[MIJB#19]

General Manager Notes: New blood, a tight cap and other things y'all have seen before
Training Camp 2107 is around the corner.

After a lot of wheeling and dealing, we ended up with 7 draft picks, still, but the highest a 5th rounder. The good news: in 2108 we'll have a lot of picks. The other news: we got 5 players that were on our list, we picked 2 players that were not on our horizon. That last bit was indirectly a result of how the rest of the league either actually paid attention for a change or had ran out of time so often, they were no longer allowed to dillydally over picks. I walked away for about 4 or 5 hours shortly after we used our mid 5th round pick and then when I actually got a chance to restock our list of names, the draft was already over... "Shrug"?

Because of the lowness of the picks and that we've already signed a bunch of undrafted rookies, I'll report on the bunches together. It's 14 rookies, so we'll have quite a bit to ge through.

Undrafted QB Allen Knott is a bit short, but does have a very good sense rush ability and scrambling ability. 7th round QB Ty Villaneuva has timing and got mandatorily assigned to us.

Undrafted RB Gino Blades could be a power pack for third down runs up the middle. Undrafted RB Marcus Jorg can protect the passer and has outstanding breakaway speed. 6th round RB Pedro LaFountain has a combination of hole recognition, endurance, decent speed and can play on special teams.

Undrafted WR Preston Gray has the right combination or route running and endurance to potentially get open and often. Undrafted WR Shaun Randle might be an interesting addition to our special teams unit and might turn into a double team magnet.

Undrafted LT Mason Erickson has some pass blocking potential, but could be undersized.

6th round DT Sherman Casanova is consider to be in potential our best pass rusher, but he's extremely green. 5th round DT Harvey Chiu has a very good shot at making our active roster for 2107, if his pass rush ability and special teams skills hold up.

7th round LB Avery Distel is an underweight pass rusher, unable to switch to DE, but has enough other potential skills to make the team. 6th round Brandon DeWacht has a reasonable opportunity to outdo other linebackers on team to win a special teams roster spot.

7th round CB Preston Reilly is very unlikely to make the team, this league office mandated selection was not on our radar at all. Undrafted CB Jonathan White will inject some new zone defense ability into our secondary.

We might actually need some of these rookies, as we were too cap strapped to make strong pushes for veteran free agents. Our score was nevertheless better than "none" as we signed 26-year old LT Roosevelt Dumrauf, 28-year old elite special teams LB Mack Pang and 24-year old zone defender CB Herb Duffy to minimal figure contracts.

Veteran S Daniel Shapiro has announced his desire to hold out for a richer contract, which is something we really won't be able to afford. Worst case, we'll have to let him go (he's already on the trade block) and live with 4th year S Craig Clancy and 2nd year S John Aponte, with 1st round bust S Lincoln Taylor perhaps getting his chance to prove that he's actually worthy of being our second highest paid safety behind Shapiro and finally getting some on field action in his 4th season in the IHOF.

It all makes us arrive at the brink of training camp with 65 players signed, including holdout S Daniel Shapiro. It means we'll have to make 5 cuts right after camp and then after the first two pre-season games, we'll have to get into the negotiations with RT Ivan Dole's player agent to find a way to not make him walk away as a free agent next off-season. There are 10 others worth re-signing ahead of time, but it will be tough to lock 'em all up. But that's something we can't worry about until pre-season action has actually commenced.