty competitive team


Season narrative:

We start off with two close games, a 1-1 split, but with Caruso posting 5 TDs to zero picks. We get to 3-2, but lose WR Czyz to a knee injury – just for a few weeks, fortunately. At the halfway point, we are a solid 4-4, and our controlled passing gameplan is working really just the way we wanted it to – not prolific yardage, but we’re moving the chains pretty well.

When we get to 7-5, it is time to start thinking about the playoffs. And at 9-5, it’s time to start thinking about playoff seeding. We have a 2-game lead in our weak division, but almost no shot at a bye week. Regardless, the managed-pass offense is treating us very well in terms of keeping games in check, not so much for generating big stats (WR Hevey’s on target to land under 1,00 yards, after approaching 1,600 last season).

We slip up and lose our last two games – that drops us to 9-7 on the season, but that’s still good enough to crown ourselves division champs. Here’s the regular season summary:

Code:
Front Office Football 2007 2025 Summary for Tampa Bay Buccaneers Year 2025 Record 9-7 Winning Pct. .562 All-Time 130-190 Winning Pct. .406 Playoffs 0-2 Playoff Visits 3 Bowl Wins 0 Head Coach Carlos Browning Record 9-7 Winning Pct. .562 Off. Coord. C. Spencer Def. Coord. Z. Huntley Tampa Bay Buccaneers Team Rank Rushes per Game 29.3 8 Rushing Yards 125.3 7 Yards Per Carry 4.28 7 Pass Attempts 32.6 21 Completions 23.3 4 Completion Pct. 71.6 1 Passing Yards 219.7 22 Yards Per Attempt 6.75 20 (T) Yards Per Catch 9.42 31 Total Yardage Gained 333.6 12 3rd Down Conversions 47.6 1 (T) Points Per Game 19.6 23 Pass Rush Pct. 19.3 22 (T) Pass Defense Pct. 38.6 28 Turnovers 17 3 Turnover Margin +11 4 Opponents Team Rank Rushes per Game 27.9 21 Rushing Yards 103.1 8 Yards Per Carry 3.69 3 Pass Attempts 29.4 1 (T) Completions 19.8 9 Completion Pct. 67.3 30 Passing Yards 223.6 14 (T) Yards Per Attempt 7.60 30 Yards Per Catch 11.29 19 Total Yardage Gained 310.8 10 3rd Down Conversions 41.8 23 Points Per Game 20.7 12 (T) Pass Rush Pct. 15.1 1 Pass Defense Pct. 27.1 1 Turnovers 28 16 (T) Week Team Versus Oppnt 1 24 at ATL 27 2 23 MIA 20 3 7 GBY 37 4 20 ARI 0 5 24 SFO 10 6 23 at STL 31 8 17 at SEA 7 9 14 at NOS 28 10 27 ATL 21 11 24 at CAR 35 12 24 at NYJ 20 13 23 at DAL 10 14 16 BUF 10 15 16 CAR 13 16 3 at NED 31 17 29 NOS 31 $$WC SEA Passing Pos Att Comp Yards Y/Att TD Int Rate 14 C. Caruso QB 499 363 3373 6.76 19 7 97.7 **Team --- 521 373 3515 6.75 21 8 96.9 $$Opp --- 471 317 3578 7.60 26 16 94.1 Rushing Pos Att Yards Y/Att TD Fum 39 R. Everett RB 211 970 4.60 7 5 35 A. Newton RB 112 461 4.12 2 3 24 T. Reed RB 82 321 3.91 0 3 14 C. Caruso QB 53 222 4.19 1 6 **Team --- 469 2005 4.28 10 29 $$Opp --- 447 1650 3.69 12 25 Receiving Pos Targ Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop TD 8 B. Czyz WR 98 71 718 10.11 7.33 2 6 81 M. Hevey WR 90 63 719 11.41 7.99 2 0 18 W. Dickens WR 72 48 591 12.31 8.21 5 1 89 K. Lindsay WR 67 46 459 9.98 6.85 5 6 43 K. Raven FB 38 29 144 4.97 3.79 3 2 39 R. Everett RB 25 22 113 5.14 4.52 1 1 24 T. Reed RB 19 18 142 7.89 7.47 0 2 37 P. Copeland TE 21 18 123 6.83 5.86 0 1 83 J. Deberry WR 32 17 261 15.35 8.16 1 2 82 C. Kanell TE 26 17 95 5.59 3.65 0 0 Defense Pos Tack Asst Sack Hurr Ints Defn PDPct 34 R. Fritz S 80 29 1.0 0 1 5 75.7 51 D. Leal OLB 79 29 3.0 1 1 3 72.5 95 D. Winfield ILB 77 34 2.0 1 1 1 77.1 25 P. Woods S 71 32 0.0 0 1 2 75.9 48 B. Shea CB 60 10 0.0 0 8 8 80.4 98 A. Ingram DE 53 18 8.5 9 0 0 82.0 33 C. Kemnitzer CB 51 6 0.0 1 2 7 72.4 91 M. Busby DT 42 17 5.5 7 0 1 82.8 99 B. Bolsins DE 42 16 5.5 8 0 0 81.9 93 G. Wilkerson OLB 38 20 9.0 23 0 0 79.1 40 L. Sawyer CB 31 14 0.0 0 0 0 71.0 94 M. Quinn ILB 28 11 0.0 2 2 2 84.3 59 D. Mathews ILB 28 11 0.0 0 0 0 74.2 90 A. Wilkerson DT 19 17 2.5 1 0 0 81.8 36 T. Kaplan S 17 9 0.0 0 0 1 74.2


Well, we fell short of my two stat predictions – we were a bit less effective with the passing game that I had hoped, especially in the late season (when Deberry got hurt). We’ll take a 98 passer rating overall, but I think we should be looking for bigger numbers in the pass attack all things considered – 3600 yards isn’t very eye-opening.

The defense was okay, but giving up 7.6 yards per pass attempt means we really have work to do. The pass rush just isn’t there yet, despite some pretty solid talent at the DE slots. We’re not generating a lot of hurries to go with a fair number of sacks. Wilkerson was good at the rushbacker slot, but overall we fell short of my hopes there. CB Shea has juicy red bars, but might not have the killer instinct – two pretty pedestrian seasons from him.

Postseason Narrative:

In the postseason, we manage to crush our opening opponents 27-6 to advance to the divisional round, but we then have a flu outbreak and have about 15 players questionable. WE play a tough game at the Giants, but lose when our late possession gets us into territory to set up a late FG to take the lead, but instead our WR fumbles, they take over, and they make the late drive for the go-ahead FG instead to win 20-17. Alas.

The Giants go on to win the championship with pretty easy wins in their final two games. We gave them their toughest matchup of the playoffs.

We are left out of the season awards again this year.

With our late season renegotiation, I decide that it makes the most sense to offer a new deal to CB Kemnitzer. Yes, this leaves us potentially without QB Caruso next year, but Kemnitzer was going to be without a contract, too, and he looks to me like the real thing. I like not feeling like I have any worry at CB, and Shea and Kemnitzer give me that feeling. Hopefully they will begin earning their fat paychecks before too long as well.

Last edited by QuikSand : 02-29-2008 at 05:48 PM.
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Old 02-29-2008, 06:09 PM   #20
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2026 offseason

Okay, I feel like this team is finally pretty much “together.” Our QB is out of contract, but overall, we have credible players at every position, and have elevated our overall roster rating from the near-zero range up to the upper half of the league. But for our dreadful cohesion, we might actually be a threat in this league, I think.

What I’m hoping now, or maybe next season, is that the more challenging aspects of this whole concept come together. Thus far, nearly all the players I have signed to longer term deals are still with us, or will be as long as I want them. In the next couple of seasons, that will cease to be true – we’ll see my initial URFAs fade off after this year unless I desire to give them real contracts (unlikely) and my ability to fill the roster through easy means will be pretty substantially limited. That’s what I’m looking for – I want pressure to make every draft pick count, every contract decision matter, and for every renegotiation opportunity to be precious.


We mostly avoid the retirement axe again this year – TE Atwell is gone, but he was a short-timer for us anyhow, and after drafting two TEs last season, he was a potential cut anyway. So, we have 37 players signed to start things off for this year – add in 7 draft picks and a smattering of new FA faces, and we ought to have our first season with the luxury of holding players inactive. We are on our way toward actually carrying a full, legitimate roster.


An interesting twist awaits us now…. QB Chester Caruso has developed a case of arthritis, and shows up as “doubtful” in the injury report as a free agent. So, I was on the fence about re-signing him as it is, but now the plot has thickened – he might be even be available if we wanted him, but it’s possible that the injury drives hid price down, too.

Reneg – DE Bo Bolsins, 4yr $23.6m
1YR -
2YR -
3YR – QB O.J. Turnbull, $4.1m
4YR – WR Warren Dickens, $15m
5YR –
6YR – RT Kevin Coleman, $121.5m (3m bonus, essentially 3yrs $10.5m)
7YR –

I see QB Turnbull as a cheap minsal guy we could use in a pinch in a short-passing offense, and it is nice to have a cheap option at QB. He wasn’t going past three years, but in a very weak QB crop this year (Caruso is the top rated guy available) I think Turnbull is a decent option even with his very uneven skills.

I use one of my free-signing slots to work out a new longer deal with WR Dickens, and use a long term slot on a veteran tackle who will be a solid #3 OT and affinity leader for us. I think there is a salary crunch coming before too long, and I don’t want to get caught unloading valuable players, so I’m not making a huge splash here in free agency.

I’ll again leave a few slots open for possible pickups after the restricted FAs get cut loose.


I wrap up free agency with 46 players signed to contracts. If we sign seven rookies, we will have to make cuts to do any more FA signings. I can live with that.
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Old 02-29-2008, 06:09 PM   #21
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2026 draft

With a team that really no longer has any **huge** gaping holes, I’m a bit more at liberty to be looking for impact players wherever I can find them. I guess our LB corps is an obvious area of need overall, as we have a number of older players in starting roles there, and you one key youngster might not be as good as we had hoped. The OL situation is more stable for the immediate future, but a solid LT would be a good addition for us as I don’t know I want to commit long term to Junior Pruett there. I also would like very much to land a promising young QB for this team to add some stability there.

We don’t have the top-ten pick this go-round, so probably no easy way to manufacture extra picks –not that I want them anyway any longer. We pick at 1.22, and inch upward each round afterward… so all middle picks, basically. We’ll see what falls to us.

I interviewed maybe 20 QBs for this draft – and not one remains at pick 22 who looks worth a damn. Oh well. At pick 22, I’m mostly looking at a few linebackers as what would be my top choices, and I’m less than inspired, to be honest. I explore a trade-down, but there’s no value in that, obviously. So, I’m back to LB, and torn between a six-blue combine guy who probably develops into a solid all-around type, and a two-red guy who looks like he can play the run and rush the passer, but with little peripheral skill. Both seem like defensible picks here, I’d actually like to work out a deal-down and take them both, but I decide to go for the across-the-board fella.

Code:
Pick Pos Name Grd Adj Dash ST BP Agil Bjump PS Dev O/U Pre Post 1.22 SLB Kelley Chancey (WILB) 6.0 5.8 4.59 33 21 7.17 9-11 37 48% HTR 29/51 2.21 C Bart Rodgers (RG) 6.0 5.2 5.12 39 34 7.69 8-10 -- 13% VU 27/58 3.20 SLB Darnell Abercrombie 4.4 4.3 5.00 36 20 7.66 9-01 34 27% VU 16/55 4.19 RT Brendan Raber 4.7 5.2 5.15 29 24 7.70 7-08 -- 38% OR 17/39 5.18 CB Zack Wilkerson (FS) 4.3 4.4 4.44 27 9 7.04 8-11 46 20% NA 13/45 6.17 QB Tito Daylo 4.3 4.9 4.77 32 12 8.22 8-04 87 13% VO 9/45 7.16 WLB Darrell Caldwell 4.1 3.9 4.63 27 10 7.40 8-05 28 44% NA 16/38

So, I decided to move the standout center to RG, where he lost a bit of his ratings, but still looks pretty solid to me. Centers are pretty easy to come by, so drafting a guy with the requisite heft to move to G usually makes a good investment. I’m also hopeful that we might have a future starter for our Sam backer slot in Abercrombie. RT Raber had a good enough combine to get me to look past the bas scout assessment. Rest are basically flyers.


Since I didn’t make any draft trades, I can accept an AI-offered trade if I like – and we have one in hand. It’s only a 6th round pick for QB Bill Wilkins, and I don’t know that’s worth much. I expect to decline this one, I think Wilkins stands a very good chance of being our #2 QB this season, assuming we don’t buckle under and re-sign the injured Caruso from the FA pile (he’s asking for big bucks, incidentally, which along with the injury and his age generally makes him pretty unattractive to me and most teams, it seems).



I think I see the answer for us at QB, at least short term. Kendell Beason is an 11th year QB, rated 48/48 overall, and coming off an injury-shortened season. But he seems to have great short passing skills, very well suited for the system I’m planning to run this season. Plus, he’s a mentor and knows 18 formations – all a good fit. We have cap space, so I want to try to work out a five year deal with him if I can (we’ve used the sweet spots of 3 and 4 years). If not, I’ll settle for two pretty good years and deal with it later.

Turns out five years is a non-starter for him, so we put in 2yrs, $10m and will bump if needed to land him. I expect him to start for us, and hopefully fit in well right away.

We still have a few of our FA slots remaining, so I look to make some moves there. The obvious thing to do with a 1 year deal is go after younger players, so I will be looking there primarily for both the 1-year and the 5-year slot if I can fit anyone into the latter.


Given that I am moving on a QB in free agency, and would be carrying five guys there anyhow, I decide to accept the 6th rounder for Bill Wilkins after all. We are deep enough that if we were in a spot to be playing him, the season would likely be a loss anyway, so I’ll take what I can get.

I end up making a silly offer to a decent veteran strong safety Rico Booker – most of his 5yr deal will be in base salary (around $5m a year) so he’s basically a luxury as long as we can afford him, and mostly wipes off our books once we cannot. He’s a standard four-bar guy, but they are the right bars for work at SS, so he may prove valuable, and can at least play special teams if needed.

For my 1-yr deal, I find an intriguing offensive tackle Julio Cronk, a guy who can slide over to play LT I think, and who might be in the mix for a longer deal if he makes that move fairly well.

Of course, I land all three of our late FA targets – no matter how many rules I put into place, I am constantly frustrated at the absolute ease of beating the AI at this stuff. I see QB Beason as a great gamble, and while two other teams made offers, it was child’s play to just ratchet up my bonus to make sure that mine would be the best among them. For a guy like Cronk, he just flies under the radar completely – just like most of the players that I choose. Just once, I’d like to see a bona fide bidding war for a free agent – where I put in my offer and then one of the AI teams making its offers actually responds by bidding higher. There’s just so much more that could be done in this FA system – as I’ve said before, It **could** be one of the best things in the single-player game, but it falls far short of that potential.
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Old 02-29-2008, 06:09 PM   #22
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2026 Training Camp

To get down to 53 players for camp (house rule I’m adopting as of right now) I release LB Donovan Mathews and, alas, SS Terrance Kaplan. We are into camp within $3m of the salary cap – so money issues are likely to be real going forward. I do have some soft salaries on the team that can be vacated by cuts (which is really as it should be) and starting next season, I expect that will be a realistic consideration.

Code:
Top Ten Most Likely Busts: Name Team Pos Change Downs, Jamie Tampa C -7 Reed, Todd Tampa RB -7 Everett, Rico Tampa RB -7 Woods, Paul Tampa SS -6 Wilkerson, Gilbert Tampa WLB -6 Abercrombie, Darnell Tampa SLB -5 Daylo, Tito Tampa QB -5 Caldwell, Darrell Tampa WLB -4 Bell, Kenny Tampa RG -4 Coleman, Kevin Tampa RT -4 Top Ten Most Likely Breakouts: Name Team Pos Change Shea, Billy Tampa LCB 6 Rodgers, Bart Tampa RG 6 Billodeaux, Morris Tampa FS 1 Beason, Kendall Tampa QB 1 Lindsay, Kendrick Tampa SE 1 Raber, Brenden Tampa RT 1 Brennan, Phil Tampa C 1 Palm, Heath Tampa WLB 1 Franklin, Randal Tampa LDE 1 Wilkerson, Zack Tampa FS 1

So, I was right about G Rodgers – his boom makes him a future starter for us, which is what we were looking for. CB Shea’s boom is nice, adding a little more value to a prime asset – a guy who we’d like to see deliver some star-caliber stats now, please.

Seeing our top rookie LB off this list is disappointing – until I realize that he belongs on the list after all. Bug, I guess. But he is a +6 in camp, and looks like a solid all-around guy in training. So, two big hits in the rookie class.

Here’s the more detailed revised rookie report:

Code:
Pick Pos Name Grd Adj Dash ST BP Agil Bjump PS Dev O/U Pre Post 1.22 SLB Kelley Chancey (WILB) 6.0 5.8 4.59 33 21 7.17 9-11 37 48% HTR 29/51 35/57 +6 2.21 C Bart Rodgers (RG) 6.0 5.2 5.12 39 34 7.69 8-10 -- 13% VU 27/58 31/64 +6 3.20 SLB Darnell Abercrombie 4.4 4.3 5.00 36 20 7.66 9-01 34 27% VU 16/55 21/50 -5 4.19 RT Brendan Raber 4.7 5.2 5.15 29 24 7.70 7-08 -- 38% OR 17/39 21/40 +1 5.18 CB Zack Wilkerson (FS) 4.3 4.4 4.44 27 9 7.04 8-11 46 20% NA 13/45 18/46 +1 6.17 QB Tito Daylo 4.3 4.9 4.77 32 12 8.22 8-04 87 13% VO 9/45 12/40 -5 7.16 WLB Darrell Caldwell 4.1 3.9 4.63 27 10 7.40 8-05 28 44% NA 16/38 18/34 -4

In other news, RB Rico Everett isn’t listed on the bust list above, but he seems to have lost a step or two. RB Todd Reed (42/42) is pretty clearly to me our best RB option, but the scout like youngster Albert Newton (39/44). Newton is Mr. Inside, Reed Mr. Outside, but I suspect we’ll end up seeing both a lot this year and Everett in a “supporting role.”


So, as we enter a new phase with this team (defined by the QB at least) here is our new signal caller. Yes, he’s an 11th year veteran so this isn’t the future – but he looks like the present.



With him, we sill use a fair number of short passes, I think I will ramp up the use of screens a bit, and also try to redirect the running game a little toward the right side. Not much else in terms of changes – we’ll head into our next season.
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Old 02-29-2008, 06:09 PM   #23
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2025 season

Benchmarks:

Roster Rating – 82 (5th)
Cohesion – 64-67-75-57 (bottom handful on offense, second quartile on defense)


My predictions:

We probably end up with two QBs playing games, and see 20 TD and 15 Ints
I’ll pick a new big numbers guy on defense – Arnold Ingram breaks through with 12 sacks
We struggle to equal last year’s 9 wins, but look better on D at least


Season narrative:

Well, we open with the sort of win that I’m really hoping for – a 16-10 final, we hang three second half FGs to take it, and control the ball with 74% passing and get a lot of QB pressure. Beason has 4 picks in week two, as we lose a close one – this might be a problem that undermines our controlled pass attack, if we’re getting picked too much.

Through four games, we are 1-3, with a PF/PA differential of 57/64… we are playing close games and losing. Beason has a ratio of 4/9, and we are –8 in turnovers. This is trouble.

Then – we get our act together. Three good wins, and Beason’s ratio is suddenly up to 12/9, and we are above .500 again. We lose two games in a row later on, and slip to 6-5 – our division is a total toss up at this point, we’re in a 3-way tie for the lead with NO just a game behind. We split two games, but so does everyone else in the division.

A late season loss to New Orleans hurts a lot, and put them into the division driver’s seat. We win to get back to 8-7, and the good news is that 9-7 is surely worth a wild card if we can beat 8-7 Atlanta in our last game. We’re back to the week one strategy – and pick up a 17-10 win to secure another postseason berth. Pretty much the season I expected.

Code:
Front Office Football 2007 2026 Summary for Tampa Bay Buccaneers Year 2026 Record 9-7 Winning Pct. .562 All-Time 139-197 Winning Pct. .413 Playoffs 1-3 Playoff Visits 4 Bowl Wins 0 Head Coach Carlos Browning Record 19-15 Winning Pct. .558 Off. Coord. C. Spencer Def. Coord. Z. Huntley Tampa Bay Buccaneers Team Rank Rushes per Game 27.5 15 (T) Rushing Yards 122.1 10 Yards Per Carry 4.44 9 Pass Attempts 34.8 16 Completions 24.2 1 Completion Pct. 69.6 1 Passing Yards 252.4 8 Yards Per Attempt 7.26 9 Yards Per Catch 10.44 27 Total Yardage Gained 368.6 3 3rd Down Conversions 52.5 1 Points Per Game 24.5 8 Pass Rush Pct. 21.7 13 Pass Defense Pct. 44.3 28 Turnovers 33 27 Turnover Margin -16 30 Opponents Team Rank Rushes per Game 26.9 21 Rushing Yards 102.6 10 Yards Per Carry 3.81 6 Pass Attempts 30.2 2 Completions 19.1 4 Completion Pct. 63.1 27 (T) Passing Yards 211.6 7 Yards Per Attempt 7.01 22 Yards Per Catch 11.10 12 Total Yardage Gained 297.0 4 3rd Down Conversions 43.4 25 Points Per Game 22.6 22 Pass Rush Pct. 15.1 1 Pass Defense Pct. 37.2 5 Turnovers 17 32 Week Team Versus Oppnt 1 16 CAR 10 2 17 at BAL 22 3 14 NYK 16 4 10 ATL 16 5 41 at MIN 14 6 31 at NOS 22 7 24 at DET 13 9 35 GBY 31 10 13 CHI 28 11 14 at CAR 25 12 19 at CIN 10 13 21 at STL 41 14 41 PIT 28 15 34 NOS 38 16 45 CLE 38 17 17 at ATL 10 $$WC at NOS Passing Pos Att Comp Yards Y/Att TD Int Rate 6 K. Beason QB 556 387 4039 7.26 37 21 96.8 **Team --- 556 387 4039 7.26 37 21 96.8 $$Opp --- 483 305 3385 7.01 24 7 94.4 Rushing Pos Att Yards Y/Att TD Fum 24 T. Reed RB 288 1376 4.78 5 7 35 A. Newton RB 123 475 3.86 3 6 **Team --- 440 1953 4.44 9 23 $$Opp --- 431 1642 3.81 17 22 Receiving Pos Targ Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop TD 8 B. Czyz WR 126 85 946 11.13 7.51 3 11 24 T. Reed RB 83 64 429 6.70 5.17 4 5 83 J. Deberry WR 90 62 890 14.35 9.89 4 3 81 M. Hevey WR 77 49 595 12.14 7.73 2 5 43 K. Raven FB 48 38 283 7.45 5.90 3 3 89 K. Lindsay WR 49 31 413 13.32 8.43 1 4 82 C. Kanell TE 42 30 267 8.90 6.36 1 5 Defense Pos Tack Asst Sack Hurr Ints Defn PDPct 32 R. Booker S 96 30 0.0 1 0 7 73.4 51 D. Leal OLB 74 21 3.0 3 1 3 73.9 34 R. Fritz S 72 25 3.0 1 1 5 76.2 95 D. Winfield ILB 64 23 0.5 1 0 1 72.8 48 B. Shea CB 50 17 0.0 0 4 16 84.3 98 A. Ingram DE 42 14 9.0 13 0 0 81.9 99 B. Bolsins DE 41 15 8.0 17 0 0 81.3 90 A. Wilkerson DT 41 15 5.0 5 0 0 81.2 33 C. Kemnitzer CB 39 10 0.0 0 0 14 79.9 93 G. Wilkerson OLB 38 16 9.0 6 0 1 79.9 94 M. Quinn ILB 31 10 0.5 0 0 0 74.7 50 K. Chancey ILB 29 14 0.0 0 0 1 77.6 58 H. Palm OLB 25 8 3.5 3 0 0 78.1 40 L. Sawyer CB 21 9 0.0 0 0 3 78.0 45 D. Abercrombie ILB 16 4 0.0 1 0 1 74.1

So, by total yardage – we’re #3 on offense and #4 on defense. Not bad. We are a real problem in the turnover department, though – we don’t cause enough, and we commit too many. That largely explains why we are a mediocre team with some base stats that suggest better than that.

Really good season for RB Reed – I was afraid he’d be splitting time, but the staff got this one right, it seems. He’s a RFA after this year, so we get one more easy season – after that it’s time to think about a long term deal, perhaps. He may be worth it, and his mixed ratings might keep him affordable – but I’ll take 4.79 yards a carry and 1,800 yards from scrimmage.

It looked like DE Ingram was going to have that huge season I predicted, but he cooled off and suffered some injuries in the second half. We end up with three guys with 8-9 sacks, and the hurries are coming, but next year we need to fill that WLB slot, as Wilkerson is gone baby gone with an exploding contract.

Looks like we did okay with S Booker, who I had in mind for a reserve role, but who came in and played pretty well. Not a coverage star, but he can help with the run – he ought to be getting after the ball a bit better, though. Lb injuries mucked up our defensive front all year, and a really serious keg injury to rookie Chancey has his future in real doubt.

Last edited by QuikSand : 02-29-2008 at 06:10 PM.
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Old 02-29-2008, 06:10 PM   #24
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
Postseason narrative

We put together a great game in our opener, and thrash our division champion Saints to advance, 35-9. Beason is brilliant, and our defense played lights out. We then get the 11-4-1 Bears, and we pound them pretty well, too, 27-13, fueled in part by a big error-free day from Beason again – 319 and 3/0.

We head to the NFC title game, played at 15-2 Dallas, favored by 7. They manage to force the bad side of Beason – as he inverts his ratio this game, and has 3 picks to zero TDs. We lose here, 28-19, and the Cowboys go on to the big game – only to get pasted there by Miami.


My late-season renegotiation is to extend C Phil Brennan. Not that exciting, but he’s been solid and I’m looking to start building some continuity with my younger players along the OL as we start to phase out the original group of veterans.
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Old 02-29-2008, 06:10 PM   #25
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
New rule additions

Since I see myself taking advantage already of weaknesses in my original rules, I’m patching on two more rules.

-there can be only one offer made to any target free agent player

Explanation: I don’t like that I can outmaneuver the AI teams so easily – so here, I’ll play with the no-change rule. if I put in a weak offer and get outbid, I should lose, rather than react and win. Presumably, this will squeeze me a bit more as I will go after my target players with either more money, more bonus, or both.

-there can be only one free agent signed during the late FA period

Explanation: I already see myself strategically setting aside FA slots to take advantage of the after-draft cap casualties and unsigned RFAs who become available. Picking are too easy then. I’ll limit myself to one signee during that phase per season.

Last edited by QuikSand : 02-29-2008 at 06:11 PM.
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Old 03-01-2008, 03:47 PM   #26
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2027 offseason

Okay, this season we are turning the corner. We now are dealing with a full roster, we’re close to the salary cap, and we are at least close to feeling the practical effects of the system of rules that I have in place. The only lingering issue is that I still have a handful of extra draft picks from recent years, resulting from a few trade-down deals. But that will fade, as I don’t expect to see many more such deals opening up for us. We are basically on our way into the “maintenance” part of the challenge, which is always the hard part to keep interesting (for me, at least… if you’re actually reading this then I haven’t a clue what keeps you interested in this sort of dreck).

RG Kenny Bell retired, which is fine – he was out of contract and we have already loaded up the OG slot for his departure. So, no harm done.

The next thing we simply must do is release LB Gilbert Wilkerson. I think of him as my “first” player here, as he was the first guy we inked to a long term deal. But it was a deal with a poison pill at the end, and it came due this year. Cutting him gets us about $30m under the $194m cap, which ought to be enough to sign free agents as we need to.


Here is the math, as I see it, for our number of players:

39 players currently signed to contracts
7 potential FA signees
5 restricted free agents who could be signed for 1yr
7 potential draft picks
--
58 players

Put as simply as possible, that means we have just a little bit of room to move here. And the “challenge” part of the deal kicks in as I realize that we don’t have either a punter or kicker signed to a contract, so most likely that forces our hand with two of our draft picks (or free agent signings, I guess). Oh – we already have one player out for the whole season (LB Kelley Chancey) so the real target would be 54 players.

(I think a couple seasons down the road, this margin will tighten more and more… I have a handful of extra draft picks buoying this tally this year)

At the start of free agency, we get a trade offer for QB OJ Turnbull, my backup. Right now, I don’t have a crunch for signed players, but later on I might. So, this year I can turn down getting a 4th round pick and a backup-quality C for him. At some point, two bodies for one might be an offer I simply can’t refuse.



Okay – planning our roster moves also requires looking at positions. Here’s what I really need to do this offseason:

MUST SIGN – P, K, LB
SHOULD SIGN – RB, CB, TE

Anyway – here is our slate of free agents for this year:

Code:
Front Office Football 2007 Tampa Bay Buccaneers Roster, Scout Overview Unrestricted FAs # Pos Start Exp Current Estimate Future Estimate Cntrct Pruett, Junior 64 LT 5 49 49 --- Collier, Colin 16 P 5 46 46 --- Blythe, Jessie 46 RCB 5 34 34 --- Downs, Jamie 52 C 5 33 33 --- Cooper, Carlton 17 K 5 32 32 --- Richmond, Rich 86 SE 5 29 29 --- Jacobs, Glenn 9 QB 5 26 26 --- Restricted FAs # Pos Start Exp Current Estimate Future Estimate Cntrct Cronk, Julio 75 LT 4 56 56 --- Reed, Todd 24 RB 4 43 43 --- Reese, Pete 57 SLB 4 31 31 --- Billodeaux, Morris 38 FS 4 30 30 --- Palm, Heath 58 WLB 4 27 27 ---

So, we’ll sign up all the RFAs for their final season, and we have seven URFAs to decide on. I don’t really think any of these are special players – I like CB Blythe as a pretty good fit for a backup CB, but his skills are pretty replaceable. Same with WR Richmond.

LT Pruett is probably the toughest case – he’s a very solid pass blocker, and for the LT slot, that has a good deal of value. Also, RFA Julio Cronk is looking for more than $9m per year in his new deal, which I don’t see happening – so Pruett could very easily become our starting LT again after this season. I guess I’ll work out a one year deal with Cronk, but if he thinks he is a top-tier caliber player, then he isn’t going to be getting that kind of coin from us.

Wow… speaking of Cronk, since he now thinks he walks on water, even just the 1yr offer to him will cost us more than $13 million. Holy cow. That’s making LT a bit of a crisis position – I thought I had this all worked out with the two guys (hoping to re-up with Pruett cheaply after Cronk gave us two cheap seasons). Now, I wonder if we might not have to just go fishing for a rookie there.

The other RFAs, mercifuly, are easy signings.


Okay, here’s my contract plan, once I have had a chance to weight my options:

Reneg – NT Amos Wilkerson, 4yrs $13.8m
1YR -
2YR – LB Dixon Daniels ($18m, $12B flat salary)
3YR – LT Junior Pruett ($11.4m, $2.4B flat salary)
4YR – WR/KR Clyde Craig ($25.1m, essentially 3yrs $3.3m)
5YR – CB Jesse Blythe ($46m, essentially 3yrs $3.7m)
6YR – TE Mitch Farias ($79m, essentially 3yrs $4.3m)
7YR – ILB Jesse Dirnbauer (108m, essentially 7yrs $24m)

LB Dirnbauer is a solid 5th year MLB who looks like a good fit for us – not a huge run stopper, though he did post around 15% of the tackles in Arizona the last two years. I’m hoping that our fat money short term signing LB Dixon will slot in as an impact player at the WLB slot, and really put our worries about the LB position to rest for the next couple seasons.

I also decide to knuckle under and try to re-up with LT Junior Pruett. Not a run blocker (and admittedly, with him on the bench, we did have a breakthrough season rushing the ball) but he’s a solid, familiar, affinity left tackle who looks to be pretty affordable. I think I have to take advantage of that – I looked at a high quality free agent, but couldn’t make that work for less than $10m a year.

I’m loading up with low-salary long term deals here, mostly trying to improve some ancillary positions on the team. WR Craig is a decent return man, who takes a three year minsal deal with one phony season at the end. I decide to extend CB Blythe for three real years, after which I’ll have no choice but to let him walk – I tried to get him down to only one phony year (and then I’d try to get it to auto-void) but couldn’t get the 5yr offer to work that way.

I’m leaving the 1yr offer out there for an after-draft fill-in. If it’s to a 2nd or 3rd year player, that buys us an extra year as an extendable RFA.


Under my new rules – I just sit back and watch these offers until they resolve, so there’s a real chance I’ll have to go dig back in, but I put in strong offers to the good players here, and I figure to land everyone I want. As the stages go by, I see LB Dixon Daniels getting offered 5yrs $70m from the Colts – but I still think my shorter bonus-laden offer will win out, and it does. In week six, WR Craig signs, and we have all six target players in hand.

(Aside: I’m not sure if this is a good or bad thing, but it took me more than an hour of real time trying to work out how to target players here for all these deals… maybe that gets simpler with time…but it was fairly rewarding to sort of chart out my needs crossed with the available players)
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Old 03-01-2008, 03:56 PM   #27
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
Late Free Agency

So, I get set to sign everyone, when I get an interesting note:

From: Kendall Beason

I have decided to hold out until I receive a new contract.

As your starting quarterback last season, I believe I had a breakout season. I believe I'm very seriously underpaid, and will not report to camp without a new contract.


Fascinating. I hadn’t though about what to do here under my rules, but here I am. Well – he’s actually asking for a massive contract worth more than $19m a year (making $5 as it stands) so I don’t even see how we’d afford it anyway. I think I’m painted into a corner here – we’ll hope Beason comes to camp under this deal, but I don’t think we have any way to re-up with him here.

3rd year DE Ernest Mills, pure pass rusher, is my target for a 1yr contract offer. He gives us some depth there cheap, which helps a great deal, as a tough position to fill.


jbvxz <- that is commentary from my assistant GM, who seems to think we need more badasses


I make a couple of veteran cuts before training camp to get down to 53 players – S Paul Woods and LB Mack Quinn. Neither was an easy cut.
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Old 03-01-2008, 03:56 PM   #28
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2027 training camp

After trying to cut corners, I’ll post the whole deal this time:
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Old 03-01-2008, 03:57 PM   #29
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
Tampa Bay Player Report (TB 2027c - TB 2027d)

Name
Pos
Team
TB 2027c Current
TB 2027c Future
TB 2027d Current
TB 2027d Future
Overall Current Change
Overall Future Change
Beason, Kendall
QB
Tampa
52
52
53 (1)
53 (1)
1
1
Daylo, Tito
QB
Tampa
11
37
15 (4)
38 (1)
4
1
Swartz, Jose
QB
Tampa
17
50
21 (4)
49 (-1)
4
-1
Turnbull, O.J.
QB
Tampa
39
39
35 (-4)
35 (-4)
-4
-4
Montero, Sedrick
RB
Tampa
23
26
24 (1)
26 (0)
1
0
Newton, Albert
RB
Tampa
41
41
41 (0)
41 (0)
0
0
Reed, Todd
RB
Tampa
43
43
43 (0)
43 (0)
0
0
Raven, Kent
FB
Tampa
40
49
43 (3)
49 (0)
3
0
Farias, Mitch
TE
Tampa
51
51
50 (-1)
50 (-1)
-1
-1
Kanell, Chester
TE
Tampa
38
47
40 (2)
46 (-1)
2
-1
Czyz, Bryant
FL
Tampa
78
78
77 (-1)
77 (-1)
-1
-1
Dickens, Warren
FL
Tampa
52
52
52 (0)
52 (0)
0
0
Rodgers, Andre
FL
Tampa
25
35
27 (2)
35 (0)
2
0
Craig, Clyde
SE
Tampa
21
31
18 (-3)
26 (-5)
-3
-5
Deberry, Jeff
SE
Tampa
62
62
62 (0)
62 (0)
0
0
Hevey, Melvin
SE
Tampa
54
54
53 (-1)
53 (-1)
-1
-1
Lindsay, Kendrick
SE
Tampa
43
45
48 (5)
48 (3)
5
3
Brennan, Phil
C
Tampa
57
57
56 (-1)
56 (-1)
-1
-1
Donhoff, Maurice
LG
Tampa
60
60
60 (0)
60 (0)
0
0
Madison, Shannon
RG
Tampa
36
49
40 (4)
50 (1)
4
1
Rodgers, Bart
RG
Tampa
38
66
47 (9)
72 (6)
9
6
Pruett, Junior
LT
Tampa
49
49
49 (0)
49 (0)
0
0
Coleman, Kevin
RT
Tampa
43
43
35 (-8)
35 (-8)
-8
-8
Raber, Brenden
RT
Tampa
26
40
29 (3)
39 (-1)
3
-1
Stone, Kyle
K
Tampa
36
70
35 (-1)
60 (-10)
-1
-10
Arnold, Neal
P
Tampa
41
62
42 (1)
58 (-4)
1
-4
Franklin, Randal
LDE
Tampa
36
49
29 (-7)
38 (-11)
-7
-11
Ingram, Arnold
LDE
Tampa
77
77
78 (1)
78 (1)
1
1
Hernandez, Leo
NT
Tampa
23
57
26 (3)
54 (-3)
3
-3
Upshaw, Walter
NT
Tampa
33
37
34 (1)
38 (1)
1
1
Wilkerson, Amos
NT
Tampa
53
60
57 (4)
61 (1)
4
1
Blackburn, Edwin
RDE
Tampa
39
43
43 (4)
43 (0)
4
0
Bolsins, Bo
RDE
Tampa
56
56
56 (0)
56 (0)
0
0
Mills, Ernest
RDE
Tampa
37
37
39 (2)
39 (2)
2
2
Leal, Drew
SLB
Tampa
47
47
46 (-1)
46 (-1)
-1
-1
Reese, Pete
SLB
Tampa
31
31
31 (0)
31 (0)
0
0
Abercrombie, Darnell
SILB
Tampa
21
47
30 (9)
52 (5)
9
5
Winfield, Devin
SILB
Tampa
44
52
49 (5)
51 (-1)
5
-1
Chancey, Kelly
WILB
Tampa
39
61
44 (5)
61 (0)
5
0
Dirnbauer, Jesse
MLB
Tampa
52
52
52 (0)
52 (0)
0
0
Caldwell, Darrell
WLB
Tampa
17
32
19 (2)
31 (-1)
2
-1
Daniels, Dixon
WLB
Tampa
66
66
66 (0)
66 (0)
0
0
Palm, Heath
WLB
Tampa
27
27
27 (0)
27 (0)
0
0
Sawyer, Louie
LCB
Tampa
53
53
47 (-6)
47 (-6)
-6
-6
Shea, Billy
LCB
Tampa
86
86
86 (0)
86 (0)
0
0
Blythe, Jessie
RCB
Tampa
34
34
33 (-1)
33 (-1)
-1
-1
Kemnitzer, Chuck
RCB
Tampa
66
66
66 (0)
66 (0)
0
0
Booker, Rico
SS
Tampa
54
54
54 (0)
54 (0)
0
0
Terry, Ben
SS
Tampa
20
74
28 (8)
79 (5)
8
5
Billodeaux, Morris
FS
Tampa
30
30
31 (1)
31 (1)
1
1
Fritz, Roy
FS
Tampa
67
67
67 (0)
67 (0)
0
0
Wilkerson, Zack
FS
Tampa
18
46
23 (5)
46 (0)
5
0
Woodson, Rusty
FS
Tampa
19
41
23 (4)
45 (4)
4
4

Last edited by QuikSand : 03-01-2008 at 03:57 PM.
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Old 03-01-2008, 03:57 PM   #30
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
And, the first bit of big news is right here:

From: Kendall Beason

I have decided that loyalty is more important than money. I will report to active duty immediately.


So, that had the potential to really hurt us for this year, but instead we dodge the bullet.

Anyway – here’s the updated rookie watch:

Code:
Pick Pos Name Grd Adj Dash ST BP Agil Bjump PS Dev O/U Pre Post 1.23 CB Ben Terry (SS) 5.9 6.1 4.32 30 14 6.78 10-03 44 13% UR 20/74 28/79 +5 2.22 NT Leo Hernandez 5.2 5.6 4.95 34 27 7.62 9-01 -- 22% NA 23/57 26/54 -3 3.21 K Kyle Stone 6.7 4.0 5.02 44 10 7.55 9-05 -- 47% NA 36/70 35/60 -10 4.23 FS Rusty Woodson 5.0 4.7 4.54 34 20 7.25 8-04 50 29% UR 19/41 23/45 +4 5.22 WR Andre Rogers 4.3 4.5 4.64 13 15 7.09 10-04 51 43% VU 25/35 27/35 -- 6.13 QB Jose Swartz 4.7 5.4 4.48 19 12 7.30 8-03 82 31% NA 17/50 21/49 -1 6.21 P Neal Arnold 5.0 2.7 4.87 28 5 7.48 9-10 -- 33% NA 41/62 42/58 -4 7.23 RB Sedrick Montero 4.6 4.9 4.56 25 10 7.25 10-01 12 52% AS 23/26 24/26 --

Okay, Ben Terry looks like a beast in waiting, while S Rusty Woodson might one day start alongside him. QB Swartz is intriguing enough to keep around, too. No major shocks here.

A big breakout for RG Bart Rodgers makes us very comfy starting him this year.

We’re ready.

Last edited by QuikSand : 03-01-2008 at 03:58 PM.
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Old 03-01-2008, 03:58 PM   #31
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2027 season

Benchmarks:

Roster Rating – 100/81
Cohesion – 68-86-72-55

My predictions:

Bryant Czyz tops 1,000 for his first time, with around 100 catches on the year
DEs Ingram and Bolsins and LB Daniels all get double digit sacks for us
We post improved number everywhere, and manage about 11 wins to take the division

Season narrative:

We suffer two blowouts in out first four games, and while 2-2 isn’t awful, it doesn’t look good on the stat sheet. Halfway through, at 5-3, we still don’t look very strong – we are upside down in passing yards per attempt, giving up more than we get.

We get down toward the end of the season, and we are 9-5 – but in a three-way tie for the division lead. Our last game is against Carolina, and we are tied at 10-5 for the division lead – they get the win and take the division, we expect to hit the road again as a wild card team – but are disappointed when we realize that we grabbed the dreaded 7-seed with the loss, and lose out to Atlanta for the final wild card. We’re done.

Code:
Front Office Football 2007 2027 Summary for Tampa Bay Buccaneers Year 2027 Record 10-6 Winning Pct. .625 All-Time 149-203 Winning Pct. .423 Playoffs 3-4 Playoff Visits 4 Bowl Wins 0 Head Coach Carlos Browning Record 31-22 Winning Pct. .584 Off. Coord. C. Spencer Def. Coord. B. McKenzie Tampa Bay Buccaneers Team Rank Rushes per Game 26.6 18 Rushing Yards 114.8 14 Yards Per Carry 4.31 11 Pass Attempts 35.1 11 Completions 24.6 1 (T) Completion Pct. 70.1 2 Passing Yards 258.6 7 Yards Per Attempt 7.36 10 Yards Per Catch 10.50 28 Total Yardage Gained 362.3 5 3rd Down Conversions 49.8 1 (T) Points Per Game 27.6 3 Pass Rush Pct. 21.3 6 (T) Pass Defense Pct. 48.8 20 Turnovers 27 19 (T) Turnover Margin +2 15 Opponents Team Rank Rushes per Game 25.2 8 (T) Rushing Yards 91.0 3 Yards Per Carry 3.61 1 Pass Attempts 32.2 9 Completions 20.7 18 Completion Pct. 64.3 29 Passing Yards 235.4 13 Yards Per Attempt 7.31 21 Yards Per Catch 11.38 16 Total Yardage Gained 309.6 6 3rd Down Conversions 44.6 26 Points Per Game 24.4 26 Pass Rush Pct. 15.7 3 Pass Defense Pct. 35.1 4 Turnovers 29 10 (T) Week Team Versus Oppnt 1 21 at NOS 38 2 21 JAX 17 3 34 at SFO 10 4 20 at WAS 45 5 45 DAL 28 6 28 ATL 31 7 35 PHI 28 9 17 at NYK 16 10 24 NOS 31 11 22 at CAR 10 12 37 at LRK 17 13 19 GBY 13 14 17 IND 34 15 30 at ATL 27 16 51 at TEN 20 17 20 CAR 25 Passing Pos Att Comp Yards Y/Att TD Int Rate 6 K. Beason QB 547 385 4075 7.45 30 15 98.6 **Team --- 562 394 4137 7.36 31 15 98.5 $$Opp --- 515 331 3767 7.31 32 15 94.7 Rushing Pos Att Yards Y/Att TD Fum 24 T. Reed RB 304 1347 4.43 12 4 35 A. Newton RB 87 402 4.62 4 2 **Team --- 426 1836 4.31 16 25 $$Opp --- 403 1456 3.61 11 26 Receiving Pos Targ Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop TD 18 W. Dickens WR 104 68 688 10.12 6.62 5 6 24 T. Reed RB 79 62 356 5.74 4.51 2 5 84 M. Farias TE 64 53 531 10.02 8.30 1 6 81 M. Hevey WR 78 52 733 14.10 9.40 3 3 8 B. Czyz WR 82 49 641 13.08 7.82 3 5 83 J. Deberry WR 45 29 344 11.86 7.64 3 3 82 C. Kanell TE 34 27 257 9.52 7.56 1 2 43 K. Raven FB 31 25 231 9.24 7.45 0 0 Defense Pos Tack Asst Sack Hurr Ints Defn PDPct 93 D. Daniels OLB 81 26 10.0 11 0 3 77.7 95 D. Winfield ILB 80 36 0.5 0 3 2 75.5 34 R. Fritz S 75 23 0.0 0 2 8 80.3 32 R. Booker S 72 24 0.0 0 2 8 80.8 48 B. Shea CB 70 12 0.5 2 3 13 75.5 33 C. Kemnitzer CB 54 9 0.0 0 2 15 78.5 98 A. Ingram DE 48 20 8.0 15 0 1 81.7 90 A. Wilkerson DT 40 26 9.0 9 0 0 81.9 99 B. Bolsins DE 32 15 4.5 12 0 0 81.4 56 J. Dirnbauer ILB 31 6 2.0 0 0 2 73.7 58 H. Palm OLB 28 13 5.0 6 0 0 77.2 51 D. Leal OLB 27 11 1.0 2 0 4 78.8

Well, our offense is clicking pretty well – we are not explosive, but we are pretty consistent. This year Beason improved slightly everywhere (except TD passes), and made fewer mistakes. WR Czyz was never on pace for a huge year, and injuries hobbled him late in the season. And we got another excellent season from RB Todd Reed, who seems to fit us like a glove.

I though our pass rush would be vastly improved – Daniels was pretty good, and Ingram was his usual solid self, but the teamwide 21.3 was a shade lower than I had hoped. We managed to get back to basically even in turnovers, but didn’t really get much better – I fear that below the surface, we are not a better team than we were last year.

- - -

Season Coda

I’m admittedly disappointed in the season, I really believed that with the weapons we had in place, our offense would be better. If we retain QB Beason for next season, I think it might be back to our more traditional offensive style, and throwing the ball downfield more. As much as I say I can live with the stats generated from the short-passing, control-the-game style… I guess it’s just in my blood to grip it and rip it. This 11 yards per completion stuff doesn’t do it for me.

Speaking of Beason – we have on late-season reneg we can do. He is asking for $17m per year, after playing the last two seasons for $5m each. My thinking here is that we can let him walk, he will ask for a ton of money, and maybe we can work out a long term deal with two or three affordable seasons to get him to return. He’s obviously good enough to run our offense, and it’s not like I have another really good option sitting around – no offense to OJ Turnbull.

I instead lock up G Maurice Donhoff for three more seasons, getting a solid interior starter on the payroll and hopefully continuing to build OL continuity.

Last edited by QuikSand : 03-01-2008 at 03:58 PM.
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Old 03-01-2008, 03:59 PM   #32
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
...this is getting boring, just as I'm getting close to finding out if the challenge actually holds up. *sigh*
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Old 03-01-2008, 04:07 PM   #33
st.cronin
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Location: New Mexico
Please keep this up, this is very interesting.
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knives out
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Old 03-01-2008, 04:37 PM   #34
Barkeep49
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Join Date: Jan 2001
Location: Not too far away
I almost always enjoy your dynasties because you are such a great player and give more insight into your thought processes (or at least do so more clearly) than most dynasties.
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Old 03-01-2008, 04:40 PM   #35
Barkeep49
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Join Date: Jan 2001
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Quote:
Originally Posted by QuikSand View Post
...this is getting boring, just as I'm getting close to finding out if the challenge actually holds up. *sigh*
Gah. How discouraging after reading all that came before it.
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Old 03-01-2008, 05:51 PM   #36
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
Well, the thing that will keep me at it is my continued desire for a truly *long term* challenge -- one that I could play for 30 seasons, and go through a team that cycles over and over. Basically, playing solo FOF I really only enjoy the "building" aspect... once I have pretty good players everywhere, i tend to lose interest, in part because it's not really fun having a team that goes 12-4 every season and the only differenced is whether you win it all of get nipped in the playoffs.

I'm a little disappointed that I have so quickly turned most of my long term contracts into bullshit (3 or 4 year deals with a clear walk-away point). Hard to do anything else in this game, though... it's just the nature of the beast.

I'll keep on for a couple more seasons, though, at least -- I would like to find out if the challenge of just having enough bodies around is sufficient to keep this engaging. If not, maybe I wipe out the rule that allows me to re-sign my own RFAs (or maybe to only re-sign one RFA in any given year).
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Old 03-01-2008, 07:08 PM   #37
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
Another Rule

Okay, thinking on it some more, I think I want to add one more rule. Right now, my rule governing restricted free agents is as follows:

-there can be only one year on any new offer made to a restricted free agent

The result here has been that when playing all out under these rules, I basically get to keep every draft pick for four years, period. I also have found myself trying to target decent-looking 2nd and 3rd year players, knowing that Ii can squeeze that 4th year out of them with a RFA extension.

So, instead, I think I want to make the rule as follows:

-there can be only one new contract with a restricted free agent outside the general limits

Basically, I get to sign one of my RFAs, to a multi-year deal if I like, in any season. Anything past that has to count against my rule of seven contract offerings.

Mathematically, I don’t think it’s a huge change – in a given season, instead of re-signing four to six guys to one year deals, I will be re-signing one guy to a three year deal, in most cases.

What I do like is that it makes some added pressure on me to try to get the longer-length rookie contract, which might actually make rookie signings a shade more interesting. if I end up in a bit of a numbers game just to maintain a full roster, then getting those 2nd and 3rd round guys to take a 4 year deal rather than a 3 year deal actually means something – maybe enough to be willing to suffer a holdout, which would be brand new to me.

So – that will be my new rule going forward. I get to pick one RFA for a new deal, however long I can negotiate, but that’s it each season… unless I want to occupy one of my wide-open slots for another RFA (which seems plausible that it could happen).

Last edited by QuikSand : 03-01-2008 at 07:24 PM.
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Old 03-02-2008, 04:20 PM   #38
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2028 offseason

I am remiss for overlooking the season awards last year… our free agent signee LB Dixon Daniels was honored as a first team OLB. Solid season for him, benefiting from the WLB stats that inure in a 3-4 defensive front.

We suffer no retirements. We also have no players who are in obvious cut years in long contracts – we will cross that bridge next season, though. So – here’s my roster math as the offseason kicks off:

37 player currently signed
7 free agent signings
1 restricted FA signing
7 draft picks
--
52 players

So, unless I make a move via trade, we will have a less than full roster this season. The difference between 53 and 52 is probably trivial… but what this basically means is that I’m going to need to get as much out of each and every draft pick that I can, going forward. For example – this habit I have of whiffing with a late round pick on a longshot QB… that is a costly practice under these rules, where a 4th or a 5th QB is basically a dead spot on the roster when he doesn’t have a future playing QB.

Incidentally, I have not created a rule against using the franchise tag… purposefully. I thought it would be reasonable to allow myself the use of the tag. Since I can do so little with renegotiations, it seems to be of limited use – but maybe not. This year, maybe I can make the case to tag QB Beason. A one year deal with him for something like $19 million won’t be that easy to swallow, but it’s not awful. He’s a 13th year guy, after all, so he doesn’t have all that many more years left in him. Worth considering – maybe after I have a look over what might be out there in free agency worth spending fat money on. We have $47m in cap space (about 23%) so we have the ability to splash around a bit here.

RT Pat O’Neill would be a candidate for thee tag as well, but the OT salary is itself over $17 million – so if I were going to use it, I’d just go ahead and use it on Beason. Re-signing O’Neil, an option I will consider, can’t be anywhere near as pricey.


Hmmm… speaking of the QB situation and the “whiffed” picks there, let’s have a quick look at young Jose Swartz, shall we?



I know he slipped a point in his first camp, but this doesn’t look like a lost cause to me. He’s got a lot going for him in the intangible stuff like accuracy, timing, sense rush, and two-minute offense. This guy could be good enough to play, or at least be a backup. His very limited formations could prove a hurdle, but a surmountable one I think. If we get trade offers for OJ Turnbull again, we will be jumping on them – we have a backup in place right here, as far as I’m concerned.


Right now, we are short of a legal roster at the following positions: RB, RB/FB, TE, OL, DL

So, we have a little work to do just to get the team ready to play, much less play at its best.

Here is our own list of free agents:

Code:
Unrestricted FAs # Pos Start Exp Current Estimate Future Estimate Cntrct Beason, Kendall 6 QB 13 53 53 --- Hevey, Melvin 81 SE 10 53 53 --- O'Neill, Pat 73 RT 10 52 52 --- Franklin, Randal 72 LDE 8 29 38 --- Reed, Todd 24 RB 5 43 43 --- Reese, Pete 57 SLB 5 31 31 --- Billodeaux, Morris 38 FS 5 31 31 --- Palm, Heath 58 WLB 5 27 27 --- Restricted FAs # Pos Start Exp Current Estimate Future Estimate Cntrct Winfield, Devin 95 SILB 4 52 52 --- Madison, Shannon 63 RG 4 42 50 --- Lindsay, Kendrick 89 SE 4 49 49 --- Kanell, Chester 82 TE 4 43 46 --- Raven, Kent 43 FB 4 45 45 --- Blackburn, Edwin 97 RDE 4 43 43 --- Newton, Albert 35 RB 4 41 41 --- Mills, Ernest 75 RDE 4 39 39 --- Upshaw, Walter 74 NT 4 36 38 ---

My thinking is basically that we are deep enough at WR to let Hevey go (though he does seem to be very productive) and that there’s nobody we really, really must re-sign. If Todd Reed is affordable, it’s tough to deny how productive he has been for us, and I’d like to lock him up for a while. DE Randal Franklin is a cheap and decent affinity DE, but I have no idea what his contract demands might look like now.

RG Madison is a guy I’d prefer to keep, but he’s going to be a backup G, and candidly – that’s not a spot worth paying a fortune for. Basically the same goes for TE and FB – pretty easy to find replacement-level guys there too, either in the draft, or on cheap FA contracts. I guess among the RFAs, my leaning right now will be to re-sign Ernest Mills, if he’s cheap – he is a superb pass rusher, and locking him for three years would be nice.

So, no totally clear plan here – but if we re-sign DE Mills, we will at least consider new deals with WR Hevey, RT O’Neill, and DE Franklin as attractive targets for our open FA offers. Other RFAs of ours are also potential targets – we could end up with less turnover than expected, if we turn our contract offers largely internally.
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Old 03-02-2008, 04:20 PM   #39
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2028 offseason

I am remiss for overlooking the season awards last year… our free agent signee LB Dixon Daniels was honored as a first team OLB. Solid season for him, benefiting from the WLB stats that inure in a 3-4 defensive front.

We suffer no retirements. We also have no players who are in obvious cut years in long contracts – we will cross that bridge next season, though. So – here’s my roster math as the offseason kicks off:

37 player currently signed
7 free agent signings
1 restricted FA signing
7 draft picks
--
52 players

So, unless I make a move via trade, we will have a less than full roster this season. The difference between 53 and 52 is probably trivial… but what this basically means is that I’m going to need to get as much out of each and every draft pick that I can, going forward. For example – this habit I have of whiffing with a late round pick on a longshot QB… that is a costly practice under these rules, where a 4th or a 5th QB is basically a dead spot on the roster when he doesn’t have a future playing QB.

Incidentally, I have not created a rule against using the franchise tag… purposefully. I thought it would be reasonable to allow myself the use of the tag. Since I can do so little with renegotiations, it seems to be of limited use – but maybe not. This year, maybe I can make the case to tag QB Beason. A one year deal with him for something like $19 million won’t be that easy to swallow, but it’s not awful. He’s a 13th year guy, after all, so he doesn’t have all that many more years left in him. Worth considering – maybe after I have a look over what might be out there in free agency worth spending fat money on. We have $47m in cap space (about 23%) so we have the ability to splash around a bit here.

RT Pat O’Neill would be a candidate for thee tag as well, but the OT salary is itself over $17 million – so if I were going to use it, I’d just go ahead and use it on Beason. Re-signing O’Neil, an option I will consider, can’t be anywhere near as pricey.


Hmmm… speaking of the QB situation and the “whiffed” picks there, let’s have a quick look at young Jose Swartz, shall we?



I know he slipped a point in his first camp, but this doesn’t look like a lost cause to me. He’s got a lot going for him in the intangible stuff like accuracy, timing, sense rush, and two-minute offense. This guy could be good enough to play, or at least be a backup. His very limited formations could prove a hurdle, but a surmountable one I think. If we get trade offers for OJ Turnbull again, we will be jumping on them – we have a backup in place right here, as far as I’m concerned.


Right now, we are short of a legal roster at the following positions: RB, RB/FB, TE, OL, DL

So, we have a little work to do just to get the team ready to play, much less play at its best.

Here is our own list of free agents:

Code:
Unrestricted FAs # Pos Start Exp Current Estimate Future Estimate Cntrct Beason, Kendall 6 QB 13 53 53 --- Hevey, Melvin 81 SE 10 53 53 --- O'Neill, Pat 73 RT 10 52 52 --- Franklin, Randal 72 LDE 8 29 38 --- Reed, Todd 24 RB 5 43 43 --- Reese, Pete 57 SLB 5 31 31 --- Billodeaux, Morris 38 FS 5 31 31 --- Palm, Heath 58 WLB 5 27 27 --- Restricted FAs # Pos Start Exp Current Estimate Future Estimate Cntrct Winfield, Devin 95 SILB 4 52 52 --- Madison, Shannon 63 RG 4 42 50 --- Lindsay, Kendrick 89 SE 4 49 49 --- Kanell, Chester 82 TE 4 43 46 --- Raven, Kent 43 FB 4 45 45 --- Blackburn, Edwin 97 RDE 4 43 43 --- Newton, Albert 35 RB 4 41 41 --- Mills, Ernest 75 RDE 4 39 39 --- Upshaw, Walter 74 NT 4 36 38 ---

My thinking is basically that we are deep enough at WR to let Hevey go (though he does seem to be very productive) and that there’s nobody we really, really must re-sign. If Todd Reed is affordable, it’s tough to deny how productive he has been for us, and I’d like to lock him up for a while. DE Randal Franklin is a cheap and decent affinity DE, but I have no idea what his contract demands might look like now.

RG Madison is a guy I’d prefer to keep, but he’s going to be a backup G, and candidly – that’s not a spot worth paying a fortune for. Basically the same goes for TE and FB – pretty easy to find replacement-level guys there too, either in the draft, or on cheap FA contracts. I guess among the RFAs, my leaning right now will be to re-sign Ernest Mills, if he’s cheap – he is a superb pass rusher, and locking him for three years would be nice.

So, no totally clear plan here – but if we re-sign DE Mills, we will at least consider new deals with WR Hevey, RT O’Neill, and DE Franklin as attractive targets for our open FA offers. Other RFAs of ours are also potential targets – we could end up with less turnover than expected, if we turn our contract offers largely internally.
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Old 03-02-2008, 04:21 PM   #40
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2028 Late Free Agency, Roster Finalization

So, we have a twist once again:

Quote:
From: Dixon Daniels

I have decided to hold out until I receive a new contract.

I believe I made a huge difference rushing the passer last season. I believe I'm very seriously underpaid, and will not report to camp without a new contract.

It’s true that he had a big season last year. It’s also true that he is getting paid a pretty solid sum this year - $3m base and $6m of last year’s signing bonus. Reacting to the obvious year two of a just-signed contract seems rough… but I’d rather have it too tough than too easy.

Interestingly enough, I just drafted a rookie who I think ought to be great at the WLB role (for which Daniels is ideally suited) so he doesn’t have us completely headlocked. He’s thinking about $12m a year with a new $14m bonus… and I’m thinking we’ll wait him out and get by with our younger player.


I get my three rookies from rounds 2-4 all signed to the longer 4yr contracts – under my rules, I think this is a pretty meaningful goal to do. The last three take three year deals, and in theory I will have a free shot to re-up with one of them while he’s still a RFA.

An interesting twist for us this year is LB Kelley Chancey, who has missed a year and a half to a seriously broken leg. He looks okay, and candidly, we will be thin at LB if he doesn’t pan out and Daniels continues his holdout. The up-and-down Darnell Abercrombie would likely get pushed into a starting role, for which I don’t really think he is well suited. This is largely because I have let LB Devin Winfield walk to free agency – he wants to get paid pretty handsomely, and I don’t like the coverage void in his skill set, so I think that is still the way to go. However, he sits out there in free agency, and a one year deal would surely help us patch things over at the LB position for this year. Hmmm.

I hem and haw, and ultimately decide to re-sign Winfield for a one year, $6m deal.
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Old 03-02-2008, 04:21 PM   #41
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2028 Training Camp
Tampa Bay Player Report (TB 2028c - TB 2028d)

Name
Pos
Team
TB 2028c Current
TB 2028c Future
TB 2028d Current
TB 2028d Future
Overall Current Change
Overall Future Change
Beason, Kendall
QB
Tampa
53
53
54 (1)
54 (1)
1
1
Daylo, Tito
QB
Tampa
14
34
17 (3)
35 (1)
3
1
Swartz, Jose
QB
Tampa
26
45
30 (4)
46 (1)
4
1
Turnbull, O.J.
QB
Tampa
34
34
34 (0)
34 (0)
0
0
Lanza, Paul
RB
Tampa
9
47
9 (0)
36 (-11)
0
-11
Montero, Sedrick
RB
Tampa
25
27
27 (2)
27 (0)
2
0
Reed, Todd
RB
Tampa
44
44
44 (0)
44 (0)
0
0
Raven, Kent
FB
Tampa
45
45
45 (0)
45 (0)
0
0
Farias, Mitch
TE
Tampa
51
51
50 (-1)
50 (-1)
-1
-1
Randle, Bryce
TE
Tampa
22
57
24 (2)
51 (-6)
2
-6
Czyz, Bryant
FL
Tampa
77
77
77 (0)
77 (0)
0
0
Dickens, Warren
FL
Tampa
51
51
51 (0)
51 (0)
0
0
Rodgers, Andre
FL
Tampa
27
35
29 (2)
35 (0)
2
0
Craig, Clyde
SE
Tampa
18
26
19 (1)
26 (0)
1
0
Deberry, Jeff
SE
Tampa
60
60
60 (0)
60 (0)
0
0
Lindsay, Kendrick
SE
Tampa
50
50
50 (0)
50 (0)
0
0
Brennan, Phil
C
Tampa
56
56
56 (0)
56 (0)
0
0
Donhoff, Maurice
LG
Tampa
61
61
61 (0)
61 (0)
0
0
Rodgers, Bart
RG
Tampa
59
77
63 (4)
76 (-1)
4
-1
Canney, Irving
LT
Tampa
18
51
23 (5)
55 (4)
5
4
Gordon, Hunter
LT
Tampa
18
38
21 (3)
37 (-1)
3
-1
Pruett, Junior
LT
Tampa
49
49
48 (-1)
48 (-1)
-1
-1
Coleman, Kevin
RT
Tampa
35
35
33 (-2)
33 (-2)
-2
-2
Raber, Brenden
RT
Tampa
33
39
38 (5)
40 (1)
5
1
Stone, Kyle
K
Tampa
42
55
45 (3)
55 (0)
3
0
Arnold, Neal
P
Tampa
47
54
48 (1)
54 (0)
1
0
Franklin, Randal
LDE
Tampa
28
38
27 (-1)
34 (-4)
-1
-4
Ingram, Arnold
LDE
Tampa
78
78
79 (1)
79 (1)
1
1
Hernandez, Leo
NT
Tampa
25
53
29 (4)
54 (1)
4
1
Marceau, Herb
NT
Tampa
17
30
19 (2)
32 (2)
2
2
Wilkerson, Amos
NT
Tampa
63
63
64 (1)
64 (1)
1
1
Bolsins, Bo
RDE
Tampa
57
57
58 (1)
58 (1)
1
1
Stone, Marco
RDE
Tampa
17
39
20 (3)
39 (0)
3
0
Abercrombie, Darnell
SLB
Tampa
24
43
28 (4)
43 (0)
4
0
Leal, Drew
SLB
Tampa
47
47
40 (-7)
40 (-7)
-7
-7
Winfield, Devin
SILB
Tampa
51
51
51 (0)
51 (0)
0
0
Chancey, Kelly
WILB
Tampa
38
54
44 (6)
54 (0)
6
0
Dirnbauer, Jesse
MLB
Tampa
52
52
52 (0)
52 (0)
0
0
Caldwell, Darrell
WLB
Tampa
18
29
20 (2)
29 (0)
2
0
Daniels, Dixon
WLB
Tampa
63
63
58 (-5)
58 (-5)
-5
-5
Gerald, Ellis
WLB
Tampa
25
58
30 (5)
58 (0)
5
0
Quill, Ernie
LCB
Tampa
51
51
51 (0)
51 (0)
0
0
Sawyer, Louie
LCB
Tampa
47
47
48 (1)
48 (1)
1
1
Shea, Billy
LCB
Tampa
85
85
86 (1)
86 (1)
1
1
Blythe, Jessie
RCB
Tampa
33
33
28 (-5)
28 (-5)
-5
-5
Kemnitzer, Chuck
RCB
Tampa
66
66
66 (0)
66 (0)
0
0
Booker, Rico
SS
Tampa
53
53
45 (-8)
45 (-8)
-8
-8
Terry, Ben
SS
Tampa
32
80
40 (8)
80 (0)
8
0
Fritz, Roy
FS
Tampa
67
67
68 (1)
68 (1)
1
1
Wilkerson, Zack
FS
Tampa
23
46
27 (4)
45 (-1)
4
-1
Woodson, Rusty
FS
Tampa
25
47
28 (3)
47 (0)
3
0


Well, Paul Lanza certainly took a gigantic hit at RB in training camp, and I fear that little experiment might not bear fruit after all. Sophomore back Sedrick Montero isn’t much, but he probably has to hold down the #2 RB job for us this year.

On the good side, we got camp bumps from T Canney and DT Marceau, making both look like worthwhile prospects. Our top pick, LB Gerald, was flat – disappointing given that combine, but I will still hope for development there.

We head to the exhibition season with 52 total players, and one lingering holdout.
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Old 03-02-2008, 08:09 PM   #42
QuikSand
lolzcat
 
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2018 season

Benchmarks:

Roster Rating – 100/96
Cohesion – 71-90-86-66

My predictions:

QB Beason adjusts fine to a more aggressive passing offense, and posts 4,500 yards
SS Ben Terry shows us what he is all about, with 80 tackles, 6 picks, and an 80+ PD%
We are again in the mix for a playoff spot, and 10 wins gets us in this time


Season narrative:

SS Rico Booker gets hurt badly in preseason, so the job is clearly wide open for our young star, Ben Terry. He was going to get the starts anyhow, but now he will probably get maximum playing time as well. On opening day, he posts 6 tackles, 8 assists, half a sack and an interception to earn POG honors. Solid – he is going to be a star.

Dixon Daniels has also returned to the fold, no shock there, and he is helping lead our pass rush once again. In the early going, at 3-1, our offense looks excellent, but the defense is very strong, holding teams way down in yards per rush and pass.

At 6-2 halfway through, we are up in the points column by 244-175, and are the highest scoring team in the league. Todd Reed will miss a few games, and we will see what our backup RBs can do in this offense. Reed himself is having a tough year so far.

We get to 10-2 on the year, with WR Bryant Czyz putting together a career season, finally liberated from the horrors of the dink-and-dunk crap we have been playing. 86 targets, 61 catches (a far higher percent complete than in the short passing attack, even) and an off-the-charts 13.7 yards per target. You read that right – 13.7 yards per target. Nice to see him paying off, finally, as we more properly are using our team’s weaponry.

We cruise into the end of the season with a 13-3 record, and the top seed in the NFC. The switch on offense certainly seems to have made a big difference for us, as we have become easily the most fearsome unit in football this season.

Code:
Front Office Football 2007 2028 Summary for Tampa Bay Buccaneers Year 2028 Record 13-3 Winning Pct. .812 All-Time 162-206 Winning Pct. .440 Playoffs 3-4 Playoff Visits 5 Bowl Wins 0 Head Coach Carlos Browning Record 44-25 Winning Pct. .637 Off. Coord. A. Stewart Def. Coord. B. McKenzie Tampa Bay Buccaneers Team Rank Rushes per Game 31.8 3 Rushing Yards 108.8 19 Yards Per Carry 3.42 32 Pass Attempts 27.9 31 Completions 17.9 29 Completion Pct. 64.1 4 Passing Yards 275.9 3 Yards Per Attempt 9.90 1 Yards Per Catch 15.44 1 Total Yardage Gained 376.3 2 3rd Down Conversions 47.6 2 Points Per Game 29.8 1 Pass Rush Pct. 23.8 5 Pass Defense Pct. 64.6 5 Turnovers 36 28 Turnover Margin -6 26 Opponents Team Rank Rushes per Game 25.4 12 Rushing Yards 94.8 4 Yards Per Carry 3.73 5 Pass Attempts 37.8 29 Completions 20.8 22 Completion Pct. 55.1 5 Passing Yards 220.9 8 Yards Per Attempt 5.85 1 Yards Per Catch 10.61 2 Total Yardage Gained 298.3 3 3rd Down Conversions 33.6 4 Points Per Game 17.2 2 Pass Rush Pct. 19.3 10 Pass Defense Pct. 53.2 19 Turnovers 30 9 (T) Week Team Versus Oppnt 1 29 ATL 18 2 27 at KCY 30 3 31 WAS 7 4 40 ARI 34 5 24 SFO 34 6 28 at STL 18 8 44 at SEA 21 9 21 NOS 13 10 31 at ATL 6 11 31 CAR 0 12 38 SDO 13 13 34 at GBY 30 14 17 at DEN 23 15 21 at CAR 17 16 27 OAK 2 17 34 at NOS 9 $$CS SEA Passing Pos Att Comp Yards Y/Att TD Int Rate 6 K. Beason QB 432 276 4299 9.95 38 22 104.9 **Team --- 446 286 4415 9.90 39 25 102.5 $$Opp --- 604 333 3534 5.85 17 17 70.0 Rushing Pos Att Yards Y/Att TD Fum 21 S. Montero RB 236 790 3.35 7 8 24 T. Reed RB 158 613 3.88 4 2 5 P. Lanza RB 80 272 3.40 2 1 **Team --- 509 1741 3.42 16 22 $$Opp --- 406 1516 3.73 9 22 Receiving Pos Targ Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop TD 8 B. Czyz WR 125 83 1560 18.80 12.48 4 10 83 J. Deberry WR 103 52 1087 20.90 10.55 6 9 84 M. Farias TE 44 36 460 12.78 10.45 1 3 18 W. Dickens WR 50 34 388 11.41 7.76 0 6 89 K. Lindsay WR 39 22 365 16.59 9.36 1 5 Defense Pos Tack Asst Sack Hurr Ints Defn PDPct 95 D. Winfield ILB 90 29 2.0 3 3 5 78.4 49 B. Terry S 81 29 0.5 2 3 12 81.0 48 B. Shea CB 66 18 1.0 0 7 13 83.0 34 R. Fritz S 53 14 1.0 1 0 15 82.7 93 D. Daniels OLB 52 20 7.0 16 0 5 79.4 50 K. Chancey ILB 48 13 0.0 1 0 2 71.8 98 A. Ingram DE 46 21 6.0 20 0 0 81.4 51 D. Leal OLB 45 17 2.0 1 0 2 74.6 33 C. Kemnitzer CB 44 12 2.0 1 1 13 79.7 90 A. Wilkerson DT 43 14 4.5 15 0 1 81.5 99 B. Bolsins DE 39 16 8.5 23 0 0 81.1 59 E. Gerald OLB 25 8 2.5 7 0 1 79.6 30 R. Woodson S 22 7 0.0 0 1 3 80.6 56 J. Dirnbauer ILB 20 4 0.0 0 0 1 73.2 40 L. Sawyer CB 18 10 0.0 0 0 2 78.2

So, the passing game is king. This just in. Pitching it downfield for 15 yard strikes is the way to win in FOF, still is, always was. Even though a fair number of my players were picked up for their skills-match to the short pass, this approach still is clearly better. Our running game suffered, oddly, but that might be due to personnel in part. We will get Todd Reed back for the playoffs, though.

So, once again – we aren’t seeing any one player really put together big pass rushing stats – 7 or 8 sacks, maybe 20 hurries, but nobody with 15/40. Teamwide, we are solid – 5th in overall PR% -- but I wonder if we aren’t wasting resources there.

SS Ben Terry had basically the season I had hoped for, as our secondary is now playing at a really high level – all four of our starters post double digit PDs and solid PR% ratings.


So… overall, our defense got a ton better, statistically. Mostly the same players. Completely the same system. What gives? I have a theory. Lacking any sort of meaningful understanding of how defense works in this game (…and really, how could you? it’s brutally hard to test, and the developer has decided that we just don’t need to know how things work) I have concocted a theory on how to make your defense work a lot better. It goes like this:

Get ahead by three touchdowns.

Yup. Pass the ball like crazy, tear the other guys a new arse, and pull out to a 21-0 lead. Suddenly, you get to drop everyone back in coverage all day, your QB rushers get to pin their ears back and let it roll, and the other team has little choice but to play right into your hands, doing pretty much what you expect and increasing the chance of becoming too familiar to function. If they decide to get sneaky, cross you up, and decide to rush the ball for 5 yards a carry… who the shit cares, you’re ahead by three touchdowns anyway.

There it is, my little secret of a dominating defense. Play better offense.
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Old 03-02-2008, 08:09 PM   #43
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
Postseason Narrative:

Divisional Playoff: Seattle (11-6) at Tampa Bay (13-3)

We are favored here by only 2 points, not sure what’s up with that. They have Bill Wilkins (former Bucc, guy we dumped for a 6th rounder a couple seasons back) in to start as their #1 QB is out. I don’t see this as a strong matchup at all. They are actually a pretty comparable team to us in talent, but with a backup QB there I have to think this is ours to lose.

We have a wacky start to the game – fumbling the opening kickoff and recovering it, and then going for a 4th down on our second possession to set up a TD for the lead. We pull out to a 14-0 lead by the end of the first quarter, and are looking very solid thus far. We lead 21-7 and block a FG attempt at the end of the first half to keep it that way.

In a sloppy effort, our lead drains to 21-17, even though we are not playing badly other than penalties and turnovers. We kick a late 4Q FG to make it 24-17, and force a 4th-and-12, but they convert it and stay alive with 2 minutes left. Finally the turnover plague hits them, and we snag a fumble at midfield. Three unimaginative run plays and we punt, they take over at their 20 with a minute and no time outs. They go into “bombs away” mode and it’s over. Closer game than I expected, but we move on.

Conference Championship: Minnesota (11-5-1) at Tampa Bay (14-3)

The Vikes are a serious team, but we are still favored here by 4 points, fairly solid. Their QB Kenneth James looks like a future superstar, a 2nd year guy already a major passing threat after they picked him at 1(2) last season. Pretty solid team, and behind James they might be a factor for a while.

The opening drives are frustrating – they move the ball but miss a long FG, we move the ball but then suffer a terrible drive-killing penalty. Defense and offensive miscues keep things scoreless until they break off a short pass for a home run and take a 2nd quarter lead. We are getting “familiar” messages already, before halftime, which doesn’t sound good to me. However, we overcome that and score a tying TD, and then recover a fumble and convert that for another, and we lead 14-10 at the half, after a late Viking drive.

In the third quarter, things are all defense, until the Vikes pounce on a fumbled punt deep in our territory, and a one play drive gives them the 17-14 edge. After another punt pins us deep, the Vikes get an offside call resulting in a safety – bad to worse. We get a stop, and get the ball back with under three minutes, trailing by five. A long pass to Dickens puts us quickly into position at their 25. The next completion is to one of our off-the-street tight ends, down to the 9 yard line with 2:05 on the clock. Aafter a MIN offsides, we get Czyz into the end zone to take the lead, with the two-point conversion it’s now 22-19.

A short pass is incomplete, a bomb is defensed, and another short pass is blocked at the line – and it’s 4th and 10 for the Vikes. Their young QB inadvisably tucks it under but comes up short, and we take over. We get a first down on three running plays, and that punches our ticket for the big game.

Superbowl: Baltimore (14-5) vs. Tampa Bay (15-3)

The Ravens also look like a team who will be tough for a while, with QB Archie Downs (remember him?) now a fully developed 4th year pro and owner of a very solid 89/54 ratio in his career so far. They also have a tremendous 3rd year RB in Donovan Paddock, and that tandem seems to fuel them. They seem solid up front, but I reckon we can get the ball downfield on them. I expect we will score a bit, we’ll try to keep them in check.

Things open up in a bad way – we allow Beason to get sacked on his first dropback, but then on his next he completes for a 16 yard first down strike to Dickens. We still punt, and give Baltimore the chance to get the early edge. They move to our side of the field, but come up short on a long FG attempt, and we’re still even.

Our next possession starts out with all Todd Reed, and he delivers a couple of first downs. Then Czyz breaks free on a 26 yard catch for the game’s first score. Baltimore takes the cue, and they let their RB Paddock carry the load on their responding TD drive. We go three and out, and then Baltimore is driving again, but they fumble it away in our territory, and we dodge the bullet. But we give it right back with an interception, and the Ravens quickly put it in for a 14-7 edge. This does not have a good feeling about it right now.

After a trade of short possessions, we get good field position and are set up for a FG by a nice run from Todd reed, and pull within 4 points. We get the ball back late in the quarter, a catch from Czyz gets us into scoring position again, and we hit another kick to make it a one point margin at the half, though we have been outgained by 90 yards already, and we have no answer at all for paddock who had over 120 combined yards.

Early in the 3rd, Baltimore opts to go for it on 4th and 2 from their own 43 – they connect, but have to punt soon after anyhow, so no major momentum swing there. Two catches from Deberry set us up for another kick, and we take the lead 16-14. At our 37, we recover a fumble, and have a chance to really take command of the game – but cannot make progress, and instead settle for a field position gain after a punt. But the Ravens respond with a full-field drive, and they put it in the endzone again to retake the lead, 21-16 with about nine minutes left. We are going to look at this three FGs and see missed opportunities, I fear.

Beason gets sacked again (he’s been swamped all day) and fumbes the ball away – we are in deep trouble now. They get a quick toss to the TE that turns into a 36 yard TD and a big lead. We have under six minutes to make up 12 points.

Things get started with two completions to Czyz and Dickens, and we are in position to score quickly – just what we needed. Deberry is in the end zone, and we are back to a 5 point edge. Our defense responds to the call, makes the stop on three and out, and we get the ball back at our 23, with three minutes left. First play is a strike to some guy playing TE, and the Ravens tack on an unnecessary roughness penalty to add 15 more – they appear to be coming unglued. Czyz for 14, and we are to their 35 yard line, almost too quickly. A sack and a long incomplete pass force us into 3rd down and 16, though – a tough spot. Another bomb, great. So, 4th and 16 from their 41 – this is probably the game…

Another bomb, another incomplete pass, and we hand the ball back over.

We make the stop as Baltimore is in the don’t-even-try offense, and we get the ball at our 20, no time outs left, and 1:23 on the clock. It could be worse.

But the first play is a pick, and it just got worse. That’s all she wrote – Baltimore 28, Tampa Bay 23.
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Old 03-02-2008, 08:15 PM   #44
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2028 Season Coda

Can’t be upset about a conference championship.

The team exceeded expectations, and has now pretty clearly arrived as a major title contender. We are going to have some attrition from veteran players in the next couple of seasons, but I don’t see why we wouldn’t just try to retain the status quo, more or less, and keep on doing what we’re doing.

Our late-season renegotiation was with standout CB Billy Shea. Even if he hasn’t had that monster season, that’s a lot of big red bars to put out on the field. He will earn $13.5 each of the next three seasons. This is the sort of thing that will be making things tougher down the road for us.


In the season awards, Bryant Czyz gets a first team honor, and CB Billy Shea second team. Those are basically our two cornerstone players. QB Kendall Beason led the league in TDs and passer rating – I really expected he might make the honors list too, but he must have just missed out.
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Old 03-04-2008, 03:49 PM   #45
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
Seems like the text of my 2028 draft, and analysis of same, went missing -- I know I wrote it up, but it isn't here, nor in the source document I type stuff into. Sorry about that. One more offseason coming soon.
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Old 03-06-2008, 05:02 PM   #46
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2029 offseason

Well, I guess after a bye week and conference championship, the team is officially in “maintain” mode, rather than “build” mode.

The retirement list for this year includes…wait for it… QB Kendall Beason. Didn’t see that coming, and it places quite a hitch in our “stay on top” plan. We also lose SS Rico Booker, who had basically phased out anyhow. In addition, we have a contract blowup from RT Kevin Coleman, so he has to be released to free up $37m under this year’s cap. LB Drew Leal is also in a year intended to be a throwaway, but at $13.5m, we can at least wait and see whether it’s absolutely necessary to cut him.

We maintain our front office staff, and decide to put the franchise tag on LB Dixon Daniels, a 9th year guy who has been very good as our weak-size rusher. That’s a $10.6m ticket, so he too might get walking papers if we can’t work things out under the cap. We sit at around $30 in usable space, but we don’t have a serious QB signed, either, so I’m not sure what sort of room we will really have.


Okay – roster math time:

40 players currently signed
1 restricted free agent signing
7 unrestricted free agent signings
7 draft picks
--
55 players


This isn’t a terrible spot to be in – we could conceivably even be forced to cut someone like LB Leal, and still be okay at 53. We clearly have some deadweight that could go, too, if it came to that. No need to panic to get bodies, at least not this year.

Okay, on to the roster planning…
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Old 03-06-2008, 05:02 PM   #47
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2029 Free Agency

We have a few ways to go with our one reneg here – one obvious place is to extend with our DE Arnold Ingram, rated 79/79 by our scout. But, to be honest, what are we getting for all those big red bars? A career PR% of 5.1, and 6-9 sacks a year, not that inspiring. He’s seeking about $21m a year, so a deal with him really ties up resources for us. I think we ride out this season, and then look into a tag or walk situation for next year.

WR Bryant Czyz is the guy who makes the most sense, then. He delivered on his massive talent last year, and even though we are deep at WR, he is a special talent. 4 years, $82million and a $24m bonus later – he is locked up. Wow. Just like that, we’re down to $17m in cap space for this year. Drew Leal is getting worried.


We also have to get to a legal roster, and that means adding: QB, QB, C, G, and LB

So, that guides some of my decision-making. I suspect we might be looking internally for a number of our contracts once again. I decide to go after LB Darnell Abercrombie as our RFA extension, as he is ready to step in and play at SLB if/when we release LB Leal. RG Bart Rodgers is the RFA we really need to keep, but he’s open to a fat long term deal and I instead slot him in ad our 5yr contract, and he will make $10m a year going forward.

My quest for a QB starts here, and I am immediately disappointed by the free agent group. I see 8th year Ryan Williams, a guy with a career passer rating of about 80 and who seems to be pick-prone… and he’s about as appetizing as it gets. There’s a 7th year guy with decent bars but almost no playing experience – he will be a guy I might look at, too. Nobody bowls me over. It would be pretty risky to sit back and wait for the post-draft late free agency to see what we could come up with, but right now that is my leaning. 3rd year man Jose Swartz, rated 33/42 by our scouts and due for another drop in camp, is sitting as our only signed QB and the effective incumbent for the starting job. On a team with this much overall talent, that is really worrisome.

Pushed at the position, I decide the safe thing to do is re-sign our own RFA QB Tito Daylo, who takes a four year deal. He’s not great, but is not bad, and can probably handle a short-passing offense okay. I suspect we may be heading that way anyhow.

Indeed, LB Leal has to get his papers so we can get our FA offers out there. With that cleared up, LB is a need area, but we manage to address most of my main concerns with some limited FA dabbling.

Reneg – WR Bryant Czyz, 4y $82m
RFA – SLB Darnell Abercrombie, 3y $4.2m
1YR – SS Clyde Sporer, $2.2m
2YR – C Phil Brennan, $11m ($5m bonus)
3YR -
4YR – QB Tito Daylo, essentially 3y minsal w/ team option to reneg
5YR – RG Bart Rodgers, $50m (RFA)
6YR – RG Heath Jarvis, $71m (essentially 3y $3.3m)
7YR – RB Edward Swift, $91m (essentially 3y $5.6m)

RB Edward Swift is pretty much a clone of our current RB Todd Reed, a guy with decent speed and some receiving skills. I don’t know which one would start, but this insures us from having one injury send us to RB oblivion like we experienced last year.

S Sporer is just a veteran fill-in at a position where we can use some patch-over help, a decent coverage safety. The one year deal is fine, he’s unlikely to be a guy we’d want for too long anyhow.

I’m leaving the 3 year slot open for whomever might pop up after the draft.


So – everyone signs quickly, and we are up to 46 players on contract as we head into the draft. This is apparently going to work out rather neatly.
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Old 03-06-2008, 05:03 PM   #48
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
2029 Rookie Draft

I am really, really hoping that one of the QBs I like slips to the end of the first round – but that hope fades quickly as four of the first five picks are QB. SO, that wipes out my real hope there – there was one uber-monster QB who went 1.1 (remember this name -- 1. Tennessee - Marsh, Ellis, QB, Nebraska) but my hopes were pinned to the third guy, who went with pick 1.3 (3. Oakland - Moore, Marcus, QB, New Mexico).

Well, I would like to take a DE here, in anticipation of letting Arnold Ingram walk after next season, but nothing appetizing appears here. Now I’m getting itchy for another QB, but I feel he’s likely to last another round, maybe two – so who should we take with our 1st this year? Stud fullback? Hate spending an early pick there. Best DE available? I’m uninspired. I decide to play it safe, basically, and just take the QB that my scout tagged as VU, and be done with it.

Code:
Pick Pos Name Grd Adj 4TBAJP Dev O/U Scout Comments 1.31 QB Timothy Murphy 5.0 5.7 -++ 22% VU 13/53 35/14 core gives hope, scout pick 2.31 TE Renaldo Crockett 5.3 4.6 +!!! 39% AS 15/31 giant combine, couldn’t resist 3.31 SLB Donnie Hastings (SILB)5.0 4.8 -+++- 63% VU 29/50 Run stopper bar, scout likes him 4.31 WR Jimmy Moore 4.2 4.4 + ++- 24% NA 15/25 Good combine, look for creeping 5.31 CB Frank Gale 4.4 4.5 + +--+ 40% NA 12/27 Good combine, look for creeping 6.31 C Matthew Montemayor 4.9 4.2 +-++ 20% NA 18/49 Hope he holds some of his bars 7.31 MLB Teddy O’Donnell (SLB) 4.0 3.9 -+ + 43% NA 16/34 Potential for coverage skills

I am quickly convinced that my QB would have lasted to round 2, probably round 3. So it goes. I smell a bust there anyhow.

I don’t trust my scout that this combine stud TE isn’t going to break out like crazy, and spend our second rounder on him on spec. We mostly just fill in roster gaps from there on out, nobody I’m too enchanted with, we will hope for some creeping potential.
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Old 03-07-2008, 07:46 AM   #49
QuikSand
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Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Annapolis, Md
By the way, it seems that in 2028 I changed to using my one-letter combine abbreviations and explained the change, but that writeup completely disappeared. Anyway -- the 4TBAJP you see above is just a simple reflection of the six combines, reading left to right, in the draft summary screen. For each letter, I used a simple code showing the color:

! = red (outstanding)
+ = blue (good)
- = green (poor)

...and I leave blank the many "average" results that are in black test in-game.

So, with my TE from this draft, Crockett was attractive to me because he had three ! ratings, and one +... that's a classic workout warrior, and I was willing to overlook the tepid interview results. I am pretty certain he will creep to being a very solid player.

Hope that's a useful explanation, and makes the presentation more useful than just listing the raw data and leaving it to you to figure out what's good. For players with exceptional combines, I plan to note the specific value in my "comments."
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Old 03-07-2008, 08:36 AM   #50
Ben E Lou
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Quote:
Originally Posted by QuikSand View Post
Well, I guess after a bye week and conference championship, the team is officially in “maintain” mode, rather than “build” mode.

Hope you'll be able to stick with it. Good read so far.
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