Free Agency
Initially, I only have offers in to two of my own players – DT Willie Oliveira and LG Mickey Thornton. Ideally, I will lock up at least a couple more players from our own group, but right now we have to see what the market is going to do (and who will be swept away with huge offers elsewhere).
I find a partial answer to my pursuits, as MLB C.J. Blackwell is open to an offer from us. I see in him a starter at MLB, and he’s only asking for about $1m/yr – very affordable. That would really help us out, financially. He’s a bit unproven, but a good match for what I want there.
WR Joey Newsome has been pretty decent for Pittsburgh, but has had trouble staying healthy. For very modest money, I’ll take a chance on him, as a potential starter for us, and cheaper than either of my own FA receivers.
Safety Jason Arnold is my backup plan for losing S Kirk Weed, which I judge to be fairly likely. He’d probably become our starter at strong safety – he’s not the big hitter that Weed is, but he’s a solid cover man, and is pretty willing to play for cheap.
With that, we have five cheap FA bids in to start things off, and we will go from here. I should have sufficient cash to then sign one or two more of my own strong players – ideally, that might end up being DT Bailey and S Weed, but I’ll have to be flexible.
I give one last look, and I can’t bring myself to leave all this to chance. In particular, with my uncertainty at WR, I really feel that we have to re-sign TE Devin Norton. $6 million is an awful lot of money to spend at that position, though. Even as I write this, I am completely torn. Would that kind of money be better spent on DT Zach Bailey, for example?
(I come back to this after “sleeping on it” – tough decision)
I decide to start off with a considerable offer to DT Zach Bailey – 4 yrs, $26 million. Having two solid, dependable defensive tackles is a luxury, and I’m hopeful that this investment will be sound. I waver on TE Devon Norton, but his injury history makes my mind up for me.
I submit a token bid of 1yr, $3 million, for S Kirk Weed, in an effort to bring back the secondary cohesion that has helped us so far. Next year will be a contract year for Eskridge, and he’ll take top priority there – but for now I’d like to return both guys. I hope this works out.
A very busy first week. Several of my players are pending to other teams, including DT Zach Bailey and TE Devin Norton. Bailey has a huge offer o the table from Carolina – I don’t see any way I can match that, my initial offer pales in comparison (they are up over $8m per season). T Donnie Thornton, CB Darrell Douglas and WR Marvin Causey are also looking at good offers that I’m unlikely to match. Such is the life as defending champion, eh?
The good news is that the first of my outside FA targets, WR Joey Newsome, has signed. And the rest of my internal re-signees all look secure. We’ll make our offer to S Jason Arnold next, hoping to bring aboard another contributor at safety, even though Kirk Weed looks likely to return.
I decide to take a different approach, and offer DT Bailey a one-year deal worth $8 million. I think that’s my best shot to bring him back, without putting up a monstrous long-term deal that will cripple me (like my deal with Gary Cascadden is right now).
In week two, it’s all different. DT Zach Bailey accepts our offer for one year, and we also sign S Jason Arnold. We’re down to $9 million to spend, but the direction is better. TE Devin Norton is still pending to Washington, who looks like they are willing to spend some $7.5 million a year for his services.
We put in an offer for LB C.J. Blackwell, hoping to land our next starting middle linebacker. In week 7, both LB Blackwell and S Weed sign with us, which settles down our defensive needs a good deal. I have competition for G Mickey Thornton, but still am outbidding Tennessee – and we expect top retain him. TE Devin Norton has signed with Dallas – for a little less than Washington had offered. About $6m per season – still a steep price.
I submit a modest multi year offer for RT Nathan Glaspie – a decent-enough fill-in for our right side spot, which is now open. He’s no star, but at $800,000 a season, he’s a pretty good value, I think. After week 10, both Mickey Thornton and RT Glaspie has signed, and our starting OL is complete. We’ll have a little cap room to work with after the rookie draft, but for now – we have retained two of our key defensive players, but now have real question marks on offense.
2016 Rookie Draft
Atop our priority list is landing a playmaker for our passing game. I’d be happy with a solid wideout, or a star-caliber tight end, but I’m almost certainly pointing our first draft pick that way – we need someone who can come right in and deliver, as our offense has lost a lot this season. Picking #32 won’t give us a lot of power at the table, though.
My initial look reveals three WRs who seem good enough to serve our needs, and one tight end. I cross my fingers, hoping that we can get one of that foursome with our pick at #32.
WR Sherman McGregor goes at #9 – he was my top choice, also. At #16 is the next WR Jamal Feusse – going right in order, so far. Looks 50/50 on anyone landing in our lap here, though. At #25, WR Darrin Prentice goes – he was the last of the guys I was hoping to get here. That leaves TE Karl Sellers, who my scout grades a 38/77 – not bad, but not really all that well-developed right away. Tough call on him as a first round pick, in my view.
Well – TE Sellers is there at my pick at #32, which fulfills my original hopes. I really wanted a more flashy wideout, but he seems to be the obvious replacement selection for the departed Devin Norton.
Code:
Amateur Draft Report:
Rnd 1 - Karl Sellers, TE, Fairfield
Rnd 2 - Thurman Foreman, CB, Indiana
Rnd 3 - Leland Turner, CB, New Mexico
Rnd 4 - Renaldo Frederickson, RB, Idaho State
Rnd 4 - Wendell Prescott, DE, Washington
Rnd 5 - Matt Badalyan, WR, Georgia Southern
Rnd 6 - Winston Howard, OLB, Wisconsin
Rnd 7 - Omar Lesky, WR, San Jose State
I decide to go with the big tight end as our top pick, and I forage for RB-to-WR conversions in the late rounds, hoping to find someone who can contribute at split end for us. Actually, I really pushed the position coversion issue a lot in this draft – both DBs I drafted were initially safeties, whom we promptly switched to corner, and DE Prescott and OLB Howard both started out as pass-rushing ILBs. Only two out of eight draft picks come to us to play their original position.
We get a B for this draft (lower than my nearly annual B+) – we’ll see how this goes.
Late Free Agency
I have a little more than $2 million to spend for this year (setting aside money for my holdout rookie TE). Even counting him, we only have 49 players signed – so we simply won’t be as deep as we usually are. Deion Brock is still awaiting a new contract, too – so we need to lock up our #2 QB with a good chunk of that available money. He’s still thinking something like $1.5 million per season.
I’m pleased to lock up WR Cornelius Tilton and TE Todd Chambliss to multi-year deals, both have been solid reserve players for us. But we have to make a cut or two to afford filling out this roster. CB Ty Enochs goes, leaving us with only two returning CBs and two rookies as backups. Ouch. I renegotiate (cap out) C Monty Nunley, and that clears up a little cap space (but puts added pressure on next season, of course).
A little worried about CB, we pick up Adam Caston, a 10th year vet who has pretty solid man coverage skills. He doesn’t have a great track record, but might do pretty well in our man system. He’s cheap, also – just what we needed. Plus, CB Zack Callens just looks like a feeble old man out there – despite his continued good results, I am always worried about putting him on the field.
And finally, we work out a three year deal with QB Deion Brock, locking him up as our #2 for this year – and as our insurance policy against James Houston’s potentially big demands for after this season. We cannot, however, work out a deal with WR Zach Blair. He will miss this season with an injury, and we cannot afford a new addition – especially one with that much risk. I hope he can recover, and we’ll talk for next year – but we cannot pay him to watch this season, I’m afraid.
Otherwise, it’s a simple picking up of undrafted rookies for a look at need areas.
Training Camp
Code:
Player # Pos Start Exp CE FE CE FE ChgC ChgF
Houston, James 7 QB 6 64 64 64 64 0 0
Brock, Deion 2 QB 4 40 51 43 51 3 0
Ward, Ray 16 QB 2 19 36 22 36 3 0
Donovan, Ian 4 QB 1 11 46 12 40 1 -6
Hayes, Jeff 18 QB 1 7 33 10 37 3 4
Stewart, Gus 39 RB 3 85 85 85 85 0 0
Baker, Joe 36 RB 2 35 49 36 49 1 0
Frederickson, Renaldo 28 RB 1 35 54 36 50 1 -4
Aguilera, Danny 30 RB 6 33 33 33 33 0 0
Goodwin, Ian 23 FB 8 42 42 42 42 0 0
Brandon, Dean 45 FB 2 15 57 17 57 2 0
Chambliss, Todd 85 TE 3 34 49 36 49 2 0
Sellers, Karl 80 TE 1 30 77 30 77 0 0
Martinez, Graham 84 TE 1 21 34 23 39 2 5
Newsome, Joey 87 FL 5 56 56 56 56 0 0
Tilton, Cornelius 83 FL 4 38 38 38 38 0 0
Garcia, Alex 88 FL 13 32 33 32 33 0 0
Harmon, Van 89 SE 6 50 51 50 51 0 0
Lesky, Omar 32 SE 1 24 54 25 49 1 -5
Badalyan, Matt 31 SE 1 21 50 22 45 1 -5
Nunley, Monty 54 C 6 85 85 85 85 0 0
Pond, Ellis 57 C 6 55 62 55 62 0 0
Weber, Jesse 59 C 3 17 33 18 33 1 0
Thornton, Mickey 53 LG 6 57 59 57 59 0 0
Wells, Joseph 77 LG 1 15 29 16 29 1 0
Gruber, Lincoln 63 RG 12 51 51 51 51 0 0
Heinlein, Bennie 71 LT 12 55 57 55 57 0 0
Ford, Deion 69 LT 3 19 32 21 32 2 0
Gaines, Cris 75 LT 1 10 30 13 30 3 0
Glaspie, Nathan 78 RT 4 36 42 38 42 2 0
Creighton, Lamont 9 P 6 58 58 58 58 0 0
Crain, Mo 15 K 3 99 99 99 99 0 0
Fox, Jimmy 93 LDE 10 49 51 49 51 0 0
Coleman, Skip 99 LDE 12 23 24 23 24 0 0
Lynn, Neal 90 LDE 4 22 24 22 24 0 0
Lucero, Brenden 95 LDE 1 21 32 22 30 1 -2
Lane, Blake 70 LDE 2 20 30 22 32 2 2
Eldridge, Wendell 65 RDE 1 21 27 23 28 2 1
Nails, Bert 79 RDE 1 15 37 16 37 1 0
Oliver, Tito 74 RDE 1 11 35 13 33 2 -2
Prescott, Wendell 56 RDE 1 10 44 11 39 1 -5
Cascadden, Gary 72 LDT 10 71 72 71 72 0 0
Bailey, Zach 96 LDT 5 62 69 64 69 2 0
Oliveira, Willie 76 LDT 12 43 43 43 43 0 0
Cote, Timothy 73 RDT 1 9 27 11 28 2 1
Winters, Nate 92 NT 6 45 56 48 56 3 0
Davis, Curtis 55 MLB 11 64 64 64 64 0 0
Blackwell, C.J. 97 MLB 5 51 73 53 73 2 0
Strong, Corwin 98 MLB 1 17 31 18 30 1 -1
Dodge, Kurt 91 SLB 6 60 60 60 60 0 0
Frederick, Clarence 58 SLB 7 47 49 49 49 2 0
Sinclair, Curtis 94 SLB 3 26 55 29 55 3 0
Howard, Winston 51 SLB 1 18 38 20 34 2 -4
Regalado, Darrin 52 WLB 8 47 47 47 47 0 0
Stuff, Blake 49 WLB 3 33 44 36 44 3 0
Diaz, Monty 40 LCB 5 48 48 50 50 2 2
Turner, Leland 27 LCB 1 18 52 20 48 2 -4
Browning, Les 25 LCB 1 7 33 8 29 1 -4
Caston, Adam 46 RCB 11 47 47 47 47 0 0
Callens, Zack 34 RCB 13 32 32 32 32 0 0
Foreman, Thurman 26 RCB 1 20 58 23 52 3 -6
Weed, Kirk 24 SS 8 59 59 59 59 0 0
Arnold, Jason 47 SS 5 55 55 55 55 0 0
Eskridge, Kenneth 20 FS 5 77 77 77 77 0 0
Once again, I am having a lot more “luck” with my undrafted rookie free agents than I am with my actual draft picks. (Not so much luck, as a function of more information there to work with) Regardless, we have a lot of negative numbers among our rookie players – and some whom we can work with.
Something happened to DE Neal Lynn between last season and this season – I didn’t catch exactly when it happened, but he is now a shell of his former self. We’re going to be downright thin on the DL already – and his loss makes it even worse.
All in all, this looks like a fairly disappointing rookie crop. We sign TE Sellers, and he’ll be good – but his potentials are also all at the bottom of his previously indicated ranges. We are shut out from the Green Page this year.
Season Analysis
We’re trying to field a team as good as last year’s, but I don’t see any place where we actually improved. We’re going to be thin on the DL, thinner in the secondary, and thinner in the receiving corps. Tough to see us coming back quite as dominant as last season – but we can certainly try to remain contenders.
Our roster rating has dropped to 76 – fourth behind Jacksonville, Minnesota, and Denver. Our cohesion remains excellent: 84/100(88)/100(92)/100(91). Our roster includes only one personality conflict – newly-signed MLB C.J. Blackwell doesn’t get along with DT Willie Oliveira. This one won’t be resolved with a release – there’s too much invested in both guys for us.