The Checkdown Browns - an evolving FOF 2007 dynasty

[QuikSand]

It's been a while since I played and documented any solo FOF play, but I have a bit of an itch, and thought I'd start something up here.

Basically, here's the setup:
-I have a MP team that is undergoing some roster transition (read: we have very little talent)
-Said team just signed a quality TE, now likely our most talented offensive player
-I have gotten some enjoyment out of experiments with alternative offenses in other leagues
-I know precious little about a TE-based offense in FOF
-So, I want to play out a career to learn a bit about what I can do

As I write I am already a few seasons deep, here's how I started the league:
-NFL cities and teams, but started with a one-player roster file, meaning initial batch of players was generally very low-skilled fill-ins
-Without thinking much about it, I used a weird salary setup -- very very low salcap initially, but escalating normally -- meaning most teams have had no trouble keeping players they want to, thus no free agents of any quality out there
-Because this wasn't traditional Empty Cupboard (where I pilot an empty team against fully developed opposition) my team didn't go through the usual series of 2-14 seasons and 1.1 or 1.3 draft picks -- instead, we were a fairly competitive team for each of our first several seasons, getting more reasonable draft equity instead (might be better for the long term)

I am not going to detail the team's first several years -- I haven't been taking notes or anything. All I have are a few printouts of my Team Summary. I have one with me, and two at home, so by tonight I can post everything to get a reader caught up.

Without spoiling much, the status of the team is basically what I really enjoy in FOF -- I love having a team that has a number of key players, but still has some real gaps in the roster that need to be filled. And while this league and its still-incomplete opposition gives me more latitude, I still look at my current roster and see about 6-8 starters who really have no business seeing meaningful time for any serious FOF team. So, I'm enjoying that -- I like going into an offseason or draft and feeling like I have a few positions that are a very top priority, due to massive weaknesses in the players on hand. The fact that I have had mini-busts from two recently drafted linebackers sort of consolidates my problems... I'm running a 3-4 front, but really only have one legitimate player at LB, other than my dime-a-dozen pass rushers I'm using at the WLB slot.

So... I have the 2008 Team Summary to post now, and a couple more coming later, and then maybe a little walk through the current roster before I start documenting my steps ahead. I am thinking I will institute some aggressive house rules to try to extend the "roster in crisis" mode as long as I can... but will give that some thought.

No promises, but I'll try to give it a go.

[QuikSand]

  
  Front Office Football 2007
  2008 Summary for Cleveland Browns
     
  Year                2008                                      
  Record              11-7                                      
  Winning Pct.        .611                                      
  All-Time            25-22-1                                   
  Winning Pct.        .531                                      
  Playoffs            1-1                                       
  Playoff Visits      1                                         
  Bowl Wins           0                                         
  Head Coach          Bruce Ardan                               
  Record              19-14-1                                   
  Winning Pct.        .573                                      
  Off. Coord.         V. Chiles                                 
  Def. Coord.         W. Perry                                  
     
  Cleveland Browns        Team      Rank  
  Rushes per Game         36.4      1 (T)       
  Rushing Yards           131.9     6           
  Yards Per Carry         3.62      31          
  Pass Attempts           24.1      32          
  Completions             17.2      26 (T)      
  Completion Pct.         71.2      1           
  Passing Yards           181.6     20          
  Yards Per Attempt       7.53      2           
  Yards Per Catch         10.56     5           
  Total Yardage Gained    304.7     7           
  3rd Down Conversions    45.0      2           
  Points Per Game         21.0      3           
  Pass Rush Pct.          18.8      19          
  Pass Defense Pct.       51.2      15          
  Turnovers               29        15 (T)      
  Turnover Margin         +3        13 (T)      
     
  Opponents               Team      Rank  
  Rushes per Game         24.3      3           
  Rushing Yards           103.9     6           
  Yards Per Carry         4.29      27          
  Pass Attempts           32.4      22          
  Completions             19.6      18 (T)      
  Completion Pct.         60.3      15 (T)      
  Passing Yards           179.9     10          
  Yards Per Attempt       5.55      5 (T)       
  Yards Per Catch         9.20      3           
  Total Yardage Gained    271.1     6           
  3rd Down Conversions    37.1      16          
  Points Per Game         14.9      6           
  Pass Rush Pct.          16.2      5 (T)       
  Pass Defense Pct.       27.1      1           
  Turnovers               32        14 (T)      
     
  Week  Team  Versus        Oppnt  
  1     27    CIN           7       
  2     23    at WAS        17      
  3     3     at NED        34      
  4     44    TEN           10      
  5     37    at JAX        13      
  6     9     at HOU        14      
  7     0     BAL           13      
  8     6     IND           17      
  9     13    at PIT        19      
  11    25    at CIN        7       
  12    21    at PHI        13      
  13    34    KCY           28      
  14    31    NYK           3       
  15    20    PIT           10      
  16    26    DAL           0       
  17    17    at BAL        34      
  $$WC  20    PIT           17      
  $$CS  14    at MIA        20      
     
  Passing                 Pos   Att   Comp  Yards Y/Att TD    Int   Rate  
  1 O. Festa              QB    381   271   2861  7.51  19    11    97.2    
  **Team                  ---   386   275   2905  7.53  19    11    97.4    
  $$Opp                   ---   519   313   2879  5.55  15    20    69.0    
     
  Rushing                 Pos   Att   Yards Y/Att TD    Fum  
 
  Front Office Football 2007
  45 L. Nichols           RB    286   918   3.21  5     6       
  26 E. Peters            RB    206   873   4.24  5     7       
  1 O. Festa              QB    73    260   3.56  1     10      
  **Team                  ---   583   2111  3.62  12    31      
  $$Opp                   ---   388   1663  4.29  7     20      
     
  Receiving               Pos   Targ  Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop  TD  
  85 M. Tamme             TE    70    53    595   11.23 8.50  2     6       
  8 A. Willett            WR    69    49    644   13.14 9.33  4     3       
  83 D. Sutton            TE    56    43    475   11.05 8.48  3     2       
  84 P. Everett           TE    33    26    220   8.46  6.67  3     2       
  11 G. Nikolaus          WR    38    24    303   12.63 7.97  1     1       
  26 E. Peters            RB    24    16    85    5.31  3.54  2     1       
     
  Defense                 Pos   Tack  Asst  Sack  Hurr  Ints  Defn  PDPct  
  59 D. Ligon             ILB   82    28    0.5   0     3     7     80.6    
  32 S. Perzul            S     82    22    0.0   0     3     5     80.0    
  99 D. Gelbart           OLB   56    29    4.5   8     3     3     79.2    
  48 K. Talamaivao        S     53    13    1.0   0     2     9     80.5    
  91 E. Fitzgerald        ILB   51    20    0.0   0     0     1     70.2    
  29 T. Howe              CB    44    9     0.0   0     0     2     71.7    
  33 J. Stephenson        CB    44    9     1.0   0     2     5     77.2    
  40 O. Riley             CB    43    11    0.0   0     3     3     76.8    
  92 A. Atkins            DE    36    18    5.5   12    0     0     81.5    
  73 M. McKnight          DE    35    20    6.5   12    0     0     81.9    
  60 G. Pinkerton         DT    33    16    4.5   6     0     0     81.0    
  53 S. Mathis            OLB   23    16    7.0   7     0     0     81.0    
  20 L. Arteaga           CB    22    8     0.0   0     1     2     75.3    
  38 B. Paulk             S     21    5     0.0   0     1     3     82.6    
  51 K. St. Amal          DE    17    6     1.5   4     0     0     80.0    
  94 B. Taylor            ILB   16    2     0.0   1     0     0     62.3  
  

[QuikSand]

Front Office Football 2007
2009 Summary for Cleveland Browns
   
Year                2009                                      
Record              7-9                                       
Winning Pct.        .437                                      
All-Time            32-31-1                                   
Winning Pct.        .507                                      
Playoffs            1-1                                       
Playoff Visits      1                                         
Bowl Wins           0                                         
Head Coach          Bruce Ardan                               
Record              26-23-1                                   
Winning Pct.        .530                                      
Off. Coord.         V. Chiles                                 
Def. Coord.         W. Perry                                  
   
Cleveland Browns        Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         30.9      10          
Rushing Yards           121.7     12          
Yards Per Carry         3.93      23          
Pass Attempts           31.5      17          
Completions             20.0      11 (T)      
Completion Pct.         63.5      11          
Passing Yards           211.3     8           
Yards Per Attempt       6.71      11          
Yards Per Catch         10.57     8           
Total Yardage Gained    325.1     5           
3rd Down Conversions    44.3      1           
Points Per Game         20.3      8           
Pass Rush Pct.          18.8      19 (T)      
Pass Defense Pct.       42.9      28          
Turnovers               26        16 (T)      
Turnover Margin         -4        23 (T)      
   
Opponents               Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         29.7      20          
Rushing Yards           138.6     30          
Yards Per Carry         4.67      31          
Pass Attempts           30.3      8           
Completions             19.7      19 (T)      
Completion Pct.         65.1      30          
Passing Yards           188.5     11          
Yards Per Attempt       6.23      23          
Yards Per Catch         9.57      6           
Total Yardage Gained    310.8     24          
3rd Down Conversions    43.4      31          
Points Per Game         19.8      26          
Pass Rush Pct.          17.2      8 (T)       
Pass Defense Pct.       50.1      17 (T)      
Turnovers               22        26 (T)      
   
Week  Team  Versus        Oppnt  
1     3     at PIT        20      
2     24    MIN           21      
3     17    at HOU        10      
5     28    DEN           31      
6     20    OAK           35      
7     10    at SDO        16      
8     13    at KCY        24      
9     23    BAL           3       
10    16    PIT           21      
11    20    CIN           31      
12    17    at CHI        20      
13    31    MIA           28      
14    24    at DET        10      
15    17    at BAL        23      
16    34    GBY           17      
17    27    at CIN        7       
   
Passing                 Pos   Att   Comp  Yards Y/Att TD    Int   Rate  
1 O. Festa              QB    500   318   3368  6.74  20    13    85.6    
**Team                  ---   504   320   3381  6.71  20    13    85.4    
$$Opp                   ---   484   315   3016  6.23  21    14    84.7    
   
Rushing                 Pos   Att   Yards Y/Att TD    Fum  
31 V. O'Neal            RB    151   575   3.81  5     5       
26 E. Peters            RB    147   618   4.20  5     5        
28 M. Pitcher           RB    85    341   4.01  4     6       
1 O. Festa              QB    77    339   4.40  1     9       
45 L. Nichols           RB    34    73    2.15  0     1       
**Team                  ---   495   1947  3.93  15    33      
$$Opp                   ---   475   2218  4.67  16    20      
   
Receiving               Pos   Targ  Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop  TD  
85 M. Tamme             TE    125   79    977   12.37 7.82  1     6       
8 A. Willett            WR    100   62    819   13.21 8.19  3     7       
83 D. Sutton            TE    47    29    285   9.83  6.06  3     0       
81 A. Pritchett         WR    39    28    305   10.89 7.82  1     1       
80 P. Milanovich        TE    45    28    317   11.32 7.04  3     0       
46 S. Prescott          FB    24    20    89    4.45  3.71  1     1       
26 E. Peters            RB    24    18    95    5.28  3.96  0     2       
84 P. Everett           TE    33    16    160   10.00 4.85  4     1       
   
Defense                 Pos   Tack  Asst  Sack  Hurr  Ints  Defn  PDPct  
59 D. Ligon             ILB   108   35    0.0   0     0     4     74.4    
25 M. Howe              S     91    28    0.0   1     0     5     73.9    
99 D. Gelbart           OLB   79    21    5.5   3     2     2     76.1    
30 M. Huffman           CB    51    21    0.0   0     5     10    82.0    
92 A. Atkins            DE    44    13    11.0  8     0     0     81.6    
93 D. Francis           OLB   43    19    5.0   8     0     0     77.4    
27 L. Van Arsdale       S     43    14    0.0   0     0     2     71.7    
52 M. Tanner            ILB   39    14    0.0   0     1     2     77.6    
51 K. St. Amal          DE    38    17    7.0   8     0     0     81.1    
60 G. Pinkerton         DT    30    12    1.0   5     0     1     82.5    
41 S. Boyer             CB    30    8     0.0   0     2     6     82.3    
33 J. Stephenson        CB    29    2     0.0   0     2     0     72.7    
90 L. Merkerson         OLB   28    12    5.5   4     0     0     79.9    
29 T. Howe              CB    28    8     0.0   0     2     1     73.5    
34 D. Rasmussen         S     28    11    2.0   1     0     4     78.3    
94 B. Taylor            ILB   24    9     0.0   1     0     2     73.9    

[QuikSand]

So, through those two seasons, TE Tamme and WR Willet were our bread and butter players in the passing game -- they were our first two first-round draft picks. Tamme was an all-around near-stud, and Willet was a solid-looking wideout who lived up to my creeper expectations (though is not destined to be a star, just a solid enough 57/57 or so type of guy, I think).

In this game environment (weak opposition, themselves still stuck with lots of starters from the initial OPU player pool) we are able to win some games and put up some reasonable stats, even without really having all that much going for us rosterwise, yet.

In our initial draft, we basically lucked out -- our first three picks all now appear to be "foundation" type players. TE Tamme is the lynchpin of our offense, by design. In round two I was pleased to see a nice looking LT, and he has evolved into a quality starter himself. We followed up with DE Atkins, who quickly showed himself to be a solid pass rusher (but not an all-around player, alas). Then in round five, I liked CB Stephenson a lot, and he has also turned out to be good enough to start for us for potentially a long time. Add in what look like solid first rounders in WR Willett and 2009's top pick CB Huffman (who looks like he will be even better than Stephenson) and I have to like the core we are building around, at least a bit. At this point (end of 2009), I feel like things are coming together -- still some real holes to fill, but I'm happy.

Nothing too exciting about the roster or the gameplan here, but we are basically a play-it-safe offense, operating in a league full of fairly unskilled opponents, so we're good enough to win half our games even while still putting together the foundation pieces.

[QuikSand]

I should point out that I tweaked the gameplan to do a lot more passing on 1st and 10 for the 2009 season... resulting in a spike of about 6-8 more passes per game. I am reverting back to the run-heavy approach for 2010, as I think that is more in line with what I expect to (need to) do with my MP team that got me into this to begin with.

I've never really played a serious run-first team in MP FOF, and my hope is that doing so will reinvigorate my interest in that team a bit like my dabbling with a new short-passing offense has re-lit my fire in the IHOF.

[QuikSand]

Front Office Football 2007
2010 Summary for Cleveland Browns
   
Year                2010                                      
Record              10-8                                      
Winning Pct.        .555                                      
All-Time            41-38-1                                   
Winning Pct.        .518                                      
Playoffs            2-2                                       
Playoff Visits      2                                         
Bowl Wins           0                                         
Head Coach          Bruce Ardan                               
Record              36-31-1                                   
Winning Pct.        .536                                      
Off. Coord.         V. Chiles                                 
Def. Coord.         W. Perry                                  
   
Cleveland Browns        Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         35.6      1           
Rushing Yards           140.8     3           
Yards Per Carry         3.95      22          
Pass Attempts           25.4      30          
Completions             16.3      29          
Completion Pct.         64.1      5           
Passing Yards           150.3     32          
Yards Per Attempt       5.91      16          
Yards Per Catch         9.21      30          
Total Yardage Gained    282.1     24          
3rd Down Conversions    39.3      3           
Points Per Game         19.0      10          
Pass Rush Pct.          22.2      6           
Pass Defense Pct.       63.0      5           
Turnovers               22        5           
Turnover Margin         +11       4           
   
Opponents               Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         28.6      18          
Rushing Yards           127.2     22          
Yards Per Carry         4.45      28          
Pass Attempts           30.0      4 (T)       
Completions             17.4      3           
Completion Pct.         58.1      13          
Passing Yards           172.6     3           
Yards Per Attempt       5.75      11          
Yards Per Catch         9.90      11          
Total Yardage Gained    284.4     10 (T)      
3rd Down Conversions    34.3      11          
Points Per Game         16.7      10          
Pass Rush Pct.          15.2      2           
Pass Defense Pct.       43.9      6           
Turnovers               33        7 (T)       
   
Week  Team  Versus        Oppnt  
1     37    BAL           10      
2     7     at ATL        13      
3     10    TEN           0       
4     34    at BUF        7       
5     23    PIT           20      
6     14    MIA           23      
7     24    NYJ           20      
8     17    at NED        23      
9     24    at BAL        20      
11    37    CIN           10      
12    31    NOS           24      
13    10    at OAK        20      
14    13    at CAR        19      
15    6     at CIN        31      
16    3     TBY           14      
17    14    at PIT        13      
$$WC  27    at CIN        10      
$$CS  17    at DEN        31      
   
Passing                 Pos   Att   Comp  Yards Y/Att TD    Int   Rate  
1 O. Festa              QB    396   258   2379  6.01  19    8     88.9    
**Team                  ---   407   261   2405  5.91  19    9     86.4    
$$Opp                   ---   480   279   2761  5.75  7     20    62.0    
   
Rushing                 Pos   Att   Yards Y/Att TD    Fum   

Front Office Football 2007
48 H. Somogyi           RB    307   1245  4.06  8     9       
21 E. Kerr              RB    186   698   3.75  3     4       
1 O. Festa              QB    67    259   3.87  2     10      
**Team                  ---   570   2252  3.95  13    30      
$$Opp                   ---   457   2035  4.45  19    30      
   
Receiving               Pos   Targ  Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop  TD  
8 A. Willett            WR    80    50    664   13.28 8.30  4     7       
85 M. Tamme             TE    91    49    452   9.22  4.97  5     2       
83 D. Sutton            TE    47    30    289   9.63  6.15  7     2       
80 P. Milanovich        TE    40    28    230   8.21  5.75  4     2       
21 E. Kerr              RB    34    26    155   5.96  4.56  0     0       
11 G. Nikolaus          WR    32    22    263   11.95 8.22  1     3       
   
Defense                 Pos   Tack  Asst  Sack  Hurr  Ints  Defn  PDPct  
91 E. Fitzgerald        ILB   99    39    1.5   0     1     4     75.5    
41 S. Boyer             CB    59    15    0.0   1     3     5     77.8    
93 D. Francis           OLB   52    19    8.0   26    0     2     79.2    
51 K. St. Amal          DE    48    12    8.0   12    0     0     80.5    
27 L. Van Arsdale       S     48    21    0.0   0     2     9     79.0    
44 B. Coleman           S     46    22    0.0   1     1     3     80.9    
99 D. Gelbart           OLB   46    6     1.0   0     1     1     74.3    
30 M. Huffman           CB    42    11    0.0   1     3     15    84.6    
52 M. Tanner            ILB   41    7     1.5   1     1     0     78.6    
92 A. Atkins            DE    37    16    8.0   11    0     1     81.5    
60 G. Pinkerton         DT    33    22    5.5   7     0     0     81.5    
53 W. Lingo             OLB   33    11    0.5   1     0     2     73.1    
25 M. Howe              S     32    11    0.0   0     1     3     83.3    
29 T. Howe              CB    26    5     0.0   0     0     3     78.4    
98 J. Gribble           ILB   25    15    0.0   0     0     0     74.8    
73 M. McKnight          DE    18    6     3.0   1     0     0     80.2    
22 D. Grant             S     18    7     0.0   0     3     3     91.5    ___

[QuikSand]

So, in 2010 we are back to the running game first, spearheaded by two rookie running backs -- Kerr a guy I picked in the draft (I don't recall what I liked about him, likely some combines) and Somogyi a guy who just has pretty good bars before training camp and signed as an URFA.

I'm not thrilled about anything we did on offense here -- 6 yards per attempt and 4 yards per carry isn't much to shout about. But we are a competitive team, 9 wins was enough for a WC berth and we won a playoff game, that's nice, at least.

Sadly, one of my first draft's gems, CB J.R. Stephenson, was injured leading into this season, and it looks like it might be a career-ender. I liked him, but he missed this year and likely misses next year as well - probably all done there.

[QuikSand]

Front Office Football 2007
2011 Summary for Cleveland Browns
   
Year                2011                                      
Record              4-12                                      
Winning Pct.        .250                                      
All-Time            45-50-1                                   
Winning Pct.        .473                                      
Playoffs            2-2                                       
Playoff Visits      2                                         
Bowl Wins           0                                         
Head Coach          Bruce Ardan                               
Record              40-43-1                                   
Winning Pct.        .482                                      
Off. Coord.         V. Chiles                                 
Def. Coord.         W. Perry                                  
   
Cleveland Browns        Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         29.1      13 (T)      
Rushing Yards           106.3     20          
Yards Per Carry         3.65      27          
Pass Attempts           27.8      30          
Completions             15.9      30          
Completion Pct.         57.1      25 (T)      
Passing Yards           145.9     32          
Yards Per Attempt       5.25      32          
Yards Per Catch         9.19      32          
Total Yardage Gained    244.3     32          
3rd Down Conversions    36.3      15          
Points Per Game         12.6      32          
Pass Rush Pct.          22.8      7 (T)       
Pass Defense Pct.       39.0      31          
Turnovers               27        19 (T)      
Turnover Margin         +1        15 (T)      
   
Opponents               Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         32.7      30          
Rushing Yards           145.6     32          
Yards Per Carry         4.45      31          
Pass Attempts           31.4      9           
Completions             20.5      27          
Completion Pct.         65.2      31          
Passing Yards           212.3     26          
Yards Per Attempt       6.75      29          
Yards Per Catch         10.36     17          
Total Yardage Gained    337.7     31          
3rd Down Conversions    40.3      30          
Points Per Game         16.8      8 (T)       
Pass Rush Pct.          16.9      4           
Pass Defense Pct.       58.2      21 (T)      
Turnovers               28        10 (T)      
   
Week  Team  Versus        Oppnt  
1     10    CIN           16      
2     10    SFO           13      
3     26    MIA           20      
4     7     TEN           20      
5     14    at JAX        24      
6     27    at HOU        10      
7     20    at BAL        31      
8     0     IND           17      
9     20    PIT           26      
11    0     at CIN        13      
12    27    STL           0       
13    10    at OAK        13      
14    3     at SEA        20      
15    0     at PIT        14      
16    10    at ARI        7       
17    17    BAL           24      
   
Passing                 Pos   Att   Comp  Yards Y/Att TD    Int   Rate  
18 N. Russell           QB    255   141   1183  4.64  5     10    57.6    
1 O. Festa              QB    190   113   1152  6.06  7     6     76.0    
**Team                  ---   445   254   2335  5.25  12    16    65.5    
$$Opp                   ---   503   328   3397  6.75  13    10    84.9    
   
Rushing                 Pos   Att   Yards Y/Att TD    Fum  
48 H. Somogyi           RB    213   751   3.53  4     7        
32 C. Starr             RB    130   376   2.89  2     3       
20 E. Peters            RB    78    417   5.35  1     0       
1 O. Festa              QB    38    147   3.87  0     4       
**Team                  ---   466   1700  3.65  7     24      
$$Opp                   ---   523   2329  4.45  13    27      
   
Receiving               Pos   Targ  Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop  TD  
8 A. Willett            WR    93    50    605   12.10 6.51  8     4       
83 D. Sutton            TE    53    32    315   9.84  5.94  6     0       
80 P. Milanovich        TE    56    32    236   7.38  4.21  5     2       
82 R. Verba             TE    52    27    211   7.81  4.06  3     1       
48 H. Somogyi           RB    24    21    121   5.76  5.04  1     0       
11 G. Nikolaus          WR    32    17    248   14.59 7.75  4     3       
32 C. Starr             RB    24    17    75    4.41  3.13  1     0       
89 D. Buckley           WR    30    16    102   6.38  3.40  3     0       
   
Defense                 Pos   Tack  Asst  Sack  Hurr  Ints  Defn  PDPct  
91 E. Fitzgerald        ILB   128   40    2.5   0     0     1     71.6    
41 S. Boyer             CB    74    11    0.0   0     4     7     76.1    
25 M. Howe              S     68    37    0.0   1     0     5     78.2    
30 M. Huffman           CB    64    14    0.5   2     3     12    79.8    
27 L. Van Arsdale       S     55    19    0.0   0     0     10    78.5    
51 K. St. Amal          DE    52    13    7.5   11    0     0     81.3    
93 D. Francis           OLB   51    19    12.0  23    0     0     79.0    
92 A. Atkins            DE    50    17    15.0  12    0     0     80.6    
99 D. Gelbart           OLB   43    17    1.5   1     1     1     75.6    
52 M. Tanner            ILB   42    14    0.0   0     0     0     73.8    
60 G. Pinkerton         DT    41    19    2.5   4     0     0     81.6    
58 H. Harding           OLB   39    10    0.0   1     1     1     74.5    
29 T. Howe              CB    38    17    0.0   0     0     2     74.8    
90 R. Marsh             ILB   32    19    1.0   0     0     1     75.3    
22 D. Grant             S     17    10    0.0   0     1     3     82.0     

[QuikSand]

And here, disaster strikes. Our star TE Maurice Tamme is hurt in preseason and is out for the year (and possibly for good), and without our centerpiece weapon, we are completely hopeless on offense. We drafted a RB in the first round, and he didn't boom like I expected, leaving him only good enough to back up Somogyi (a proven fumbler, it seems) and neither one could do anything worthwhile on the ground regardless.

At 2-6 halfway through, I tossed in a young QB to give him a look -- not sure what I saw there, but the QB position is officially unsettled here, as are several others, generally. About the only thing I'm actually happy about is our pass rush, which has come together nicely around two defensive ends (one a converted OLB) from our first rookie draft, Atkins and St. Amal.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by QuikSand

Our star TE Maurice Tamme is hurt in preseason and is out for the year (and possibly for good),

Ouch

[QuikSand]

Cleveland Browns Roster, Scout Overview

Here’s a quick roster rundown, as we pick things up to be documented in earnest…

   
  Player                #   Pos   Start Exp  Current Estimate  Future Estimate Cntrct 
##Festa, O.J.           1   QB          5    32                32                3 yrs
Russell, Norbert        18  QB    QB    2    22                42                1 yr.
Hoffman, Adam           13  QB          1    19                35                4 yrs
Havran, Adrian          6   QB          5    14                19                1 yr.

O.J. Festa is just the guy who wandered into the starting job in year one (ahead of a guy I actually drafted) – I have been letting the AI do depth charts, and he took the job and never looked back. He’s not a long term answer, but he has been adequate thus far. For a run-first team, I don’t want to invest too much cap room around a big-bars QB, so I’lm continue looking for a guy with limited skills that fit well.

Russell was flat in rookie camp, but +2 in his second. He’s got good bars in the lower tier, decent in sensing rush, reading defenses, and that stuff, with not much of anything in the top area. At 22/42 he might develop into a better fit for this offense, and I’ll at least give him a look – but our best chance to win next year is likely with Festa.

   
Somogyi, Herman         48  RB    RB    2    43                43                1 yr.
Starr, Clarence         32  RB          1    37                55                4 yrs
Peters, Edwin           20  RB          6    26                26                3 yrs
Heft, Broderick         42  FB    FB    2    38                45                1 yr. 

So, Starr might wrest the job away from Somogyi, but neither guy looks like anything special. Bad use of a first rounder, I passed up a very good looking LB to take Starr.

   
%%Tamme, Maurice        85  TE          5    77                77                3 yrs
Verba, Rufus            82  TE    TE    6    31                31                1 yr.
Sutton, Deron           83  TE          6    27                27                2 yrs
Milanovich, Preston     80  TE          3    23                23                1 yr. 

Tamme was looking like a career centerpiece sort of guy, and now he might be gone forever. Nobody else is worth a damn, even as a blocker, and it showed once we tried to build around them this year – this position, given my stated goals, is now a very high priority.

   
Willett, Amos           8   FL    FL    4    58                58                1 yr.
Nikolaus, Glen          11  FL          5    37                37                2 yrs
Buckley, Damon          89  FL          6    30                30                2 yrs
**Lincoln, Johnnie      88  SE          4    39                39                3 yrs
Giles, Walter           86  SE    SE    3    18                27                1 yr. 

I’m actually fairly comfy here – Willett is fine, and Lincoln is actually a very solid wingman type (decent bars but very low RR). We are only going to have one WR on the field for a lot of formations, so I’m good with Willett and his backup, the YAC-specialist Nikolaus, as the main guys in the mix here.

   
Savea, Myron            54  C     C     3    57                57                1 yr.
Di Pardo, Sean          59  C           1    46                73                3 yrs
##Wolf, Carlton         50  C           1    25                73                3 yrs
Roller, Shane           77  LG    LG    2    56                84                3 yrs
##Flannery, Ronnie      71  LG          6    7                 7                 1 yr.
**Buffington, Phillip   64  RG          4    47                53                2 yrs
Campbell, Jackie        55  RG    RG    1    33                57                1 yr.
Abraham, Desmond        65  LT    LT    5    70                70                5 yrs
Coghill, Doug           69  RT    RT    6    49                49                3 yrs
##Reger, Jerald         70  RT          6    32                32                1 yr.
Castillo, Devin         78  RT          1    29                55                1 yr. 

I stumbled into some OL talent this year, and it looks like it may pay off. RT Castillo was a curious-looking guy in the URFA market, made a +10 jump in rookie camp, and secured a spot in my long term plans at RT. Coghill was a guy I signed as a free agent, but I think Castillo has the higher ceiling. LG Roller was a first round pick and is on his way to being really good, and with any luck one of these rookie centers (both drafted in later rounds) might turn out to be a long term keeper, too. I’m basically happy at OL, but always open to standouts – I want to run the ball, so I need to attend to this group.

   
Shephard, Ed            14  P           4    45                45                1 yr.
Horn, Darryl            9   K           4    52                52                1 yr. 

Fine.

   
Atkins, Antoine         92  LDE   LDE   5    47                47                3 yrs
Farnsworth, William     72  LDE         2    42                48                3 yrs
##Humphrey, Neil        63  LDE         5    31                31                3 yrs
St. Amal, Keith         51  RDE   RDE   5    49                49                2 yrs
McKnight, Mitch         73  RDE         5    46                46                1 yr.
Pinkerton, Geoff        60  NT    NT    5    34                34                1 yr.
Jones, Christian        95  NT          1    20                32                3 yrs
Spetz, Kendall          76  NT          2    15                19                2 yrs

No standout talent here, but it’s nice to get pretty good production without investing any major draft equity here – Atkins was a 3rd rounder, and DT Jones was our 2nd this year (not sure if he’s panning out). We’ll see how it develops (and if someone asks for huge money) but right now, we’re feeling fine here.

   
Fitzgerald, Ed          91  SILB  SILB  6    40                40                2 yrs
Marsh, Rickey           90  SILB        1    24                42                1 yr.
Tanner, Myron           52  WILB  WILB  4    22                26                1 yr.
Gelbart, Donnell        99  SLB   SLB   5    29                29                1 yr.
Harding, Herb           58  SLB         1    26                46                4 yrs
Francis, Dustin         93  WLB   WLB   3    29                29                1 yr.
Hawkins, Billy Joe      56  WLB         1    19                41                1 yr. 

This position is just a disaster. Fitzgerald has been gathering tackles, but he’s nothing special at all, a fill-in free agent who has benefitted mostly from being better than the crap around him. Harding was a 3rd round pick this year who went something like –4 in camp, just like the guy I drafted last year in the 3rdr round, so he’s not the answer either. Dustin Francis puts up decent numbers from the WLB position, but that’s not because he’s good or I am, just that the 3-4 defense is obviously broken.

   
Boyer, Sedrick          41  LCB   RCB   3    49                49                1 yr.
Howe, Terrell           29  LCB         6    24                24                3 yrs
Huffman, Michael        30  RCB   LCB   3    81                81                2 yrs
**Riley, Orlando        40  RCB         6    29                29                3 yrs
Howe, Marcus            25  SS    SS    3    36                36                1 yr.
##Devitt, Phil          26  SS          1    21                38                1 yr.
Van Arsdale, Lincoln    27  FS    FS    3    39                39                1 yr.
Grant, Deion            22  FS          2    34                39                2 yrs

So, Huffman turns out to be a stud, falling to us in the late first round a couple drafts back – now one mid-career volatility bump and a couple good creeping seasons later, he’s got all-star bars. Sedrick Boyer is passable, but nothing tough to replace. Our safeties are basically roster filler – I think Howe is creeping slightly, but he’s not really any good. I’d like to get some depth here, so DB is a relative priority, too.

   
$$ - player is suspended, ## - player is inactive,  
** = player is injured, %% - player is on IR.  
   
Players Under Contract: 53
Inactive: 6
On Active Roster: 46
   
Salary Cap: $46,000,000
Cap Room: $21,360,000
Maximum for New Player: $21,470,000
Cap Room Lost (to old contracts): $500,000
   
Cap Room Lost Next Year (to old contracts): $170,000
Cap Room Required Next Year: $19,900,000

If you’re into this stuff, I have not been doing much in free agency, and am way way way under the cap. I have let only a couple worthwhile players walk off the team thus far, but over time I expect to force myself to do so.


That’s my assessment right now. For the 2012 offseason, my thinking is that my positional priority is probably like this:

TE
LB
S
LB

…if we get lucky and get Tamme back looking like his old self, it’s still a pretty high priority to land a playable backup TE, but I could see us using our top pick at LB next year in any case.

[QuikSand]

So, for right now, I don’t have a structure in mind for the long term – I’m going to play a pretty vanilla year in 2012. I’ll draft my players, keep the checkbook pretty tight by my side, and stay the course. But I think that once I decide to really play this out, I’m likely to use some version of the “Action Points” concept, as originally fleshed out some time ago on these forums. I have a document saved somewhere with a much more refined version of my Action Points menu, and I think I will likely dust that off and put it to use again, perhaps with a couple of new twists (I really want to find a way to make a late-round draft pick more valuable as opposed to just waiting for after-draft free agency… not sure exactly how to do so, though).

My thinking now is that I built the AP concept around an annual budget of 60 AP to be a pretty tough challenge. Maybe I play this team with an annual budget of 50 AP, and see how tough it gets to keep the thing afloat. Not sure yet.

[QuikSand]

Well, that was fast. I had a little bit to stew on this, and I’m plunging into the 50 AP system effective immediately. Here is the “menu” as I pull it from my latest (never published) AP-based dynasty:

Action Point Values for FOF House Rules

Staff Hiring
3 – Scout or head coach who was hired with no contract restrictions
2 – Scout or head coach who was offered his requested contract before stage 3
0 – Scout or head coach who was offered his requested contract in stage 3
1 – Replacing scout or head coach currently under contract
2 – Hiring coordinator with no contract restrictions
1 – Hiring coordinator on requested contract before stage 3
0 – Hiring coordinator on requested contract in stage 3
0 – Hiring coordinator at half of his HC request in stage 3
1 – Replacing coordinator currently under contract

Internal Contract Moves
4 – Use franchise tag on player for third consecutive year or more
3 – Use franchise tag on player for second consecutive year
3 – Use franchise tag on player labeled as angry, livid or demanding trade
3 – Use franchise tag on player with loyalty rating of zero
2 – Use franchise tag on any other player
3 – Send former 1st round pick to European league
2 – Send former 2nd or 3rd round pick to European league
1 – Send former 4th or 5th round pick or undrafted rookie to European league
0 – Send former 6th or 7th round pick to European league
4 – Sign current player to unrestricted renegotiation
2 – Sign current player to his requested renegotiation
0 – Sign current player to a full or partial capout
2 – Sign RFA player on an unrestricted new contract
1 – Sign RFA player to his requested multi year contract
0 – Sign RFA player to his requested one year contract
1 – Additional cost of using any item above after its first three uses

Early Free Agency
4 – Offer FA player an unrestricted contract
2 – Offer FA player a flat contract with at least 25% bonus
2 – Offer FA player a three-year minsal contract
1 – Offer FA player a one year, no bonus contract
1 – Offer FA player his requested contract
0 – Offer FA player 8th year+ requested contract 1yr no bonus
1 – Additional cost of using any item above after its first three uses
(Submitting an altered contract to a player already on offer list re-incurs same cost as original offer would have above)

Trading
2 – Initiating trade for player from another team
4 – Initiating trade of player(s) for a 1st round pick or more
2 – Initiating trade of player(s) for 2nd round pick or more
1 – Initiating trade of player(s) for less than 2nd round pick
2 – Accepting AI-initiated trade that fails “fairness test”
1 – Accepting AI-initiated trade that passes “fairness test”
2 – Trading down from Top 10 pick within current draft
1 – Any other trade within current draft
5 – Any trade involving future 1st round pick from another team
2 – Any other trade involving draft picks in future years
1 – Additional cost of using any item above after its first three uses

Rookie Draft
6 – Use up to 60 rookie interviews
5 – Use up to 40 rookie interviews
3 – Use up to 20 rookie interviews
6 – Manually use draft pick between 1.1 and 1.5
5 – Manually use draft picks between 1.6 and 1.16
4 – Manually use draft pick between 1.17 and 1.32
3 – Manually use 2nd round draft pick
2 – Manually use 3rd round draft pick
1 – Manually use 4th or 5th round draft pick
0 – Manually use 6th or 7th round draft pick
0 – Cost of allowing scout to select pick in any round
1 – Added cost if player drafted after first round has 2 or more red combines
1 – Added cost if player drafted after first round has 4 or more red + blue combines
-1 – Deduction from positive AP cost for selecting top player on position board

Late Free Agency
5 – Sign a FA player released during late free agency
4 – Sign a FA player in 2nd or 3rd year in league
3 – Sign a FA player in his 4th year in league
1 – Sign a FA rookie player
1 – Offer any other FA player his requested contract
1 – Offer any other FA player a one year contract
1 – Additional cost of using any item above after its first three uses

Training Camp
3 – Use custom training camp settings
0 – Use default training camp settings
5 – Carry up to 70 players into training camp
3 – Carry up to 60 players into training camp
2 – Carry up to 57 players into training camp
1 – Carry up to 55 players into training camp
0 – Carry up to 53 players into training camp

In-Season

10 – Implement custom gameplans at start of season
8 – Implement custom GP, with unchanged offensive gameplan from FOFC library
2 – Allow unlimited changes to offensive gameplan during season
2 – Allow unlimited changes to defensive gameplan during season
0 – Implement staff-controlled gameplans for full season
4 – Allow unlimited changes to depth chart during season
0 – Implement staff-controlled depth chart for full season
6 – Set injury rate at 100
3 – Set injury rate at 150
0 – Set injury rate at 200
3 – Sign veteran free agent to replace player placed onto IR
1 – Sign rookie free agent to replace player placed onto IR
0 – Sign lowest-rated rookie free agent to maintain legal roster

Salary Cap
15 – Use entire salary cap
12 – Leave 5% of cap unused as of start of season
9 – Leave 10% of cap unused as of start of season
6 – Leave 15% of cap unused as of start of season
3 – Leave 20% of cap unused as of start of season
0 – Leave 25% of cap unused as of start of season
3 – Each player on roster for week 1 occupying over 10% of cap
2 – Each player on roster for week 1 occupying 5-10% of cap

Carryover of Action Points
2 – Cost to carry over remaining AP from one year to the next
1 – Cost to “borrow” 3 AP from the following year (+2 AP now, -3 next year)


Revision notes

3.27.08 substantially revised by QS and incorporated into “Testing My Limits” thread
3.28.08 Increased age of “free” FA signees to 8th year, added 4AP cost of manual depth chart control
3.29.08 Rephrasing and technical changes by QS
3.29.08 Allowed discount for using unchanged Off GP from library (per SD)
3.29.08 Added modest sliding scale for sending player to Europe (per SD)
3.29.08 Added additional cost increment for transactions being used repeatedly
3.29.08 Clarify cost for taking rookie not on overall top page is as by Grade or Adj
3.30.08 Revise draft AP system, AP based on location, skills, with top-guy discount
3.14.09 Reduce cost of signing URFA from 2 to 1
3.14.09 Allow one year no bonus FA signing for 1AP
3.14 09 Establish costs for carryover and borrowing of AP year to year

[QuikSand]

2012 Offseason

First thing I need to do is develop a plan for spending my Action Points. I have never played all the way down to 50 before, but here’s my first draft of what I’ll do here (I have the luxury of not likely seeing very many tempting free agents, so I expect I won’t be doing many wide open veteran signings, other than locking up my own guys).

0 All staff hiring will be last stage, at request or less
0 Europe tour will be for late round picks
0 Re-sign RFAs to requested contracts only
0 Use no rookie interviews
12 Base cost of our draft picks (we hold pick 1.2)
4 Approximate added cost of drafting players with strong combines
10 Implement custom gameplans at start of season (necessary to use my TE-first offense)
0 Implement staff-controlled depth chart for full season
0 Set injury rate at 200
0 Leave 25% of cap unused as of start of season
--
24 AP remaining for roster moves

This doesn’t look terrible to me, actually. I have grown bored with rookie interviews, so I’d rather be able to work out a friendly contract or two that fiddle with them, at this point.

24 AP for contract moves isn’t a ton, but it leaves me with some latitude… if I want to, I can go back and drop that injury setting, or something of that nature. It also might free me up to make one or two fairly expensive (in AP terms) signings of RFA players in late free agency.


The TE situation -- One quick note, TE Tamme is listed as out for 16 weeks, so we won’t be counting on him for anything this year. Adding a qtarting-quality player at TE is absolutely essential for this team. Drafting at 1.2 isn’t ideal with that situation, but perhaps we can land someone at 2.1 to step right in. I will be looking in free agency, too, of course.


I’ll document my decisions as I itemize my AP usage… might not be the liveliest prose, but I think it will be functional.

[QuikSand]

Early Free Agency

1 – Sign RFA player to his requested multi year contract – C Savea
1 – Sign RFA player to his requested multi year contract – CB Boyer
0 – Sign RFA player to his requested one year contract – RT Castillo
0 – Sign RFA player to his requested one year contract – RG Campbell
0 – Sign RFA player to his requested one year contract – QB Russell

This is the easy stuff…

My own WR Amos Willett is the highest-rated free agent in the whole league, so that’s a measure of the open market. Just not much worth making a major commitment to. As for Willet, he’s pretty important, and he’s apparently going to be a 5% player no matter what I do, so I offer a bonus-rich deal worth $4m a year.

2 – Offer FA player a flat contract with at least 25% bonus (WR Willett)
2 – Offer FA player a flat contract with at least 25% bonus (DE McKnight)
2 – Offer FA player a flat contract with at least 25% bonus (LB Gelbart)
2 – Offer FA player a three-year minsal contract (TE Jeffries)
2 – Offer FA player a three-year minsal contract (CB Kemp)
2 – Offer FA player a three-year minsal contract (G Flannery)

So that locks up six more guys, four of our own and two cheap new signings. TE Jeffries is probably good enough to be a number two TE, but I doubt he’s adequate to play as our starter – we really have to land someone in the draft who can play right away.

And we have about 10 AP left to work with. That gets us to the draft, and we’ll see where we are afterwards.

Sitting at 1.2, and assuming the stud QB comes off the board at pick 1, I think it may make sense to trade down to pick 6 or so, and pick up a few more draft picks that are cheaper than signing undrafted rookies. So, we trade down to 1.6, and pick up some more rookies here – the net cost o this move is only 1 AP, since using the pick at 1.6 is a point cheaper than using the top five selection, but the extra picks in rounds 2 and 3 will cost us some AP to use.

[QuikSand]

Rookie Draft

Pick Pos Name                  Grd Adj Dash  ST  BP  Agil  Bjump  PS  Dev  O/U AP
1.06 CB  Shawn Kibble          6.7 6.9 4.40! 35+ 18! 6.94+  8-07  55! 32%  n/a  4
2.01 FB  Lamar Buchanan        6.5 5.3 4.72  32+ 18  7.12!  9-08+ 32+ 50%  n/a  3
2.05 SS  Otis Voss             5.1 4.8 4.37! 35+ 22! 7.40   8-00  54! 15%  n/a  4
3.02 TE  Sean Farmer           5.4 4.7 4.78  32+ 18- 7.39!  9-06+ 36  45%  n/a  2
3.07 FB  Leon Stanton          5.8 4.7 4.64+ 27+ 24+ 7.21!  9-02  35+ 41%  n/a  2
4.01 OLB Vince Shapiro         5.0 4.8 4.63+ 12- 18  7.06!  8-06- 24  48%  n/a  0
5.02 OLB Desmond Conway        4.7 4.5 4.56+ 36+ 19  7.26+  8-11  34  28%  n/a  1
6.01 QB  Mercury Lester        4.6 5.2 4.76  35+ 11  7.56+  8-10  56- 33%  n/a  0
6.07 P   Benjamin Beyer        5.6 3.0 5.00  28+ 13+ 7.53+  9-01  --  37%  n/a  0
7.02 WR  Kim Lofton            4.4 4.6 4.51  18  11  6.91!  9-02  56+ 35%  n/a  0
7.06 RB  Lonnie Atkins         3.7 3.9 4.82- 11- 10- 7.26   9-11  19  39%  n/a  0

Well, the plan was to land a stud LB, but the guy I was angling for with the trade-down was selected at pick 5, so I took the standout cover man, a globally more important position anyway, in my view.

I end up using three picks on fullbacks and tight ends, thinking I’ll get two TE and one FB, all starters, out of these slots. S Voss looks like he ought to fill up our starting SS role nicely, and that’s another need.

Somehow I’m into round four and I still haven’t drafted a single linebacker. Ugh. I remedy that with a couple run stopper types, but I don’t expect either guy is a long term solution.

[QuikSand]

Late Free Agency

We didn’t go far over budget in the draft, despite the trade and extra picks – so we have 8 AP left to spend on transactions.

1 – Offer any other FA player his requested contract (C Savea)
1 – Offer any other FA player his requested contract (CB Boyer)
1 – Offer any other FA player his requested contract (K Handley)
1 – Offer any other FA player a one year contract (S Van Arsdale)
1 – Offer any other FA player a one year contract (LB Hawkins)
1 – Offer any other FA player a one year contract (DT Pinkerton)

And with that, we land at 53 players heading into camp, and a legal roster. The limit of 50 players left us with more guys on 1-yr deals than I would have liked, but this season wasn’t really that tough. Of course, the draft day trade yielded more rookies than we’d usually expect, also… and we didn’t make any serious effort to do anything in free agency, just landing two minsal veterans. I have 2 AP remaining, likely to be used to renegotiate and extend one of our key players (probably CB Michael Huffman).

[QuikSand]

2012 season

We start off 0-3, and signs are not good here, Starr has 4 fumbles (the reason we didn’t re-sign the RB in front of him on the depth chart) and we look flat, at best.

We snap out of the awful funk, but we are not really a good team right now. As the competition continues to improve, we are only mediocre. We suffer a lot of close losses on the way to a 6-10 record and another pretty early draft pick. I may regret trading down from the pick where we could have landed the second-best QB in this rookie draft, as we now need to consider that position a fairly high priority for this team.

Front Office Football 2007
2012 Summary for Cleveland Browns
   
Year                2012                                      
Record              6-10                                      
Winning Pct.        .375                                      
All-Time            51-60-1                                   
Winning Pct.        .459                                      
Playoffs            2-2                                       
Playoff Visits      2                                         
Bowl Wins           0                                         
Head Coach          Bruce Ardan                               
Record              46-53-1                                   
Winning Pct.        .465                                      
Off. Coord.         V. Chiles                                 
Def. Coord.         W. Perry                                  
   
Cleveland Browns        Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         34.1      4           
Rushing Yards           129.7     7           
Yards Per Carry         3.80      29          
Pass Attempts           27.4      31          
Completions             17.9      28          
Completion Pct.         65.1      2           
Passing Yards           171.6     31          
Yards Per Attempt       6.25      16          
Yards Per Catch         9.60      24          
Total Yardage Gained    295.9     18          
3rd Down Conversions    42.7      4           
Points Per Game         15.4      26 (T)      
Pass Rush Pct.          24.3      3           
Pass Defense Pct.       49.9      19          
Turnovers               26        13 (T)      
Turnover Margin         0         18          
   
Opponents               Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         29.4      18          
Rushing Yards           117.6     15          
Yards Per Carry         3.99      10          
Pass Attempts           27.4      2 (T)       
Completions             16.9      1           
Completion Pct.         61.6      21          
Passing Yards           172.3     1           
Yards Per Attempt       6.29      21          
Yards Per Catch         10.21     17          
Total Yardage Gained    272.8     2           
3rd Down Conversions    42.2      28 (T)      
Points Per Game         16.6      7 (T)       
Pass Rush Pct.          12.2      1           
Pass Defense Pct.       47.2      12          
Turnovers               26        18 (T)      
   
Week  Team  Versus        Oppnt  
1     10    at PIT        31      
2     20    WAS           27      
3     17    at NED        20      
5     13    DEN           23      
6     16    OAK           3       
7     13    at SDO        7       
8     7     at KCY        17      
9     30    at BAL        10      
10    18    PIT           34      
11    14    at CIN        10      
12    23    PHI           3       
13    3     TEN           12      
14    14    at NYK        21      
15    12    BAL           17      
16    9     at DAL        10      
17    27    CIN           20      
   
Passing                 Pos   Att   Comp  Yards Y/Att TD    Int   Rate  
1 O. Festa              QB    386   255   2457  6.37  10    11    80.4    
18 N. Russell           QB    37    24    210   5.68  2     0     97.8    
**Team                  ---   439   286   2745  6.25  12    13    79.2    
$$Opp                   ---   438   270   2757  6.29  13    14    76.2    
   
Rushing                 Pos   Att   Yards Y/Att TD    Fum  
32 C. Starr             RB    271   979   3.61  3     10      
20 E. Peters            RB    102   406   3.98  2     0       
44 J. Tilton            RB    78    293   3.76  3     6       
1 O. Festa              QB    65    246   3.78  1     3       
**Team                  ---   546   2075  3.80  10    26      
$$Opp                   ---   471   1881  3.99  12    24      
   
Receiving               Pos   Targ  Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop  TD  
8 A. Willett            WR    103   59    774   13.12 7.51  7     3       
87 B. Jeffries          TE    62    38    320   8.42  5.16  4     1       
32 C. Starr             RB    43    33    192   5.82  4.47  3     1       
46 L. Buchanan          TE    44    33    250   7.58  5.68  2     3       
88 J. Lincoln           WR    39    26    409   15.73 10.49 2     1       
81 S. Farmer            TE    43    25    167   6.68  3.88  5     0       
47 L. Stanton           FB    26    21    163   7.76  6.27  0     0       
89 D. Buckley           WR    23    17    154   9.06  6.70  2     1       
11 G. Nikolaus          WR    30    17    194   11.41 6.47  1     1       
   
Defense                 Pos   Tack  Asst  Sack  Hurr  Ints  Defn  PDPct  
91 E. Fitzgerald        ILB   100   26    1.0   0     1     3     77.3    
23 O. Voss              S     69    33    0.0   0     2     7     80.9    
58 H. Harding           OLB   68    22    4.5   5     0     7     77.1    
27 L. Van Arsdale       S     53    17    0.0   0     5     8     82.3    
93 D. Francis           OLB   47    14    12.5  24    0     0     80.6    
51 K. St. Amal          DE    41    9     9.5   6     1     0     82.5    
41 S. Boyer             CB    41    12    0.0   0     2     3     79.4    
28 S. Kibble            CB    37    8     0.0   0     0     3     73.5    
30 M. Huffman           CB    36    13    0.5   0     1     5     77.9    
96 D. Conway            ILB   34    12    0.0   0     0     1     64.7    
72 W. Farnsworth        DE    33    14    5.0   16    0     0     82.2    
57 V. Shapiro           ILB   29    9     0.0   0     0     0     69.3    
60 G. Pinkerton         DT    25    7     2.0   3     0     1     82.1    
99 D. Gelbart           OLB   23    8     0.0   0     1     0     70.2    
73 M. McKnight          DE    20    8     1.5   2     0     0     80.8    
39 A. Kemp              CB    18    5     0.0   0     1     2     77.9    
76 K. Spetz             DT    18    6     1.0   2     0     0     81.3    

Just not a good team.

[QuikSand]

2013 offseason

Curious retirement, DE Antoine Atkins was quietly beaten out for his starting job last season (so it goes when you turn over depth charting to the AI) and after his 6th season, he up and quits. Didn’t see it coming, to be sure. Anyway, that makes DE William Farnsworth (48/48, with 100 PRTech) our starter in the key LDE slot. He was our 2nd round pick in 2010, and looks a lot like Atkins, really – I expect he will be fine there.

Another roster note – TE Maurice Tamme appears to be okay now. He’ still rated 76/76, and listed as “good.” He may now be much more injury-prone, but if he slots back into the TE1 role, suddenly our offense looks a whole lot more complete.

Our AP budget is our first consideration – we will follow basically the same script as last season, with slight tweaks based on last year’s experience:

0 All staff hiring will be last stage, at request or less
0 Europe tour will be for late round picks
0 Re-sign RFAs to requested contracts only
0 Use no rookie interviews
11 Base cost of our draft picks (we hold pick 1.2)
2 Approximate added cost of drafting players with strong combines
10 Implement custom gameplans at start of season (necessary to use my TE-first offense)
0 Implement staff-controlled depth chart for full season
0 Set injury rate at 200
6 Three players occupying 5-10% of cap (CB Huffman, LT Abraham, WR Willett)
--
21 AP left for roster transactions



My plan for this season is basically to again retain core players, probably look for either a QB or else a dire need position (like SILB) with our top pick in the draft. I think we need to add another RB as I am not pleased with butterfingers RB Starr and his gaudy 3.4 yards per carry, with 13 fumbles in 450 touches – but I am loathe to invest a top pick at the position unless the guy looks like a messiah.

So, an ideally pre-charted draft for us might go like this:

ILB, WR, QB, RB, S, OLB, K
or
QB, ILB, WR, RB, S, OLB, K

[QuikSand]

2013 Early Free Agency

0 – Sent 7th rounder WR Kim Lofton to Europe
1 – Offer FA player his requested contract (RG Buffington)
1 – Offer FA player his requested contract (DE St. Amal)
0 – Sign RFA player to his requested one year contract (QB Russell)
0 – Sign RFA player to his requested one year contract (WLB Hawkins)
0 – Sign RFA player to his requested one year contract (RG Campbell)
1 – Sign RFA player to his requested multi year contract (RT Castillo)
0 – Offer FA player 8th year+ requested contract 1yr no bonus (G Flannery)
2 – Offer FA player a three-year minsal contract (WR Nikolaus)
2 – Offer FA player a flat contract with at least 25% bonus (S Van Arsdale)

I get competition for G Buffington, but I suspect his loyalty kept him around – to save on AP, I just offered his requested contract, nothing clever there. Lots of other bidders on St. Amal, too, but ours is the best money of the lot, and it’s no shock when he accepts our deal to stay.

LB Ed Fitzgerald has been out leading tackler for some time, but I hadn’t planned to offer him a new deal. He’s an 8th year guy, and we simply have to do better – he’s been a 100+ tackle guy, but that’s been because we stink and the guy around him stink even worse. He gets an offer from Baltimore, and I pause a bit before letting him walk away to them… but ultimately I do so.

1 – Sign RFA player to his requested one year contract (S Grant)
1 – Sign RFA player to his requested one year contract (DT Spetz)
0 – Offer FA player 8th year+ requested contract 1yr no bonus (WR Buckley)

So, this gets us to 49 players on contract, and everything but kicker at least legal. We have some latitude in where to draft, especially if we don’t think this season is likely to yield very much anyway. And we have a total of 25 AP left to spend… I’m expecting to use up 12-14 on the draft, meaning we ought to get to late free agency with a little flexibility, or else we can make a draft day maneuver if we want to.

[QuikSand]

2013 Rookie Draft

Well, for us the obvious target is going to be LB Mitchell McGee, the 4th overall player on the board and a surefire monster by his combines and bars. The QB I nominally like best is 4% developed with 6 formations known, so he’d at best be a long range plan – with scouts setting depth charts, he might never see the field anyhow.

LB McGee goes with pick 2, obviating my dilemma over whether to trade up to 4 or 5 or so to land him. Instead, the best overall options for us at 1.6 seem to be linemen on either side. I end up sitting tight, and plunging in on the combine-skipping DT with the maxed-out bars who will either occupy the LDE or NT slot for the foreseeable future, barring a disaster. Just too much talent there to skip over and reach for one of the decent linebackers.

Pick Pos Name                  Grd Adj Dash  ST  BP  Agil  Bjump  PS  Dev  O/U AP
1.07 DT  Mack Furman           6.3 6.8 ---   31+ --  ----  -----  --  42%  n/a  4
2.06 OLB Brian Davidson        5.7 5.5 4.47! 24  19  7.27+ 9-05   39+ 37%  n/a  3
3.05 OLB Omar Flowers          5.4 5.2 4.63+ 38+ 22+ 7.30+ 10-0+  33+ 25%  n/a  3
4.04 QB  Maurice Vaughn        5.0 5.7 4.93  28  16  7.49+ 9-06+  74   7%  n/a  2
5.11 CB  Brenden Webb          4.4 4.5 4.61- 15  15+ 6.89! 8-08-  45+ 37%  n/a  2
6.10 K   Vinny Butler          5.6 3.3 5.04+ 32+ 11  7.97  8-08   --  49%  n/a  0
7.09 OLB Buddy Griffin         4.1 3.9 ---   30+ --  ----  -----  34  28%  n/a  0

The LB class looks deep, but I watch them get selected at 14,15,19,23, and 24 – essentially wiping out all the guys I was hoping to see in the early 2nd round. I look a bit deeper, and find a guy I think can likely step in for us as a starter in Brian Davidson (though I’m unsure whether he’s a better fit on the strong outside or inside). I follow up with Omar Flowers, and I think that decision now pushes Davidson inside.

I grab QB Vaughn in round four, but am steamed that the RB I had been eyeing went (way out of order) before my fifth round pick. I have no Plan B there at all.

[QuikSand]

2013 Late Free Agency

With some AP to spare, I look for a few targets – but we are already up to 56 players, so we don’t need to grasp for bodies at this point.

I sign one rookie RB, but that’s it. I think this clears us up to do a few renegotiations to keep several guys around past this season, which is good.

Top Ten Most Likely Busts:

Name                          Team             Pos	Change
Furman, Mack                  Cleveland        NT	-14
Voss, Otis                    Cleveland        SS	-7
Gelbart, Donnell              Cleveland        SLB	-5
Howe, Terrell                 Cleveland        LCB	-5
Griffin, Buddy                Cleveland        SLB	-4
Humphrey, Neil                Cleveland        LDE	-3
Money, Timothy                Cleveland        RB	-3
Flannery, Ronnie              Cleveland        LG	-2
Jones, Christian              Cleveland        NT	-1
Farmer, Sean                  Cleveland        TE	-1


Top Ten Most Likely Breakouts:

Name                          Team             Pos	Change
Huffman, Michael              Cleveland        RCB	4
Webb, Brenden                 Cleveland        SS	3
Hoffman, Adam                 Cleveland        QB	3
Atkins, Lonnie                Cleveland        FL	2
Vaughn, Maurice               Cleveland        QB	2
Spetz, Kendall                Cleveland        NT	1
Kemp, Aaron                   Cleveland        RCB	1
Starr, Clarence               Cleveland        RB	1
Nikolaus, Glen                Cleveland        FL	1
Kibble, Shawn                 Cleveland        LCB	1

Well, it’s tough to imagine a worse training camp than that. Top pick takes a massive nosedive – hopefully aided by some bad volatility. Last year’s rookie safety takes a dump too, weakening his claim as a long term asset for us there, too. Ouch.

[QuikSand]

2013 season

My hope is that with TE Tamme back in the fold (hopefully) we will have a more potent offense overall, and will be a bit more capable of ball control. However, I think I’m moving on beyond QB Festa, so that may pose a challenge itself – the AI makes Norbert Russell our starter, and I’m comfy with that for now. Rookie Vaughn looks like he might be the guy longer term, but I don’t have any ability to get him into the starting job right now (with AI control over depth charts) so he will be in the #3 slot, it appears.

Well, our opening game upends my plans a bit… QB Russell is hurt and out for 8 weeks, and we need to reshuffle the deck there.

We start out 0-5, but quarterback play isn’t the real cause. Hoffman, as our starter, has a rating of 89 and no interceptions… it’s our dreadful running game and nonexistent run defense that is killing us. If we’re going to be a ball control team, we need to stop the run a lot better than we are right now, we’re getting smothered in the run game 5.03 to 3.55 ypc, ouch.

At 0-8, some of our offense still looks okay – Hoffman’s rating is 95, on nearly 7 ypa, and our top two targets Tamme (8.08 ypt) and Willett (9.06) have both been fine. Our downfall remains the running game, with our OL banged up by injuries, and our RB situation in flux with Starr benched and inactive. We then peel off a couple of wins, and I decide to leave Hoffman in the saddle for this year, despite Russell getting up to probable.

Shockingly, this formerly 0-8 team rides all the way to 5-8…we’re not going to the playoffs or anything, but this is a weird turnaround. After a run of 7 wins, we succumb to division champs Pittsburgh, and settle for a 7-9 season. Wow.

Front Office Football 2007
2013 Summary for Cleveland Browns
   
Year                2013                                      
Record              7-9                                       
Winning Pct.        .437                                      
All-Time            58-69-1                                   
Winning Pct.        .457                                      
Playoffs            2-2                                       
Playoff Visits      2                                         
Bowl Wins           0                                         
Head Coach          Bruce Ardan                               
Record              53-62-1                                   
Winning Pct.        .461                                      
Off. Coord.         V. Chiles                                 
Def. Coord.         W. Perry                                  
   
Cleveland Browns        Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         32.7      2           
Rushing Yards           123.9     7           
Yards Per Carry         3.79      26          
Pass Attempts           25.4      32          
Completions             17.4      30          
Completion Pct.         68.6      1           
Passing Yards           174.7     30          
Yards Per Attempt       6.87      7           
Yards Per Catch         10.02     22          
Total Yardage Gained    289.4     26          
3rd Down Conversions    43.6      3           
Points Per Game         17.2      25          
Pass Rush Pct.          19.3      21          
Pass Defense Pct.       44.1      27          
Turnovers               25        14 (T)      
Turnover Margin         +4        11 (T)      
   
Opponents               Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         30.5      27          
Rushing Yards           140.1     30          
Yards Per Carry         4.59      31          
Pass Attempts           26.8      1           
Completions             18.1      4           
Completion Pct.         67.5      32          
Passing Yards           189.8     5           
Yards Per Attempt       7.09      30          
Yards Per Catch         10.51     18 (T)      
Total Yardage Gained    317.5     23          
3rd Down Conversions    39.8      21 (T)      
Points Per Game         18.3      13          
Pass Rush Pct.          14.0      1           
Pass Defense Pct.       36.4      3           
Turnovers               29        9 (T)       
   
Week  Team  Versus        Oppnt  
1     20    at BAL        24      
2     10    at MIN        20      
3     3     at TEN        27      
4     13    at BUF        16      
5     17    PIT           24      
6     17    MIA           23      
7     21    at NYJ        23      
8     12    NED           14      
9     24    BAL           14      
11    31    at CIN        24      
12    13    CHI           12      
13    13    SDO           7       
14    20    DET           16      
15    24    CIN           14      
16    24    at GBY        13      
17    13    at PIT        21      
   
Passing                 Pos   Att   Comp  Yards Y/Att TD    Int   Rate  
13 A. Hoffman           QB    375   263   2540  6.77  14    6     94.5    
**Team                  ---   407   279   2795  6.87  15    9     90.8    
$$Opp                   ---   428   289   3036  7.09  19    16    87.1    
   
Rushing                 Pos   Att   Yards Y/Att TD    Fum  
20 E. Peters            RB    218   859   3.94  6     7       
33 T. Money             RB    209   736   3.52  4     2       
13 A. Hoffman           QB    64    290   4.53  0     11      
**Team                  ---   523   1982  3.79  11    35      
$$Opp                   ---   488   2242  4.59  11    25      
   
Receiving               Pos   Targ  Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop  TD  
8 A. Willett            WR    101   68    866   12.74 8.57  4     7       
85 M. Tamme             TE    81    59    588   9.97  7.26  5     3       
81 S. Farmer            TE    46    34    281   8.26  6.11  4     2       
46 L. Buchanan          TE    48    30    248   8.27  5.17  2     1       
47 L. Stanton           FB    28    20    167   8.35  5.96  0     1       
20 E. Peters            RB    24    16    97    6.06  4.04  5     0       
88 J. Lincoln           WR    24    16    217   13.56 9.04  4     1       
   
Defense                 Pos   Tack  Asst  Sack  Hurr  Ints  Defn  PDPct  
94 B. Davidson          ILB   93    29    0.0   2     1     2     70.6    
23 O. Voss              S     76    31    0.0   1     2     7     79.5    
58 H. Harding           OLB   55    22    3.0   2     0     1     74.2    
30 M. Huffman           CB    54    15    0.0   0     3     3     74.7    
96 D. Conway            ILB   52    19    1.0   0     1     0     71.4    
93 D. Francis           OLB   51    18    13.0  15    0     2     81.2    
27 L. Van Arsdale       S     50    10    0.0   0     5     7     82.9    
28 S. Kibble            CB    49    10    0.0   0     2     12    79.1    
51 K. St. Amal          DE    48    27    7.0   7     0     0     80.8    
92 M. Furman            DT    43    19    1.0   4     0     0     81.5    
41 S. Boyer             CB    41    16    0.0   0     0     1     75.6    
57 V. Shapiro           ILB   40    12    0.0   0     0     2     78.2    
72 W. Farnsworth        DE    37    19    2.0   17    0     0     80.3    

I use my remaining AP to extend contracts with DE Farnsworth, G Roller, and TE Tamme.

[QuikSand]

2014 Initial Offseason

Well, the team clearly needs some help. Don’t get me wrong… I **want** to have this kind of difficulty, but we really have work to do.

We’re sitting on pick 13, and I suspect we will again be looking for a BPZ selection. Could we look for a QB there? Don’t know. We had a “good enough” year out of Hoffman last season, and I think Maurice Vaughn is going to keep creeping toward being a starting caliber player also. One thing I may have ahead is taking over the depth charts, specifically for the purpose of getting Vaughn in as the starter – there’s an AP cost, but I think it might be necessary for this team right now.

Here’s the initial AP plan:

0 All staff hiring will be last stage, at request or less
0 Europe tour will be for late round picks
0 Re-sign RFAs to requested contracts only
0 Use no rookie interviews
12 Base cost of our draft picks (we hold pick 1.13)
2 Approximate added cost of drafting players with strong combines
10 Implement custom gameplans at start of season (necessary to use my TE-first offense)
4 Implement manually controlled depth chart for full season
0 Set injury rate at 200
4 Two players occupying 5-10% of cap (G Roller, WR Willett)
--
20 AP left for roster transactions

I expect to do a couple capouts to get CB Huffman and T Abraham under the 5% mark, and that alone will essentially pay for the cost of taking control of our depth charts. Good tradeoff I think.

20 AP ought to be plenty for our in-season transactions – last year, we actually ended up with 57 players on hand once we were done with everything. What I need to do this year is be more discerning with my AP-cost moves.

The recipe to get to 53 players:
38 players on contract now
7 rookie draft picks
3 free veteran no-bonus signings
…so that’s 48 without using any AP at all…

We have a few RFAs to re-sign, and I may be looking to spend an extra AP here or there to stretch out some of these guys a few years, notably C Di Pardo, who looks like a guy we could live with for the next several years as our starter. RB Money likely gets a new deal, but LB Hawkins is in doubt for the easy-to-fill backup WLB slot.

As far as veterans, we have a number off guys who we’d like to bring back, and perhaps we will be looking to make multi-year deals rather than just one.

0 – Sign RFA player to his requested one year contract (G Campbell, RB Money, LB Hawkins)
0 – Offer FA player 8th year+ requested contract 1yr no bonus (RB Peters, G Flannery)

We aren’t in cap trouble, really, so I take a look at a free agent DT – I know we just burned a top draft pick at NT (we’ll see how good he turns out to be) but this seems like a decent pick. DT Jeff Snyder is a solid run stopper (scouted 49/49), a 6th year guy looking for a 5 yr contract – so for 1 AP we could land a quality reserve and spot starter at either DT or DE, I like this move better then using the same AP to extend a RFA like DT Christian Jones (29/33). Of course, I’m taking a risk that I will be outbid, but I think it’s worth the 1 AP to find out.

1 – Offer FA player his requested contract (DT Snyder)

I have a couple tough calls with veteran players… a guy like WR Johnnie Lincoln has been okay, but we don’t get the ball to the split end that much in this offense, so I’m not sure it makes sense to pony up much money (and use AP) to keep him around. Same thing with veteran RT Doug Coghill, a nice enough player but now relegated to the bench behind two starters locked up to long contracts.

QB Norbert Russell is another tough call – he wants a shade more than minsal, and seems like he has a playable bar profile. But I don’t know where he’d fit with this team – last year Hoffman was okay, Vaughn may be the guy we invest in, so where does that put Russell? Not sure. I think I wait him out, and if he drops to a minsal request in late free agency, I’ll likely lock him up to a 3yr minsal deal.

(I note here that I once again hate having late round draft picks… I don’t know how to create a system of incentives to make those picks worth much of anything. With this team, I have veterans that I’d rather keep around than replace them with 6th round picks… and unless the cap makes it so, it doesn’t seem like I have much incentive to do so. It’s looking like a valid strategy to just turn over my 4th and 5th round picks to my scout (where they’d cost me nothing in AP) and not even sign those guys.

I find another veteran who seems like a great fit for us, I think. WR Tyrone Poston is looking for a bit more than minsal, but he fits several needs for us. He’s an excellent punt returner, good enough to play a bit in reserve, and he’d be an affinity leader as a plus with our two anchor players in the group, TE Tamme and WR Willett. Tough to beat that for a $600k signings, so I put in a 2 AP offer there.

2 – Offer FA player a flat contract with at least 25% bonus (WR Poston)

As I kick off the FA period, we look like we will lose out on DT Snyder, as there are better-looking offers than our out there. It’s also clear that if we want T Coghill to return, it will cost us… I meet his one year request, in hopes of landing a stable reserve.

1 – Offer FA player his requested contract (RT Coghill)

We do lose out on DT Snyder after all, he stays home in Green Bay. Might have been smarter to wait through the early stages to see what’s “left over” before getting in with my offer there.

By week 5, QB Norbert Russell is unwanted elsewhere, and willing to listen to my multi year minsal deal – I think he’s good enough to play, and there’s value in having a cheap QB of that nature, no matter what we end up doing there.

2 – Offer FA player a three-year minsal contract (QB Russell)

WR Popston and RT Coghill are late deciders, leaving us unsure where we’ll end up with them. Both have offers from other teams – I expect Poston to ink with us, but I’m relying on loyalty to keep Coghill here. In week 8, both guys finally sign with us, and that should help our depth chart in the immediate sense.

In the waning stages, I put in the multi-year (fairly expensive) offer that C Di Pardo is seeking. I’m enamored with the idea of locking up our entire OL for several years, and hopefully churning out some cohesion. I don’t know what it takes to get any of my teams to run the ball worth a damn, but I’d think this is a reasonable approach to doing so. Di Pardo is rated 66/69, and seems good enough to handle the middle with us a while.

1 – Sign RFA player to his requested multi year contract (C Di Pardo)

So, that’s a total of 7 AP spent in this early free agency period. We’re up to 47 players on contract, and I have one more free veteran signing, if I choose. I also am still ogling WR Johnnie Lincoln, still out there in free agency, and who could be had on a no-bonus deal himself.

[QuikSand]

2014 Rookie Draft

So, we end up sitting at pick #13, no monster players worth a big move-up for, I don’t think, so I expect to take what lands on us. Best guy available seems to be a great LB with superior combines and bars in everything but run stopping… not sure where he’d fit in now. But the guy looks so good… a 4.40 dash… I don’t think I can pass him up and dig deep elsewhere just to “respect” guys I tried to fill in with during the last couple of drafts.

I spend some real time thinking about this pick. I essentially have it narrowed down to the best-left RB Sherman Swift, who looks like a legitimate first round talent to me, against the LB Carlton Tate. In many ways, taking the RB is the obvious thing to do – we “addressed” our LB needs last year drafting two guys I’m fairly comfortable slotting as starters for the foreseeable future, and our run-first offense has been downright anemic generating rushing yards. So, admitting my mistake in drafting RB Starr a few seasons ago and casting again into those waters would be a sensible thing to do, I feel. So hell with it, I’m taking the bulletproof guy.

Pick Pos Name                  Grd Adj Dash  ST  BP  Agil  Bjump  PS  Dev  O/U AP
1.13 OLB Carlton Tate          6.6 6.4 4.40! 40! 29! 7.16+ 9-06   37+ 48%  n/a  5
2.01 RB  Walt Woodson          5.3 5.6 4.46! 17  27! 7.09+ 10-03  17  39%  n/a  4
4.10 C   Herman Smith          6.5 5.6 5.04! 42! 37! 7.52! 8-01   --  19%  n/a  2
5.09 WR  Kendall Williamson    4.2 4.4 4.47  24+ 11  7.04+ 9-05   34  11%  n/a  1
6.16 ILB Toby Rees             3.6 3.5 4.72+ 28  25+ 8.09- 8-09   26  39%  n/a  0
7.15 FS  Conrad Ulbricht       4.2 3.9 4.51+ 36  16  7.70- 8-01-  48+ 26%  n/a  0

Tate lands at 56/65 on our roster, and my plan is to slot him on the strong side. RB Swift goes with the next pick to Baltimore, right inside the division.

Since I have some AP to burn, and maybe a few roster spots as well, I decide to swing a trade – I’m targeting the RB who was listed third on the big board, and I’d like to eliminate the chance he gets swiped out from under my nose in round two. Our 3rd rounder is enough to move us up to the top pick in round two to get the guy we want there. He’s fast, not smart. We’ll see.

We don’t need a center here, but getting a 4-red combine guy in round four seems worth an exception. Surely we can find something for him to do, right?

WR Williamson looks like a nice role player and kick returner, and LB Rees will immediately move to pass rushing end, and give us one more weapon from the outside. S Ulbricht looks like a ballhawk, and has other bars that might make him intriguing.

So, the draft costs us 12 AP +1 more for the trade-up. Not bad, we have some room to move in late free agency, if we desire to.

[QuikSand]

2014 Late Free Agency and Training Camp

We have two holdouts, from WR Willett and LB Francis. My thinking is that Francis is completely replaceable, but Willett is not, at least not on this roster. We have a trade offer in for QB Russell, but since we just re-signed him this year, it fails the “fairness test” and would cost us 2 AP to accept it. Kinda funny, that doesn’t seem to make much sense… not sure if that’s a weakness in the AP system, but this is a dumb disincentive, I think.

We have 53 players on hand, including our two holdouts. I have 11 action points in hand (I’m not going to have 25% of the cap unused, so I’m counting it at 20%, costing m3 3 AO more than I had anticipated) – enough to do a thing or two if I’m so inclined.

I put in a bid to retain DT Kendall Spetz, a 5th year guy, former creeper, affinity plus, and decent run stopper. Nothing special, but he will help us keep a legal roster, giving us 6 defensive linemen.

1 – Offer any other FA player his requested contract (DT Spetz)

WR Johnnie Lincoln takes a new contract from Cincinnati, another guy staying in the division to face us. I think it was a mistake to let him walk that easily, now I suspect we’ll slot Glen Nikolaus out at split end – he’s been unhappy about playing time, so maybe this will help his morale.

I decide to knuckle under and agree terms with WR Willett, he’s just too important to us to piss off. This will also lock him up for two more years, which I likely was going to do anyhow.

Top Ten Most Likely Busts:

Name                          Team             Pos	Change
Tamme, Maurice                Cleveland        TE	-9
Williamson, Kendall           Cleveland        SE	-8
Ulbricht, Conrad              Cleveland        FS	-8
Rees, Toby                    Cleveland        LDE	-7
Peters, Edwin                 Cleveland        RB	-5
Kemp, Aaron                   Cleveland        RCB	-5
Boyer, Sedrick                Cleveland        LCB	-4
Nikolaus, Glen                Cleveland        SE	-4
Poston, Tyrone                Cleveland        FL	-3
Woodson, Walt                 Cleveland        RB	-2


Top Ten Most Likely Breakouts:

Name                          Team             Pos	Change
Smith, Herman                 Cleveland        C	6
Francis, Dustin               Cleveland        WLB	5
Kibble, Shawn                 Cleveland        LCB	4
Flowers, Omar                 Cleveland        SLB	4
Spetz, Kendall                Cleveland        NT	2
Buchanan, Lamar               Cleveland        TE	2
Russell, Norbert              Cleveland        QB	2
Castillo, Devin               Cleveland        RT	1
Vaughn, Maurice               Cleveland        QB	1
Money, Timothy                Cleveland        RB	1

So… weirdness abounds. My combine star linebacker looked 56/65 before camp, and now looks to be 60/64. Nothing wrong with that, but I candidly was hoping for a +4 camp even from that high starting point. Heh, and of course we get a nice bump from the guy we are replacing with the rookie, too, as well as from the weak-side guy I have all but written off.

The rest of my draft litters the “massive bust” list, that’s nice too. I liked RB Woodson, but I clearly have no business saying shit about running backs, as I can’t draft them, and I can’t get them to do shit for me anyhow.

Here’s the other thing that should have been far more apparent to me. I suspect the main reason that we got reasonable performance out of QB Adam Hoffman isn’t because he’s really any good (he isn’t) nor because he has a good set of matching skills (he doesn’t) but rather that he is just way ahead of my youngsters in formations. Our 2TE-heavy offense is built on only 6 formations, and Hoffman knows 5 of them, compared to only 3 for Russell (with his Intelligence rating of 3, he’s probably a lost cause on this front). It’s easy to overlook this sort of thing, but there’s really no excuse for me doing so this long, since my theoretical driving force behind this career is to build up this offense. Heh.

Anyway, youngster Maurice Vaughn just made a leap from 3 formations to 5, and that makes him at least a contender for some playing time this year. His bar profile suggests he still has some upside – he might be a 50+ player given some real playing time. I’m taking thee reins with the depth chart this year, so I think the thing to do is make him our #2, and get him in there once we fade from the playoff hunt, and get him in development.

[QuikSand]

2015 Season

Well, our OL gets all banged up in preseason – pretty much the one part of this team that seems to be in really good shape, and we have three starters out for opening day. Swell.

We suffer a terrible opening day loss, but get back together and make it to 3-2. Injuries are killing us, including now our defensive line – we’re going to see DT Spetz play most of this year at NT for us, it seems.

…or maybe not. One week after he gets the starting job, he’s out for two months. Ugh.

Well, despite the injury hassles (and do I ever hate stepping in to tweak full rosters every single week of the season… fuck this AP crap, I’m so out of this racket next year) we manage to sneak our way to 5-4-1. We are no match for this year’s division power Cincinnati, but we are in the mix for a postseason berth. None of our running backs is over 4 yards per carry, but out QB is 2:1 in TD:Int, and we are playing okay.

At 7-6-1, we have a shot – we need to make up a half game on either of the two teams ahead of us in the wild card race. We get the win we need, and Indy loses, and we grab position for the wild card out of thin air. And, of course, then we lose our final game (a supposed walkover against the lowly Ravens) and give it up. Ugh.

Front Office Football 2007
2014 Summary for Cleveland Browns
   
Year                2014                                      
Record              8-7-1                                     
Winning Pct.        .531                                      
All-Time            66-76-2                                   
Winning Pct.        .465                                      
Playoffs            2-2                                       
Playoff Visits      2                                         
Bowl Wins           0                                         
Head Coach          Bruce Ardan                               
Record              61-69-2                                   
Winning Pct.        .469                                      
Off. Coord.         V. Chiles                                 
Def. Coord.         W. Perry                                  
   
Cleveland Browns        Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         35.0      1           
Rushing Yards           132.8     2           
Yards Per Carry         3.79      28          
Pass Attempts           27.0      32          
Completions             18.1      31 (T)      
Completion Pct.         67.1      3           
Passing Yards           196.9     26 (T)      
Yards Per Attempt       7.29      6           
Yards Per Catch         10.86     16          
Total Yardage Gained    319.1     15          
3rd Down Conversions    42.8      3           
Points Per Game         16.1      26 (T)      
Pass Rush Pct.          20.0      17 (T)      
Pass Defense Pct.       38.9      30          
Turnovers               26        20 (T)      
Turnover Margin         -13       30          
   
Opponents               Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         30.8      27          
Rushing Yards           130.1     29          
Yards Per Carry         4.22      20          
Pass Attempts           25.9      1           
Completions             17.1      1           
Completion Pct.         65.9      32          
Passing Yards           178.1     1           
Yards Per Attempt       6.88      24          
Yards Per Catch         10.44     8           
Total Yardage Gained    292.0     3           
3rd Down Conversions    38.2      23          
Points Per Game         16.6      6           
Pass Rush Pct.          15.3      1           
Pass Defense Pct.       29.8      2           
Turnovers               13        32          
   
Week  Team  Versus        Oppnt  
1     0     at CIN        28      
2     13    ATL           10      
3     27    DEN           3       
4     28    TEN           21      
5     6     at JAX        16      
6     10    at HOU        10      
7     17    BAL           20      
8     17    IND           10      
9     27    at PIT        24      
11    9     CIN           26      
12    10    at NOS        34      
13    20    at MIA        17      
14    10    CAR           14      
15    30    PIT           0       
16    17    at TBY        13      
17    17    at BAL        20      
   
Passing                 Pos   Att   Comp  Yards Y/Att TD    Int   Rate  
13 A. Hoffman           QB    393   268   2909  7.40  15    8     94.0    
**Team                  ---   432   290   3150  7.29  16    9     92.1    
$$Opp                   ---   414   273   2850  6.88  13    7     89.1    
   
Rushing                 Pos   Att   Yards Y/Att TD    Fum  
33 T. Money             RB    193   721   3.74  2     6       
32 C. Starr             RB    173   618   3.57  4     2       
37 W. Woodson           RB    134   518   3.87  2     7       
13 A. Hoffman           QB    58    266   4.59  1     8       
**Team                  ---   560   2125  3.79  9     29      
$$Opp                   ---   493   2081  4.22  13    16      
   
Receiving               Pos   Targ  Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop  TD  
8 A. Willett            WR    99    68    981   14.43 9.91  6     7       
85 M. Tamme             TE    90    61    660   10.82 7.33  2     2       
32 C. Starr             RB    47    36    332   9.22  7.06  1     3       
46 L. Buchanan          TE    46    35    335   9.57  7.28  5     2       
47 L. Stanton           FB    33    28    250   8.93  7.58  0     0       
87 B. Jeffries          TE    35    21    206   9.81  5.89  1     0       
   
Defense                 Pos   Tack  Asst  Sack  Hurr  Ints  Defn  PDPct  
94 B. Davidson          ILB   119   33    1.5   0     0     6     71.1    
23 O. Voss              S     72    26    1.0   0     1     4     76.6    
57 V. Shapiro           ILB   69    33    0.0   0     0     0     70.1    
52 O. Flowers           OLB   57    22    5.0   2     0     7     76.2    
28 S. Kibble            CB    54    15    0.5   0     1     9     74.2    
53 C. Tate              OLB   46    17    3.5   6     0     0     76.6    
51 K. St. Amal          DE    45    15    5.0   9     0     0     81.4    
27 L. Van Arsdale       S     42    12    0.5   0     2     2     78.0    
72 W. Farnsworth        DE    41    11    5.5   4     0     0     81.8    
30 M. Huffman           CB    39    15    0.0   0     1     8     80.2    
93 D. Francis           OLB   33    8     10.5  8     0     0     78.7    
96 D. Conway            ILB   23    6     0.0   0     1     0     77.5    
73 M. McKnight          DE    19    15    0.5   3     0     0     82.0    
41 S. Boyer             CB    18    9     0.0   0     0     1     80.0    
92 M. Furman            DT    16    6     1.5   2     0     0     80.6    

So, here we are. Our run-first team can’t run. Teams don’t throw against us that much, in part because we are so easy to run on. Our defense is poor overall, it seems, and there’s not much to like about our offense right now, either. That overstates the problems a bit – we were basically a .500 team after all, not 2-14, but at this point I think we ought to be seeing more from this team.

[nfg22]

Weird to see you struggle. I think a solid RB would help. Woodson looks to be a bust. Pretty efficient passing though. Keep on trying.

[nfg22]

Another thing, a massive amount of fumbles from RB's/QB. Might be the turner.

[QuikSand]

While I claim to enjoy struggling, and concoct all these crazy rules to try to force me to have difficulty, I don't really enjoy being clueless. Right now I feel like I am. My team is running out of 2TE sets nearly all the time, I have locked up an offensive line that is probably twice as talented as any defensive front we face in this league, and we still put up a pathetic <4 yards per carry.

Short of investing a top-5 pick in a can't-miss stud RB, I don't see what else I could do to make this thing work. Yeah, the fumbles are annoying and are hurting us... but seriously, I am trying my damndest to make this a power football team, and I'm getting nowhere with it. This is the stop on the train where I usually just get off, and draft/sign a top tier QB, and let 'er rip... I am committed to not doing that here, but I'm not sure I want to play 10 more seasons of 7-9 football with my run-first team unable to run, and my offense emasculated by committing to something I obviously don't know how to do well in this game.

Alas.

[QuikSand]

2015 Initial Offseason

Okay, may basic thinking is – we’ve been struggling a bit, but the roster really is coming together. We’re now reaching the point where the AP challenge is going to define how tough this is. Maybe I can make this silly run-first, TE-based offense work, I don’t know. But the 50 AP limit is likely to start feeling tough either this year or next, and I hope that proves to be fun itself.

Our OL affinity leader Ronnie Flannery retired – no great loss there, I suppose. I haven’t really committed to chemistry in this career anyway.

I have to make a decision on staff this year – everyone is out of contract. Under the AP system, the approach that seems smartest is just to economize here, but I might be willing to pay AP for a solid head coach, I’m thinking – that may be a factor in my team’s sluggish performance to date. I make a change at head coach, but only for free, taking young Ricky Dodge in as my new head man at 32 years of age.

So, I’ll start now with my path toward 53 players:

30 on contract to start season
3 free RFA signings
3 free veteran FA signings
7 draft picks

That leaves all our AP for 10 players to sign. We have a flood of 4th year guys (that draft wasn’t too bad after all, I guess) and will probably spend several AP locking up some of them. We also could obviously use an instant addition at DL, where we were exposed as perilously thin last season. But basically, I think most of our additions will be from inside, as we lock up RFA players and keep them around, and likely keep QB Adam Hoffman around as our starter. Hoffman is the 3rd-highest rated QB out there in free agency, rated at a paltry 38/38... a real indication that the FA market in this OPU-based league is still perilously weak.

Anyway, my AP plan looks basically like this right now:

0 All staff hiring from last stage, at request or less
0 Europe tour will be for late round picks
0 Re-sign RFAs to requested contracts only
0 Use no rookie interviews
11 Base cost of our draft picks (we hold pick 1.17)
2 Approximate added cost of drafting players with strong combines
10 Implement custom gameplans at start of season (necessary to use my TE-first offense)
0 Implement staff controlled depth chart for full season
3 Set injury rate at 150
6 Three players occupying 5-10% of cap (G Roller, WR Willett, CB Huffman)
3 Leave 20% of cap unused as of start of season

--
15 AP left for roster transactions

That number is dwindling a bit, understandably. I’m going to spend my AP differently this year, and drop the injury setting, trying to stem the total mess we had on our hands last season. My new head coach won’t be a great help there – I looked for a guy with a strong rating, but there were none to be had that weren’t a disgrace elsewhere.


Here’s the roster snapshot as we start the season:

Front Office Football 2007
Cleveland Browns Roster, Scout Overview
   
  Player                #   Pos   Start Exp  Current Estimate  Future Estimate Cntrct 
Hoffman, Adam           13  QB          5    38                38                ---  
Russell, Norbert        18  QB          6    35                44                2 yrs
Vaughn, Maurice         5   QB          3    20                51                1 yr.
Starr, Clarence         32  RB          5    48                48                ---  
Money, Timothy          33  RB          3    39                39                ---  
Woodson, Walt           37  RB          2    38                42                2 yrs
Peters, Edwin           20  RB          10   20                20                ---  
Stanton, Leon           47  FB          4    59                59                ---  
Buchanan, Lamar         46  TE          4    75                75                ---  
Tamme, Maurice          85  TE          9    66                66                2 yrs
Jeffries, Bennie        87  TE          10   45                45                ---  
Farmer, Sean            81  TE          4    36                41                ---  
Willett, Amos           8   FL          8    67                67                2 yrs
Poston, Tyrone          80  FL          9    37                37                2 yrs
Atkins, Lonnie          14  FL          4    37                42                ---  
Nikolaus, Glen          11  SE          9    35                35                1 yr.
Lofton, Kim             84  SE          4    24                24                ---  
Williamson, Kendall     88  SE          2    22                37                2 yrs
Di Pardo, Sean          59  C           5    72                72                3 yrs
Savea, Myron            54  C           7    60                60                ---  
Smith, Herman           60  C           2    27                59                2 yrs
Roller, Shane           77  LG          6    86                86                3 yrs
Buffington, Phillip     64  RG          8    59                59                3 yrs
Campbell, Jackie        55  RG          5    41                41                ---  
Abraham, Desmond        65  LT          9    78                78                1 yr.
Castillo, Devin         78  RT          5    78                78                4 yrs
Coghill, Doug           69  RT          10   44                44                ---  
Beyer, Benjamin         10  P           4    51                51                ---  
Butler, Vinny           9   K           3    62                62                1 yr.
Farnsworth, William     72  LDE         6    47                47                2 yrs
Rees, Toby              99  LDE         2    22                40                2 yrs
St. Amal, Keith         51  RDE         9    50                50                2 yrs
McKnight, Mitch         73  RDE         9    46                46                ---  
Knoyle, Desmond         91  RDE         2    6                 13                ---  
Furman, Mack            92  NT          3    63                69                3 yrs
Spetz, Kendall          76  NT          6    27                27                ---  
Weber, Bob              75  NT          2    6                 13                ---  
Davidson, Brian         94  SILB        3    56                56                2 yrs
Harding, Herb           58  SILB        5    37                37                ---  
Shapiro, Vince          57  WILB        4    43                50                ---  
Conway, Desmond         96  WILB        4    26                40                ---  
Tate, Carlton           53  SLB         2    66                66                3 yrs
Flowers, Omar           52  SLB         3    44                61                2 yrs
Griffin, Buddy          15  SLB         3    21                37                1 yr.
Francis, Dustin         93  WLB         7    34                34                ---  
Hawkins, Billy Joe      56  WLB         5    28                32                ---  
Kibble, Shawn           28  LCB         4    90                90                2 yrs
Boyer, Sedrick          41  LCB         7    47                47                2 yrs
Huffman, Michael        30  RCB         7    81                81                3 yrs
Kemp, Aaron             39  RCB         10   35                35                ---  
Voss, Otis              23  SS          4    53                53                3 yrs
Webb, Brenden           25  SS          3    22                26                1 yr.
Van Arsdale, Lincoln    27  FS          7    35                35                1 yr.
Ulbricht, Conrad        43  FS          2    24                42                2 yrs
   
$$ - player is suspended, ## - player is inactive,  
** = player is injured, %% - player is on IR.  
   
Players Under Contract: 30
Inactive: 0
On Active Roster: 30
   
Salary Cap: $81,400,000
Cap Room: $29,430,000
Maximum for New Player: $25,330,000
Cap Room Lost (to old contracts): $0
   
Cap Room Lost Next Year (to old contracts): $0
Cap Room Required Next Year: $50,910,000

[QuikSand]

2015 Early Free Agency

1 – Sign RFA player to his requested multi year contract (TE Lamar Buchanan)
1 – Sign RFA player to his requested multi year contract (FB Leon Stanton)
0 – Sign RFA player to his requested one year contract (LB Shapiro)
0 – Sign RFA player to his requested one year contract (WR Atkins)
0 – Sign RFA player to his requested one year contract (LB Conway)
0 – Offer FA player 8th year+ requested contract 1yr no bonus (CB Kemp)
0 – Offer FA player 8th year+ requested contract 1yr no bonus (RB Peters)
0 – Offer FA player 8th year+ requested contract 1yr no bonus (S Arceo)

Interesting to see LB Dustin Francis open to my offer now – we basically have to take him up on that, following his massive half season last year for us.

2 – Offer FA player a three-year minsal contract (LB Francis)
2 – Offer FA player a flat contract with at least 25% bonus (DE McKnight)
1 – Offer FA player his requested contract (QB Hoffman)
1 – Offer FA player his requested contract (G Campbell)
1 – Offer FA player his requested contract (LB Harding)

I give some thought to re-signing RB Starr – his bars still do look a good deal better than anyone we have on hand. But I think the better of it, he has just proven to me that he isn’t any good, bottom line. RB Peters, even rapidly fading, is probably better on the field, sadly.

So, through these early stages, we have mostly stuck to the familiar – just not much that’s really appetizing in the FA market, so we might as well keep around guys who help us with cohesion, like G Campbell and LB Harding.

With 9 AP spent on roster moves, that leaves us with about 6 AP for after the draft, likely enough to do a couple extensions, and maybe sign a few rookie free agents. We sit at 43 players, so we should have room to bring aboard a few undrafted rookies this year, if we like.

My last move here is to go back to DT Spetz, the same guy I did at this stage last season. No more free signings left, but he’s an affinity and a decent enough run stopper to play in a pinch. I decide to lock him up for three years with a minsal deal.

2 – Offer FA player a three-year minsal contract (DT Spetz)

[QuikSand]

2015 Rookie Draft

So, on our roster we have a serious deficit on the defensive line, so we need to add at least one playable guy, preferably two I think. At RB, I am wholly unsatisfied with the production we have seen, so that would be a target spot as well. Past that, I’m open to anything – though with the investment we have made along the offensive line, that would seem like an absurd place to invest anything but a modest pick. We’ll see… last draft the BPA by far were centers starting in about round 3.

It seems like a RB-heavy top of the draft, and the guy I like best is actually listed as the 4th guy on the board. The first RB doesn’t even go off until #12, so I like our chances at pick 17.

Pick Pos Name                  Grd Adj Dash  ST  BP  Agil  Bjump  PS  Dev  AP
1.17 RB  Archie Anagnostis     6.1 6.5 4.44! 36! 19+ 7.13+ 10-03  28+ 28%   4
2.17 TE  Rufus Gerth           5.5 4.8 4.69+ 45! 24  7.55! 9-06+  10- 43%   3
3.17 DE  Roger Hutton          4.7 5.2 ----  33+ --  ----  ----   --  61%   3
4.17 DT  Roman Davidson        4.7 5.1 4.86! 26+ 28  7.64  7-00   --  29%   1
5.17 LT  Mel Jones             4.3 4.7 ----  44! --  ----  ----   --  48%   1
6.17 QB  Ike Summers           4.5 5.1 4.80  32  10  7.51+ 8-10   74  20%   0
7.17 P   Hardy Lemoine         5.9 3.1 4.95+ 31+ 14+ 7.24! 9-03   --  62%   1

So, the draft costs us 13 AP, right at my initial target cost. Not bad.

TE Gerth is a strong combine guy who looks like a punishing run blocker, and he might one day become our top target on this team, as Lamar Buchanan – a fine player—is pretty clearly going to be a blocker first and a target second. If Gerth develops, that pairing could be very potent for us in the years ahead.

Hutton and Davidson both look like pass rushers – Hutton is a bar profile pick, Davidson is the combine guy with a fast dash. LT Jones has one red combine along with the skip, which seems good enough for a late round stab at a position of relative need. QB Summers is another bar profile guy, but will need to develop formations to get anywhere for us (familiar).

[QuikSand]

2015 Late Free Agency

So, we get another trade offer for QB Russell – and with my dissection of his formation knkowledge, I think this is a no-brainer. It even passed the “fairness test” and therefore costs us only one AP. Done.

We have a holdout, LB Brian Davidson. He’s currently inked for two more years, but his extension request is for two more, so extending him wouldn’t be absurd. That would drop me to 3 AP, though, and I’d rather grab a few rookies here.

1 – Sign a FA rookie player (RB Hugh Money)

RB Money is a big-bars guy with apparent receiving skills – not sure whether we park him at RB or WR, but I suspect he sticks a while. I want to sign some intriguing rookies… but I can’t get too intrigued. Perhaps good news for LB Davidson after all.

2 – Sign current player to his requested renegotiation (LB Davidson)

This brings us into training camp with 3 AP to spare, and 51 players signed. We’ll live – the 3 AP at least give us some flexibility to respond to injuries with something beyond total stiffs.

Top Ten Most Likely Busts:

Name                          Team             Pos	Change
Hutton, Roger                 Cleveland        LDE	-17
Huffman, Michael              Cleveland        RCB	-9
Money, Hugh                   Cleveland        RB	-8
Poston, Tyrone                Cleveland        FL	-6
Arceo, Reggie                 Cleveland        FS	-6
Peters, Edwin                 Cleveland        RB	-6
Buffington, Phillip           Cleveland        RG	-5
Kemp, Aaron                   Cleveland        RCB	-5
Atkins, Lonnie                Cleveland        FL	-4
Abraham, Desmond              Cleveland        LT	-2


Top Ten Most Likely Breakouts:

Name                          Team             Pos	Change
Tate, Carlton                 Cleveland        SLB	6
Davidson, Roman               Cleveland        RDE	5
Anagnostis, Archie            Cleveland        RB	5
Summers, Ike                  Cleveland        QB	2
Lemoine, Hardy                Cleveland        P	2
Spetz, Kendall                Cleveland        NT	1
Voss, Otis                    Cleveland        SS	1
Nikolaus, Glen                Cleveland        SE	1
Boyer, Sedrick                Cleveland        LCB	1
Davidson, Brian               Cleveland        SILB	1

So, a nice bump from LB Tate suggests maybe last year was a fluke after all. DE Davidson gives us a nice jump, which makes up for the complete collapse of Hutton, drafted ahead of him.

But the +5 from Archie is the big news, maybe we actually have some talent at RB now. Assuming he can do something for us toting the ball, I fully intend to feed it to him as much as he can handle it.

[QuikSand]

2015 Season

So, like last year we start things off poorly, this time 0-3. Then we seemingly right the ship, and peel off 7 straight wins. At 7-3, we are one game off the Cinti lead in the division, Archie has 14 rushing TDs, and +5 in the turnover battle (though Archie does seem to have the dropsies a bit). Anyway, things are looking up a bit.

At 10-5, we are now assured of a playoff berth, nice. But a win at home would give us the division over Cinti, and a bye week. Very nice. However, they pull off the win, and send us into the wild card round – still good, but disappointing to get that close and miss.

Front Office Football 2007
2015 Summary for Cleveland Browns
   
Year                2015                                      
Record              10-6                                      
Winning Pct.        .625                                      
All-Time            76-82-2                                   
Winning Pct.        .481                                      
Playoffs            2-2                                       
Playoff Visits      3                                         
Bowl Wins           0                                         
Head Coach          Ricky Dodge                               
Record              10-6                                      
Winning Pct.        .625                                      
Off. Coord.         V. Chiles                                 
Def. Coord.         W. Perry                                  
   
Cleveland Browns        Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         37.1      1           
Rushing Yards           162.9     1           
Yards Per Carry         4.40      7           
Pass Attempts           25.0      32          
Completions             17.3      30          
Completion Pct.         69.0      1           
Passing Yards           172.4     32          
Yards Per Attempt       6.90      3           
Yards Per Catch         9.99      25          
Total Yardage Gained    328.9     11          
3rd Down Conversions    46.4      2           
Points Per Game         21.1      13          
Pass Rush Pct.          19.1      20 (T)      
Pass Defense Pct.       58.9      6 (T)       
Turnovers               22        9 (T)       
Turnover Margin         +3        11 (T)      
   
Opponents               Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         27.1      13          
Rushing Yards           126.1     27          
Yards Per Carry         4.66      30          
Pass Attempts           30.7      5 (T)       
Completions             18.4      3           
Completion Pct.         60.1      15          
Passing Yards           197.1     8           
Yards Per Attempt       6.42      14          
Yards Per Catch         10.69     21          
Total Yardage Gained    310.3     14          
3rd Down Conversions    35.8      9           
Points Per Game         16.9      4 (T)       
Pass Rush Pct.          15.4      2           
Pass Defense Pct.       27.5      1           
Turnovers               25        16 (T)      
   
Week  Team  Versus        Oppnt  
1     10    PIT           16      
2     24    at SFO        27      
3     17    NED           26      
5     34    at DEN        6       
6     28    OAK           24      
7     17    SDO           16      
8     27    at KCY        14      
9     36    BAL           10      
10    17    at PIT        16      
11    16    at CIN        0       
12    7     STL           27      
13    21    at IND        7       
14    27    at SEA        37      
15    23    at BAL        17      
16    19    ARI           6       
17    14    CIN           21      
$$WC        at MIA                
   
Passing                 Pos   Att   Comp  Yards Y/Att TD    Int   Rate  
13 A. Hoffman           QB    373   259   2570  6.89  16    7     95.1    
**Team                  ---   400   276   2758  6.90  17    7     95.2    
$$Opp                   ---   491   295   3154  6.42  14    14    76.5    
   
Rushing                 Pos   Att   Yards Y/Att TD    Fum  
17 A. Anagnostis        RB    410   1786  4.36  18    10      
37 W. Woodson           RB    116   480   4.14  0     4       
13 A. Hoffman           QB    63    327   5.19  0     3       
**Team                  ---   593   2607  4.40  18    24      
$$Opp                   ---   433   2018  4.66  13    24      
   
Receiving               Pos   Targ  Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop  TD  
8 A. Willett            WR    100   70    974   13.91 9.74  4     5       
85 M. Tamme             TE    86    59    510   8.64  5.93  6     4       
46 L. Buchanan          TE    56    38    278   7.32  4.96  2     4       
17 A. Anagnostis        RB    40    30    217   7.23  5.43  1     1       
47 L. Stanton           FB    26    23    219   9.52  8.42  0     1       
89 R. Gerth             TE    35    22    201   9.14  5.74  2     1       
   
Defense                 Pos   Tack  Asst  Sack  Hurr  Ints  Defn  PDPct  
94 B. Davidson          ILB   112   30    2.5   2     3     8     76.6    
53 C. Tate              OLB   93    22    11.0  8     0     7     73.3    
57 V. Shapiro           ILB   66    20    0.0   1     0     0     71.2    
23 O. Voss              S     64    39    0.0   0     1     16    82.8    
28 S. Kibble            CB    48    14    0.0   1     3     13    82.5    
92 M. Furman            DT    44    27    3.5   8     0     1     82.5    
41 S. Boyer             CB    32    13    0.0   0     2     6     83.0    
93 D. Francis           OLB   28    4     3.5   7     0     0     80.0    
43 C. Ulbricht          S     26    10    0.0   1     1     2     76.9    
39 A. Kemp              CB    24    1     0.0   0     0     3     74.9    
58 H. Harding           ILB   22    10    0.5   3     1     0     83.3    
51 K. St. Amal          DE    21    8     4.5   6     0     0     80.7    
30 M. Huffman           CB    19    9     0.0   0     1     7     82.6    
96 D. Conway            ILB   19    5     0.0   0     0     2     81.9    
24 R. Arceo             S     18    3     0.0   0     0     1     69.5    
73 M. McKnight          DE    17    12    2.0   8     0     0     82.1    
27 L. Van Arsdale       S     16    1     0.0   0     2     1     85.4    
52 O. Flowers           OLB   16    10    2.0   5     0     0     80.6    

We win our playoff opener at Miami, thanks to a game-tying TD pass from Hoffman in the final minute, and then another in OT. We then pave Cinti 27-3 to get the last laugh there, and are on to the conference title game.

I don’t really think this team has the “look” of a superbowl team… but our margin of win actually increases as we roll Indy, 43-7, to get our slot in the title game. Go figure.

In the Superbowl, Green Bay’s first possession is awesome, they tear off yardage in big chunks, and march for an easy score. But we stick with our ground game, and we post Archie at over 100 yards by halftime, as we get the margin up to 17-7, our favor. After an opening FG drive, we play the next stretch on their side of the field, and then cash in a turnover for our own FG and a 20-10 lead in the early 4th. CB Michael Huffman makes a big tackle on a 4th down play to give us the ball near midfield with about 5 minutes to go, and we are in chokehold mode now. We keep them from getting much done, seal it with a late kick, and we’re the champs. Whoa.

We extended LT Abraham prior to the title game, wiping out 2 AP of our remaining stash.


So… obviously things went better this season, despite this team not necessarily being a top tier unit altogether. We still have several spots on the roster where we feel weak, but the team played well, avoided mistakes, and put together a run when we needed it.

[kobe360x]

nice you won the super Bowl!

[QuikSand]

Mixed blessing. I'm trying to win, so that's nice... but once I start gathering rings, I *always* have real trouble staying interested.

[nfg22]

Getting a RB featured like that is hard. Nice job and not a bad rookie season on his part. Looks like defense got it done but the offense wasnt too shabby.

[QuikSand]

[u]2016 Initial Offseason[u]

So, we return everyone from a championship team, great. (No retirements, that is)

I still feel like the roster has some real needs, but overall we are in pretty good shape. We had two seasons of injury trouble along the DL, so maybe adding one more legitimate pass rusher would be good, I think. But all told, I think we are in decent shape.

Right now, here’s the roster situation, to give a flavor of where we stand overall:

Front Office Football 2007
Cleveland Browns Roster, Scout Overview
   
  Player                #   Pos   Start Exp  Current Estimate  Future Estimate Cntrct 
Hoffman, Adam           13  QB          6    39                39                ---  
Vaughn, Maurice         5   QB          4    25                53                ---  
Summers, Ike            19  QB          2    13                34                2 yrs
Anagnostis, Archie      17  RB          2    59                67                3 yrs
Woodson, Walt           37  RB          3    43                43                1 yr.
Money, Hugh             21  RB          2    35                48                2 yrs
Peters, Edwin           20  RB          11   14                14                ---  
Stanton, Leon           47  FB          5    59                59                4 yrs
Buchanan, Lamar         46  TE          5    75                75                5 yrs
Tamme, Maurice          85  TE          10   63                63                1 yr.
Gerth, Rufus            89  TE          2    44                56                2 yrs
Willett, Amos           8   FL          9    66                66                1 yr.
Atkins, Lonnie          14  FL          5    37                37                ---  
Poston, Tyrone          80  FL          10   31                31                1 yr.
Nikolaus, Glen          11  SE          10   36                36                ---  
Williamson, Kendall     88  SE          3    26                35                1 yr.
Di Pardo, Sean          59  C           6    71                71                2 yrs
Smith, Herman           60  C           3    34                62                1 yr.
Roller, Shane           77  LG          7    84                84                2 yrs
Buffington, Phillip     64  RG          9    55                55                2 yrs
**Campbell, Jackie      55  RG          6    40                40                ---  
Abraham, Desmond        65  LT          10   77                77                2 yrs
Jones, Mel              69  LT          2    17                26                2 yrs
Castillo, Devin         78  RT          6    80                80                3 yrs
Lemoine, Hardy          3   P           2    36                36                2 yrs
Butler, Vinny           9   K           4    59                59                ---  
Farnsworth, William     72  LDE         7    47                47                1 yr.
Rees, Toby              99  LDE         3    26                37                1 yr.
Hutton, Roger           97  LDE         2    16                18                2 yrs
McKnight, Mitch         73  RDE         10   46                46                2 yrs
St. Amal, Keith         51  RDE         10   45                45                1 yr.
Davidson, Roman         90  RDE         2    28                51                2 yrs
Furman, Mack            92  NT          4    72                72                2 yrs
Spetz, Kendall          76  NT          7    28                28                2 yrs
Davidson, Brian         94  SILB        4    56                56                3 yrs
Harding, Herb           58  SILB        6    37                37                ---  
Shapiro, Vince          57  WILB        5    48                48                ---  
Conway, Desmond         96  WILB        5    31                40                ---  
Tate, Carlton           53  SLB         3    78                78                2 yrs
Flowers, Omar           52  SLB         4    56                60                1 yr.
Griffin, Buddy          15  SLB         4    24                36                ---  
Francis, Dustin         93  WLB         8    34                34                2 yrs
Kibble, Shawn           28  LCB         5    88                88                1 yr.
Boyer, Sedrick          41  LCB         8    48                48                1 yr.
Huffman, Michael        30  RCB         8    70                70                2 yrs
Kemp, Aaron             39  RCB         11   30                30                ---  
Voss, Otis              23  SS          5    55                55                2 yrs
Webb, Brenden           25  SS          4    27                27                ---  
Van Arsdale, Lincoln    27  FS          8    33                33                ---  
Ulbricht, Conrad        43  FS          3    30                38                1 yr.
Arceo, Reggie           24  FS          11   23                23                ---  
   
$$ - player is suspended, ## - player is inactive,  
** = player is injured, %% - player is on IR.  
   
Players Under Contract: 36
Inactive: 0
On Active Roster: 36
   
Salary Cap: $90,800,000
Cap Room: $19,640,000
Maximum for New Player: $15,300,000
Cap Room Lost (to old contracts): $10,000
   
Cap Room Lost Next Year (to old contracts): $0
Cap Room Required Next Year: $53,940,000

36 guys on contract, 7 draft picks, 6 free pickups in early free agency… that gives us a base of 49 players. Shouldn’t be any major trouble filling us up to 53 this year, I think. Since we are already fairly sloe to the 20% mark on the salary cap, my guess is we will not be able to stay below that mark – so I’ll pencil in the 15% AP cost. This is going to be the next squeeze we face, on the cap, rather than just being able to fill up the roster.

Here’s my AP plan for the year ahead:


0 All staff hiring from last stage, at request or less
0 Europe tour will be for late round picks
0 Re-sign RFAs to requested contracts only
0 Use no rookie interviews
11 Base cost of our draft picks (we hold pick 1.32)
2 Approximate added cost of drafting players with strong combines
10 Implement custom gameplans at start of season (necessary to use my TE-first offense)
0 Implement staff controlled depth chart for full season
3 Set injury rate at 150
8 Four players occupying 5-10% of cap (LT Abraham, G Roller, WR Willett, CB Huffman)
6 Leave 25% of cap unused as of start of season

That leaves us with 10 AP to use on the roster, as that number keeps dwindling year by year for us. However, not a huge roster crisis – we need to get a starting QB signed, and we have a need for bodies at WR and LB, but I don’t see a crisis ahead anywhere. Between a few retention signings, and a few draft picks at need spots, we ought to be okay.

[QuikSand]

2016 Early Free Agency

0 – Sign RFA player to his requested one year contract (K Butler, LB Griffin, S Webb)
0 – Offer FA player 8th year+ requested contract 1yr no bonus (S Van Arsdale, WR Nikolaus, WR Glover)

The free fill-ins help to keep us with some continuity, and to inch us closer to a legal roster. WR Glover is the new face here, just a decent affinity guy with some return skills, at a thin position. The tougher choices are where to actually spend some AP.

Linebacker is a tough situation for us – we have our SILB starter Davidson signed, but the other three guys we use inside are all out of contract. At WILB, we have been using Shapiro and Conway, and Herb Harding has been an effective reserve for us. Shapiro is the main run stopper, and we have been pretty bad against the run – so losing him would seem to be awfully tough.

Now, looking more closely, Conway is pissed about playing time, so he won’t re-sign period. That makes this easier – so I put in a 3yr offer to LB Shapiro, using 2 AP there and thinking we can fill in behind him with either Harding or a rookie.

2 – Offer FA player a flat contract with at least 25% bonus (LB Shapiro)

There’s a 10th year DE who looks okay in free agency, but I decide to sit tight, wait out the first rush, and maybe scoop someone up later on. I’m not interested in blowing any AP making offers on players that old who might not even come aboard.

RB Clarence Starr had a pretty decent season last year as the main back in New England, and now he’s again looking for a cheap contract – but I don’t see how we could afford him, with three productive backs already on the roster.

I am correct in anticipating QB Adam Hoffman getting no suitors, so I feel like I can wait him out, and then likely meet his 3-yr demands in a later stage. Maurice Vaughn wont re-sign (playing time) so our backup option is probably to grab a multi-formation free agent, in case Hoffman walks. Second year guy Ike Summers may be start-worthy at some point, but with only four of our formations in his book, he isn’t ready to go yet (though we did send him to Europe).

LB Herb Harding takes a one year deal to play in Seattle, likely moving ILB up my list of draft day priorities, which is fine. Affinity guy and okay, but pretty replaceable.

1 – Offer FA player his requested contract (QB Hoffman)

Hoffman isn’t going to make much money, but he will be a fair bit above minimum salary. This gives us two guys at the QB position, and we will likely look for a cheap rookie to step in as our second option.

With that, we are up to 44 players signed, and 7 more on the way in the draft. I don’t feel pressure to burn through these AP – I don’t have anyone who looks too attractive in the FA market, so we’ll just sit tight, probably use a couple AP on undrafted rookies or maybe a young player, and then reneg out a couple guys to firm things up for next season.

[QuikSand]

2016 Rookie Draft

Having pick 32 is always a mixed blessing – sucks to see so many good players off the board ahead of you, but then you remember why you’re at 32, and it’s not so bad.

I end up going with a combine guy (with dreadful apparent bars) in S Scottie Levine. Combines say he’ll develop into a serious cover man and tackler – but for now he’s got only a couple of bars that look worth a damn. We may have to get creative with the staff-managed depth chart to get this guy developed.

Pick Pos Name                  Grd Adj Dash  ST  BP  Agil  Bjump  PS  Dev  AP
1.32 S   Scottie Levine        5.5 5.2 4.55  27  17  7.00! 7-10   55! 48%   4
2.32 DT  Ken Richard           5.1 5.5 4.99+ 30+ 28  7.72  9-02+  --  38%   3
3.32 OLB Brant Binkow          4.8 4.6 4.58+ 28+ 25! 7.53  9-10+  34  28%   3
4.18 WR  Lamont Sapolu         4.4 4.6 4.48  18  15+ 7.18  10-00  47  15%   1
4.32 G   Chuck Tyler           4.6 4.4 5.00! 40! 28  8.38- 8-01   --  14%   2
5.32 QB  Randall Kanell        4.3 4.9 4.65+ 30  10  7.79  8-01   80+ 17%   1
6.32 CB  Kevin Donovan         3.9 4.0 4.49  25+ 11  7.58- 10-03  39  32%   0
7.32 C   Jorge Hurst           5.5 4.7 5.31  24  32+ 7.73! 9-02!  --  10%   1

DT Richard will move outside and hopefully be a solid rotation DE for us. LB Binkow looks like a pure SLB, but seems too good to pass up, even though our real need is someone to play inside.

Extra 4th round pick (forgot about that trade) yields WR Sapolu, who looks like a very good kick returner and capable WR.

[QuikSand]

2016 Late Free Agency

We get a pointless trade offer for QB Hoffman -- where were they when he went unwanted through 9 stages of free agency? We also have a holdout, from WR Willett, who is in excellent position to demand anything he wants from us, as our only credible receiving threat whatsoever.

We bow to Willett’s demands – he needed to be extended this year, anyway, I think. So that eats 2 AP right away, leaving us with 3 more to use. We do have 52 players signed, so this works out fairly neatly – we’ll sign one rookie, and leave enough AP to do a late-season extension with one veteran, most likely CB Shawn Kibble, which will get very expensive.

2 – Sign current player to his requested renegotiation (WR Willett)

I use our AP to land one more linebacker, a guy I think we can slot inside as our top reserve there.

1 – Sign a FA rookie player (LB Novacek)

Top Ten Most Likely Busts:

Name                          Team             Pos	Change
Poston, Tyrone                Cleveland        FL	-8
Boyer, Sedrick                Cleveland        LCB	-7
Tamme, Maurice                Cleveland        TE	-7
Griffin, Buddy                Cleveland        SLB	-6
Jones, Mel                    Cleveland        LT	-6
McKnight, Mitch               Cleveland        RDE	-6
Farnsworth, William           Cleveland        LDE	-5
Hurst, Jorge                  Cleveland        RG	-5
Rees, Toby                    Cleveland        LDE	-5
Buffington, Phillip           Cleveland        RG	-4


Top Ten Most Likely Breakouts:

Name                          Team             Pos	Change
Levine, Scottie               Cleveland        FS	9
Glover, Fred                  Cleveland        FL	8
Summers, Ike                  Cleveland        QB	5
Webb, Brenden                 Cleveland        SS	3
Ulbricht, Conrad              Cleveland        FS	1
Davidson, Roman               Cleveland        RDE	1
Kibble, Shawn                 Cleveland        LCB	1
Anagnostis, Archie            Cleveland        RB	1
Lemoine, Hardy                Cleveland        P	1
Butler, Vinny                 Cleveland        K	1

So… we’re seeing declines among a number of veterans, no real surprise there. This is a veteran team, really, and that’s how it goes at this stage of each season.

Safety Scottie Levine delivers in camp, that +9 reaffirms my thinking that he’s going to be a lot better than those initial bars. QB Ike Summers posts a +5 after last year’s +2, and now I suspect we have our QB situation in better shape than I had thought. Summers is only 18/39 now, but his bar profile looks good, and I suspect we might invest some AP into training camp to try to bump his formations for next season, unless Hoffman keeps this team completely rolling.

The bump from WR Glover is nice, just volatility, but given the bump he probably will get 60 targets for us this year, so as a minsal guy, that’s not bad.

[QuikSand]

2016 Season

In preseason, we have some serious injuries, none worse than SILB Davidson, who is suddenly gone for the year. Our OLB are universally underweight, and I can’t get anyone into the SILB slot (none could even gain weight) – this is a mess, given that we don’t have the AP left to assume control of the depth chart. Okay – I check again, and Omar Flowers can move inside (though he wasn’t able to gain weight in camp). He will be solid, and that frees up our rookie Binkow for some time at the strong outside slot behind the versatile Carlton Tate (who seems to play in the weak spot a fair amount, despite my apparent depth chart).

This team doesn’t start off tentatively like it has the last two – we tear out to a solid 3-0, with the offense clicking very nicely. We run it out to 8-0, and the team is just blistering now – Archie is already sitting on over a thousand yards at our halfway point, and Hoffman is up north of a hundred in his passer rating.

Cincinnati nips us to end our unbeaten run, but we remain a game ahead in the division race. We again are facing crazy injuries, with DE St. Amal out for the whole season so far with “anxiety.” Whatever.

With two games left, we need a pretty good run from Archie to hang the 2,000 yard season. 120 in Week 16 gets him within striking distance, but he still needs 147 in the finale to hit the elusive season mark. Meanwhile, Hoffman has gone 9 games without a pick – and we are tough to handle if we don’t give the ball away.

Well, as I’m looking at stats, we actually manage to lose our last game and slide into a tie with Pittsburgh at 13-3, but we luckily hang on for the division and bye week. Archie ends up at 1961 yards – a great year, of course, but disappointing to fall just short of the big number.

Front Office Football 2007
2016 Summary for Cleveland Browns
   
Year                2016                                      
Record              13-3                                      
Winning Pct.        .812                                      
All-Time            89-85-2                                   
Winning Pct.        .511                                      
Playoffs            6-2                                       
Playoff Visits      4                                         
Bowl Wins           1                                         
Head Coach          Ricky Dodge                               
Record              27-9                                      
Winning Pct.        .750                                      
Off. Coord.         V. Chiles                                 
Def. Coord.         W. Perry                                  
   
Cleveland Browns        Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         37.1      1           
Rushing Yards           160.2     1           
Yards Per Carry         4.32      8           
Pass Attempts           23.3      32          
Completions             16.8      32          
Completion Pct.         72.1      1           
Passing Yards           181.1     30          
Yards Per Attempt       7.77      2           
Yards Per Catch         10.77     16          
Total Yardage Gained    334.3     11          
3rd Down Conversions    48.0      2           
Points Per Game         27.6      2           
Pass Rush Pct.          22.4      7           
Pass Defense Pct.       65.9      3           
Turnovers               6         1           
Turnover Margin         +29       1           
   
Opponents               Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         25.5      7 (T)       
Rushing Yards           116.7     18          
Yards Per Carry         4.58      31          
Pass Attempts           33.3      14 (T)      
Completions             19.6      6           
Completion Pct.         58.8      10          
Passing Yards           221.9     18          
Yards Per Attempt       6.67      19          
Yards Per Catch         11.35     29          
Total Yardage Gained    318.9     14          
3rd Down Conversions    40.4      23          
Points Per Game         15.3      3           
Pass Rush Pct.          14.6      1           
Pass Defense Pct.       21.5      1           
Turnovers               35        1           
   
Week  Team  Versus        Oppnt  
1     26    BAL           15      
2     29    WAS           24      
3     26    JAX           14      
4     17    at BUF        0       
5     24    PIT           10      
6     31    MIA           15      
7     34    NYJ           17      
8     28    at NED        10      
9     19    at BAL        14      
11    17    at CIN        23      
12    27    PHI           0       
13    34    at KCY        35      
14    34    at NYK        14      
15    31    CIN           13      
16    41    at DAL        10      
17    24    at PIT        31      
   
Passing                 Pos   Att   Comp  Yards Y/Att TD    Int   Rate  
13 A. Hoffman           QB    373   269   2898  7.77  26    3     114.4   
**Team                  ---   373   269   2898  7.77  26    3     114.4   
$$Opp                   ---   532   313   3551  6.67  19    24    72.0    
   
Rushing                 Pos   Att   Yards Y/Att TD    Fum  
17 A. Anagnostis        RB    437   1961  4.49  19    4       
37 W. Woodson           RB    95    344   3.62  2     0       
13 A. Hoffman           QB    60    253   4.22  1     3       
**Team                  ---   593   2563  4.32  22    10      
$$Opp                   ---   408   1867  4.58  11    28      
   
Receiving               Pos   Targ  Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop  TD  
8 A. Willett            WR    78    59    772   13.08 9.90  3     10      
17 A. Anagnostis        RB    70    59    540   9.15  7.71  2     6       
89 R. Gerth             TE    56    38    363   9.55  6.48  3     2       
85 M. Tamme             TE    60    35    349   9.97  5.82  7     2       
46 L. Buchanan          TE    30    22    194   8.82  6.47  2     2       
   
Defense                 Pos   Tack  Asst  Sack  Hurr  Ints  Defn  PDPct  
53 C. Tate              OLB   96    29    5.0   3     1     8     74.9    
23 O. Voss              S     84    24    1.0   3     4     17    82.2    
57 V. Shapiro           ILB   68    17    0.5   0     0     2     77.0    
93 D. Francis           OLB   67    23    19.0  21    0     0     78.9    
52 O. Flowers           ILB   65    31    0.0   1     3     2     77.6    
92 M. Furman            DT    46    22    3.5   7     0     0     81.5    
28 S. Kibble            CB    44    15    0.0   0     3     13    80.2    
30 M. Huffman           CB    37    10    0.0   1     1     11    81.3    
90 R. Davidson          DE    29    12    8.5   10    0     0     82.2    
43 C. Ulbricht          S     28    8     0.0   1     5     5     84.4    
73 M. McKnight          DE    24    5     3.0   1     0     0     81.8    
40 S. Levine            S     24    7     0.0   0     3     2     83.8    
29 K. Donovan           CB    20    3     0.0   0     2     0     78.6    
41 S. Boyer             CB    19    6     0.0   0     2     3     82.9    
72 W. Farnsworth        DE    19    8     7.0   12    0     0     81.8    
15 B. Griffin           ILB   18    0     1.0   0     0     2     72.0    

Well, this is basically what I would have hoped for from this offense, honestly. We are running the ball a bit better than average, even though we held a lot of leads. Good. When we do pass, we are very efficient – 72% and nearly 8 ypa is awfully solid, given the caliber of players we have in the key roles there. And the defense is playing well – we got some big numbers once again from WLB Francis (I still don’t quite know what happened there last year) but our defense overall was pretty solid.

Archie… 2500 total yards and 25 TD. Not much more to say, he certainly brought it all together.

So, we get our bye week as the #1 seed, and await a wild card winner. No surprise, it’s Pittsburgh.

Divisional Playoff: PIT (14-3) at CLE (13-3) – This plays out a lot like our playoff opener last year – Hoffman caps off a tying drive with a last-minute TD pass, and send the game into overtime. But this time it’s the opponent who gets the TD pass in overtime – PIT takes their second possession all the way for the winning score, and we are one-and-out.

The Steelers, incidentally, run out the string and win it all. Second straight year a wild card team from our division wears the crown.


We have a few options for a renegotiation, but I decide to lock up our superstar cornerback, Shawn Kibble. That leaves a few pretty valuable players heading to the free agent waters next year, where we may have some more pressure on our 50 AP limit than has been the case to date.

My overall take is – last year, we were not an elite team, but made a run all the way. this year we were truly elite, essentially the best team in the league, and got a tough break in the one-and-out playoffs. As a team, we have pretty clearly arrived. Makes it tough to be thinking about a new direction at QB when the incumbent guy is basically fitting perfectly into the objectives of this team.

[QuikSand]

2017 Initial Offseason

So, we have one retirement – WR Tyrone Poston. Chemistry leader and punt returner roles up for grabs, but his play as a reserve wideout wasn’t special. Nobody in our WR corps has been special, other than Willett.

This year we again bring 36 players into the season under contract. Add in 6 free signings and 7 rookies, and that’s again 49 guys before we spend any AP. Again this season, it seems like we will be able to focus on quality more than quantity.


Here’s my AP plan for the year ahead:

0 All staff hiring from last stage, at request or less
0 Europe tour will be for late round pick
0 Re-sign RFAs to requested contracts only
0 Use no rookie interviews
11 Base cost of our draft picks (we hold pick 1.29)
2 Approximate added cost of drafting players with strong combines
10 Implement custom gameplans at start of season (necessary to use my TE-first offense)
0 Implement staff controlled depth chart for full season
3 Set injury rate at 150
8 Four players occupying 5-10% of cap (LT Abraham, G Roller, WR Willett, CB Kibble)
6 Leave 15% of cap unused as of start of season

This leaves us with 10 AP to use on roster moves, same as last season.

We’re short at WR and DB right now, both seem resolvable.

[QuikSand]

2017 Early Free Agency

0 – Sign RFA player to his requested one year contract (RB Woodson, C Smith, WR Williamson)

2 – Sign RFA player on an unrestricted new contract (S Ulbricht)

Feeling like I have some flexibility with my AP here, I decide to lock up Ulbricht, coming off a pretty good season, for three years rather than one. Even if we eventually re-sign S Van Arsdale, I like Ulbricht enough as a cover man to keep him around a while.

Now, for the wide-open stuff. TE Maurice Tamme is a tough call for us. I am quite pleased with the bar profile of our other two tight ends – Buchanan is completely maxed out in all three blocking categories (converted stud fullback, mental note) and our younger guy Rufus Gerth is rated 100 in run blocking, 100 in route running, and strong in getting downfield and courage. In my mind, this is a very solid combo for the two starting job in this offense, so Tamme projects as a solid across-the-board reserve, in his 11th year (and likely to decline). The last two years Tamme posted sub-6 ypt numbers, so he is simply not a real value added in the passing game. I think it’s time to move on, especially since he’s looking for a good deal more than minimum salary.

S Lincoln Van Arsdale has been out DB leader for some time, but we now have zero affinities with him. He has basically been passed by both Levine and Ulbricht for playing time (despite LVA having a very high zone coverage rating) so all he could do for us would be a deep reserve and an affinity void. Tough to justify thee AP cost for that over a younger more versatile player, I think.

LB Omar Flowers is pretty solid, and is looking for a 5 year deal – to lock him up long terms would be pretty nice. However, he’s looking for $3m or so a year, not quite 5% stuff, but tough on the salary cap. Since right now he’s essentially our 4th best linebacker, and might not even have a starting job, I don’t see that working out. I like him, but he’s not that tough to replace, I don’t think.

I actually don’t have any of the 8 year free signigns in hand yet – I’m going to wait to see if a few guys seeking slight bonuses might still be around, with lowered demands, in the later stages of free agency. In particular, I would really like to re-up with CB Sedrick Boyer, who’s in his 9th year but seeking a modest bonus in the early stages. I think that some of these guys drop that demand in the late stages, from previous careers under similar rules.


In the first FA stage, I have no offers in at all to unrestricted players. TE Tamme and LB Flowers both get offers right away, and our kicker immediately signs with Buffalo. Tamme is going to get $2m per year – way more than I can spend, so that’s a done deal. LB Flowers more than $3m per… so pretty much the same story, these guys are going to walk.

In week 4, CB Sedrick Boyer gets a one year offer, and it’s time for me to decide what to do there. He’s got high loyalty, but his asking price is still below his best offer – so putting in the 1 AP offer might not even land him. I give it a shot anyway, trying to lock him up for one year with a modest bonus… and he signs with us immediately. Okay, then – in my mind, we have 4 CB and 3 S signed, and while it might be nice to find some value there, the pressure is off to force something.

1 – Offer FA player his requested contract (CB Boyer)

I am still contemplating using more AP than usual to manage my training camp and to pump my quarterbacks full of formation gains. Still on the table, but our roster moves may threaten that plan.

In the late stages of free agency, I am looking to fill in the roster with free veteran signings, and maybe to put in a keep-him-around bid on one or two of our own guys, even if not free. My defensive line needs to take some shape here, at least. We have 6 defensive linemen signed, but that number includes a no-talent guy like Hutton and assumes we will let two productive defensive ends in St. Amal and Farnsworth simply walk away. I decide that Farnsworth is worth paying a few bucks to keep around, and we take him up on his decent 3yr demands for 1 AP. St. Amal we will let walk – he’s creating a conflict with Roman Davidson who has firmly claimed the starting RDE job, so I think that’s best for all there.

1 – Offer FA player his requested contract (DE Farnsworth)

S Van Arsdale is not yet off his demand of a bonus, and I don’t think I will spend an AP to keep him around. Instead, I will look to get some depth at WR, TE, and LB if possible. (Incidentally, the way to search for these guys in this conatrsined system is basically to pull up the free agents page, and sort by contract – right now the minsal for an 8th year player is exactly 630K, and while some guys want a 20K bonus on top, it’s the guy who sort as 630K exactly who are eligible to be signed for free… just a practical tip for anyone who might use the AP system)

0 – Offer FA player 8th year+ requested contract 1yr no bonus (WR Hout, LB Baze, DE Hall)

So, we sit at 45 players signed to contracts, with 7 draft picks ahead. That charts our path to use an extra 3 AP to modify our training camp, sign one after-draft rookie, and still be able to do one or two key renegotiations to extend players or resolve holdouts. Works for me.

[QuikSand]

2017 Rookie Draft

I come into the draft not really urgently needing immediate help anywhere. I feel like we could do well to add an impact player at DE, and we surely could use some legitimate depth at WR, but neither is in a crisis situation – WR is probably the closest we have to a desperate situation.

So, with our top pick… intriguing guys at CB, TE, and DE. Nothing very exciting at receiver, though. While I really like the top tight end, I decide that CB is the higher need medium term (with Huffman in his 9th year, he’s due for a decline before long) and I go there to lock up the best-looking coverage corner I see.

The top tight end is still on the board about 10 picks later, and I decide to try to move up to land him. It takes our 3,4, and 5 in this draft to move up to 2.11, but I love this guy as a great fit for us, and I think we can manage the AP shift involved. (Wondering to myself… since I don’t have to spend the AP for the draft picks I just used… is this too attractive an approach in any given draft, especially when I am not facing roster shortages overall?)

Pick Pos Name                  Grd Adj Dash  ST  BP  Agil  Bjump  PS  Dev  AP
1.28 CB  Dennis Hills          5.3 5.5 4.45+ 24  14  7.41- 9-02-  54! 29%   4
2.11 TE  Tony Burke            5.6 4.9 4.63+ 27+ 23  7.28! 10-00  43+ 32%   4 (+1 for trade)
6.30 WR  Toby Crain            3.6 3.7 4.59  15  10  7.26  10-05+ 40  17%   0
7.29 WR  Darrel Agrela         3.7 3.8 4.43+ 12-  9  7.06+ 8-06-  47  15%   0

We use our two late round picks to enhance our depth at WR a bit – Crain is likely just a return man, and Agrela might oneday be a usable wingman type who doesn’t get many targets. Neither is likely anything too special.

On the by-the-way subject…

Pick Pos Name                  Grd Adj Dash  ST  BP  Agil  Bjump  PS  Dev  AP
7.29 TE  Dan Harden            4.5 3.9 4.71+ 32+ 30! 7.54+ 8-10   22+ 22%   1

As I was writing this guy up to be my last draft pick, it occurred to me that with those combines, there’s no reason to take him in round 7. I can just draft someone else here who won’t cost me anything in AP, and then I can just go sign TE Harden in free agency for nothing more than anyone else. Seems to be a weakness in the AP incentive system, worthy of some thought. Same goes for any no-combine guy, or anyone whose characteristics would up-tick his AP cost as a draft pick, but not as a FA signing. Not sure how to get around that, really… once they slide to round 6 or 7, why not let them slide all the way out, if you’re already planning to sign a rookie or two anyway?

It also occurs to me that I should have asked for a 6th or 7th round pick back in the trade with Green Bay. These guys, picked carefully, have zero AP cost to sign, and take three year contracts – that can surely help with our ability to field a full roster down the road. Another thing to think about, both for this team and in evaluating the incentives of the AP system.

[QuikSand]

2017 Late Free Agency

We get into late free agency, and I definitely want to land TE Harden, from above. Since I saved enough AP from our draft maneuvering to free up some more latitude with roster moves, I can open my horizons a bit. We sit on 45 signed players plus 4 draft picks… so our path to 53 could still have a few turns ahead. I’m still waiting to see a quality RFA who was allowed to walk away – that’s often a solid way to make an addition here (at high AP cost) and maybe this is the year we can do it.

By my count, we have 10 AP left to use – we were 6 under budget going into the draft, and then our draft (including the AP cost of the trade) was only 9, rather than the 13 I had planned on. So, that’s more latitude than I’m used to here. We will likely spend 3 on a custom training camp to bump up formations for our QB, but past that I’m flexible. I’m thinking we sign 3 rookies in late free agency, and use the remaining 4 for renegotiations.

LB Dustin Francis, returning first team OLB off his 18-sack campaign, is thinking that minimum salary isn’t what he’s worth, understandably. Tough call here – he has been a great numbers producer, but he’s not exactly an exceptional talent, nor is he a young guy. Do I want to commit $4m to a guy who’s already in his 9th year, rated 34/34 overall, and likely on the decline? Do I need to answer that question? We’ll likely wait him out.

1 – Sign a FA rookie player (TE
1 – Sign a FA rookie player (K Buchanan)
1 – Offer any other FA player his requested contract (WR Lincoln)

I decide to bolster our WR group by signing a one-time Brown Johnnie Lincoln. He was a solid player for us for a number of years, has played on one-year contracts since (one big year with Cinti) and now we’ll bring him back for another one year deal for minsal plus a sliver.

So, we take 52 guys into training camp, with one starter holding out. Let’s see how it goes.

Top Ten Most Likely Busts:

Name                          Team             Pos	Change
Williamson, Kendall           Cleveland        SE	-13
Hall, Rondell                 Cleveland        LDE	-11
Roller, Shane                 Cleveland        LG	-11
McKnight, Mitch               Cleveland        RDE	-10
Huffman, Michael              Cleveland        RCB	-9
Money, Hugh                   Cleveland        RB	-7
Crain, Toby                   Cleveland        SE	-7
Agrela, Darrell               Cleveland        SE	-6
Abraham, Desmond              Cleveland        LT	-5
Baze, Lamar                   Cleveland        WLB	-5


Top Ten Most Likely Breakouts:

Name                          Team             Pos	Change
Burke, Tony                   Cleveland        TE	5
Ulbricht, Conrad              Cleveland        FS	1
Summers, Ike                  Cleveland        QB	1
Kanell, Randall               Cleveland        QB	1
Hoffman, Adam                 Cleveland        QB	1
Tate, Carlton                 Cleveland        SLB	0
Buchanan, Lamar               Cleveland        TE	0
Harden, Dan                   Cleveland        TE	0
Castillo, Devin               Cleveland        RT	0
Woodson, Walt                 Cleveland        RB	0

I sank 5 hours into the study room, trying to bump formations for our quarterbacks, especially for young Ike Summers. He gains one useless formation for us, great. But Adam Hoffman gains one, giving him the full complement of 7 that we use, so that might actually help. But honestly, with Hoffman coming off a 114-rated season, why am I tangled up in that position anyhow? Summers might be creeping, but Hoffman clearly knows what he’s doing in this offense.

As for the ratings movement… lots of losses, nothing totally shocking, though a bit more and heavier than I might have hoped to see. TE Tony Burke gave me the bump I had been hoping for, so he probably slots right into a three-headed platoon at the TE position for right away. But our other top rookie CB Hills has a –5 swing, and that doesn’t bode too well.

LB Dustin Francis gives up and comes back to the team, so we are free to manage out remaining 4 AP however we like. I have to do one cap-out reneg to get us just under our 15% limitation.

[QuikSand]

2017 Season

The preseason games are friendly to us, we suffer only a couple of minor injuries. Would be nice to not have to patch together a defensive front for the first time in years.

We start the season looking really good, winning our first 2 games comfortably and everything falling into place nicely. Two losses, though, slip us to 4-2 and we are a game behind our rival Steelers. Another loss against lowly Baltimore, and we’re in some trouble, coasting in to our halfway point at 5-3 with two games against Pittsburgh still coming up.

WR Willett goes down with an injury, and our offense all but implodes – we are shut down by Pittsburgh 13-3, and then by Cinti the following week even worse. We’re suddenly a team in real trouble – I figured us for title contenders, but here we sit at 5-5, fighting for some shot to sneak into the playoffs at all. Ouch.

We finally get Willett back and manage to beat the Jets – but 6-6 isn’t very good. We are two games out of the wild card, with 4 to play – long odds, even if we win out from here. We go get two wins, including a big one against Pitt, and that gets us up to 8-6, only a game behind both Pitt and Cinti. Keep hope alive.

But, a loss at Green Bay ends our hopes. Wow. Last game is meaningless, as we are out of the hunt with a week to spare – didn’t see that coming at all.

Front Office Football 2007
2017 Summary for Cleveland Browns
   
Year                2017                                      
Record              8-8                                       
Winning Pct.        .500                                      
All-Time            97-93-2                                   
Winning Pct.        .510                                      
Playoffs            6-3                                       
Playoff Visits      4                                         
Bowl Wins           1                                         
Head Coach          Ricky Dodge                               
Record              35-18                                     
Winning Pct.        .660                                      
Off. Coord.         V. Chiles                                 
Def. Coord.         W. Perry                                  
   
Cleveland Browns        Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         32.2      5           
Rushing Yards           138.0     4           
Yards Per Carry         4.29      6           
Pass Attempts           26.5      32          
Completions             17.6      30          
Completion Pct.         66.5      7           
Passing Yards           189.2     30          
Yards Per Attempt       7.14      9 (T)       
Yards Per Catch         10.73     14 (T)      
Total Yardage Gained    316.6     16          
3rd Down Conversions    44.2      4           
Points Per Game         19.8      19          
Pass Rush Pct.          17.4      28          
Pass Defense Pct.       39.5      27          
Turnovers               23        10 (T)      
Turnover Margin         -1        16 (T)      
   
Opponents               Team      Rank  
Rushes per Game         28.4      22          
Rushing Yards           111.8     18          
Yards Per Carry         3.94      14          
Pass Attempts           30.1      2           
Completions             20.9      14          
Completion Pct.         69.4      31          
Passing Yards           207.3     8           
Yards Per Attempt       6.90      23          
Yards Per Catch         9.93      1           
Total Yardage Gained    300.8     7           
3rd Down Conversions    47.2      30 (T)      
Points Per Game         18.6      11          
Pass Rush Pct.          15.1      1           
Pass Defense Pct.       41.1      10          
Turnovers               22        24 (T)      
   
Week  Team  Versus        Oppnt  
1     26    CIN           14      
2     34    at MIN        8       
3     16    at OAK        10      
4     23    TEN           35      
5     37    at JAX        10      
6     16    at HOU        31      
7     17    at BAL        20      
8     20    IND           6       
9     3     PIT           13      
11    10    at CIN        34      
12    7     CHI           20      
13    31    NYJ           7       
14    20    DET           12      
15    26    at PIT        15      
16    10    at GBY        34      
17    20    BAL           28      
   
Passing                 Pos   Att   Comp  Yards Y/Att TD    Int   Rate  
13 A. Hoffman           QB    413   278   2998  7.26  16    11    90.2    
**Team                  ---   424   282   3027  7.14  16    11    89.0    
$$Opp                   ---   481   334   3317  6.90  23    12    94.2    
   
Rushing                 Pos   Att   Yards Y/Att TD    Fum  
17 A. Anagnostis        RB    371   1701  4.58  12    6       
37 W. Woodson           RB    111   393   3.54  3     1       
**Team                  ---   515   2208  4.29  16    17      
$$Opp                   ---   454   1789  3.94  11    21      
   
Receiving               Pos   Targ  Catch Yards Y/Ctc Y/Tar Drop  TD  
17 A. Anagnostis        RB    92    71    695   9.79  7.55  4     2       
89 R. Gerth             TE    96    56    581   10.38 6.05  5     5       
8 A. Willett            WR    74    49    699   14.27 9.45  4     2       
46 L. Buchanan          TE    52    34    263   7.74  5.06  0     2       
47 L. Stanton           FB    25    21    210   10.00 8.40  0     1       
84 E. Hout              WR    24    16    198   12.38 8.25  2     1       
44 T. Burke             TE    31    16    179   11.19 5.77  6     2       
   
Defense                 Pos   Tack  Asst  Sack  Hurr  Ints  Defn  PDPct  
53 C. Tate              OLB   100   30    7.5   0     1     8     73.2    
40 S. Levine            S     85    32    1.0   0     4     4     77.3    
94 B. Davidson          ILB   69    28    2.0   1     0     3     73.4    
57 V. Shapiro           ILB   64    9     0.0   1     0     2     71.7    
28 S. Kibble            CB    54    18    1.0   0     4     14    82.5    
92 M. Furman            DT    53    20    6.0   6     0     0     81.3    
23 O. Voss              S     48    18    0.0   1     1     4     76.7    
93 D. Francis           OLB   45    21    7.5   13    0     0     78.6    
30 M. Huffman           CB    40    6     0.0   0     2     5     74.6    
41 S. Boyer             CB    37    18    0.0   0     0     3     77.8    
90 R. Davidson          DE    33    6     4.0   8     0     0     81.7    
95 K. Richard           DE    30    18    4.0   4     0     0     80.3    
50 L. Baze              ILB   24    9     0.0   0     0     0     72.9    
24 D. Hills             CB    21    2     0.0   0     0     3     80.3    

So, the most visible dropoff is at QB – Hoffman was downright brilliant last season, and just solid this year. Interceptions way up, and our unreal turnover margin from last year evaporated completely. Archie was basically himself, but clearly our running game wasn’t while playing from ahead like we had gotten used to.

On defense, LB Tate is proving himself to be our real centerpiece, and CB Kibble is the real thing. Past that, we had an active season from young S Levine, but I don’t want a safety racking up tackles that way, to be honest.

So, we wrap up new contracts with G Roller and DT Furman, but we will have several key players, notably on the offensive line, up for new contracts next season. On the surface, that leaves LB Tate exposed as a free agent, so I elect to “borrow” 2 AP from next year, and lock him up for three more seasons.


Cincinnati goes on to win over Green Bay in the title game – three in a row for our division.

[QuikSand]

2018 Initial Offseason

Okay, I didn’t expect the disappointing 8-8 season… especially while this team seemed to have really hit its stride in the last couple seasons. Now, we are again going to be among the top-rated rosters in the league (we had been the 100 for a couple years prior to rating a 95 last year behind Tenessee). My sense is, though, that we are going to start having some cap/AP troubles this season – and that might become the defining issue with this team in the next couple of seasons.

Here’s the scout’s impression of the roster we bring into the new season:

Front Office Football 2007
Cleveland Browns Roster, Scout Overview
   
  Player                #   Pos   Start Exp  Current Estimate  Future Estimate Cntrct 
Hoffman, Adam           13  QB          8    40                40                1 yr.
Summers, Ike            19  QB          4    24                40                ---  
Kanell, Randall         18  QB          3    16                39                1 yr.
Andersen, Bernard       15  QB          2    5                 22                ---  
Anagnostis, Archie      17  RB          4    72                72                1 yr.
Woodson, Walt           37  RB          5    42                42                ---  
Money, Hugh             21  RB          4    37                37                ---  
Stanton, Leon           47  FB          7    58                58                2 yrs
Buchanan, Lamar         46  TE          7    74                74                3 yrs
Gerth, Rufus            89  TE          4    57                57                ---  
Burke, Tony             44  TE          2    42                50                2 yrs
Harden, Dan             81  TE          2    22                39                2 yrs
Willett, Amos           8   FL          11   62                62                1 yr.
Hout, Emmanuel          84  FL          11   26                26                ---  
Sapolu, Lamont          82  SE          3    43                49                1 yr.
Crain, Toby             10  SE          2    23                42                2 yrs
Williamson, Kendall     88  SE          5    20                20                ---  
Agrela, Darrell         80  SE          2    17                32                2 yrs
Di Pardo, Sean          59  C           8    71                71                ---  
Smith, Herman           60  C           5    47                62                ---  
Roller, Shane           77  LG          9    72                72                2 yrs
Tyler, Chuck            66  LG          3    49                52                1 yr.
Buffington, Phillip     64  RG          11   46                46                ---  
**Hurst, Jorge          54  RG          3    44                63                1 yr.
Abraham, Desmond        65  LT          12   71                71                ---  
Jones, Mel              69  LT          4    18                18                ---  
Castillo, Devin         78  RT          8    81                81                1 yr.
Lemoine, Hardy          3   P           4    40                40                ---  
Buchanan, Byron         2   K           2    34                43                2 yrs
Richard, Ken            95  LDE         3    50                50                1 yr.
Farnsworth, William     72  LDE         9    41                41                2 yrs
Hall, Rondell           71  LDE         9    28                28                ---  
Hutton, Roger           97  LDE         4    16                16                ---  
Davidson, Roman         90  RDE         4    49                49                ---  
McKnight, Mitch         73  RDE         12   30                30                ---  
Furman, Mack            92  NT          6    70                70                3 yrs
Spetz, Kendall          76  NT          9    30                30                ---  
Davidson, Brian         94  SILB        6    55                55                1 yr.
Shapiro, Vince          57  WILB        7    47                47                1 yr.
Baze, Lamar             50  WILB        9    25                25                ---  
Tate, Carlton           53  SLB         5    76                76                3 yrs
Binkow, Brant           91  SLB         3    36                49                1 yr.
Francis, Dustin         93  WLB         10   30                30                ---  
Novack, Leslie          58  WLB         3    27                50                1 yr.
Kibble, Shawn           28  LCB         7    88                88                2 yrs
Boyer, Sedrick          41  LCB         10   41                41                ---  
Huffman, Michael        30  RCB         10   60                60                ---  
Hills, Dennis           24  RCB         2    44                61                3 yrs
Donovan, Kevin          29  RCB         3    30                31                1 yr.
Voss, Otis              23  SS          7    56                56                ---  
Lyons, Tom              25  SS          2    11                18                ---  
Levine, Scottie         40  FS          3    49                49                2 yrs
Ulbricht, Conrad        43  FS          5    36                36                2 yrs
   
$$ - player is suspended, ## - player is inactive,  
** = player is injured, %% - player is on IR.  
   
Players Under Contract: 29
Inactive: 0
On Active Roster: 29
   
Salary Cap: $109,600,000
Cap Room: $47,390,000
Maximum for New Player: $42,270,000
Cap Room Lost (to old contracts): $0
   
Cap Room Lost Next Year (to old contracts): $0
Cap Room Required Next Year: $40,760,000

So this year, only 29 players – off a cliff a bit compared to the last couple of seasons. And we are obviously illegal in lots of places. We’ll work on that later. But for now, the defining matter is just sheer numbers. 29 + 6 free signings + 7 draft picks is a “base” of 42 players before we start using our action points. Assuming we use something like 10 AP to add players, we’re awfully unlikely to get anywhere near a full 53 man roster this year.

Adding to matter is the slate of quality players of ours who are going to be available as free agents. Left to my own devices, I’d be looking to re-sign LT Abraham, C DiPardo, CB Huffman and S Voss to pretty much whatever they wanted, as they have all proven to be reliable players. As it stands, I suspect we have cap space to lock up two or three of them, but the AP cost will leave us without a lot of wiggle room elsewhere. And I need to remember that I’m paying a 3 AP penalty for overbudgeting last season.

Anyway, here’s my AP plan for the year ahead:

0 All staff hiring from last stage, at request or less
0 Europe tour will be for late round pick
0 Re-sign RFAs to requested contracts only
0 Use no rookie interviews
11 Base cost of our draft picks (we hold pick 1.19)
0 Approximate added cost of drafting players with strong combines
10 Implement custom gameplans at start of season (necessary to use my TE-first offense)
0 Implement staff controlled depth chart for full season
3 Set injury rate at 150
3 Three players occupying 5-10% of cap (LB Tate, WR Willett, CB Kibble)
6 Leave 15% of cap unused as of start of season
3 Penalty for borrowing 2 AP in last year’s allocation

I am going to actively try to economize in the draft, so I’m writing off our anticipated extra costs. But this schedule still leaves me only 11 AP to use for personnel moves. Let’s say we manage to secure three of those top veterans to stick around – those contracts will almost certainly cost us 2 AP each. That drops us to just 5 AP.. very possibly less, if any of those new contracts peak up over the 5% mark (costing 2 AP each). We might need those just to lock up a couple of our quality RFAs… and that means zero renegotiations, zero in-season fill-ins, and no wiggle room at all (read: a holdout and we’re screwed). This is finally the year where we are really pressed right up against the AP limit.

And while it might be tempting to push some of the pressure off until next year we have a complicating factor there, too. RB Archie Agagnostis, our major workhorse running back and team centerpiece, is in his contract walk year right now. So far, his idea of a renegotiation/extension is in the ballpark of $10m a year. If we end up going for that, it makes things even tougher for us in keeping the balance of the team intact at all.

[QuikSand]

2018 Early Free Agency

So, we need to have a strategy for our top free agents. LT Abraham is starting to fade, but the OL has been pretty central to what we do here – and I have no backup plan behind me. I think 2 AP for a three year deal with him makes sense for us here. C Sean DiPardo is a tougher case – he has been rock solid for us, but he is a center after all. It’s just never that tough to find a decent-enough center. But I think for purposes of getting the most out of our running game, continuity and quality is worth the investment, and I’ll plan to put in a strong offer.

CB Huffman has been very solid for us. But he’s in his 10th season, is still recovering from an injury, and we have a young first rounder behind him. This is the guy we have to let go – though I will sit and watch, and if he gets pretty cheap and un-pursued in the late stages, I could see us taking a chance by just meeting his offer.

And finally, safety Otis Voss. He has been solid for us – career PD% of 80.1, and one first-team all pro selection. He’d be very nice to keep around, but if we don’t or can’t, we do have two guys on hand who are good enough to start, and safety is a fairly easy-to-fill position overall.

I decide on a 3 year offer to Di Pardo strategically built to stay under the 5% level each year, but with Abraham it just won’t be possible to hedge that way. I see only two options – either spend 4 AP on him (2 AP for a flat offer plus 2 AP for him being over 5% of the cap), or I spend only 1 AP on him by meeting his demands, and hoping that ours is the best offer he gets (loyalty of 24 won’t help a lot here). I think the way to play this is to wait a week, hope he doesn’t accept another offer immediately, and test the market –if nobody else bids right away, we’ll just meet his demands and try to do that (only a 2yr deal and pretty backloaded, but we’ll live).

With Otis Voss, I think we can get away with the 1 AP solution, and just put in his offer. He’s got 79 loyalty, and I think we have a real shot of retaining him that way.

2 – Offer FA player a flat contract with at least 25% bonus (C Di Pardo)
1 – Offer FA player his requested contract (S Voss)
0 – Sign RFA player to his requested one year contract (P Lemoine, QB Summers, RB Money)
1 – Sign RFA player to his requested multi year contract (TE Gerth)
1 – Sign RFA player to his requested multi year contract (DE Davidson)
0 – Offer FA player 8th year+ requested contract 1yr no bonus (LG Francis, DT Spetz)

That’s my first sortie of offers – we keep one zero-cost veteran signing for later, but seek to lock up a good group of our own players here. And we will watch and wait with LT Abraham. I’m also waiting on RG Buffington – a long time starter for us, who would help with cohesion, and likely will go unwanted here.

Well this will be tougher than I had feared. There are offers in on everyone – LT Abraham, CB Huffman, even our backup C Smith. To keep Abraham, we need to lay out some do-re-mi here, the two offers he sees are well above his asking price. I think we will keep Di Pardo, even though other offers are higher, he should stick around… same with S Voss. And Huffman, his demand is pretty cheap, I think it’s worth the risk to put it in and hope for a loyalty discount.

1 – Offer FA player his requested contract (CB Huffman)
1 – Offer FA player a one year, no bonus contract (C Smith)
2 – Offer FA player a flat contract with at least 25% bonus (T Abraham)

The offer to Abraham, if he accepts, will pay him over the 5% level this year, so there’s an extra AP cost there, too. Keeping him is expensive, but I think it’s the right thing to do here.

G Buffington gets, and takes an offer from the Vikings in stage 4, so we will not be returning our entire line after all. CB Sedrick Boyer also signs elsewhere, so my CB depth is less than I had hoped it might eventually be (was hoping he might go for a minsal deal later).

C Sean Di Pardo surprises me, and accepts a marginally better offer from Denver – so he’s now gone, too. I have my offer in on Smith, now that’s looking pretty important. In stage 8, he decides to take it.

Then the bomb drops. LT Abraham rejected my offer, which I believed to be excellent, for that of Buffalo. I am floored that he did it at all, but I’m also bewildered as to what we’re going to do now. Castillo can move to LT at 91% and that’s an option – we probably need to sign a veteran OT as well. But here I was making fairly extreme efforts to try to keep the whole OL intact, and now we’ll only return two starters after all.

So, taking stock now. We have 39 players signed. I had squeezed the draft budget down, to free up 11 AP for use in roster moves. Only 2 of those are left. I cannot cap out CB Kibble nor WR Willett to get them under 5%, but I can and do with LB Tate, that frees up 2 more AP for this year. I expect to engage in some draft day skullduggery too, but I still need pretty much all those bodies just to field a team this year.

I decide that we need to ink a tackle in free agency, and none of the free guys look very appetizing, so I spend an AP to get a guy I think can play if he has to.

1 – Offer FA player his requested contract (LT Floyd)
0 – Offer FA player 8th year+ requested contract 1yr no bonus (LT Chandler)

Floyd hasn’t put up good stats in Tampa Bay really, but he’s a decent, balanced LT and likely becomes our starter. Chandler is playable in a pinch, but more valuable as a chemistry leader for this group, building four affinities from where we had none.

Oh, wow. Our offer to Floyd is usurped by thee Giants – presumably they were losers in the derby to get Abraham, and moved on to Floyd as their next best option as well, and outbid his asking price. That’s 3 AP used up for nobody to play left tackle – and now our best option looks like 27/27 Max Chandler. Also, I have used up all my 1 AP multi-year offers, so even meeting another guy’s demands would cost 2 AP. This is going from bad to worse.

Best I can do here is to offer a free agent player a one year, non-bonus offer. I think the best path is to wait until after the draft, see what holes we have filled there, and how many AP e have to use then.