FOF 2004 - Taking The Lake Erie Challenge
 

The Lake Erie Challenge

Ahhh… the good old days. Taking the Cleveland Browns, the NFL’s expansion club, from the ground up and building a dynasty the old fashioned way, brick by brick. I remember it like it was yesterday, back at the old Sideline…

Anyway – I’m finally cracking open FOF 2004, and am going to give this game a whirl. My plan is to use TCY-generated draft files, and try to follow this career fairly closely. I’ll be using the game files generated from my Akron Zips career, which has been a semi-amusing sidelight of this project already.

The quickest way to effect the “empty cupboard” scenario in this game (unfortunately) seems to be to start a new career, QuikSim through a full but pointless season, cut your whole team, and start from the ground up. (When using HR’s game files, you have to be careful – if you cut absolutely everyone in year one, you may eat up your entire salary cap for year two by accident, and run into impossible number problems) You’ll see lots of your pissed-off former players in the free agent pool, but if you follow my original standards for the true “Empty Cupboard,” that won’t be a factor. In my case, I won’t be considering any players who were in the league prior to the 2004 rookie draft.

For my initial settings, I’m going to try to run this career without any inflation – so I set that to zero/zero. This might cause some disruption in the initial player market – but it won’t affect my team, since I’ll only be signing new players starting next season anyway. And, I’m using a fictional player pool, generated by HeavyReign’s snappy utility. I hope that will work out fine, but it should be pretty transparent to me – I’m not going to be using those players, just competing against them. (But I loathe the presence of real-world players so much, that I welcome such a tool – it’s a great addition, I think)

House Rules

I expect this will evolve a bit as I go forward, but I’ll keep them simple for now, at least.

Empty Cupboard Framework

-Start 2004 with empty roster, and never use players from before the 2004 rookie draft

Team Finances

-Keep ticket cost index below average of two nearest geographic rivals

Player Contracts

-Only contract renegotiation allowed is to “cap out” offer to a player

-All offers to free agent players requesting a bonus must include a bonus as large as the largest annual salary we offer

Trades

-Only may offer trades during the draft, and involving current year draft picks

-May only accept trade offers that pass the “fairness test” (alter offer then accept it)

Positional Usage

-No player may start out of his primary position group (LG may start at RG, but not at LT)

TCY Tie-In

-Reserved for future use


With that, I think I’m pretty well ready to get started. I think at some point, I want to have some kind of rule about players from my TCY college (Akron, currently) but until I get a flavor for what quantity and quality I’m talking about there, I’m not ready to commit to a rule. In the formative years of any “Empty Cupboard” team, there are plenty of roster spots for stiffs… so I expect to have a few old friends around, and we’ll see where it goes from there.

2004 preseason

Transitions and League Observations

Ordinarily, I plan to start my write up with a discussion about retirements and other transitions – but with this young league and my special circumstance, that seems unnecessary.

Front Office Decisions

I haven’t placed any limitations on myself in terms of acquiring talent – so I will try to bring aboard a solid staff, if possible.

I end up keeping on most of our staff from the initial season, largely because they are cheap (for now). We re-up with Head Coach Earnest Carlyle, as he seemed better than nearly anyone out there – even though he was pretty expensive to retain.

Here’s where we land with our staff, in brief:

Scout: Zack Bates, 67
EX: Young Talent
VG: QB,DL,LB
GD: PK
AV: WR,OL,DB
FR: RB

Head Coach: Earnest Carlyle, 53
EX: Injury Avoidance
VG: Discipline, Off PC
AV: Motivation, Def PC

Off Coord: Levon Moss, 44
VG: OL
GD: QB,RB,WR,PK,YT

Def Coord: Bucky Burbage, 62
EX: YT
GD: DB
AV: PK,DL,LB


Roster Review

I have no roster yet, so there’s nothing to review here. In the future, I’ll use this as a spot to discuss who’s up for a new contract and where we stand with the salary cap – that sort of thing.


Free Agency Planning

Not this year, but in future years I’ll lay out a strategy here. This year, we skip right through the whole 20 stage process.


Rookie Draft

Here’s where we start working. We have pick #26 in the rookie draft this year, due to a pretty solid 10-6 campaign last year under a rudderless ship. (Hats off to the coaching staff)

There’s not a single soul from Akron in the draft – which is fine, since none would be players I actually coached, anyway.

When pick #26 comes up, I have to take a while to look at college standout Ralph Harman from Oklahoma, who is atop the list of prospects at this point. He looks very good, but I see other draftable QBs available, and decide to go elsewhere. In fact, I decide to trade down from my first round perch, and see what I can get later in this draft. (I have some salary cap problems, due to overaggressive cutting in season one, also) I get Carolina’s 2nd and 4th round picks for our top selection, and slide down a few slots. Atlanta takes Ralph Harman with pick #28, incidentally.

I show my hometown bias with our very first selection, taking Ohio State safety standout Nicky Gonzalez in round two (using Carolina’s pick). he looks solid all around, and we’ll need some help in the secondary behind a presumably porous defensive front. With our later round two pick, I am lured in my the flashy, super-fast QB Bobby Silvers out of Oregon State. He runs a 4.43 40-yard dash – and that makes him faster than nearly all the receivers in the entire draft, and easily the fastest guy on our team. I don’t yet know what we’ll do this year – but Silvers is going to have to run around to stay alive anyway, considering the kind of line he’ll be behind.

Here’s how we round it out:



Late Free Agency

I make the predictable moves to fill in the roster with undrafted rookie free agents, signing tons of guys to two-year deals for minimum salary. Nobody all that exciting – we’re going to be just awful on both the L and DL this year, that much is sure. (I didn’t do a great job targeting my draft picks at positions that would be tough to fill after the draft, like DE and OT)

So, lots of things happening – but not a lot to report. You’ll see the roster soon enough, and you’ll see all the genius acquisitions we managed to snag.


Training Camp

Here are the results from a vanilla training camp:


Pretty good news with Bobby Silvers, whose tiny drop in future potential suggests a smooth future. I get him signed after his holdout, and see that he looks like a typical “athletical” QB type – he will run a lot, try to make plays, and he will definitely make a lot of mistakes. We’ll see on him long term.

Safety Nicky Gonzalez looks good, but perhaps not quite as stellar as we had hoped. I wanted an anchor for the defense with him, and instead we got a solid starter, it looks like. He still ought to have a great season ahead – he’ll probably get 100 tackles without much problem.

I tinker a bit with my secondary – we will slide S Johnny Dotson over to play corner, where he will be a starter for us, I fear. I tinker a bit more, but we’re basically ready to go into our first (lost) season.


Season Analysis

Down the road, I am going to try to keep track of things like cohesion, team chemistry, and so forth here. For now, suffice it to say that most of this team is very temporary, and I don’t want to overanalyze the dozens of players who won’t be here in two seasons.

2004 Regular Season

Not going to profile this season week by week -- as I know what’s ahead. We ought to fall badly this first season, and anything but the first draft pick next year will come as a surprise to me.

I am stunned when we open the season with a 10-0 shutout of Baltimore. My offense was pathetic – but how did we manage to stop anyone? We get an equally improbable fourth-quarter rally to beat Washington in week two, and are now an undefeated titan! Whoa!

However, order is soon restored, and we crash to earth and end up with a 4-12 record, about what I would have expected (maybe a game or two better, really). Regrettably, safety Nicky Gonzalez was hurt for most of the year – so we lost a good season of development from him, and his shot at perhaps getting a rookie award.


Well, MLB Cedric Goodwin, an undrafted rookie, grabbed the MLB job and ended up being probably our most effective player in this season. I would have expected to see a LB rack up huge tackle numbers, and he filled the job nicely – he’s pretty solid against the run, actually. Our pass defense, overall, was pretty good – and I can’t figure out why. In total, I understand that teams would just easily run against us, but why did we hold teams to only 6.08 yards per pass attempt? That’s pretty impressive, but I have to consider it a fluke.


Season Wrap-up


The list of players above are strangers to me, for the most part – but some will become familiar in time. QB Mark Holm was Cleveland’s starter last season, before he was cut along with everyone else to make way for the new brass.

LB Cedric Goodwin gets the DROY award – which I thought might be heading our way somehow.


Regardless – a season to tuck away as a building and learning experience, as predicted.

Nothing much more to add. We’ll look forward to next year, and will hope to keep up the building process.

2005 preseason

Transitions and League Observations

Well, we have no retirements, but there is one “transition” note. My very first draft pick, safety Nicky Gonzalez, has been unable to recover from his injuries. He’s been cleared to play, but he’s no longer the solid player that we initially drafted. Shame. He’s also the highest-paid player on the team, which is also a shame.


Front Office Decisions

I re-up with OC Levon Moss, after missing out on a real star who opts to re-sign with Dallas.

We cleared $109 million in our second season – in large part due to a very low payroll. We’ll have to wait out a year or two longer before we get a real sense of the money issues here.


Roster Review

I have 50 players already signed to contracts – since nearly everyone from last year inked a two-year deal to begin with. So, additions this year will not be based on roster vacancies – but rather on talent vacancies, of which we have plenty.

No need to detail things here quite yet.


Free Agency

I plan to pursue any and all capable free agent players – but don’t expect to see very many. I have lots of places we can improve, but generally the 2nd year players out there are just the URFAs who weren’t worth being drafted last year. We‘ve already passed on them once.

For what it’s worth, our top listed needs are WR, G, and T. I don’t know how these get ranked ahead of DE and DT, for example, but they are all certainly need positions.

Not surprisingly, the very top-rated 2nd year player available when sorted by future potential is my 4th string QB. Swell. Looks like we’ll sit out another year here.


Rookie Draft

Once again, not a single Akron player in the rookie draft. I’m not surprised – the cadre of players I inherited there was awfully weak. We ought to see some Zip prospects, though, starting next season.

The excitement builds, as our Zips hold the #3 draft pick overall, and will have a chance to bring aboard a true impact player. Initially, I take a look, and find a number of defensive ends who look like they would fill the bill quite nicely. It’s certainly a need position for us, and that seems to be the best spot at the top of this draft. There is also one very good left tackle – another tempting position to address.

DE Rodney Huffman looks like exactly whet we need. A college standout at DE, he plays against the run and the pass, has great strength and agility, and low volatility. I love him. Lock him up.


I’m pretty optimistic about this draft – we landed a can’t-miss defensive star, and I feel like we have added bookend offensive tackles who might be good enough to be long term starters. Of course, that’s what we always say on draft day – we’ll have to put these guys through the paces to see what we really have here.

RB Fred Magnuson, another local product, has a load of potential – but I don’t know whether I need him more as a runner or a receiver, where I think he could also be excellent.


Late Free Agency

Oakland offers us a 6th round draft pick next year for QB Harold Janes – and we accept. Janes isn’t much of a long-term prospect, so this isn’t a real loss I don’t think.

Things go very smoothly with our rookie class, though – everyone is signed in advance of training camp, unlike last year’s troubles.

I pursue a number of decent fill-in players with high volatility, and sign nearly all to two year deals. I’d love to get a couple of legitimate contributors this way, but for now, we’ll take guys who at least fill up a uniform.


Training Camp

We’re bursting at the seams – bringing 70 players into training camp. Here’s the result:


Good news with DE Huffman – he’s everything we wanted. Not quite topped-out in potential, but certainly good enough to be a serious impact player for us.

Bad news on T Graham Durham, who simply won’t be the stellar starter that I thought might have been stealing in the fourth round of the draft. Heinlein looks good on the left side – about right for a second round pick, really.

LB Howie Tyler looks like a good URFA pickup, and might start right away at LB – I move him to the strong side. Fred Magnusson, switched to play receiver, has really disappointed – I might give him a switch back, but we’re not optimistic.

Overall, this is a team of very marginal talent – we’ll see how well we build from here.


Season Analysis

In a weird curiosity, QB Bobby Silvers rates #10th on the “League’s Fastest Man” list – running a 4.31 this season. Another rookie QB is also on the list – maybe there’s some weird bug involved here. Silvers did rush for over 400 yards last season – so maybe it’s not ridiculous – maybe he really is Vick-like (uh, without the other QB skills, I guess).

Our roster rating is currently 1 out of 100 – by far the lowest in the league. Exactly what it should be at this point, with a well-stocked league up against my mostly cast-off rookie types. We’ll get there in time, I suspect, but it will require some good drafting (better than I have been doing thus far).

I really don’t expect that we’ll be appreciably better than last season, but it would be nice to determine whether Silvers is really worth keeping around at QB, whether we have anything salvageable from our crop at the skill positions, and who on this defense is really worth keeping. Most of this team will be up for contract next year – and so they are mostly playing for their jobs, such as it is.

2005 Regular Season

No crazy up-and-down story this time around, we start out flat, manage to eke out a few close wins, but are basically a bottom-tier type of team the whole way through.

No surprises – we end up 5-11, but probably aren’t even that good. Looks like we will have pick 6 or 7 in the draft next year, which should help.


Well, MLB Cedric Goodwin continues to impress – those are some downright staggering numbers he put up, albeit playing for a lousy defense. Hell, he even led the team in passes defensed! His ratings, in the eyes of my scout, continue to develop – I think he’s still getting better and better. Definite re-signing.

Not a huge year for DE Huffman, but not that bad, either. He played in all 16 games, but did have a couple minor injuries (hamstrong at season’s end) that might have slowed him a bit. He still looks very good, certainly another anchor to this developing defense.

And the defense, once again, is very tough on the pass, but this year it’s easier to see what happened. We are tough in total passing yards, but teams don’t pass on us much – we’re up to average in yards per attempt, much more like what I’d expect. We were #1 in stopping 3rd down conversions – go figure that one out.

Is RB Dixon Hoffman our future? Up to 4.5 ypc this season is an improvement for him, but I don’t see him as really anything special. I suspect I’ll keep foraging around, since RB is a position that seems very easy to fill with decent players, at least.


Season Wrap-up


About what we expected. No catastrophic losses, I don’t think. (Starting safety Paul Hammond might be disrupted after a season-long knew injury – we’ll see about that)

Hopefully we will have some chance to build on this season, and start to see some results coming together. Another offseason awaits!

Great job, QS! Looking forward to this. I'm on board!

Are you thinking long-term on Silvers? His yds/att. went down, but his td/int. ratio got much better.

Yes, at this point I'm thinking that Bobby Silvers is an intriguing enough project that I'm not really looking for another QB. I'd love to find some way to gameplan more runs for the QB - but at the moment, I don't see how. Might experiment a bit with the "finesse" setting with a short backfield... but I'm guessing that just calls for more reverses and traps and so forth (as opposed to QB options to run).

2006 preseason

Transitions and League Observations

TE Will Roebuck has retired. Oh, we’ll each live long to sing songs and tell tales about ... wait, who was he again?


Front Office Decisions

We bring in a new defensive coordinator – landing the guy I think was the best available, though he costs an awful lot:

Def Coord: Vincent Compton, 60
Salary: $3,300,000
EX: PK, LB, YT
GD: DB
AV: DL


We again raked in the cash this season – no surprise there.


Roster Review

Maybe after this season we’ll go through this piece by piece. This season is just weird, with tons of players without a contract. Only 26 players currently are signed.


Free Agency

We finally have at least a few players worth bringing in as free agents. Looking at guys up to third year, we will find at least a few castoffs who are worth an approach.

CB Wes Mace – decent-enough corner, solid kick returner, good pursuit for us. Might even get a job as a “gunner” for us on special teams.

FB Mickey Woodson – just what I like in a fullback – great run blocker, and can’t run patterns worth a damn.

WR Randall Sanders – another big-hitter type receiver, more of what we already have, but decent enough to merit a bid.

C Kurt Nichols – decent-enough, but not really the answer here

LB Kim Jervey – pass-rushing specialist, might be useful in limited DE role

We have all five pursuits wrapped up by week eight. I make a later offer to LB Julio Wiggs, who is a better run-stopper than my current crop, and might even battle for a starting job as the WLB.

I also get TE Rich Metzger, who would be a nice upgrade for us at TE, where we have basically been voided out. He’s had over 300 yards receiving in each of his two seasons – not too bad at all.


We ink a new four year deal with MLB Cedric Goodwin, and it’s clear that he is creeping upward in his skills. He’s always been good against the run, but his coverage skills are improving gradually, and he’s getting better overall – certainly better than his original projections indicated was possible for him. Even though the LBs I have drafted have yet to pan out for much, this guy (a URFA pickup) has been outstanding – our first breakout player.

I also work out a new deal with RBs Dixon Hoffman and Daniel Newman, who will be the two to escape from our initial flood of backs. I’ll still dabble with rookies, but these guys didn’t demand huge raises, so I kept them on.


Rookie Draft

I just need to add another star player – it almost doesn’t matter where. DT would be ideal, but CB would be great, WR would be fine, I can be very flexible. I’d rather not fill an “easy” position (like C) but we’ll take what comes our way, I suspect.

Three defensive tackles go in the six picks ahead of us, which basically wipes out that notion. Here is the short list for our consideration:

WR Ed McDonald from Clemson is the fastest player in the draft, and looks excellent. Not a big physical receiver, but he should be a major flyaway talent, who comes in very ready to play (highly developed already). Intriguing.

G Casey Palmer looks to be a prototypical topped-out lineman. Guard isn’t usually that tough to fill, but I’ve got nothing there at all right now – so it is a real need. Very high volatility is a concern.

CB Deon Richmond looks like the best cover man out there, and has great upside. Solid tackler, even at his size – also very quick, running 4.40 and 7.03 drills.


My thinking is that I will be able to land either a starting receiver or a top-grade offensive lineman (probably not quite like Palmer, but still very good) at the top of round two, so I decide to grab the cornerback Richmond here. We’ll see how that pans out.

McDonald and Palmer go at #9 and #11, by the way – a nice indication that my rivals are evaluating talent in a fashion very similar to the way that I am.


DT Gibson was a bit of a reach, but if he stays in the “blue band” for run defense, he could be a real improvement for us, despite being pretty one-dimensional. DT has been a gaping hole on our defense – any improvement is needed.

WR Baker might be a steal – he could be very solid, if he can reach my scout’s indication of his potential. We bulked up with a few OL picks, and got a versatile back in the late rounds, with a good college performance pedigree.

I’ve been disappointed before – but I will again hold out hope that this draft turns into a really good one.


Late Free Agency

I make a few more moves, picking up rookie I passed over late in the draft (as it should be) and grabbing a few more “profile” type guys (fairly high current ratings, fairly high volatility – seems like it ought to generate something, though no dice thus far).


Training Camp

Here’s how things panned out after yet another training camp – only 61 players signed this year, though:


We have to take seriously any player who shows a positive movement in his potential ratings – and this year we have two of them.

Rookie RB Kendrick Ramsey (7th round pick) had a little jump – he looks like a typical mixed-bag guy (the FOF dime-a-dozen type), but if he develops, he might have potential to contribute in the running game. If he can develop beyond his current apparent potential, then we might really have something here.

Second year DE Deion Schultz started 15 games last season (logging nearly 700 plays), and posted 6 sacks for us. Now, he seems to be on the improve – his potential now looks pretty respectable, and he might hold off our efforts to replace him (with rookie Dale Blum, who looks pretty decent, but had a bad camp) after all.


Bad news, though, for top pick CB Deon Richmond. He’s still holding out – but the –4 beside his potential might bode poorly for that top pick. We really need him to excel, but that’s not a great start. Since he’s unsigned, we don’t have a great read on him quite yet.

DT Kris Gibson is all potential at stopping the run (15/79) but if he can put it together and approach that lofty total, he’ll be exactly the kind of guy I like on the inside (great run stopper, great endurance). So – he is basically the kind of guy we were hoping for, but it still looks like a reach pick.

WR Bill Baker is all kinds of bust – nothing like my scout’s initial impression. Third round pick will be lucky to make the team.

(I keep forgetting about this) My draft grades out at a C-, which is the lowest grade on the board. I know that I took mostly players who were not at the top of the consensus list, so I’m not that worried – at least not quite yet.


Season Analysis

I accept a trade offer from Philadephia for CB Dotson, who was probably going to be released anyway – jut a 7th rounder. I had to turn down an offer for WR Nathan O’Rourke – he is our most dependable wideout at the moment.

And we bring the total down to 53 – not a terribly easy task. I end up cutting both of my sixth round draft picks (offensive linemen, neither one worth a damn) in the process. For record-keeping purposes – here’s what we’ve got on hand as we head into the season:


I can’t help but notice that probably 2/3 of my defensive roster is under-sized for their position. I have plenty of guys who are unable to switch within their position groups—DE who are too light to switch to another DE position, LB who are too light to be a LB, that sort of thing. It isn’t a real problem – but it does seem to be somewhat troubling, especially if you do like to move guys around (or if you let the scout do it for you during training camp – which I HATE).

Still rated 1 in our roster rating (next lowest is a 28) so we clearly have a long way to keep building. I think we’ll be okay with our group on hand – I’m just trying to build as much talent as possible, and am not even focusing on chemistry issues at all yet. (Maybe that’s unwise, considering the level of talent I have even when paying attention to that)

We’re set to go… but what kind of season do we have ahead? I won’t just hand things over to the staff, but I still don’t expect much. We might be good enough to improve another game or two, but a .500 season would really surprise me.

2006 Regular Season

In the pre-season, we lose RB Dixon Hoffman for the season – so we have to reshuffle a bit, and it looks like rookie Kendrick Ramsey will get some chances after all, in the #2 spot. This also makes Daniel Newman much more of a “feature back” than we have used so far – so we’ll see how well he can do with that kind of role.

We play a solid, mistake-free game at home to beat Pittsburgh in our opener, and we get to our early bye week at 2-1. I still have little doubt that we will be a second-rate team, but it’s nice to carry this early glimmer on a while.

Soon enough, we are 2-9 and out of glimmer. Toward the end of the season, our entire defensive front is ripped to shreds by injuries – we are in chaos. Huffman is seriously hurt – we’ll have to see how well he can rebound from that, but his season is over for certain.



Season Wrap-up


Nice to see good things from DT Kris Gibson, who had a very nice opening season – in part because he is clearly head and shoulders above anyone we have on hand at DT.

Okay, I feel like this team is dying on the vine. I’m doing poorly in the draft so far, and we’re just not building up the talent level that we need. Without true open free agency as a vehicle, we‘ve still got plenty of wide open spaces on this roster – where we are starting and using players who probably shouldn’t even be employed.

I'm enjoying this and your Zips dynasty...keep it up. :)

2007 preseason

Transitions and League Observations

No retirements from our young team – we are back intact. A quick look at DE Huffman verifies that he is okay and past his last injury without dropping off the map. Good news there, though I’m worried about him becoming injury prone.


Front Office Decisions

My lead scout is 70, and declining – but I’ll stick with him for one more season. He’s still pretty good.

My OC Levon Moss is up for a new deal – I want to bring him back. He accepts my first offer, and is locked up again. Here’s a refresh on his skills:

Off Coord: Levon Moss, 47
EX: OL
VG: QB,PK
GD: RB,WR,YT

He is improving pretty rapidly – if I give him some players to develop, he ought to be very solid.


Roster Review

Why not go through the whole lot of them – might give me a better sense of what I really need to do here.


Silvers seems to have arrived – he didn’t lose much from his original projections. I think it might be time for us to open things up a bit, and let him make some plays. It might be time to make an investment in a backup or another seasoned player, since nobody behind him is worth a damn. (Needless to say, we will re-sign Silvers)


Who’s the man? Newman? Ramsey on his slight potential bump? I don’t know – they are all marginal, and unless I see another bump up in his potential this year (doubtful). Woe is me. I like FB Woodson, though – he stays out of the way of the ball, and just does all the dirty work for us. (60 run blocking, 77 blocking strength, and 23 route running – he’s just wonderful)


Metzger was on his way to a big season when he got hurt last year – but he could go for 500 yards this year if we start throwing a bit more. TE might not be a terrible spot to target a solid rookie with a 2nd or 3rd rounder, if someone is there.


Probably need to re-sign O’Rourke, and I actually like Sanders fine as my other starter. Not a star in the lot here, but they are adequate. Adding a flashy star would be exciting – and they are always available, even in the early second round.


Bennie Heinlein is turning into a prototypical lead pass-blocking LT – further reinforcing my theory that we need to throw the ball more here. Overall, this group is okay – but that’s probably a function of my low standards. Heinlein is really a B-, and he’s the best of the lot by some margin.


We’re okay here.


We have to re-sign Deion Schultz, though it’s not clear whether he will continue to improve. Huffman’s future is very important, as is the continued development of Kris Gibson, of course. We remain pitifully thin here, and I’d love to add another monster to the line – maybe a giant DT with the top draft pick.


Cedric Goodwin remains our standout here – he missed a few games last year, keeping him from another titanic stat season (he had 123+32 tackles in 13 games).

Howie Tyler is turning into a solid player for us, and must be re-signed. With my current starting trio (including run stopper Wiggs), I think we are adequately covered, and Jervey is a pass-rusher who filled in pretty well at the DE spot, as I had hoped he could.


Our big money is on Deon Richmond, and he looks like he will be pretty good. Solid first season, and he can play man-up defense, which is what I want. I also like Wes Mace a good bit – that was a good free agent signing for us, and he’s got the starting job locked down for now.

At safety, I don’t know what we’ll do. I like Thurman Jacobs from this group, and I could re-sign any of them if I needed to, but nobody really inspires me that much. I like having a great safety – but it’s a position easily filled with adequate players, and with a team like this with so many holes – it’s tough to pursue safeties too aggressively.


The plan from here? Check for ways to improve via free agency, and I’ll weigh my trade-down options from the #2 pick (which are often fruitful). I’d like to get one more receiving weapon, and a big addition for our DL coming into the year, at a minimum.


Free Agency

We can look at up to 4th year players, so I might get something to work with.

RT Deon Hiatt looks like a great improvement for us, but his stats have been very underwhelming. I will pursue him, and he probably will become our starter – we don’t have a lot on that end right now with Victor Daniels.

CB Scott Dunn will probably come in and compete for a starting job – he’s pretty well-developed as a man-up coverage specialist. Good pickup for us, giving us a nickel back, and depth for an injury at the very worst. Might push Mace for a starting job.

DT Willie Oliveira is a pretty exciting pickup for us – he’s a 3rd year DT with little experience, but he could be pretty good.

DE Lincoln Limon looks like a prototypical injury-prone DE, but he is pretty good. We’ll put in a bid, for certain. Not a game breaker, but a possible starter, or rotation guy.

QB Shawn Matthews isn’t a star, but he’s got some experience and makes a decent enough backup, I think. He’s actually got a career TD>Int stat, a test which Silvers fails by 18.

There are a number of playable cornerbacks out there – I’ll bid on Dunn, but I might go and pick up one more guy, too – we have options, which is nice.


In later stages, I pick up LB Daryl Gaines and RT Frank Bass. I’m worried about picking up RT Hiatt (which I have) since he has become our position leader – and we have numerous conflicts there. It might behoove me to grab another player who might be a more stable position leader there – Hiatt has questionable results, anyway. In that vein, I sign G Billy Rodriguez, but he doesn’t edge out Hiatt (though he does have an affinity with him, oddly enough). I then bring in C Antoine Hambrick, who adds another conflict with Hiatt. (This is tougher than I realized)


Rookie Draft

My initial inclination is that I want to trade down – I don’t see a monster DT or superstar anywhere I can’t live without, and indeed there are plenty of solid DTs later in the first round, I think. I might be able to pick up a pick or two to slide about ten slots, and still get an impact player.

We pull a nice deal – getting St. Louis’s top pick at #7, their second pick this year, and next year’s #1 – all to get our selection at #1. (Echoes of Ryan Leaf, eh?) I wasn’t in love with anyone with that pick – so this is just great for us, I think. The Rams take the best DE on the board – not a shabby pick, really.

At #7, I like a few different defensive tackles. I like one run-stopper in particular, but there are plenty of guys I could be happy with. I deal down to #11, moving from round five to round two, courtesy of the Saints.

Starting with pick #11, I still get the DT that I covet, and manage to use three second rounders to pick up two more players for our defensive front – which should really help us with depth there. I also grab a solid receiver, filling my other target need area.


If things pan out, then we could end up with an impressive array of young players here. DT Fox looked good enough to make me take him, despite already grabbing Cascadden in the first round, and having the defending DROY at DT already. Other players looked intriguing.

We are graded a B- for our drafting this year – a bit better than last season, which seems fair. Last year didn’t work out too well, all told.


Late Free Agency

Incidentally, there was one Akron player in the draft pool this year – finally. I mention this as an incidental comment because he is/was a pretty incidental player, as it turns out. QB Pat Branch comes in as a 2.8-rated QB, a very marginal prospect. In college, he was just a backup – and here, if he gets any chance at all, he won’t be any more than that. I sign him, with hopes that perhaps he can gain the kick holding job – which might see him throw a pass once every couple seasons or so.

I make a sizable number of rookie pursuits – once again hoping to land that elusive young breakout player – guys like Cedric Goodwin, who has evolved into our defensive standout player. I stick with the theory of high current skills and high volatility, and also decide to try to grab players who had fairly productive college seasons – as a backup for the expected volatility (my theory: college star has better chance to break out than bust –not that complicated).


Training Camp

We carry a somewhat untoward 75 players into training camp – so we will have a lot of guys here who simply won’t be around soon. Lots of invitees who will be driving trucks in a few weeks.

Among my pre-camp position switches is moving DT Jimmy Fox to play on the outside – he didn’t have the weight to plat DT for us, so we’ll try him as an end. If he pans out – we could have really made a great stride with our defensive line this year, between Cascadden (run-stopping DT) and Fox (pass-rushing DE).


So, in camp this year – here are our potential developers:

QB Bobby Silvers – very nice to see, even a small bump up
FB Pat May – solidifies the backup FB job
TE Norm Simmons – might make the team after modest jump up
DE Leo Goetz – marginal jump for a college sack star
DT Gary Cascadden – oh, yeah – HUGE run stuffing potential here
LB Ronald Castaneda – might end up being best of the rookie LB lot


WR Mickey Rose looks okay, but he (like Bill Baker before him) is WAY toward the low end of our expectations. I expect Rose will stick around and perhaps even start – but he’s clearly not the gamebreaker that we had hoped to be getting here. He didn’t fade in camp – he just wasn’t that good to begin with.


Season Analysis

So, where do we go from here? It’s Bobby Silvers’ team, and it’s time to open things up a bit – we have an OL suited for more passing, and we will go with many more multi-WR sets than last season, trying to get something more out of our anemic offense than we have been thus far.

The only place on this team where we have chemistry problems is with RT Deon Hiatt, who has become our OL leader, and is hated by four other players. There’s a simple solution there, but I have felt that I need Hiatt to cover the right side – we just don’t have anyone else who can do it. I knuckle down, and decide to let Hiatt go (eating his signing bonus to do so) – we will play with somewhat lesser players, but the chemistry should be tons better. With that – we have zero chemistry conflicts on the team – that might help, no?

Our roster rating has leaped – all the way to 2 out of 100. Good sign?

This should be a step forward – I think we’ll be better than the measly 3-13 from last season. If our DL can stay reasonably healthy, we should be much improved there – and I think the defense is starting to look pretty respectable overall. Offensively, we still need OL help and would like to have a real “playmaker” emerge – but overall, we have guys who can play a little bit, at least. I’m hoping for six wins, and a nice ray of hope.

2007 Regular Season

If our preseason is any indication, the big winner from our offensive realignment might be WR Nathan O’Rourke, who had a huge preseason, and looks like our prime target for a much more pass-intensive attack. He has yet to top 600 yards in a season – but he had close to 400 in our four preseason games. Look out!

After four weeks, we are 2-2, and looking okay. However, Bobby Silvers has blown out his ankle - he’s gone for the year, and we have a sudden shift with the team. Shawn Mathews, untested journeyman, is our #2 option, and we have a passable rookie as our #3. We need to sign someone, and hope we can get by without Silvers. Very tough break.

In our first game after Silvers is gone, we rise up and beat Pittsburgh – Mathews is steady, but the defense won the game. We follow up with another smothering defensive win over Miami – and at 4-2 this team is looking the best it ever has. We’re still getting more rushes then most teams, but adding a bit more vertical passing has certainly made a difference, I think.

And in the early going, it has been WR Randall Sanders, and not O’Rourke, making the biggest splash in our passing game – Sanders might be on his way to the big season that I had forecasted for O’Rourke. Sanders gets game MVP in our next win, as he posts 152 yards and 2 TDs (both in the fourth quarter, inn our comeback) to help seal it.

We drop a game at New England, but reach our halfway point at 5-3, only a half game behind Pittsburgh. Wow. We rank #2 in yards allowed per carry – so our defense against the run is right where I want it to be, finally.

After slipping to 6-4, we lose RB Newman for a few weeks – and will place the running chores into the hands of rookies Donovan Adams and Michael Hudson. Adams is a pure runner with terrible hands for receiving, but seems to be okay as an offset to our passing game. Hudson is more complete, and will be in for passing downs mostly. Both were 1,000-yard rushers in college – so they understand where to go with the ball, at least.

Down the stretch, we cannot maintain our early success – but we get to the finale with a shot to finish .500 on the season. A one-point loss seals our season at 7-9, but there’s a lot more to be excited about with this team than to date – so that’s pretty good overall.



Season Wrap-up

I’m pretty pleased with the way the defense is taking shape, and with the potential we are showing there. When we can stop the run, we can play a good game overall. I think we have players who can come together and play well for us.

It seems that what we really need is a gamebreaker on offense – and my inclination is that it might be time to bring in a serious running threat. I don’t mind that being an established player if we can get one, but drafting a stud RB might be a good plan for us. Alternatively, maybe a serious top-grade wideout might do the trick – we’d love to have a go-to threat for our fledgling air attack. Either way, we need a focus for the offense.

Getting a healthy Silvers back at QB is an essential part of moving forward – so we will watch his ankle closely. I expect that his “fastest man on the team” days are over – we now need him to be able to step into the role as our overall offensive leader.


Of course, we are thrilled to have two all-star honorees, the foundation players for our improving defensive front.

In a move that makes perfect sense, RT Deon Hiatt, my late chemistry-induced roster casualty, ended up re-signing with his old team, Cincinnati. He played in a few games, and might get another look for the coming year. (That sounds just like what I might expect to see happen in real life)

Work to be done… but coming up will be our first free agency period where there will be bona fide unrestricted free agents – only the 5th year guys, but still an opportunity to possibly bring aboard a real star or two!

Good stuff Quik, tough break (no pun intended) with Silver's ankle, but the team did amazingly well without him.

Who's been winning the Front Office Bowls?

EDIT: Nevermind, looked at who won the FOB MVP's...instead, who would you say have been the dominant teams and who have been the doormats?

Awesome read!

Just caught up with reading this from the beginning. As always, a good read! As for trading that #1 pick, do you feel (as have been mentioned in other threads) that the computer overvalues the high picks in the first round? It seems like a very good strategy to trade away a risky pick for such wealth in FOF2k4.

In the first few years, there was little pattern in top/bottom teams. I think there was a lot of contract turmoil, partially caused by using zero inflation.

Tampa bay went to consecutive Superbowls, one win and one loss - that's about as dominant as anyone has been thus far. I can include the full standings in future reports.... I like that for background flavor anyway.

Re: FOF 2004 - Taking The Lake Erie Challenge
 

Hm.

Would it be possible (either through the utility, or before the import of fictional players) to pre-do the empty cupboard? i.e. not generate any players for a particular team (possibly forcing some extra scrub-level players into the FA pool to compensate)?

BTW, QS, I've been grinning since the moment I saw you were doing a dynasty. Seriously looking forward to this.

Kevin

I'm not so sure. The old mentality of FOF drafting was that you coudl get value most anywhere - you just needed to be high to get great players at certain positions (like DE, OT, maybe CB and WR). I'm now thinking that with the revamped drafting system, there's more value with the higher picks -- you don't end up getting guys who settle at the bottom of their "blue bands" and have a chance to land players with future ratings of 80 or better.

My current thinking is that the value of very high draft picks has probably jumped up, maybe to match the way the game seems to value them (or to at least get closer).

2008 preseason

Transitions and League Observations

Pretty disappointing news with QB Bobby Silvers. He is healthy again, and will be ready for the season – but his injury from last year has taken a serious toll. He is now a fair QB, with some decent skills – but he’s definitely not the old Bobby “Quik” Silvers we were building around. Tough loss – and a tough decision ahead for us. Suddenly, QB is moving up our list of priorities.

We don’t have any retirements – as would be expected with such a young team. It will probably be a few years until we start worrying about that, without major injuries causing them.

DT Gary Cascadden is on “The Green Page” for top league prospects, and it looks like he will continue to develop toward being a titanic run stopper on our defensive front, exactly what I wanted. His run defense rating of 29/92 is very encouraging. DE Cole Harrison, the DE taken with the #2 pick I dealt away, was the DROY and looks like a future star for St. Louis.


Front Office Decisions

Zack Bates, our scout, is out of contract, 71, and declining. Time to look elsewhere. I put in a big $750,000/yr bid for Myron Hampton – who is 69, but looks really good.

Earnest Carlyle, our head coach, is 57 and out of contract. I want to re-sign him, despite our lousy record – can’t blame that on him.

After two weeks, both Hampton and Carlyle are aboard:

Scout: Myron Hampton, 69
EX: QB,Young Talent
VG: OL,PK,DL,DB
AV: RB,LB
FR: WR

Head Coach: Earnest Carlyle, 57
EX: Injury Avoidance, Off PC
VG: Discipline
AV: Motivation, Def PC

Even if we only get a few years out of Hampton, he seems worth it.


Roster Review

With a new scout aboard, we get a new look at our players – and we’ll walk through the position groups here, once again. This time, I will show each player’s contract – you’ll see my scout impression during camp.

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Silvers, as I noted, is depleted badly. He may still be our starter, but now we cannot consider the position settled. Too bad. Mathews played okay last season, but is not a long term answer, I don’t think, at all. Davis is a nice #3.


Newman remains our most proven quantity, and comes into the season as the projected “chairman” of a running back committee. The others are spot players, but nobody has really stood out with his performance to suggest he merits extra attention. Position is also unsettled, but not desperate.


I continue to like Woodson here, and he might have a job for a long time.


Metzger cannot stay healthy, but is productive. We could really use a second contributor here, as I’m fond of the single back TE pairs set – and need a solid second TE for that, of course. (We can use Woodson, if need be)


Sanders and O’Rourke are acceptable, but our offense could really benefit from a serious game breaker at receiver. We have picks #11 and #18 in the upcoming rookie draft, and I’d love to land an impact player here with one of them.


The scouting staff rates the OL (both G and T) as our top need position, and it’s hard to argue otherwise. Thing is, we got pretty decent performance out of our group last year – probably in part because of the carefully-managed chemistry that works well for them. But re-signing C Nichols and perhaps acquiring a solid guard would really help out. I’d love to pull down a veteran through free agency.


I intend to re-sign Wingard, but it won’t be a top priority – he’s not too good on kickoffs, and quality kickers are just abundant.


Our starting foursome of DEs Huffman and Fox, with DTs Cascadden and Gibson held up pretty well last season. We have depth here now, but I’m contemplating a trade offer for DE Limon – a 3rd round pick might be worth dealing him, I think. I’m feeling good about this group, but Jimmy Fox might end up being the weak link.


Cedric Goodwin continues to improve – he’s getting better in coverage now, too, gradually. A real star for us right up the middle, with crazy tackle numbers. Howie Tyle is turning into a pretty complete “sam” for us, and is helping with the QB pressure as our main blitz option. Julio Wiggs is a pure run-stopper, and I’m reluctant to sit him for the more well-rounded Stanley Fisk – so Fisk will probably remain our top backup for another season. Jervey is a pass-rusher, worth re-signing if he’ll come cheaply.


Deon Richmond is eroding gradually, and doesn’t really look like a star cover man after all. He’s still worth playing, but doesn’t look like a guy who will be with us for his whole career, after all. Irving Lucas, on a one year deal, started at free safety last year – and might get another shot if he’s willing. Jacobs is pretty good (though not a great man-up cover guy) and will stick around. No stars back here, but we’re okay.


That’s our status – we have plenty of cap space, and after we do the deal for DE Limon, we grab another roster spot and draft pick in the exchange. We have almost as much cap space as anyone – and probably fewer actual roster vacancies. Looks promising.


Free Agency

We look around, and quickly find that there are a number of players who would help us.

The first guy to strike my fancy in a big way is RB Roderick Arsenault – the defending Player of the Year, with 5585 yards rushing in his first four years in the league – ouch! Predictably, he is looking for really big chunk of cash – nearly $10m a year. I could do that, but it would take a good share of our resources. I think I’ll put in a bid, though – he’d be the type of impact player that we really covet (even though his ratings aren’t truly extraordinary, he’s a proven commodity). Simple offer – 4yrs, $40, split up evenly.

WR Jermaine Aceves is a mixed bag receiver, but has really good skills (but not great production thus far). He only wants a modest deal – we put in a three year offer, and expect that he’d become our new receivers leader.

At QB, the best guy available seems to be Tyrone Glover, a crisp underneath passer who has been pretty solid for the Giants. I’m not sure he’d be a great fit for a pass-happy attack, but he’d be a good complement to a more run-intensive plan, which we might seek out if we land RB Arsenault. I decide to put in a bid, but not a staggering one – just two years, $15m.

TE Arnie Whiting is another great fit – a dynamite receiving TE from Carolina, who topped 800 yards receiving two seasons ago, and made the all-pro team. Good fit, though not a great pass blocker. My offer is 3yrs, $12m.

RT Bert Schroeder is an excellent pass blocker, though his on-field results have been poor thus far. Regardless, we’ll bring him in, and will slot him on the vulnerable right side of our line.

I make a move for a few more decent players at DT, LB, and CB – but that’s the end of my big money pursuits.


We end up with no competition for any players we pursue – but after several weeks, I have locked up the cheap guys, and still have RB Arsenault, QB Tyrone Glover, and TE Arnie Whiting all sitting pending.

Week six – and we land our first major impact free agent, as RB Roderick Arsenault signs to play in Cleveland. He’s posted two 1,500-yard seasons, and has yet to post a season with under 4.0 yards per carry. Assuming he can deliver anything close to that with us now, he should make a huge impact right away.

I fall back a bit with QB Tyrone Glover, dropping my offer to one year, $6 million. If he comes, fine, if not, fine.

TE Arnie Whiting signs up after a couple more weeks, giving us one more potent weapon on the offense, and QB Glover comes with him. We have landed all three of our major targets – and now have a pretty significantly new look for our offense.

I zip through the remaining FA stages, as we are nearly out of cap space, and I get ready for the rookie draft.

Rookie Draft

We finally have some Akron players to see here – a few familiar faces. There are about ten guys in the draft in total, probably two or three have a shot to actually play some pro ball.

QB Marvin Fox (4.0) was Akron’s best player, and comes in as probably the top prospect. Might be a late round pick, with potential in several areas. Good at avoiding interceptions and at holding kicks - he might be able to make my roster.

CB Riddick Leslie (4.0) looks solid, but a bit slight. Decent but very even potentials at the coverage areas make me think he may not pan out – his 93 volatility also supports that theory. Bust in waiting?

The rest all seem to be very marginal prospects at best. I’ll watch to see if any get taken, and I might invite some to camp – but for now, I don’t want to upend my whole team to bring in a fleet of stiffs. DT Ricardo Terrell might have some small chance of grabbing a roster spot with us, I suspect. Others would be charity cases.


Looking at the top prospects, I would like to grab a receiver, and perhaps an offensive lineman. It looks like a pretty poor draft for both positions – of course. My scout rates the top two receivers as 69 and 68 down the road. And I’m no lock to get either one of them. Alas.

When #11 comes around, I decide that WR doesn’t fit – so I go with the best player available, in my opinion. LB Ricky DiGiacomo is a potential star, I think, and I expect that we can move him into the weak-side spot to make our LB corps that much better.

At #18, I end up taking standout safety Deron Ellery, who was a total monster at USC and looks like a pretty complete player for this level. He seems like the best player available – and fits a team need also.


I hope the top two picks work out well – both would really help out this defense. If G Mason is as good as my scouts think he can be, then we’ll have something there, too. Others may or may not amount to anything.

I make a mid-draft deal, since we are already at full capacity, to deal picks in rounds 3,4, and 5 this year to get Chicago’s #2 next season. Not a robbery – not even a good deal, really, but this works for us.

CB Leslie Riddick manages to get snagged in round three – I still predict a bust there, but he’s the first product from my Akron program to actually get selected.


Late Free Agency

We land a trade offer from Minnesota, and are thrilled to get a 2nd round pick for RB Daniel Newman, our new backup. We also get an offer for MLB Cedric Goodwin, but he’s going nowhere.

And right upon starting the late free agency period, I get another trade offer – this time for RB Michael Hudson. Again – I’m not planning to use him a whole lot anyway, so this doesn’t seem too bad. Done deal – second rounder from Denver.

In late free agency, I bring aboard another college standout running back – George Wilson had over 1,700 yards rushing for Notre Dame last year. We’ll hope to give him a look, and perhaps a chance to contend for a good spot. I bring in a couple more RBs also – trying to find decent reserves either at RB or WR.

We head into camp overloaded once again – with 66 players signed to contracts.


Training Camp

We have all our rookies signed before camp – I’m hoping that we get some good news with this year’s crop.


DE Rodney Huffman was among a few veteran players who had a little “bump” from this year’s training camp – not a major breakout, but a nice little nudge, at least.


Season Analysis

My thinking is that we need to temper these changes going on. With Arsenault arriving, we will go with a pure “featured back” system, rather than the committee of runners we are used to. While we didn’t land a star receiver this year, I think TE Arnie Whiting can become our go-to guy in the underneath routes as well.

Quarterback? I don’t know what to do. I think we’ll take a look in preseason, trying to see what Silvers can still do. But we have Tyrone Glover in place already, and he could be ready to take the reins if needed.

And as we contemplate the QB position, we accept Miami’s trade offer for QB Shawn Mathews – last year’s starter. We get a second rounder, and they may have gotten their starter for this season.

We are out of the basement in the roster ratings – up to a 50 rating, with four teams rated below us.

2008 Regular Season

In our first preseason game, Arsenault runs for 99 yards in limited duty, and Bobby Silver stays in most of the way – and looks pretty good. Glover looks sharp in clean-up duty – we’ll get a better look later in the preseason. Silvers goes 7 of 8 in his second game – with one pick. Glover is looking pretty solid, too, but I’m getting the feeling that Silvers can still play. We mop up Minnesota, and both QBs look extremely sharp – this is very tough. But – Tyrone Glover comes down with an elbow injury, which settles the opening day starter “controversy.” We’ll go into the season once again with Bobby Silvers listed as our #1 signal caller.

Steven Davis and Marvin Fox battle for the backup job for now – I decide that Davis is probably better suited for it right away, and he will be our reserve for the first few weeks while Glover recovers.

We also start the season with new TE Arnie Whiting on the sideline with a broken collar bone. So, two of our “big three” new faces are taking a seat as we get things started. Arsenault, though, is ready to go.

Game one – we’re in upheaval again. QB Bobby Silvers blows out his knee, sidelining him for the season, and probably ending his football career. My “insurance policy” was certainly a good move – but even he is on the sideline now. We’ll start Glover even though he is hurt – and he’ll have to be our trigger man through the season.

In game two, Glover goes out, and we have Steven Davis in there for most of the game, until even he gets hurt. Glover finished up, but both are on the injured list for the coming week. MLB Cedric Goodwin, our defensive anchor, is also out for a while. This is starting to look like a M*A*S*H unit.

Behind Glover and Arsenault, and a staunch defense, we get our first win of the season, at home over Oakland. The next week, Arsenault tops 100 for the first time with us, despite a close loss to Tennessee. We’re settling down, at least.

Roderick Arsenault, after posting his second straight 100-yard game, is injured – and will miss three weeks. Our injury-related adjustments continue, it seems. He misses the chance to play against his old Houston team, who are undefeated this year without him, oddly enough. They shut us down, winning only 7-0, but our offense is awful.

We get a surprise dominating win over Baltimore in week 7, winning 41-16. Glover was good, and is starting to build some buzz with now-healthy TE Whiting (6-95 and a TD). Rookie LB Ricky DiGiacomo has 9 tackles to lead the team – and is playing pretty well after being thrown right into the fire. (Everybody around him has been hurt, so we really needed him anyway) And when we eke out a 10-7 win over Jacksonville, we make it too or halfway point at a remarkable 4-4.

Glover has a QB rating of 68.6 – not exactly the kind of efficiency we were looking for from him. Arsenault, who should return for our next game, has 430 yards rushing in 5 games – not too bad. And WR Randall Sanders may be on his way to a 1,000-yard season, which would be a first for this franchise.


Down the stretch, we are 7-6, and in a three-way tie for the division lead. For the first time, we are talking about a possible playoff run. Hosting Pittsburgh, also 7-6, is a huge game at this point. We get DE Huffman back after his second injury this season, and hope that the DL can get more pressure. We clobber the Steelers 27-6, behind more than 200 yards on the ground – 132 from Asrsenault. Suddenly, we are in a serious position.

Bobby Silvers is rehabbing, but still a few weeks away from getting back. He simply won’t be a factor this year, I’m pretty sure, and we’ll have to test him out after his recovery – he may lose another couple of notches, which would render him pretty useless, I fear.

A big win over Dallas, behind 4 TD passes from Glover and again over 200 yards rushing, puts us to 9-6, and in command in the division. We are now a lock to take the division title, and will make our first postseason appearance.

Roderick Arsenault is over 1,000 yards now, despite only playing in 11 games – he is averaging 4.4 yards per carry, which is better than anyone else has been able to do on this team. WR Randall Sanders needs 87 yards to top 1,000 on the season. We drop the last game, and Sanders falls just short of the mark – but it’s a pretty good season nonetheless.


Overall, this is the sort of defense I love to see. We were #1 in yards allowed per carry, #7 in yards allowed per pass, and #4 in scoring allowed. Great results.


Looking over the stats – note that TE Arnie Whiting posted some pretty staggering numbers for a tight end, and that was only starting 10 games (playing in 13). If he ends up averaging 6 catches a game next season, he can be a very powerful weapon in our offense.

We also got our money’s worth out of LB Rick Casey, who we grabbed as a cheap free agent because he’s of the same general mold as our starting MLB, Cedric Goodwin. When Goodwin went down for most of this season, Casey Started at MLB, and we didn’t lose too much when our best defensive player went down – Casey stepped in very well for us.

Incidentally, Bobby Silvers is probably done as a professional football player. Two serious leg injuries have rendered him a shell of his former self, and our biggest decision is whether to retain him for next year with his significant salary.

2008 Post-season

Our first postseason game is at home, against 10-6 wild card Tennessee. They are a run-first, play-action type of offense, and they focus very aggressively on stopping the run on defense. It’s a pretty similar style to what we play – so I don’t expect either team to try to get cute here – it ought to just be head-to-head football.

The game opens with two long drives, that each end in a turnover. We manage to slowly build on field position in the first half, capitalize twice for field goals, and take a 6-0 lead into the half.

In the third quarter, Tennessee makes a great drive down the field, and punches in for the tying score, but misses the PAT so it remains tied at 6-6. Later down the road, though, Tennessee manages to run down to put up a field goal… and that’s all it takes. They keep Arsenault in check (79 yards) and that’s really all it takes to cinch up the win. Pretty good effort, but we just couldn’t put it away.


Season Wrap-up


Our best season so far, and we’re completely left out of the all-pro listings. No surprise – though RB Arsenault might have gotten there had he remained healthy all year.

We’ll have questions to resolve – starting at QB. We signed Tyrone Glover for just one year – so we’ll have to decide about him. He improved in the second half – but he’s clearly just a “don’t lose the game” kind of guy – but perhaps that’s what we need on this team, with a developing defense, and an improving running back. Prior to the end of this season, we released QB Bobby Silvers – purely a cap management decision, but not one that I wanted to get to like this.

Finally a taste of the playoffs – but this certainly still seems like an incomplete team, overall. And now, we will finally have to face financial constraints – we might not be able to re-sign the players we would like to for next season.

2009 preseason

Transitions and League Observations

We don’t have any retirements, and QB Bobby Silvers (let go late last season) remains in the free agent pool, hoping to get one more chance from somebody.


Front Office Decisions

Our defensive coordinator is out of contract – and I’ll look for a possible (younger) replacement. I pursue the DC from Minnesota, and we wrap him up with a pretty fat offer.

Def Coord: Ted Keith, 54
EX: DL
VG: LB,DB
GD: PK
AV: YT


Roster Review

Here’s the salary summery – sorted by current salary number, so we can easily see where our priorities have to lie (as we are losing a lot of players).


One quick adjustment will be to release RB Van Pelt – his $3,000,000 salary is a typo from last year’s offer (extra zero) and that will help. But we still will only have $22m in cap space, with 21 roster spaces to fill. Including, of course, starting quartercack.

At the moment, our only QB on the roster is Akron’s own Marvin Fox. I’m not so sure that we’re ready to hand things over to him.


Free Agency

My first move is to try to work out a long term offer for LT Bennie Heinlein, who has been very effective for us in his four years. He’s not all that highly regarded, so we offer 3yrs, $3.6m flat – and might have a shot to work it out with him.

We also get in a reasonable offer to FB Mickey Woodson, despite the fact that we have two other competent fullbacks – this is the guy I like to use.

WR Randall Sanders seems to be a good fit in our system, but is also not holding out for giant cash – so my 3yr offer is very affordable, also. Good news again.

We’ve got to decide what to do at cornerback. Deon Richmond missed nearly all of last year, and Scott Dunn returns. Calvin Wickliff is a nice utility reserve, but I don’t think he’s a starter. So – we’re okay for now, but might pursue a new deal with either Wes Mace or Scott Gomez before we settle everything here.

So – we have some cap space to work with, and the free agency market is open to us more than ever. I’d like, in particular, to wrap up improvements at QB and guard.

QB Quentin McDaniel has been a four-year starter for Detroit, with solid seasons, but not a superstar. Four years, and an 89/81 ratio – decent, but not outstanding. Right now, he seems like the best option at QB – and seeks about $7m a year. I’ll consider making an offer… I’d be more confident if he had put up at least one very good year, rather than being “pretty good” every year so far.

DE Butch Holbert was relegated to the bench in Chicago last year, but seems to be solid – would make a very nice addition to our depth chart up front. We make a standard three year offer.

G Lincoln Gruber would start for us at right guard, providing additional pass protection on the right side. He looks pretty effective – and would probably become our offensive line leader, too. I put in an offer, thinking he’d be a good fit.

CB Zack Callens is a perfect fit for our defense – a man coverage specialist who can make interceptions. Seems ideal, and we won’t have to pay for other skills, so he is affordable to us. Might be the answer for our secondary. I also decide to put in an offer for Chris Gomez, our own guy.

WR Josh Andruzzi is an exciting talent, very fast, but has yet to put it all together with the Jets. I will lay off – I can’t afford $7m for an unproven commodity, I don’t think.


So, including our own players – we have seven pursuits identified, all pretty cheap (under $2m.yr). That leaves enough space for a QB – but if we go after an expensive QB, we won’t be able to make any more moves. I’m not so sold on Quentin McDaniel that I want to leave the whole team with huge gaps – so my plan will be to search for value at the QB position, and to possibly look for a rookie there as well.

In the first week of free agency, we are pleased to see everything going fine with our several pursuits. QB Quentin McDaniel wouldn’t have come to us anyway, it seems – he received a fat offer from Buffalo, and will probably go there.

After seven weeks, all our guys are signed, and so is QB McDaniel to Buffalo (with a $10m signing bonus). We have $8 million or so to spend on three more roster spots – so the resolution of the QB position is obviously the biggest thing left to do.

Our options include re-signing QB Tyrone Glover, which would make a certain degree of sense. He wants $8m a year – so that’s a challenge financially, but it’s certainly a viable option. Shawn Mathews, another injury fill-in for us, is also available. Plus, there are other familiar faces – including Bobby Silvers and Steven Davis. I cannot find other guys who stand out from the crowd of available free agents – but we might consider a new addition, especially if we don’t draft a rookie.

The QB position goes untouched through the entire 20-stage process, and I’m content to wait until after the rookie draft to see where we can go there. I have lots of leverage in this draft (with a staggering five second round picks) so we might be able to make a move, if we like someone in the early part of the draft. Absent such a big move, we might be able to come up with a one or two year deal for someone like Glover or Mathews, both of whom are familiar with our team.


Rookie Draft

There are a few guys from Akron in this draft – again, I don’t think there will be an earth-shattering effect, but I do think we will get one impact player.

LB Don Montgomery (4.1) – Was a great ‘backer at Akron before having academic problems – missed his last two seasons, so he looks like a college guy who came from absolutely nowhere (zero stats his last season show up in FOF 2004). He projects to be a decent all-around player, but it will mostly be potential (he’s 24/49 by my scout).

S Alex Bunch (3.8) – looks like a solid prospect, maybe a late round pickup. High volatility (98) makes him suspect.

CB Wally Maloney and DE Johnny Rock were both great college players, but neither one looks to be worth much at the next level. Punter B.J. Wolf looks like he’s got a shot to catch on somewhere – maybe here in Cleveland, even.


Now, I’d love to land a top-grade quarterback in this draft – but as luck would have it, there’s nobody who seems to fill the bill, as nearly as I can tell.

The most fascinating player in the draft is LB Zach Reich, who is graded as an 8.0, and looks to have a very complete skill set. What’s so weird about him? He ran a 4.36 40-yard time, which makes him the third-fastest player in the entire draft. Wow.

Cincinnati takes LB Reich at #6 – so he will be in our division – wonderful.


I’m eyeing a couple of wideouts who slip out of the top ten spots. A.J. Ralston from Georgie Tech looks very good, and Zach Blair from Syracuse would be my next choice. Interestingly, Blair’s college QB Vincent Turnbull is probably the next QB to go in the draft as well. I see both guys as somewhat risky projects, but both have real upside, too.

QB Turnbull goes at pick #17 to Detroit, leaving my options at #22 even more limited. I decide that I want to get a wideout here – and I’ll wait until one of the two goes off the board, and then move up if need be to grab the other one. WR Ralston is #18 to San Francisco, so my hand is somewhat forced here.

With my plethora of extra draft picks, I decide to dip in and approach Denver. Two late seconds and a fourth pick later, and we have selection #19 in this draft, with which we take wide receiver Zach Blair from the ‘Cuse.

At #25, we could go with another wideout, as there are a few available, but instead I want to go with a defensive player. I’m also keeping a loose eye on G Lawrence Davidson from Clemson, who would make a great second round pick, I think.

There are two really good defensive players sitting here at #25 – LB Rickey Morrow and S Kirk Weed. I feel that our secondary is in greater need than our LB corps, so I grab Weed. Last year’s selection of Deron Ellery doesn’t look like it got us a true impact player – so we hope this one will do so. Either way, it ought to give us another legitimate option there.

Lawrence Davidson, my target left guard, gets taken at pick #32, to my chagrin. So, our two picks in the early second round will have to go elsewhere. I don’t have a real plan – I’ll just be looking for BPA. I end up grabbing another speedy wideout, and a pass-rushing OLB.


In round three, I finally select a quarterback, Michigan’s Marco Clancy. Super-high volatility might be a good or a bad sign, but he has enough going for him to merit interest. He ranked atop the “adjusted ratings” list since the early second round – so I feel we’re getting some value here, also.

Cincinnati took LB Don Montgomery in round six – so we’ll be able to keep tabs on him from with in the division. We’ll check in to see how he looks after training camp.

We receive a trade offer – a 4th round pick for FB Adam Salisbury – and quickly accept. He’s solid, but decent fullbacks are pretty easy to locate, and we have three. Done.


Late Free Agency

With all but our two first round draft picks signed, we have about $12m total to spend – with 47 roster spots spoken for. That leaves room to bring in rookies, and to spend some money on a player, or a few. We would like very much to resolve our immediate quarterback picture, with one or maybe two veterans.

Tyrone Glover has substantially adjusted his demands since before the draft, and is now seeking something along the lines of $3 million per season – half of where he was a few weeks ago. That is an awful lot closer to what I can afford than the $7m he sought before.

We also like what we see in RB Archie Ramsey, who did pretty well for Carolina playing for three seasons. Good, quick back who should be helpful for us as we need some depth there.


So, we settle on an offer to QB Tyrone Glover, and prepare to move onward. However, a twist in our plans arises – we now have competition. Detroit has put in a four year offer – comparable to ours, I think. Might make this a bit tougher. Through six weeks, he cannot decide between our offers – meanwhile, all our other players are signed.

As an insurance policy, we re-sign QB Stephen Davis – I really am not wild about the prospect of him taking over as our starter, but he could grow into the #2 job, I suppose.

In week seven of eight, Tyrone Glover decides – and accepts our offer. We are offering him to return as the starting QB for a playoff team – that has to be worth something, even if he’s upset that we didn’t pay him big, big money.

I give one last look at the free agent market, and I’m a little but concerned about the QB position. If rookie Clancy isn’t ready to contribute this year (pretty likely), then we’ll have Steven Davis as our #2 – and each of the last two years, our #2 ended up being the main starter. That’s a bit too much pressure, I fear. I check out the field – nobody really strikes me, but we have some options if we need them. That should be fine, rather than laying out yet another signing bonus.


Training Camp

We bring 62 players into camp this season – here’s the layout:


I don’t even have my top two picks signed, but the early returns are not too encouraging. Both lost some ground in their future ratings – which just isn’t a great sign.

We get WR Zach Blair signed, and it looks like he won’t be quite what we had hoped for – he has pretty good hands, but may not have the crisp skills needed to get open a lot. Oscar Goodwin, drafted later in the second round, might turn out to be more prolific – though each has his own set of skills.

QB Marco Clancy, however, looks like he might be pretty solid. Mixed skill set, but he has some real upside. LB Darrin Regalado looks like he can be a very effective pass-rusher, whether it’s from an OLB or even DE position.

In the draft review, we are awarded a B-plus, our best rating yet. We have two players on “The Green Page” – QB Clancy ranked 8th, and WR Zach Blair down the list a ways.


Season Analysis

Tough to say where we will go this year. I don’t think we made any major impact additions – perhaps save DE Butch Holton, who certainly helps us with depth, and might even become a starter for us. But the rookie receivers will be rotation players at most, and I don’t think we’ll see a breakout there. Overall, we’re largely the same team as how we ended up last season – hoping that a year to gel will help us to improve a shade further.

Our roster rating is up to 61… still in the bottom third, but rising.

I haven’t been watching cohesion closely – but now it stands at 89-98-99-87, pretty highly regarded in every area. The passing game took a dent by adding two promising rookies, and we have rookie Zach Blair currently slated to start for us at flanker. But overall, we have been pretty stable.


This year, we will try to put it together again, and make another run at the postseason. Our WR corps has never been better, and we ought to have pretty good offensive balance. On defense, we just want more of the same from last year – maybe add in a few more sacks. Tough to argue on that side. A division win will again be the main goal I don’t know if we have enough pieces in place to be thinking much bigger than that.

2009 Regular Season

In our opener against Pittsburgh, our defense comes out swinging – getting 8 QB sacks en route to a great shutout, 26-0. QB Glover gets dinged up, and will be listed as questionable for next week, but what an opening game!

After we roar to a 3-0 start, Tyrone Glover’s abdominal injury just gets worse, and we simply have to sit him down. Tough call on who should start – but I decide to go with the rookie, Marco Clancy. Glover ought to be okay in a couple of weeks, so we’ll do our best without him.

We lose in Clancy’s debut, but we had a 19-3 lead and choked it away – only one pick, so it’s tough to lay this on him. Tyrone Glover declares himself ready to go – and we reinstate him as the starter. We run our record to 5-2 with a good rushing attack and solid defense, but then we have our next roster crisis.

RB Roderick Arsenault blows out his knee – it will require surgery, and he’s done. Definitely for the year – who knows about after that. Another big ouch, as our best player has washed ashore yet again. Veteran Archie Ramsey will step in and start, but Arsenault’s production (640 yards rushing in 7 games) will be sorely missed. We’re back to our committee system again, it seems.

At 6-2 halfway home, our division looks pretty weak and we are looking good, but a bit unknown with the loss of Arsenault. We’re also going to be without LB Cedric Goodwin for a while – but at least I have confidence in my backups there. Pittsburgh gets their revenge on us, and pulls within one game of us in the division race.

The next knee blowout is that of QB Tyrone Glover. Now we face a real challenge. We’ll have little choice but to toss rookie Mario Clancy in for the rest of the way, and it will be his lead to lose. I don’t feel like we have time to bring a brand new QB up to speed. That is, unless. . .

We re-sign Bobby Silvers for the league minimum for this year, and place him at #2 on the depth chart. He’s not the speedy, flashy track star we once built around – but we know him and he’s ready to go.

We also have to sub in at RB, giving Kendrick Ramsey a chance to start in place of injured Archie Ramsey (tough to keep straight). TE Whiting is out again, too – and I don’t think we’ll ever get 16 games from this guy.

We reel off two wins behind Clancy, and even get Silvers into the win over Chicago for one pass. Another win behind the youngster, and we can see him improving week by week – I’m rapidly getting sold on his future, even while he has our present right in his hands.

We get to 10-3, a remarkably lofty record, when we suffer our next setback. Any guesses? Of course! QB Marco Clancy’s elbow is twisted around, and he will need a few weeks off. This leaves us with hardly an option at all. With second and third choices installed all over the backfield, we will try to finish out this injury-marred season with Bobby Silvers behind center.

In his re-debut, Bobby Silvers has three picks and we lose to Baltimore. He shows some signs of his old self – but that player is long gone. The next week, though, Silvers is our MVP completing 27 or 37 in a wonderful game.

11-4 is only one game better than Pittsburgh, so we have to win our finale at Cinti. If we win, we will get a much-needed bye week, and probably the #2 seed in the AFC. A clutch 27-24 win seals it, and we are headed into the postseason again, as repeat champs of the AFC North division.


There is a lot of mediocrity in this league – lots in the AFC. We will take our week off, and await a contender from the wild card round.


Again, the defense comes first. In the top six against the run, pass, and scoring. Amazing. We added a pass rush to the mix this year, with newcomer DE Holton adding quite a lot to our attack. Plus, we got something of a breakout year from CB Deon Richmond, whose 16 passes defensed is a huge improvement over his best to date. We didn’t grab a lot of interceptions, but the pass defense was solid overall, regardless. Top marks to the D!

Offensively, our line held together, and everything else was patched up just to get by. We were the #3 team in yards per carry, without any back over 700 yards. We went through quarterbacks like water – what a weird season! Regardless, we have a fabulous record, and a home playoff game ahead – for whoever can actually go out and play.


2009 Postseason

AFC Divisional Playoff: Tennessee (11-6) at Cleveland (12-4)

We know Tennessee – this is where our playoffs ended last season, on a late field goal as our helpless offense stood by and couldn’t do a thing about it. Many think we’ll be in for much the same this year, with our “spare parts” offensive weapons.

The first quarter is spent trading punts and working field position. We drive as the quarter runs down, and Bobby Silvers finds Jermaine Aceves for a key third down conversion, and then again for the first TD of the game. Through the first half, Aceves comes up with one big catch after another, and we remain in control most of the way. The Titans drive at the end of the half, and get within 7-3 at the break.

In the third quarter, Tennessee gets a big break, as Kendrick Ramsey fumbles, and they return the fumble for a 29 yard TD. They lead 10-3, and have gotten the edge, even though our defense has played over their heads all day. Later in the quarter, a 43-yard pass from Silvers to, of course, Aceves, puts us right into scoring position. A serious of inexcusable penalties push us back to the 25, and we have to try a pretty long kick. Vallejo delivers, and we tie it up at 10 apiece.

After our defense holds again, we get a fair catch interference penalty after perhaps some baiting by WR Rose, and get the ball at our 37. We fail to capitalize, though, and we drop back into the punting and position battle.

Down just under 6 minutes to play, we get to the Tennessee 27, facing fourth down and one yard to go. Tough kick from here, but it’s tied up and our defense is playing well – three points might well win this thing. Vallejo sends it up, but it sails wide right… and we turn it back over to Tennessee. They get to midfield, but we force a punt, and take over again – albeit at our own 5 yard line.

With two minutes left, Silvers gets us a first down, and another, and we are out of immediate danger. But on second down from our 29, he gets sacked, and loses the ball. Tennessee comes away with the football, and a precious opportunity to go ahead – on our 22 with 1:05 to go. With 3 seconds on the clock, they connect on a 28 yard field goal, and go up 13-10. Once again, our season ends by a Titans field goal, and we head home, beaten on our home turf.


Two turnovers, both immeasurably costly. Tough to say what we could have done without those mishaps, but allowing them to score on defense and setting up their other easy score makes it pretty clear. A tough offseason awaits for our weary warriors.


Season Wrap-up

It’s hard to fault anyone, or to be disappointed. With this spate of injuries, it was pretty obvious we’d have trouble on offense. The defense rose to the challenge, and we did all we could with the offense. We were right in the big game, but just didn’t have the tools to close the door.

Injuries have become my top concern with this team, and I wish there were something I could do… our coach has the best possible rating, so there’s no obvious solution form here.


Dallas beats Jacksonville in the Superbowl, becoming the first team to win two (first was in 2004).


We’re shut out of the awards list once again – disappointing, but not surprising.

Excellent read as usual, QuikSand.

One question for you, with regard to your training camp results sections: did you do that by hand? Or is there a way to print the changes in current and future ratings directly to a file?

Fonzie: I'm not sure, but I think he put it into Excel, and has a handy-dandy forumla pre-made to automatically track the changes.

Quik: Tell Bobby that his fans (at least this one) still love him.

Thanks RPI-Fan. That was going to be my guess, but I just wanted to make sure I wasn't missing out on some wonderfully handy new feature that was obvious to everyone but me. Alas!

Good read Quik. Incredible story with Bobby Silver coming back to win 2 of 3 games to finish off the regular season...how much would the media have hyped that up? Shame he lost that fumble in the end of the Tennessee game.

I do indeed use excel to make the camp analysis. Now that I do that, I almost can't imagine playing the game without doing so... watching closely to see what players see their future potential go way down or slightly up seems very important to me.

As of yet, I haven't even automated the process -- I just paste it in from a text file, and quickly add the "comparison" columns I need. The whole thing takes maybe five minutes to assemble.

Might be a nice utility, though... and I have to imagine it would be fairly easy to create, using the two text files as the inputs.

FYI - I'll be away for a couple of days - probably won't have another update until Friday afternoon or evening, at the earliest. But not to fear- I'm sufficiently hooked on this career to keep playing.

Actually, I lied - I can post one more update to get up to date before I go...

2010 preseason

We have established ourselves as a playoff-caliber team, with two running division titles. Now, we need to get over that hump, and try to become consistent enough to play with the big boys. That means getting past these injuries, and putting together a strong season – and hopefully getting past our first round playoff game.

Here is our synopsis to date:


The slope has been properly upward, and now we should have fairly free reign to improve where we need to. Some of our biggest decisions, though, will be where we decide to stick with our existing players – many of whom will be looking to really get paid this year.

Transitions and League Observations

We again escape retirements, and bring back our roster intact.

“Intact” is a relative term, since we left two of our important players with serious injuries last season. Fortunately, it seems that we have good news. RB Roderick Arsenault and QB Tyron Glover both look healthy and none the worse for wear. So, there’s at least some chance that we can get back to normal with these two – both of whom have been critical cogs in our offense.


Front Office Decisions

I hired an aging scout a couple of years ago, knowing he was on the decline. The decline is well underway – I can take him for one more year, perhaps. But I do look for a suitable replacement. There’s nobody as good as our 71 year old coot – so we stick with him for now.

OC Levon moss has been pretty solid for us – I’m not itching to replace him. He accepts a new five year deal – solid. Here’s an update on his ratings:

Off Coord: Levon Moss, 50
EX: OL
VG: QB,RB,PK
GD: WR,YT

He keeps improving – and so do we. Five year deal, good stuff.


Roster Review

Interestingly, I check out “The Green Page” again here – and see that Mario Clancy remains on the list of hot young players – listed #9 overall. That’s pretty exciting for us, now we just need to keep him healthy. I now think he looks like the best QB form that draft – and we got him in round three.


Well, if Glover is really back, we are in pretty solid shape here. Bobby Silvers was a desperation move for last season, but in all practicality can’t have a future with us. We’ve got our squad of four players set for this year.


Much like QB – if Arsenault is really all the way back, then we are in nice shape. Kendrick Ramsey had a nice season last year as our #1 back down the stretch, and I think he’s actually getting a bit better as we go. We’ve got four players signed – and should be all set here. At FB, I like Ian Goodwin’s potential – and would like to re-sign him cheaply to be our reserve.


I’m frustrated with Arnie Whiting, who just gets hurt about every other game. He is a brilliant talent, but if he can’t play, what good is he? Schroeder has potential, but has little to offer right now. This might be a target position for an acquisition, regrettably (I’m spending a lot of money on Whiting).


Somme decisions to make here – especially since Sanders is probably out for most of this year, and probably won’t be worth a damn when he’s back. Jermaine Aceves stepped up and played really well last year when called on – if he’s affordable, he could become our starter at split end. O’Rourke might be cheap after an injury-plagued season spent mostly on the bench. Two youngsters have good futures, but we need some more around them.


Lincoln Gruber is our positional leader, and while he doesn’t provide a chemistry boost, he gave us a solid season in his debut. LG Terrell Marion had a very nice year last season, developing into a quality starter after all (we were worried). RT Bert Schroeder was supposed to be our pass-blocking giant on the right side, but his performance has been a bit disappointing in his two years with us. Overall, though, I am pleased with the performance we’re getting up front – and we’ll only look to add if we get a great prospect.


I could re-sign both of these local products – Wolf is from Akron, and Vallejo from Ohio State. I think Vallejo has great potential – he was a great pickup after the draft last year, and we’ll try to keep him around.


Rodney Huffman has been an anchor for us for years, but adding Butch Holton seemed to make everything work last year. Cascadden continues to develop into a top-grade run stopper inside, while Harry Wayne keeps pushing Kris Gibson for playing time – both are pretty solid. This group has been getting the job done – but depth is key, as injuries continue to loom.

One factor for consideration – DT Willie Oliveira is our positional leader, and we have a crazy five affinities with him. This might be a case of a player earning his keep by just stirring the pot – we don’t use him a lot, but he’s certainly decent enough to keep around.


We have contract issues here, as both Goodwin and Casey are out of contract at MLB. We’ve been spoiled to have two good run-stoppers here, and the last two years, we have needed them both. If Goodwin is going to be injury prone from now on, we will need to back him up well.

Goodwin is asking for over $3m per season, which is pretty significant. If I knew he could be healthy, it would be very worth it. But coming off two injury-plagued seasons, I have to be worried a bit here. Rick Casey, similarly, wants almost $4m per season – so neither guy here is going to be cheap.

Ricky DiGiacomo would be able to step in and play MLB if needed, as he has the right mix of skills. I’m reluctant to actually move him there, though – we’ll play it by ear.

Sam-backer Howie Taylor was on his way to his best season when he got hurt last year – he wants nearly $5m per season, which looks unlikely.

We have a serious issue here. DiGiacomo and Regalado are good enough to start, and we couoldd build a lineup around them – but bringing back one or more of the familiar faces from this top-rated defense would certainly be nice to do, if we could.


Deon Richmond had a nice season last year, and his ratings boosted as a result. His rating in man coverage is up to 89 – that’s where he has been gaining rapidly, which fits well with my secondary system.

Does Scott Dunn get a new contract? He’s been a three-year starter for us, has gives us pretty solid seasons, but just isn’t flashy. My inclination is to go with the guys that we have on hand – with five corners already signed, we should be okay. Losing him will mean a new secondary leader – probably Deon Richmond. We’ll see how everyone gets along with him – at the moment, we have two pluses to one minus there.

Undrafted Thurman Jacobs remains better than either of the first-rounders he’s lined up with at safety, and re-signing him would make a tone of sense.


It’s good to have no place on the roster where we are absolutely desperate. We’ve got 38 players signed to contracts, and about $9.4 million free after accounting for the draft ahead. $9 million won’t replace our LB corps, unless we can make room elsewhere (presumably by releasing players).

As I contemplate players who might be cut, I take a fleeting glimpse at RB Arsenault. There’s something that really unnerves me here. I check his contract, and see that to renegotiate, he’s only asking for a modest signing bonus and three years at minimum salary. That seems like a bad sign to me – yes, he comes off an injury, but he looks like he’s healthy and ready to go. Why the pathetic demands? Is this guy a time bomb, waiting to implode? ::drumming fingers::


Free Agency

There is great news on the free agent market – Tennessee’s QB Bo Watkins is available, hopefully meaning he won’t be back with Tennessee to kill us again.

The only player of ours I have an initial bid in for is DT Willie Oliveira, the capstone to our great defensive chemistry up front. Everyone else will be a wait-and-see decision, especially since we are so cap-strapped.

WR Marlon Sasser has been steady for the Jets – I like his potential for our system, and we put in a modest offer for him. We need someone at WR, and Jermaine Aceves is looking for pretty big money. Sasser would give us a startable option, for much less money.

DT Harvey Gustafson looks pretty good, a solid pass rusher, and very affordable here. The Giants got three good seasons from him – we hope to lock him up and make a serious improvement to our defensive front. What a value pickup.

And that’s all I’m going to do right away. I plan to spend most of our money on re-signing our own players, so I don’t pursue any of the top-dollar free agents. Rather, I’ll sit back and see who among our own guys goes for big money (and we will let them go) and who might return at an affordable rate.


After week one, we have a partial answer. CB Scott Dunn and S Thurman Jacobs both get fat deals and head elsewhere. WR Jermaine Aceves has one waiting, and I don’t expect to match that. So, there are three guys we won’t have back.

I have to up my offer a shade to try to content with Seattle’s bud for DT Gustafson, but we hope and expect to land him. The others are currently uncontested.

Week two sees us wrap up all three of the guys we are pursuing, and no additions to the departing list – so that’s a good turn of events. Including those signings, we have 42 players signed plus eight draft picks – leaving only three genuinely “open” roster spots, and about $7m to spend on them.

I also note that DT Harvey Gustafson adds the first personality conflict to an otherwise happy bunch of defensive linemen. He’s pretty darned good, but that might be more than I want to add to the mix there.

I have the opportunity to sign some guys to cap-friendly deals for this season – like MLB Goodwin, whose starting offer only hits us for $1.8m this year, but grows to $3.5 then $4.1 in the following seasons. I hate to get into that pattern, but with a team this close to success, it’s very tempting.

I go ahead and re-sign P Wolf for minsal, but that’s a move basically without consequence. The real decisions are with the bigger money players, especially at linebacker.

Howie Tyler is next to go, inking a fat deal with Denver. With his departure (for over $4m per season) I think my decision is clear – I have to re-sign MLB Goodwin, and keep the LB group fairly close to intact. Since he has no offers, I decide to wait him out a while. I sit all the way through 20 stages, and both Goodwin and Casey are untouched. We can sort this out after the rookie draft, it seems – maybe they will have an adjustment in their demands at that time.


Rookie Draft

Overall, my top priority positions to fill via the draft would probably be TE, S, and LB. Linebackers seem to be pretty plentiful (though I haven’t been selecting them that well) so we might look for an impact player early, then settle on our need spots later. A new guard for our OL might be a good addition, as our two starters are both out of contract soon.


The Akron contingent is fair this year:

C Brian Wolfe (4.5, 33/51) looks like a solid interior lineman, good middle pick
TE J.T. Stoyanovich (3.8, 15/45) could be solid if his blocking skills develop
G Thurman Davidson (3.3, 14/38) extremely high volatility, looks risky
DT Kent McKnight, QB Bobby McGregor, and CB Jim Marshall look like they will go undrafted


In this draft, I love safety Louis Shipway out of Clemson, and would love to grab him. He’s easily the top safety, and it’s a need position (despite the fact that we are carrying two first-rounders already). There are other players we like, but he’d be a great fit. If he falls out of the top 10 or 15, I may try to move up to grab him.

S Shipway goes at #6 – too high to attempt to move up. So, we will settle for whoever falls down a bit farther. At picks #18, and #21, I fail to move up to get the players I want – and see them drop off the board. Sitting at #30, now I fear we’ll get stuck with a player we don’t really need – or a big fat bust.

I decide to deal out of the first round this year, and swing a deal with Minnesota – picking up their first rounder next year for this pick and my extra fourth rounder. I didn’t see first-round value at this spot, and I’d rather wait until I do before signing a player for big money. This will free up cap space for this season, as well.


At our top pick (round two), there are two linebackers and one offensive tackle I like. I offer Jacksonville our picks in round 4,5, and 6 to get the very next selection at the end of round two – and our draft has suddenly consolidated an awful lot. We grab two Ohio products with these picks, and hopefully bolster our line and backer corps.


TE Pariso looks like a solid prospect, and we expect to start him when Arnie can’t play for ten games this year. WR Causey might have potential to make the team and contribute as a fourth or fifth receiver, we think.


Late Free Agency

So, we hit the late FA stages with 47 players signed (including all our drafted rookies), and $7.9 million to spend. I decide that rookie LB Clarence Frederick is a better fit on the strong side, where he may have a chance to become our starter.

I put in a 1yr, $3m offer for MLB Cedric Goodwin. With his injury history I just don’t want to commit long-term money and bonus to him, just to see him sit another half-year our. It’s risky, but I think it’s the right thing to do here.

Fortunately, Rick Casey has had a change of heart, and has reduced his demands a lot. I put in a 3yr, $3.8m offer to him, and feel like grabbing both of these guys would be a great way to maintain the group up front.

I re-up with LB Stanley Fisk, also. He has been a solid reserve, and is only asking for minsal plus a trifle. K Jeremy Vallejo is also an easy re0signing, now that his demands have fallen to reason.

Buffalo has released TE Jonathan Holmes, who looks like he might be a very solid player, despite having gotten almost no playing time for them. I put in a three year offer, in hopes of landing a potential big fish very cheaply.

I add a number of undrafted rookies to our list of pursuits, and we are ready to roll.

We land our rookie pursuits, and toward the end of the FA period, both MLBs Goodwin and Casey re-sign as well. Very successful ploy on our part, I reckon.


Training Camp

Before we even get to training camp, there is big news. WR Marvin Causey, an afterthought draft pick, suddenly looks like a monster. This could be our first major breakout player form the late rounds of the draft. My scout now rates him a 30/67… much better than he appeared when we first grabbed him.

Here’s how training camp unfolds, through our scout’s eyes:


Most of the big losers among the rookies were guys we just brought in to see if we could fish something out of the water at C, RB, and S. No great losses there.

Regrettably, T Danny Norton (for whom we moved way up in the draft) doesn’t look all that promising – yet another busted OL pick in these drafts, which has been a rather disturbing pattern.

CB Deon Richmond had another nice camp, and continues his mid-career growth process. TE Jonathan Holmes looks like a monster signing – he may even get the start over the frail Arnie Whiting.

Both QB Marco Clancy (#6) and WR Marvin Causey (#13) reside on The Green Page. That’s interesting…


Season Analysis

Cohesion stand at 92-95-100(85)-92. Very solid, though we lost some in the secondary.

On the franchise value screen, we rate a 60 in roster rating – putting us finally into the top half of the league.

I have adjusted our defensive scheme a bit – I want to keep WLB DiGiacomo on the field more, so we will use even less nickel than before. I also slant our coverage even more toward man-to-man, as that’s where our guys are best suited.

We’ve managed to do well in wins and losses each of the last two seasons despite suffering awful injury setbacks. Can we stay healthy this year? I’m very worried about Arsenault, but I’m feeling good about the backups at RB, especially the cousins Ramsey and Ramsey. On defense, we have largely the same crew, and good replacements for those who are gone – I think we should be solid once again.

Is this team cut from championship cloth? I don’t know. We will run the ball, try to avoid turnovers, and play solid defense. That’s pretty much all we can do – we’ll see how it plays this year.

2004 Regular Season

As we start of the regular season, rookie LB Clarence Frederick is already hurt, and won’t be able to start the season in the lineup. I shuffle the deck a bit, and start Derrick Regalado instead. He may not give up the job – he’s bee effective as a substitute, now we’ll give him a real shot.

We roar to a 2-0 start, looking good with Arsenault and Glover seemingly 100%. DT Harvey Gustafson, pushed into a starting role due to injuries, is named MVP of our next game, with 7 tackles and 2 sacks to help us beat Denver 16-6. We need overtime to beat Buffalo, by stay undefeated and get to 4-0. Good start – we are rolling right along.

The stage is set for a division showdown – we host Pittsburgh, who are also unbeaten through four games. Lots on the line – we’ve edged them out for the last two division titles, but they are the big threat, of course. A big fourth quarter propels us to a 20-12 win over the Steelers, and puts us ahead in the division race.

Miami (of course) ends our thoughts of a perfect season, but we make it to our halfway point at 6-2, and still in the division lead. Glover has been solid at QB (16/6 ratio is god, but a 6.36 ypa is only marginal, I think). Arsenault has 696 yards carrying the bulk of the load for us. Cedric Goodiwn is having a very nice year, with 61 tackles at the halfway point, and we have notched 27 QB sacks so far. Our defense remains tough – we are #1 in yards per carry allowed. Signs point to “yes” here in Cleveland.

Later in the season, we lose two in a row, and slide to 7-4. That’s cause for some concern. Of course, we are crippled with injuries, but that’s nothing unusual. I reshuffle again (mostly on the front seven, where we have now lost two more starters), and try to come up with the magic formula.

We get a big win on the rebound, but lose Tyrone Glover again – out for 7 weeks. That projects right into the playoffs, so he may be done. We’ll fall back to young Marco Clancy – he’ll become our #1 the rest of the way, it seems. I’m sure Bobby Silvers is sitting by his phone, waiting for the call. Who knows?

We reel off two wins behind Clancy (and a rejuvenated running game), and practically lock up the division at 10-4. Baltimore is 8-6, and still has slight hopes – but we should be okay.

The injuries on our defensive front are becoming comical. It’s as if every guy plays for one or two games, gets hurt, and gets replaced by the other guy coming off the injured list – who then himself gets hurt in a game or two, and it never ends. We’re going to again have 15 guys with 40 tackles on the season – everybody is playing a half season, it’s crazy.

Regardless, we win out for the regular season, and get our postseason berth in fairly good order behind young Marco Clancy.


There’s obviously been tumult in the league – last year’s Superbowl combatants are both going to miss the playoffs. Must be a bug – that could never happen in real life.

Regardless, here is the summary of our season:



We slipped a good deal in the second half – on both offense and defense. Roderick Arsenault led the league in rushing for most of the season, but faded and finished second by about 80 yards. Newcomer Marlon Sasser had a nice season for us as our starting split end, and he fended off rookie Marvin Causey pretty well to post a good season. If we could get the QB position stabilized, we might be able to post some bigger receiving numbers.

Amidst the DL injury problems we had, two guys stayed healthy all year – DT Gary Cascadden had a wonderful year on the inside, and DE Butch Holton was great on the outside. Both ought to get some all-pro recognition – they were both spectacular. Both are signed through next season – then they might get pretty pricey.

As we head into the postseason, I’m a little skittish about our QB situation – Clancy is playing well, but he’s got a dinged-up knee and behind him we have two untested unknowns. It seems like it’s time for an insurance policy – and we re-sign QB Bobby Silvers to another short-term deal, to the delight of the Browns’ faithful. Hopefully, he can just help with morale and form – but if he has to play, we’ll slot him at #2.

Fortunately, we have a bye week to recover from out many wounds, and hopefully get into place.


2010 Postseason

Here is our injury report, heading into the playoff game against the Jets.


Glover, Huffman, DiGiacomo and Gibson are all on IR. We have a number of second-stringers in key positions, yet again.

New York Jets (12-4-1) at Cleveland Browns (12-4)

The spread is Cleveland by 3, assessing the game as a basic draw on talent. They have a great QB in Harrison Stanford, behind a superior offensive line. They have a tough defensive front, but I think their secondary can be picked on – they picked up S Thurman Jacobs from us this offseason in an attempt to strengthen back there, but we might be able to work on their corners. We will still try to pound the ball, but will keep the air game at the ready, of course.

We get the kid of first quarter that we like – a field position battle, lots of punts. We get a break when safety Kirk Weed gets through to block a Jets punt, and we take over at their 26 yard line. We connect on a 36 yard FG to take the lead late in the first quarter.

Big turn of events in the second quarter, as we drive deep but give up an interception in the Jets’ end zone. They respond with a long drive, get to our four yard line, but we hold on fourth and one yard to go – so we take over on downs. No scoring on the exchange, but a lot of drama in a close, low-scoring game thus far. The Jets take advantage of the field position, though, and tie it up before the half.

In the middle of the third quarter, Arsenault breaks a 22-yard run to get to the Jets 20, our deepest attack yet. He runs again to their 12, and we are in excellent position. WR Causey drops a sure TD pass, and we have to settle for another kick, and go ahead 6-3. The Jets respond with a solid drive, and on the first play of the fourth quarter, they tie it up again at 6-6.

The Jets capitalize on their momentum, stop us cold, take over near midfield after a short punt, and drive the short field to post the game’s first TD, and take the lead 13-6 with half a quarter yet to play. We’re not a great come-from-behind team, but suddenly we will need to open things up. Clancy hits Sasser and Causey for first downs, and gets us out to midfield. Time is not a pressure quite yet, but we are down to five minutes and change. Sasser for 14, then Whiting for 10, and we move to the Jets’ 13 yard line. Sasser jets into the end zone on a timing pattern, and we pull even with the Jets on the score, 13-13.

With three minutes to go, the Jets get going quickly, and hit a strike downfield to get to our 43 as the two minute warning sounds. We yield a painful third down conversion (a 13 yard completion on 3rd and 10), and they get into position for another late FG – going ahead 16-13. We bumble the return, getting only to the 13 yard line – and with 25 seconds remaining things look very bleak. Our final two plays are in vain, and we end up losing in our playoff opener yet again, and yet again by a mere field goal.


It’s Indianapolis and Philadelphia in the Superbowl, and the Eagles get a 13-0 shutout win.


Philly’s QB Jacques Cheatham has become the uber-player, bringing down the league MVP award three years running, and now leading his team to the title.

I’m glad to see my two stalwart defensive linemen making the all-pro team, much deservedly, I think. With so many injuries, having two guys make it the whole way and do so well was a key ingredient in our relative success.


Season Wrap-up

Another season basically at the same level. We play good enough defense, no matter who’s actually slotted in the lineup, that we win a good number of games. But I don’t know that we really have all the answers on offense. Marco Clancy was adequate, and will push to start next year – but does he have enough weapons?

We’ll have tough free agent decisions in the coming offseason, and I don’t really know whether we ought to pursue retaining players (especially ones who have had injury problems) or re-stocking with new faces.

Regardless, it’s a good dilemma to be in – standing at 12-4 and trying to decide how to get better.

Quik,

I noticed in your house rules that you wouldn't start a lineman out of position, but you seem to make the exception for defensive backs. Just curious, as it is fairly common in the NFL to shift linemen around due to injuries.

I suspect he didn't just move Dotson to corner, but rather changed his position to CB.

Tampa Bay won their division with a 6-8-2 record? Wow.

Too bad about the early playoff exit - but given your team's trajectory next year will be different, I'm sure.

I don't even remember this case, but in general I have felt fairly free to move players to new positions permanently. I try it fairly regularly with URFA running backs (moving to receiver) and shuffle around linemen as well. DBs are another case.

I may have slipped a time or two and started a player out of position, but in general I think this is a good rule to follow, and I'm trying to remember to stick with it.

2011 preseason

Transitions and League Observations

It’s become routine, but we again escape any retirements.

I don’t notice any lingering injury issues – se we will head into the meat of the preseason, with a lot of work to do.


Front Office Decisions

Scout Myron Hampton is 72, and rapidly declining. He’d accept a new contract, but I don’t think it would make a lot of sense to give him one.

We sign Kim Donaldson, 39, whose main attractive feature is his lack of grave weaknesses. Nothing too special about him – but perhaps he can develop over time. He is pretty cheap, though.

Scout: Kim Donaldson, 39
VG: WR
GD: QB,PK,DL,LB,DB,Young Talent
AV: RB,OL


Roster Review

So, through the eyes of our new middling scout, here is a walk through the roster – with a eye on free agency coming up ahead.


What to do at quarterback? Glover has been decent, but Clancy is coming along – and might be ready to take over this year. It might be an open competition in preseason, but Clancy has a legitimate shot to be our #1 this season, I think. I’m a little tired of Glover’s late-season disappearing act.

Steven Davis might be worth re-signing, though I never seem willing to actually let him start. What of Bobby Silvers? He’s immensely popular – I don’t mind keeping him around, perhaps even as our #3. Marvin Fox is probably gone – tough to keep justifying his role and paycheck (see Steven Davis).


I like this group, but we lack any long term stability – with everyone in a contract year. Arsenault is solid and productive, and extremely expensive. I sort of suspect we could get similar results giving the ball to either of the Ramsey cousins, but I’m not sure if we want to backtrack on our commitment to the run, which has borne fruit thus far. Re-signing Donovan Adams is not a high priority, but he may come cheaply.



Both fullbacks are nice players – Woodson has the balance of skills I like at FB, while Goodwin is versatile enough to do most anything.

Holmes is good enough to be our starter at TE, and I don’t expect to pursue the brittle (but brilliant) Whiting. Pariso is a decent backup, nothing more.


Zach Blair has established himself as out starter at the flanker spot, while Sasser and Causey may battle again for time at split end. Sasser is super-fast, and had a really nice season last year – but Causey shows such promise. After missing all of last year, Randall Sanders is a dead man walking – he can’t stick around, after he lost so much to injuries.


Five-year starter Kurt Nichols had a lousy season, but it was his first one after several really good years. G Terrell Marion deserves a new deal, but his demands are steep, and might require us to look elsewhere. We have to do something at RT, as Bert Schrader is looking for pretty big money, and I don’t know. We’ve thrived behind this line, but free agency may be about to render it asunder.


If our plan is to play the ball control, field position style of football that has been our hallmark, we probably need to improve at punting. Wolf’s average dropped to 35.5 last year – and that’s just not good enough. I may make landing a top-grade punter a priority for the coming year.

We’re very pleased with Vallejo, despite a dip in his performance this year also.


Work to be done here. Holton is signed, but he’s the only DE we have on board. Rodney Hurrman wants $12 million per year – and considering that he has only given us 16 starts twice in his six seasons with us, that is a very hard amount to swallow. I could see us working something out if he goes unpursued through the first stage – but for now, I’m planning to be without him. Fox and Blum are fairly cheap, and either or both could return – but we will have to make a move here this year, whether by getting a veteran or a rookie, or both.

At DT, Cascadden is signed through this season, but Gibson; might not even play this year. That makes Gustafson our key player – he’s been solid, but not reliably healthy (we may need him for the DE mix as well). Oliveira and Wayne give us good depth – especially if Wayne will sign a long term deal to stick around (though my new scout doesn’t like Wayne nearly as much as my old scout did).


Playing on a one year deal, MLB Goodwin gave us a solid season – getting over 20% of the team tackles while on the field – a high number, even for him. He was only able to start 12 games, though, adding to my injury concerns. We have Casey signed (and I think he’d be a solid starter) but we will try to work out a suitable deal for Goodwin, who has been with us since the very beginning.

Outside, we have solid potential – need to develop Frederick into a player, after he missed his entire first season on the IR. DiGiacomo fits well into the weak side role, and Regalado played well last season wherever he was slotted.


Deon Richmond is out of contract, but has been improving in recent years. I want to lock him up, and keep him aboard – and I think we will be able to do just that. Zack Callens is a similar player – I started him opposite Richmond last season, with decent results. Calvin Wickliff has been a nice substitute, but isn’t a great fit for us – his top skills are inn zone defenses, which we have mostly abandoned.

Kirk Weed and Deron Ellery continue to pull down big money to play (reasonably well) in our back secondary, and converted corner Cowley has work to do, but can be okay. I’m a little gun shy about drafting here, but an improvement would be welcome.


Top target positions: DE, T, G, CB, OLB, P


Free Agency

We have 38 players signed, and $16.8m in usable cap space. That’s tight, but not quite as bad as last season. So, we will have some room to move.

I have DE Jimmy Fox and CB Dean Richmond on my initial re-signing list, with more expected to follow if they remain reasonable.


C O.J. Owens looks like a very solid lineman, and a possible starter for us if we aren’t able to re-up with Nichols. Solid player, pretty good in the running game.

DE Tim Hendrix doesn’t seem to be stable enough to start regularly, but he seems decent enough – a good guy for our rotation, I think.

LB Warren Holmes looks like a contributor, and comes cheaply. Great value.

DE Cris Moseley has been underutilized by Dallas, and I think he could be a solid addition. Better against the run than pass, he might make a good platoon guy for us.

WR Jimmy Ellard is a great kick returner and would make a solid reserve wideout – he even had a 1,000-yard season with Houston a couple years back. Nice short-term pickup.


So, with seven pursuits, none for really big money, we go ahead into free agency. Even if we land everyone, we’ll still have some cash left over for re-signings of our own players. But this could help fill some need areas, if we get the guys we are after.

Things look good right away – we get two of our seven, and are along in bidding for the rest. We should land them all.

DE Huffman and TE Whiting both have big money suitors, so I expect them both to be gone. I’ll miss Huffman, but he simply hasn’t been reliable – and at over $11 million a year, I can’t see a new deal making sense – we’d have to make such great sacrifices.


Jimmy Ellard signs to play receiver, and this looks like a boom for us. He’s become our receivers leader, and we suddenly have three affinities – this could help the whole unit, even if Ellard is strictly a reserve.

Dallas signs RT Bert Schroeder, and we definitely need to something about that position. I check out the possibilities, and former first rounder Donnie Thornton is the obvious target. I put in a two year offer, and after a few weeks, we land him.

I’m surprised when C Kurt Nichols receives and accepts a contract from Arizona. I really didn’t think he’d depart – I had expected to wait him out and get him back a little more cheaply. Tough break – but new signee Owens will probably step in and become our starter. I don’t think we’ll have a chemistry problem, but we will have a cohesion loss for certain, with at least two new starters, and the LG spot still unsettled.

I’m playing the same game with MLB Cedric Goodwin – I want and expect to re-sign him, but I’m balking at the price he’s asking for. My plan is to wait until after the 20 weeks and rookie draft, and then move in with a more reasonable offer. I want to bring him back – but I have a backup plan, which is essential.

We get to the end of the first 20 weeks, and Goodwin remains unsigned. My late move here is to pick up 5th year MLB K.C. Perez, who seems to be a nice underused player from the Pats, and who would be a possible starter if we needed him to be. We have the safety net all ready in case Goodwin is unwilling to re-sign.

2011 Rookie Draft

The Akron class here is pretty weak – S Marcus Stephens and DE Trent Guthrie might get drafted, but I don’t see either one making much of a splash.

After making a deal last season, we surprisingly hold the #1 draft pick overall in this draft. We dealt with Minnesota last year, and they fell apart last season – all to our benefit. That’s a wonderful spot to be in – and a chance to land an impact player.

Thing is – I am completely unimpressed with the top of this draft. Chicago deals us two firsts and a second to move up from #14 to #1 overall – pretty good deal for us, I think. I decide to address our interior line issues with OL Mickey Thornton, whom we will slot at left guard.

Tough decision at #30 – I like a safety (again) but also see a LB who I think might become a fantastic pass rusher. Tough decision – must think on it a while. (My luck drafting these two positions has been spotty, at best, thus far) There’s also a cornerback out of VaTech who would make a nice addition – and that’s a need position also.

I end up going with CB Jamie Freeman, whom I think can be a good cover man for the long haul. When my coveted safety is still there midway through round two, we get him, too. Two potentially big additions to our secondary in one quick swoop.


As usual, I like the guys from our draft a lot. We may revise that soon, after we get a closer look – but I’m thrilled so far. Big help to the interior line, big help to the secondary – both places where we needed it.


Late Free Agency

As I had hoped, MLB Cedric Goodwin has adjusted his demands, and I put in a three year offer. I want him around – and hopefully this will keep that hope alive.

G Terrell Marion is still asking for a small fortune, and I don’t think that will work, especially since we just drafted a LG high. Unless he dramatically revises his demands, we will let him walk, and go younger there.

I put in for a few undrafted rookies and we purge ahead into the late stages.

In week five, MLB Cedric Goodwin accepts our offer – and we have locked it all up.

Weird side story – WR Josh Andruzzi has asked for huge money in each of the last two years’ free agent markets, but hasn’t gotten a big contract. This will be the third year he will go into training camp without a job. He made the all-pro team for his last two employers (on one year minsal deals) – can this guy ever get paid?


Training Camp


Well, the big news is that my super-draft turns out to be… well… less than super. Once again, nearly all my players turn out to have their upside somewhere at or near the bottom end of the “bands” that my scout forecasted. So, my top four picks all look like role players, rather than star players. Disappointing – especially CB Freeman, who I though was going to be a very solid starting CB. Instead, he’s the same caliber guy we’re used to seeing in free agency for modest money. ::sigh::

Anyway, we get some good news – S Kirk Weed had a really good camp, and now seems to be developing beyond his previous forecasts. That’s good to see. We also have an interesting prospect at QB in James Houston, who could make our “future” at that position a little more cloudy. More on the relative merits of Houston and Clancy in due course.

I’m disappointed, again.


Season Analysis

As we approach the season, here’s a snapshot of our team chemistry situation – you’ll see that we have worked pretty hard to build up good chemistry (some of this has been happenstance, some deliberate).


Pretty good group of affinities there, especially with four (three strong) among the defensive front. I’ve allowed two conflicts to build there – but Gustafson in particular is just too good to let go due to chemistry issues.

G Lincoln Gruber and RB Roderick Arsenault have become mentors to their positions for us, which is a good thing to see emerge. My balance at RB in particular is building good chemistry – leader Archie Ramsey prevents Arsenault from clashing with QB Tyrone Glover, plus he has a strong bond with his cousin Kendrick Ramsey. Even though I have mostly relegated Archie to #3 status, he still serves a valuable role for us here.


We have certainly had our biggest year of turnover this season – and after being a playoff team three years running, I would have rather stayed the course. But most of the moves we have made have been pretty good on the surface – we lose DE Huffman, but he hadn’t been a consistent presence for us anyway. It’s the OL where I have my gravest concerns – as we will be starting three new players there, and will lose nearly all of our continuity. I think this might spell trouble for us – but hopefully our defense will play well and carry us again.

We are obliged to say that this year’s goals are to go even deeper into the playoffs… but really, I just hope that some of these moves end up working out. If we end up on top of our division again this year, that will be great.

One quick note - for the first time, my team is over-represented on the league's "Green Page." We have four of the twenty players listed: QB James Houston (#6), undrafted QB Howie Gordon (#9), CB Jamie Freeman (#12) and G Mickey Thornton (#16). Wow.

We were graded a B+ for this draft, incidentally. I'm not so sure I agree - but nominally, there it is.

I think Andruzzi needs a new agent.

2011 Regular Season

We get through the preseason with the usual scrapes and dings, but no huge losses. After a pretty nice preseason QB battle, I decide to at least start this season with my veteran QB Tyrone Glover at the helm. I have Clancy as my #2, and promising youngster Houston as #3 – we’ll be okay down the road, but for right now, I like the hope for stability that we get from a veteran like Glover (who nominally ought to make fewer mistakes).

We look super sharp on both sides of the ball beating Cinti 27-11 in our opener. However, Glover suffers yet another injury (he’s just cursed) and my QB plans are right in the dumper. We install Clancy as our top guy, with rookie Houston slotted #2. Right away, we have a backup plan in place.

Marco Clancy comes through, carrying the load for the offense in a nice 31-7 win in week two. Four scoring passes help the stat line look good – and Clancy is trying to stake his claim to the spot, it seems.

We get dropped 21-16 at Kansas City, but we right the sip and get rolling again – out to a 5-1 start for the year. QB Tyrone Glover is healthy again, but I am comfortable enough with Marco Clancy that I decide to stick with him, and his 89 passer rating (and 12/5 ratio, higher than any season by Glover). Arsenault is on a 100/game clip, and we are running along pretty smoothly.

A mid-season loss to Pittsburgh drops us to 6-3, and into a tie with the Steelers. Cincinnati, though, is the big surprise team – up by two games for the division lead.

Off our bye week, we look around and assess. RB Archie Ramsey’s early season injury seems to have converted him into a clipboard holder – not even worthy of being #3 on our depth chart, I fear.

In week 11, we get thrashed by mighty Cinti, and our season looks to be in some trouble. The division title is all but gone – now we must try just to return to the playoffs. However, we win three in row, get to 8-4, and are within one game of the Bengals again – even with Pittsburgh.

A tough loss at Seattle drops us to 8-5, and even after two more wins, we need a final victory and probably a loss by Kansas City to get into the postseason, I assess. Now it’s Baltimore at 11-4 who lead our division, and they come to town for the final game. We get the 34-24 win at home in the last game of the regular season, and that fortunately places us where we wanted to be: back in the playoffs, albeit as the #5 seed this season.


Our division suddenly got very, very tough. And Indy gets in at 7-9, while Cinti sits out at 10-6. Shame, really. Heh.


On offense, Arsenault had another solid season – again carrying most of the load for our running game. We did throw a pretty fair amount, and Clancy was effective, though his interception rate was a bit high down the stretch. TE Jonathan Holmes led the team in catches, despite missing a couple of games – he is very solid.

Defensively, we kept up our end of the deal, with dominating performances against the run and pass, despite once again facing major injury problems. Butch Holton was solid again, but we spread around our sacks and pressures among many players – and as a team we did fine: #2 in yards per carry allowed, #3 in yards per pass allowed, and #4 in points per game allowed. Strong.


2011 Postseason

As we prepare for the postseason, here is our injury picture – a little grim:


So, with Marco Clancy this banged up, we will (for what seems like the fourth straight season) head into the postseason with a different QB than our main regular season starter. We will fall back to Tyrone Glover, and hope that his veteran hand can help us in the playoffs.

Only two starters from the DL are out for the year – so this is a light year for injuries, I guess. How pleasant. We have bodies to throw out there, and should be okay.


Our opener is against Indianapolis, the 7-9 division winners. They feature a great QB and an outstanding offensive line, but not a lot else on offense – this team could really use a playmaker or two at the skill positions. Their defense is mostly slanted to stop the run, but their LB corps is just awful. I think we should be able to move the ball on them, especially passing underneath their secondary – to guys like TE Holmes and WR Blair. We are made 9 point favorites, despite playing on the road at the division champions.

AFC Wild Card Round: Cleveland (10-6) at Indianapolis (9-7)

We get the ball first, and drive pretty smoothly to get an opening FG. We stop them quickly, get the punt in good field position, and drive for another FG. The first quarter ends with us ahead 6-0, and an 80-yard edge in offense. Good so far, but touchdowns would be a lot better.

Indy senses that, too, and their defense comes up big with a series of plays (and penalties against us) pinning us deep, and forcing a punt to our own 40. The Colts move downfield, and strike to take the 7-6 lead. The Colts gain field position again, and ad a field goal just before the half to lead 10-7 at the break.

On our first possession in the third quarter, Glover hits Causey on a third-and-long to keep our drive alive, getting to the IND 33. We take our third kick, and get back within one point. We get an injury announcement on Tyrone Glover, and have to wait and see if he can still play.

Our next possession, it’s James Houston on the field, leading the offense. He hasn’t had to play any meaningful snaps for us – now he’s in charge for the playoffs. Arsenault and Blair make plays to get us into position to try another FG, and Vallejo hits the 36-yard kick to put us ahead again, 12-10. Our defense has been perfect in the third quarter, and they stuff the Colts again – we take over near midfield as the third quarter wraps up.

From the Indy 34, I think I probably would call for a punt, but my coach lets Vallejo try again – and he nails the 51-yard kick to give us a five point lead. Indy strikes immediately with a big pass play, though, getting 43 yards and striking into our territory for the first time in this second half. Three plays later, though, they face fourth and 16 from their 48 – our defense again rises to the occasion.

Houston keeps it under wraps, throwing plenty of safe underneath passes (which was our game plan anyway) and avoiding a big mistake. Indy takes over with 6 minutes to play, near midfield. This might be their best chance to get it back. QB Droughns decides to go for it all from our 45, and the hail mary pass is picked off by Ellery, which give sus the ball back with 4:28 on the clock.

A key completion to Causey gives us a first down, then we have to punt it back – Indy takes over with 2:11 remaining, at their own 11 yard line after a brilliant 53-yard punt by our rookie Creighton. Three incomplete passes, one of them batted down by LB Regalado, and we have them up against fourth and 10. We give them the first down, though, on a penalty – bad timing for that. Droughns makes us pay – competing a 48 yard pass on second down, and they are at our 36 with 1:13 left. A sack and a penalty push them back to face 2nd and 19, and two incomplete passes make it fourth down. Unbelievably, they manage a 25-yard completion, and have a last shot at the win, with a first down at our 20. They spike the ball to stop the clock with 22 seconds.


That’s the defense that got us this far – good individual plays (by less-than-star players) and good preparations overall. They stand up, and seal this one for us.


So, we have our first playoff victory – and get back to the divisional playoffs for the fourth straight season. QB Glover is listed as questionable, Clancy remains doubtful. I don’t have a great feel for what we should do here – Houston is just so green, that seems like begging for a problem. My plan will be to start Glover, and hope that he can get through this one for us.

AFC Divisional Playoff: Cleveland (12-5) at Oakland (11-5)

Oakland has a straight-ahead offense with a great interior offensive line, and a tough defense – tops in the league against the pass. Should be a tough matchup – probably another one of ball control and field position.

On the very first offensive play, Arsenault gets five yards up the middle, and the Raiders’ safety practically tears his head off after the play. After the scrum, it’s a penalty and an ejection. Raider football! Arsenault is okay, but the message is sent and received. We grind our field position, and get into a scoring chance. After a penalty sets us back, Glover hits streaking speedster Sasser, and the pass goes for a 24 yard touchdown. Touchdowns are better than field goals.

Safety Kirk Weed steps in front of a pass in the early second quarter, and has nothing but real estate ahead of him – hauling the pick back for a 59 yard touchdown. We keep them in check through the second quarter, but they get on the board just before the half, after converting on a fourth down and two third downs, to set up the kick.

Midway through the third quarter, we are driving again – but Glover gets hit hard, and seems to be hurt again. It was an outside running play to Arsenault – no reason for anyone to be after the QB in the first place. Raider football! Glover has to come off the field, and we’ll again be in the hands of a rookie quarterback. We have two penalties that push us back, but end up getting another kick to lead 17-3. As the third quarter winds down, we get another long kick from Vallejo, and lead the game 20-3.

While things look gook, the Raiders go vertical, and hit a 50-yard pass to get their first TD. It’s 20-10, and doesn’t look as comfy as it just did a while ago. With about ten minutes left, near midfield, Houston gets picked off – and it looks bad. The defender takes the ball into the open field, and only a TD-saving tackle by Bennie Heinlein saves the score. They Raiders gets it at our 21 – looking to get within a score of taking the lead. Two completions, and it’s 20-17 – our lead has dwindled to only one kick’s worth.

Needing at least a few first downs, we get only two yards – and have to punt it right back to them. They again go vertical, and again come up with a big play – down to our 24 on the very first play of the possession. From the 17, they kick a tying FG, and we get it back with the score tied, and under four minutes to play.

Arsenault powers for 8 yards, then Houston finds Blair for another 11 – a good opening sequence. Arsenault pounds twice for a couple of yards, and we face 3rd and 6 when the two minute warning sounds. Houston’s pass falls incomplete – but a Raider penalty gives us the first down. Raider football! Arsenault gets a bit 11-yard carry up the middle, and we land at their 29 yard line. Vallejo can hit from here, but we want ot keep moving forward, of course. We call a time out with the clock at 0:03, and the ball at the Oakland 11 yard line. This kick would send us into our first AFC Championship game. Vallejo is true, and we get the 23-20 lead as the clock ticks to zero.

Roderick Arsenault gets the game ball, for 153 yards rushing to power the offense, including some clutch runs on that all-important deciding drive.


Now, our QB puzzle gets even more complicated. Marco Clancy has been upgraded to questionable, but Tyrone Glover’s blown0our MLC will sideline him for certain. Injured Clancy? Or healthy rookie Houston (who has been okay so far, but a big mistake nearly killed us). I decide to put Clancy back in as the starter, with Houston as our #2.

Bobby Silvers, our old friend and QB safety net, gives an obligatory phone call. I give it a little thought, but I just don’t think we can go to him here – we’ll make do with our youth contingent.


AFC Championship: Cleveland (13-5) at Baltimore (12-5)

We know Baltimore – they will come at us with veteran QB Mark Holm (who started out in Cleveland, the year before my true assumption of power) and a nice fleet of skill players to bring a multi-faceted attack. Adding steady veteran Holm to the mix this year was the key catalyst to bring them out of the doldrums of the league. Defensively, they stop the run, and have a great playmaking safety in Scott Jacobs, a first-team all pro last season who has 7 more picks this year.

We are now down to only four healthy (as in “anything less than out”) defensive linemen. We’ll be using LB Derrick Regalado in heavy rotation at DE, and will do our best to cover up our extreme lack of depth there. You already know about our precarious QB situation.

Philadelphia, behind football god Jacques Cheatham, awaits the winner in the Superbowl.


On the first possession, our defense steps up and looks great. Clancy gets his first pass complete for 12 yards to Sasser. Clancy is hit hard, but “he’s toughing it out.” Clancy does get picked off at their 15, spoiling our opening drive.

Baltimore goes to the ground game, and picks up enough yardage to get a go-ahead FG. Clancy gets picked off again – the second by CB Brian Long – and the Ravens take over. We get the ball back, and Clancy is undeterred – throwing to get us into scoring position, but we miss the long FG. The first quarter ends, and despite two turnovers, we trail only 3-0.

Midway through the second, Holm goes deep for a 49-yard TD pass, putting the Ravens ahead by a mark of 10-0. We’re not a particularly good come-from-behind team, but I don’t think we’ll get too rattled quite yet. A couple passes to Ellard set up a nice drive, and Blair catches a TD pass from Clancy to get us right back into the game, down 10-7. The Ravens drive for a F to end the half, and have a nice lead of 13-7 at the break.

Clancy gets dinged again in the third quarter – he’s woozy, but will stay in the game. We get a good possession, escaping our own goalpost’s shadow and out to midfield, to reverse the field position advantage. The third quarter ends with it still 13-7 Ravens, and a classic field position battle underway. This is our kind of game, other than the scoreboard.

We get a first down, and then another on passes to Blair and FB Woodson – and we have the ball at our own 45, with 7 minutes left. This may not be our last chance, but it may well be our best chance. However, a third down pass is blocked at the line, and we have to punt it deep – giving the Ravens a chance to eat clock. They do a bit – and probably our last chance starts at our own 30, with 2:10 remaining.

Arsenault for 10 gets us a quick first down. Blair catches a huge pass, escaping from his usual underneath routes, and grabs 26 yards, down to the Baltimore 32. Clancy goes for the gusto, trying to find Sasser in the end zone. However, Ravens CB Brian Long comes up with his third interception, and that probably seals the deal for the Ravens.

We get the ball back with all of 18 seconds left. Oddly enough, the final play of the game sees Blair make an internediate catch underneath the hail mary coverage, but he is unable to squirt in from there, being tackled at the 11 yard line, where our Superbowl dreams come to an end.


Baltimore goes on to lose 14-10 in the big one to Philly, and the Eagles become the first team to repeat as champions in this league’s history.


Season Wrap-up


Philadelphia’s Jacques Cheatham gets the coveted superfecta of individual awards – four awards in the same season. Not too frequently that we see that.

Our “team focus” means that we don’t end up with really gaudy numbers for any one star – and we are shut out from the awards list this season. Nobody with 120 tackles, 1500 yards, or 20 sacks – and you don’t get the bling bling.


Good season for us, all told. Tough division, and we still managed to go 11-5. We will have yet another tough offseason with contributors looking for starring roles and corresponding salaries. We will have to resolve our QB situation – we would like to land someone who can come in and start 16 games for us, which so far has been a faraway dream.

2012 preseason

Okay, the team has reached a pretty consistently high level – but we haven’t yet been able to break through. Some decisions lie ahead this season, that might help us do just that. Here’s the team’s history under my watch:



Transitions and League Observations

We again avoid any retirements – so our personnel decisions will all be based on contracts, rather than departures.

Bobby Silvers has retired. After last season, when we had yet another QB crisis in the postseason and felt like we couldn’t use him, I suspect he realized that his number was up. He doesn’t even make the transactions list, but he is out of the free agent pool.

DT Harvey Gustafson is seriously injured – he will miss this entire season, and probably won’t be worth a damn after his recovery. Shame – he has been pretty solid for us, when he could play. (I’m sensing a trend here… many of these players I’m getting as bargains in free agency seem to have innate injury tendencies – it’s like the other teams know this and I don’t)


Front Office Decisions

We re-up with DC Ted Keith for three more years – very little to argue with there:

Def Coord: Ted Keith, 57
EX: DL
VG: LB,DB
GD: PK
AV: Young Talent


Roster Review

This season, I will do the position-by-position analysis again, but we’ll show the salary information – since that will be driving us in part this season.


Tyrone Glover is back from his knee injury, but is no longer a candidate to lead this team or any other – he’s lost a lot in the injury transition.


Only our third-string rookie from last season is signed – and we have decisions to make. Archie Ramsey is a shell after his own serious leg injury, so we will have layers of decisions to make. Retaining Arsenault won’t cost us nearly as much as we had been paying him, I’m pretty certain. And Kendrick Ramsey still has potential, I think.


I’ve made my support for Mickey Woodson very clear, and it’s not likely to change any time soon. Goodwin is solid and versatile, but not that essential. Holmes emerged as our top receiving target last season, and will again be a main part of our attack.


Zach Blair had his best season with us, and Marvin Causey stepped into a starting role well. We’re deep here, with speedy Marlon Sasser and Mickey Rose both capable players in reserve. Jimmy Ellard is also pretty decent, and played a big role with team chemistry – we’ll try to get him to return for another go-round. Oscar Goodwin is not essential, but if he’ll return cheaply, that would be fine.


Owens was fine as our starter last season, but Pond is developing toward taking the role. LG Mickey Thornton will start again, and his pass blocking skills developed a lot last year – now we need him to develop his power for the up front job. Re-signing Lincoln Gruber is important – he’s pretty solid, and is our OL leader – building chemistry boosts all start with him. T Bennie Heinlein has been solid for us for seven years as a starter, and we’ll try to bring him back as well. RT Donnie Thornton is mostly a pass blocker, but has put up solid numbers and is a welcome returning starter.


I’m pleased with both guys’ performances here. Creighton is solid, and Vallejo is over 75% with FGs on his career, including a clutch 5 for 5 in the playoff game last year.


Depth is obviously key here, as we have just cycled through players at the DL positions with impunity. Fox is a mentor and decent player, while Moseley and Hendrix are solid, but unstable. Retaining Holton would be great – he has been a rock of stability for us.

Inside, Cascadden has been exceptional, the centerpiece of our solid run defense for years. His return is a top priority, period. Kris Gibson comes off an injury, but looks like he might be okay – and probably will be cheap to sign. Oliveira has been a spot-starter, but has always been pretty productive and pretty flexible. We’ll keep him around, as our positional leader and anchor for team unity here, too.


Cedric Goodwin is our long-time middle man, but is clearly an injury-prone problem for us. Rick Casey is solid and cheap, while K.C. Perez can play anywhere and has balanced skills. These three keep us stable both at MLB and elsewhere.

Ricky DiGiacomo plays thee weak side well – we have tried to boost his playing time, but he just fills the spot that takes the most time off, it seems. Clarence Frederick had a solid season last year in the strong side, and projects to return for another year there. Regalado backs up both OLB spots, and can even step in to fill in at DE if needed – I’d like to re-sign him, if it’s affordable to do so.


Deon Richmond has developed into a solid man-coverage specialist, and after two years beside him, Zack Callens has done much the same. If we can re-sign Callens, I won’t have a problem starting those two again and for some time. Jamie Freeman might have to wait his turn – as he currently is a ways behind in terms of pure skills.

SS Kirk Weed continues to improve, and looks like a pretty solid starter. Ellery is holding on to his job, while Specter looks like a bit of a disappointment. None are true stars – we might look for another complementary player for back here, though.



There’s our main status – we have more money to spend than in previous years, but we do have many spots that need to be filled.


Free Agency

My top re-signing target is DT Gary Cascadden, and I decided to use the franchise tag for the first time. I plan to work out a long term deal with him, but I don’t want to run the risk of losing him – so we put the $5 million offer out there as a placeholder.

That leaves us with $25 million or so to spend on free agents in the open market.

RB Roderick Arsenault is seeking over $5 million per season – I didn’t think his demands would be so high, honestly. DE Butch Holton, also, is seeking over $5 million a year – which is just a lot to pay for a pretty good complementary player, I think.

So, my first round of re-signing offers go to FB Woodson, WR Ellard, G Gruber, T Heinlein, and CB Callens – all three year offers, all pretty cheap. I’d like to bring that whole group back – and it would cost us about $8 million this year to do so – which seems quite reasonable.

Looking through the FA market, I really don’t see any particular standouts that I’d pay top dollar to come join our team. The closest I can find is CB Brett Maxwell, who as played for Washington and Seattle – two typically poor teams. I think he could flourish in our system, and I put in an offer for a one year deal (I don’t want to be locked up long term).

DE Skip Bromley is a cheap addition – not very durable, but seemingly pretty effective when he does play. But bodies on the D-line are just too important to pass up a solid fill-in, especially as cheap as he is.

As I contemplate the defensive line, I also need to think about a trade offer we have received – a 2nd round pick for DE Tim Hendrix. Hendrix only was able to play in four games last season, and I suspect he’s an injury problem. So, a second rounder sounds pretty good. However, he is very strong – and effective when he plays. Tough call – having a good rotation guy cheaply for two years might be better than what we can get in round two of a rookie draft.


Right away, DE Butch Holton accepts an offer from Chicago, and signs there for $5 million per season. I might have been able to match that, but instead wanted to wait him out – and we end up losing a steady producer.

There are multiple suitors for CB Brett Maxwell, so if we’re going to get him, we probably need to make a bona fide multi-year offer. It looks like Callens will re-sign, so maybe we don’t need to expend huge money there, after all. I leave my one-year offer up for Maxwell, but also put in another offer – a three year deal for Calvin Wickliff, who played a few years for us but last year for Seattle.

I am shocked in week five, when not only does CB Wickliff sign with us, but so does CB Brett Maxwell. Maxwell immediately projects to be a starter, and that pushes Callens into an unknown zone. We’ll be much deeper there, though – that much is certain.


We sign DE Lincoln Limon, who played a season for us a long time ago, and will now return to our DE rotation. My hope is to field five playable defensive ends this year, and try to mix up playing time so nobody gets too work out. Limon would land near the bottom of that list (I hope).

We get to the end of the 20-stage period, and I still don’t have a starting running backs signed. Roderick Arsenault has priced himself out of his market, so he’ll have to rethink that strategy – and I hope he lands at a place where we can make a move to re-up with him for another year or two. I don’t know how long he has left, but if he could continue at his current clip he’d be solid.

2012 Rookie Draft

There are only three players from Akron in this draft. T Curtis Sherman will be a fairly high draft pick, and looks like a future NFL starter for somebody, rated by the scouting board at 4.8, and by my scout as 25/57. DT Christian Lincoln and FB Ronnie Graul probably will both be passed over.


For us, we hold an extra pick at #11, and hold our own picks at #24 down the line. We’ll try to grab an impact player with the early pick, and then target needs afterwards. Our top need areas are probably DT, RB, TE, S, and perhaps DE. I’d take a real impact player at almost any position, though.

I see th guy I want right away – but I don’t know what it will take to go and get him. I’ve pursued safeties in the past and have been disappointed, but Kenneth Eskridge is a can’t miss superstar prospect. After five picks, he is on top of the consensus board – and I must have him. I offer my second an fifth round picks to move up to #6, and they accept. I don’t know how much longer he would have lasted, but it’s good to land the guy I really wanted (I have waited out a lot of rookies in this career, only to see them taken just ahead of me).

At pick #20, the DT I want is atop the board, and I decide to move up slightly to get him. It takes a sixth round pick, which is no problem, and I get my guy there, too.


T Curtis Sherman from Akron went at #29 to Oakland – the first player from the Zips to go in the first round under my watch.

I’m very optimistic about Eskridge, and also about Bailey. Two need positions hopefully filled for the long run here. FB Pritchett looks like a very solid fullback/utility player, and the others are projects.


Late Free Agency

QB Marco Clancy wants a new contract, and has instigated a holdout. Since we didn’t pursue a veteran, he realizes he’s out top dog for now – and wants to be paid accordingly. This is the first time I’ve been in this situation – I intend to work something out with him, and get him happy again. Thing is, he’s looking for a multi year deal, with salaries upwards of $3-4 million a season after this year. We’d be pretty well locked into Clancy as our long term guy, even though I’m not 100 sure he’s beaten out James Houston right now. Tough position.


RB Roderick Arsenault has not really adjusted his demands much, but we really need a RB – so I put in an offer: 2yrs, $9 million. It’s good enough to get his attention, and hopefully we can land him without major incident.

I also put in bids for about a dozen undrafted rookies – we’ll try to land someone to help out, perhaps at TE, LB or on the OL.

After one week, I adjust my bid to Arsenault down to one year, $4.4 million. Nobody else is after him, and I feel I have some power now. He sees the shift, and decides to take the deal – so he will be back, at least for this season.

DT Gary Cascadden turns out to be very tough to deal with – we eventually work out a deal, but it’s at $6.75 million a season. A high price to pay to avoid bitterness – but he has been excellent for us, and we want him to return.


I get through the late free agency process, and we have 64 player signed – and about $7 million in available cap space. With the cap space available, I work out a two-year deal with QB Marco Clancy, who will now make about $3.5m for each of the next two seasons. I felt it was a necessary step, and now we have that major position issue settled.


Heading into trainig camp, we got a B+ for our draft, and have only last year’s two players on the Green page again: QB James Houston (#7), QB Howie Gordon (#10). I’m worried because I expected safety Kenneth Eskridge to be there for certain. Hhis absence is very puzzling. (Crossing fingers)


Training Camp


Well, my top two rookies are still unsigned, so there’s still mystery there – but neither got crushed during training camp. DT Zach Bailey even jumped up a point in his future evaluation, and that usually means good things.

We grabbed a couple of fairly promising prospects after the draft, and we might make room for a couple of them. RG Derrick Meuller is certainly among those who are worth a serious look.

Setting the defensive lineup, I decide that free agent pickup LB Curtis Davis will get to play in the strong-side spot (the pass-rusher position) ahead of developing Clarence Frederick. We expect to get Frederick playing time, but Davis just has more complete skills right now, and I think he can be a solid addition there.

We need to get our top rookies signed – I still hope to get each into prominent if not starting roles.


Season Analysis

Our roster rating is only a 72 – but that might bump up when we sign our top two rookies (I have no idea how they get counted). Our cohesion ratings remain high: 92-94-100(98)-95. We’re near the top in every category, including the OL where we turned over a lot in the last couple of seasons.

I’m fairly optimistic about the season ahead. I think we should be better in the passing game, and if Clancy can stay with it, our offense should be better overall than last season. On defense, we have more turnover, but I like adding a very solid corner to the mix, and hope that our DL rotation is deep enough to withstand the inevitable rash of injuries we’ll face. This is the first year I’ll set the “official” team goal at winning it all.

2012 Regular Season

In the preseason, we lose FB Mickey Woodson for the year – so rookie Eric Pritchett will get celled right into service. He’s more versatile than Woodson, and I suspect he will end up working into the passing game more than we would have expected Woodson to have.


In our opener, it’s a pretty predictable outcome – we get a nice big day out of Marco Clancy, a big play for a TD from our defense, and a comfortable victory. Clancy gets the game ball with 4 TD passes, and we look pretty comfortable in our more pass-inclined offense.

After our second win, both Clancy and Arsenault are dinged up. Arsenault will take the second chair in the running game behind Ramsey, but I’ll keep Clancy in. Ramsey delivers with just over 100 yards, and we get 6 for 6 from K Jeremy Vallejo, and an 18-0 win.

We get to 4-0, and have barely been challenged. Clancy is 10/5, and if e can keep up the 2:1 ratio, we will be in good shape. We get two more pretty easy wins, and at 6-0, look very good. Marco Clancy’s 14 TDs are tied for the league lead, and his 95.8 passer rating is better than anything we have ever seen from our team.

We have injuries at wide receiver – with both Rose and Rose out for the season. I hit the free agent pool, and grab an old friend – WR Nathan O’Rourke. He played for Oakland then New Orleans the last two seasons – we welcome him back, and will use his versatile skills in the passing and return game.

We lose at Kansas City, ending our winning streak at six games to open the season. We get back on track with two more wins, but then we have a shift in our season. At 8-1, we have a prolific passing attack, but now we’ve lost QB Marco Clancy for six weeks, and even backup James Houston is dinged up. This will be a challenge.

And just in time for us to travel to 7-2 Cincinnati – our closest rivals in the division. James Houston, though, delivers under the gun – with 3 TDs to lead us to a 24-6 win. The following week, we beat Pittsburgh 13-10 with a last second field goal from Vallejo. That sets up a matchup with 10-1 Houston – a showdown for the conference top seed. In the big showdown, we manage to get a 17-14 win in overtime, moving to 11-1 on the season.

We are facing a serious problem at WR, with so many injured players that we are filling holes with whatever we can find. I grab a rookie RB to try to fill in at both RB and WR, and we now have our rookie starting FB also slotted as the #2 running back. Everyone who can play is being called into service. Of course, in one game, the new face at RB is immediately dropped onto the IR list – this is downright tragic.

Not even through the season – here’s our injury report:


We win another in OT, over Baltimore, and we have the division all wrapped up. TE Jonathan Holmes has regained the lead in receptions and receiving yards, despite only making seven starts this year. He has had a few pretty big games along the way.

In our finale, we get Marco Clancy back into the starting lineup – back and healthy, and ready for a playoff run. We trash Cincinnati, and manage to put together a 15-1 season, easily earning the conference’s top seed.


Odd – after winning two titles, the Eagles fall apart and drop out of the playoff picture altogether. But the real story across the way is the 49ers, who rolled to a 16-0 perfect regular season, and have their sights set on the league’s first flawless finish. We, among other teams, aim to prevent that.

Curiously, the 49ers got key contributions from a couple of ex-Browns. RB Daniel Newman is their main ball carrier (over 1,000 yards this season) and they picked up QB Tyrone Glover to be their backup this year (he started and won three games).



A solid season from both of our young quarterbacks – put their stats together, and you’d have an all-star candidate, I think. Arsenault is declining, but still productive – and we got good effort out of Ramsey when he played as well. TE Jonathan Holmes played very well when healthy – he will be a tough decision for next season.

Defensively, a great season from free agent LB Curtis Davis, who delivered a star-caliber season playing at strong side linebacker. DT Gary Cascadden helped anchor a great defensive front, and we put up the double: #1 in yards per rush and pass. Only SF allowed fewer points on the season – the defense was just superior.


Well, with two teams towering over their respective conferences like this, it would be a shame to see anything but a giant showdown in the Superbowl. We will try our level best to deliver on that.

2012 Postseason

In our opener, we get to play host to the team who ended our season last year – hopefully we can exact a measure of revenge here.

AFC Divisional Playoff: Baltimore (10-7) at Cleveland (15-1)

Baltimore has a new QB since last season (they let Mark Holm go to the Saints) and they have slipped a bit – now they have 4th year man Carlos Wynn (their backup) at the helm. Still a talented offense, and a good defense led by a tough secondary. We’ll try to work underneath again, and might have some luck running against their right side defenders.

We’ve got most of the advantages, and are favored by 10 points.


Bad things happen quickly for us – we fumble their first punt, and they get the ball at our 7 yard line – a one play TD drive ensues. We respond with a nice drive, two big runs by Arsenault, two big catches by Blair, and Arsenault tops is off with a 13-yard score. Tie game.

Marco Clancy gets smacked in the late first quarter, and we see James Houston back on the field. We should be okay, though Clancy does inspire a little more confidence. The field position battle rages into the second quarter – we miss a FG, but they make theirs to lead 10-7. AT the two minute warning, Baltimore rushed Houston and forces a big fumble – they come up with the ball at our 6 yard line. They again cap off the short drive with a TD, and it’s 17-7 at the half. Not the start we were looking for.

We open the third quarter with a solid drive, running Arsenault hard, then capping it off with a 19-yard TD to Blair. Good score, and good for momentum, we hope. Baltimore, though, connects on a long pass to set up another kick, and stretches their edge to 20-14. We get to the fourth quarter after two short possessions, and it’s still a six point game.

A 38-yard pass to Causey on the first play of the fourth quarter gives us great position, at their 42 yard line. However, Houston is intercepted on third down, and we turn it over at a clutch moment. Fears are elevating. On our next possession, Houston goes deep, but the Baltimore safety playing center field grabs the lofted ball, and they take over again. We get thee ball back, but Houston throws yet another interception near midfield. Down six points, the last thing you can do is turn the ball over three times in the fourth quarter and expect to win.

We take over at our 1 yard line after a brilliant punt – and we are in trouble now. We have to punt from our 20, and are now approaching the two minute warning. The defense holds, and we get one last shot – from our 27 with 2:17 remaining, and no time outs.

We face third and 9, and Houston decides to air it out. He overthrows the pass, but Causey is manhandled downfield, and we get the flag. With 1:33 left, we take over at the Baltimore 24 yard line, trailing by six points. Houston zips a pass to Zach Blair, who gets inside the ten, to the 7 yard line. First and goal.

A pass to Causey is incomplete, but we go right back to the same play – and Causey gets separation this time, and brings it in! We nail the PAT, and it’s Cleveland 21, Baltimore 20 with a minute to play. Unbelievable.

The defense, as it has the whole second half, plays over its head and are practically impenetrable. We force fourth and ten from the 20, and then get a sack to turn it over. That cinches the one point win – what a way to advance.


Meanwhile, across the nation, San Francisco dismantled Atlanta to get to the NFC Championship. They are looking like a juggernaut.


AFC Championship: Houston (13-4) at Cleveland (16-1)

We played Houston before, and they pushed us to overtime. Since then they have been a bit wobbly – but looked good last week in the playoffs. Their offense is mostly QB Kim Roux, who led them to a title four seasons ago. They have excellent pass rushers on defense, and force a lot of mistakes.

Marco Clancy is out for this game, so it’s on James Houston to get it done again. We have to reshuffle the defensive line yet again, too – injuries take DE Hendrix out of the playoffs, after a very nice year from him.


The D looks very sharp on the opening series, forcing a quick three and out. We get a short drive mixing up the weapons, and topping off with a flip to Pritchett for the TD. After another defensive stonewall, we get to midfield and then Houston goes deep to Causey for a 49-yard TD and a 14-0 lead. At this point, we have 1010 yards in total offense, and Houston has negative 5.

Houston wakes up, puts things together, and drives for a TD to get back into the game in the early second quarter. Houston hits Sasser to finish off a drive later in the quarter, but Houston converts after getting an interception to get back within a TD by halftime.

In the third quarter, we open with a FG to extend to 24-14. We get our own turnover, and score after a short drive to get ahead by 17. Down the stretch, there is very little drama – we have the game firmly in control, and cruise to a 38-17 win – earning our first Superbowl berth with relative ease.


Superbowl: San Francisco (18-0) vs. Cleveland (17-1)

No real surprise, but here it is. About as titanic as it can be. San Francisco has been outstanding all season, and Cleveland has overcome great adversity to keep at the top of its game. Both teams come in after impressive wins in the playoff chase, and the oddsmakers make this game a push. Fantastic.

San Francisco’s QB Donald Schultz has been battling a nagging injury – he sat out last week, yielding to Tyrone Glover (a former Brown). We’ll see what happens this week, but we expect to see Schultz. We will also prepare for RB Daniel Newman, who still resides pretty highly on the Cleveland career rushing leaders. WR A.J. Ralston is annually among the league’s fastest men – and he is a serious threat outside. Defensively, they are banged up in the secondary, but good overall. They allowed fewer points than we did.

Marco Clancy is listed as probable, and he will get the call for the big game. Houston will be ready to go, but he is clearly prone to the big mistake – and I don’t think we can afford that against this team. We’ll try to go with Clancy, and will hope for fairly error-free football – the best ticket to a win here.


Bettors everywhere rejoice as Cleveland wins the toss, and opt to receive. On our first play, we pass to Blair – but he gets absolutely drilled and misses the ball. About the last people I can afford to lose are the receivers – we basically only have three healthy guys to play wideout. We are forced to punt, and SF gets their first possession.

SF, behind Tyrone Glover, moves to about midfield, and then on a third down they hit a long pass to get down inside our 10 yard line. Big series, as they get to our one yard line. A penalty pushes them back, but they decide to go for a fake field goal from the six:


Huge play by the rookie safety and the veteran linebacker, and they save the big play. We take over from the one yard line – we’ll take it, of course. We have to punt from our five, but at least it’s still scoreless. San Fran takes advantage of the good field position, and gets in place for a real field goal – and they take the 3-0 lead.

Into the second quarter, we face a third and long, and go for a quick hitter – which gets picked off by SF corner Hamilton, who hauls it all the way back with a 47 yard return for the score. San Fran takes advantage of another short field – and punt us down to our one yard line – where we start a drive for the second time in this game. They get a punt, and in three plays are in for a score – Ralston streaks by our secondary to get the 17-yard scoring pass. 17-0 San Francisco, and they can taste the perfect season already.

We are just unable to do much of anything against their defense. It doesn’t look to promising – we simply need a big play to get things going.

San Francisco has it in their territory, facing a third down. Glover hits a short pass, and Ricky DiGiacomo makes a huge hit on the crossing receiver, who coughs up the ball. CB Maxwell picks up the free ball, and find open field for a 31 yard score. The defense comes up big, and we are on the board!

San Fran drives for a kick attempt, but after a bad snap, they botch it – and we make it to the half down 10 points. We’re not playing well, but we aren’t out of this one yet.


Every SF possession puts pressure on us, and we are lucky to get away with a midfield stopper and a turnover in the first two of the second half. We eventually push them back to their own 1 yard line – and our defense pins its ears back, smelling opportunity to make something happen again. We can’t get a turnover or big sack, but do force the punt – and our offense takes over near midfield, early in the fourth quarter.

We face 4th and 1 at their 45 – tough call. We punt, and hope to keep the field position in our advantage – but we do need two scores, at least. A nice 77 yard drive, culminating in a FG, pushes them up 20-7. It’s very tough to see us getting back in this one - with under 6 minutes to play, we have yet to mount a bona fide drive thus far in the game at all.

Jump back! The Browns suddenly push right down the field, with short passes and quick outs, and set up a quick plunge from Kendrick Ramsey to get on the board with 2:58 remaining, and three time outs. I think we can even execute a regular kickoff, and still have a shot here.

The defense holds after one quick first down, and we get the punt at our 30 with 2:05 remaining. This is quite a lot like the Baltimore game – we trail 20-14, with two minutes to get a final score to go ahead. However, the San Francisco defense has bee the toughest to score on in the entire league – so this is a pretty tall order.

Clancy is undeterred, and hits Blair right away for 15 yards on the first play of the possession. However, three incomplete passes put us in a tough fourth and 10 position at our ofn 45 – this is the game right here, if we don’t convert it. Clancy’s pass falls harmlessly to the ground, but the 49er defender just lays out Causey on the play – and draws the flag for unsportsmanlike conduct. A huge penalty, and we are kept alive. Controversy is bound to ensue everywhere.

Clancy decides to try to grab for it all, and throws deep for Sasser. But at the 6 yard line, it’s the 49er defender who comes down with it, and it seems the threat is ended. Tyrong Glover assumes the victory position, and they run out the clock to secure the win, and top off their undefeated season. All hail San Francisco, the champions!


Season Wrap-up


TE Jonathan Holmes is a major part of this offense – he only started 10 games, and still earned first team honors. If he could stay healthy, he’d be a holy terror. What a pleasant surprise we got from LB Curtis Davis – now we have to decide how to fit together our LB situation going forward, especially as MLB Cedric Goodwin continues to break down.

And so - we've seemingly reached the "top" with this team. Yes, we lost in the big game, but it's pretty clear that this is a major power team, and probably will remain so for years to come. This is where I usually start getting bored.

I think it might be time to start kicking in some more serious house rules. I don't have a clear sense of what - but maybe some tougher financial restrictions (which might cut back on my coaching or front office staff) or else a rule regarding players from Akron (or other local schools, perhaps?). I may need to institute some rule restricting my participation in the free agent market, too -- I just get frustrated when I go and cherry-pick the six or eight players who seem like great bargains to me, and I end up getting all of them almost every single year. Why doesn't some other team see the same bargains that I do?

Point is... if anyone is reading this - any thoughts? Add some tougher rules that might drop us out of the top tier? Add some rules on using Akron players? Anything else along those lines make for good reading?

I'd welcome well-intentioned suggestions...

I think this version offers many more opportunities with the finances than before. It seems to me that you have way overpaid your coordinators and this must be translating to money losing seasons. If this is true, I think rules regarding mandatory profit plus more stringent ticket price rules would give you some nice handicaps to go with.