BarleyNY

The Chargers have traditionally taken some very hard lines on contracts. IIRC the Bosa contract was held up by the Chargers not giving into offsets that players taken with his pick (and picks after his) had been getting. Bosa was literally just asking for what was standard practice and the hold up was due to the Chargers were trying to walk that back.

I get the reasoning for comparing the two. I just am not a fan of LJ. I’ve been upfront about where I think JA needs to improve, but at least he has a chance to do so. I see LJ as too limited to be successful for any length of time in the NFL as anything other than a backup. I’ll give my appraisal of LJ one caveat: the NFL game is changing and he might be serviceable in it. That’s his ceiling IMO though.

Allen is a better QB than Jackson. Let’s set the bar higher than that this season though. Looking forward to making some favorable comparisons to some real QBs this season.

Hyde makes more than Adams. Both are excellent safeties. I’d probably give Adams the nod, but I love Hyde as a player. Poyer isn’t paid as much, but he isn’t as good as either. Adams is still young too. He can get better. Dunno. I’m really happy with the Bills safety duo and their contracts. Adams is a stud though.

Its a solid beer. Everything Big Ditch does is related to the Erie Canal or Buffalo. They do a nice job with that. The name big ditch is the nickname for the canal, for example.

Eight games. If he were my kid, I’d give him the reality talk. It’s unfair that even if you’re doing nothing wrong you’ll be accused of all kinds of crazy crap. Most people can have a night out, not start any trouble and be fine. You can’t. Sorry, but life’s not fair. You can trade evenings out and big parties for an NFL career and millions of dollars or not. Your call.

Yeah. Knocking a girl over with your foot isn’t a great look. But breaking your toddler’s arm is absolutely effed up. This is not his first issue like this so it’s pretty clear to me that he isn’t changing his behavior. I hope he loses custody of his kid and never plays football again.

Thank God someone revived this post. On an unrelated note, are there lifetime bans on this site?

H. Jon Benjamin is hilarious. Bob’s Burgers is a personal favorite. There was an Adult Swim show called Lucy, Daughter of the Devil. He did several voices, including the Devil. Great, but short-lived show. I almost made that character my avatar.

I feel like this thread is destroying a lot of friendships.

Jordan Reed Injury Predictor Yikes!

Glad you saw he is on a 5 year contract. I couldn’t find that info. If that’s the case, then I think you nailed it.

When I lived in the Cleveland area, I got to know the Special Teams Coordinator, Chris Tabor, and his family a little bit. (Our daughters swam together.) Not the HC, but still. I’ll tell you this, it seemed like every second he wasn’t working he was with his family. His wife was a stay at home mom. I was always impressed with the whole family, how respectful and happy the kids were. Heck, how happy and nice the whole family seemed to be. It was nice to see that with someone who had such a demanding job. As for the media guy, he actually didn’t say much (and he wasn’t wrong), but he shouldn’t have said anything at all. As a parent, I’m not surprised people would be upset. It’s a very short clip (<30) if you want to listen.

23 reps of 225# on the bench would’ve been tough to fake

Good article, but I would’ve liked to have seen SI dig into the harm this does to the kids. Parents who have their own identities yoked so tightly to their children’s is incredibly detrimental to their kids. It goes way beyond simply being proud of their kids and becomes very toxic. The result is kids never learn to deal with failure and can’t function properly as adults and parents whose identities are inappropriately tied to their children’s success. For those players that do make it professionally I get that parents want to help protect their (even adult) children from being taken advantage of. But I think they cross a line when their livelihoods hare tied to their children’s earnings and success. That’s a major conflict of interest. For the average kids, there are so many travel teams, premier teams, camps ,private trainers, etc., etc. They’re all selling the dream and telling parents how great their kids are, but they’re all just out to make a buck. My daughter plays premier soccer locally and regionally. Every last parent (other than me) on the regional team thinks their daughter is getting a D1 scholarship. It was all I could do not to laugh out loud. I doubt that there’s a single one. If there is, there be no way to know which girl right now anyway. We’re likely bumping back down to travel next season. Premier isn’t worth the money. The coaching isn’t any better and I don’t like being lied to and treated like a sucker.

While we shouldn’t write off Shaq 100%, I expect the Bills to proceed as if he won’t be. That said, none of us know the most important piece of information regarding this - the relationship between the Bills and Shaq. It’s also possible that his play will take a big leap forward, but that’s unlikely. It it happens, we’ve got a different situation and tagging him would make sense. Another unlikely situation is that his play falls off significantly. Easy decision there too. Most likely he’ll play at about the same level as last season. If that happens I’d expect that he’d want to go elsewhere to try to prove himself in a system that fits him better. He’d probably get a better initial contract and that would be preferable to signing a backup level contract here. Plus he’d have a chance at a better deal down the road too. It’d likely net us a comp pick too. We will have to let the season play out before anything happens, obviously.

Reading his quotes all I can say is: I had no idea he was that funny.

Yep. You’re right. I can’t believe I missed that many, but I did. Rare, yes. But not as rare as I thought.

That doesn’t make sense. All of those options would’ve been available if they had franchised Watkins. That includes the ability to trade him which is an option they otherwise would not have had (unless they had tagged him first). This is the dead season for football. There’s no harm in what-ifing situations like this, but let’s keep the odds of it happening real. If teams want to keep 1st round picks, then they pick up their option or extend them early. There’s was no higher level game being played with Lawson or Watkins. Since the 5th year option was added, exactly one player who did not have one of those things happen stayed with the team that drafted him - Mark Ingram with the Saints. Lawson is gone after this season. It’s better for him and it’s better for us.

Yup. He belongs on a 3-4 team. That’s what he was drafted to do here. We have just kept him around because he’s serviceable at a premium position and we’ve needed him. He’ll go to a team where he fits and is therefore more valuable.

Totally agree. It also helps to have consistency with scheme and coaches who can develop players. The Wrex hire really boned us in those regards.

The positive PED test worried me more than the injury - and the injury did worry me. Not only is he looking at a year long suspension if he tests positive again, there’s also the risk that he won’t return to form without juicing again. I remember Shawn Merriman oscillating between Pro Bowls and below average play after testing positive. I hope Murphy doesn’t need them and plays big for us this year, but I worry. We don’t have anyone else to give us a pass rush opposite Hughes.

You were underselling the situation by a fair bit. You wrote that he has a “very small contract compared to others” and that he could be released next year with “almost no dead cap”. That wasn’t accurate so I provided details. Also a player’s contract is important in BOTH contexts - relative to players at the same position around the league and to the other players on his own team. He’s got cap hits that will be around 4.6% of the total league cap this year and next. That’s significant. He’s got the 5th highest on the team and 33rd among edge players in the league. Also significant (not “very small”). The $1.75M hit if cut next offseason matters. It isn’t that bad, but it’s not “nothing“. Players get cut for less than that all the time. Again, in no sense is this some horrible albatross of a contract, but it isn’t nothing either.

While I don't think his contract is crippling or anything, it's pretty big relative to the roster. 3 years, $22.5M with the 5th biggest cap hit on the team this season and next. If he's cut he'd have dead money of $6.5M this off-season or $1.75M next. Again, it's not an enormous contract, but it isn't small either. This is definitely a make or break year for Murphy. We need him to play well. It's important for him too because he won't see the last year of his deal if he doesn't.