Reed83HOF

On point and totally agree. Fans will be happy during the draft if that's the case because of their perceived value in a deep WR draft and then the I told you so birds (like me) will comeback to ***** on their car/head. A weak class means there may be 1-3 players and that is it and if you miss any of them you are SOL. A Strong/Deep class means you can find good developmental prospects throughout the rounds and have a better shot with their development than taking the mid-tier guy in a weak draft who is really a UDFA talent = the Cream of the Crap. The Cream of the Crop in a weak class or a deep class is still the desirable talent. For the record we should be doing both and have the picks to grab a developmental WR in the 2-4th tiers who could be good in 2021 & 2022 to take over for an aging Brown/Beasley whose contracts will be coming due. The goal in RD1 should be getting a monster who can score anytime the have the ball in their hands immediately and create a threat that has to be countered by the defense opening up other plays for the rest of the offense.

I am too, which is why I am proponent of bringing a guy in and dumping Kroft & Lee Smith. Overpaying a top flight pass catching TE is still cheaper than a FA WR and gives Knox time. If Knox actually can fix his hands, I am not opposed to having 2 great pass catchers at TE for a few years.

We have 2 viable WRs imo, maybe Mckenzie, but he is like a 5th/6th WR to me I'd argue we have some the worst WR talent in the league period, regardless of age

They did dwindle and their ***** fans cried about it

this wins the thread

This does make sense if they truly believe in Knox - the dropsies have to get corrected

Trimming this down, but how does this translate back to our discussion in the Cooper thread - namely are our pass catchers getting enough separation to give Allen a window in which he can deliver the ball?

Great conversation because I don't know how much this has been discussed on here and I don't disagree regarding Allen, but I do think there is a bit more to it, rarely is anything 1 direct cause. Yards of Separation, Beasly was #29 in the NFL at 3.2, Knox was 65th at 2.8, Brown was 107th at 2.4. For reference #1 was 3.9. When you have a QB is to a degree inaccurate (and Allen really is not that bad) and WRs who don't get a lot of separation, you are asking for contested catches and making it harder from a YAC standpoint. They are actually pretty good from a cushion standpoint as well, Knox & Brown were near the top of the league. This does seem to indicate the answer is in the middle, we can't create great separation naturally with our WRs and Josh' inaccuracy negates the cushion that is there with the WRs, which is why a WR who can turn his speed on in a millisecond after making a contested catch is a dream for this team. I'm not trying to make this a Ruggs thing, but no other players in the draft can do what he does. Ruggs from the draft network: Ability to stop on a dime on the outside leads to immediate separation on back shoulder fades or deep comebacks, which is an important counter to his primary usage.Works back across face on quick-breaking routes well and incorporates his hands with good aggressiveness. Basketball background is apparent. Soft mittens. Catches naturally in stride and isn't perturbed by high-velocity balls outside of his frame. Flashes hands late and aggressively to balls that are at his full extension and quickly transitions to a runner. Able to attack balls at the highest point while elevating and has plus technique to avoid body-catching habits when working back to the football. It's just easy for him, man. A candidate for schemed touches and deep bombs due to alien speed and acceleration. Has loose hips and clean feet to change direction when he's not working at full speed; will need gather steps when he's on full throttle. Flexibility in the lower half allows for natural leverage and he has enough density to deliver hits and survive contact at a high level Has true zoomies with pads on and regularly breaks the angles of his opponent's fastest defenders, which contributes to his unreal propensity for the explosive play. Instant acceleration is hugely valuable given his ability to break tackles with plus contact balance -- when he goes 0 to 100 is when he makes the most would-be tacklers look foolish. Is not uniquely elusive but has good quicks and solid vision -- is a no-nonsense runner who will take the first runway he gets Locates the deep bomb quickly and will aggressively work to the football through contact. Prefers to run under passes down the field, however, and must become better at attacking deep balls as an alpha in the air, with his hips toward the line of scrimmage. The cliche phrases about being a threat to score on every touch are absolutely applicable. One wrong angle or missed step by the defense can result in six points because his ability to accelerate is from another planet. Ruggs from Walter football: 2/1/20: Ruggs had 40 catches for 746 yards and seven touchdowns in 2019. Of the tremendous group of receivers at Alabama, sources say that Ruggs is the fastest, possessing a serious ability to stretch the field. Ruggs' production was held back by Alabama spreading the ball around to its stable of talented receivers, but he is a game changer to stretch NFL defenses vertically. Ruggs suffered a concussion in the Citrus Bowl win over Michigan.8/17/19: Ruggs (6-0, 183) goes under the radar somewhat because of Jerry Jeudy and other Alabama play-makers, but Ruggs is a dangerous receiver who produces big plays. In 2018, he totaled 46 receptions for 741 yards and 11 touchdowns. At just about any other school, Ruggs would be the No. 1 wide receiver and produce a huge stat line, especially if he played in the Big XII.

It is ridiculous when you watch him play, he does the back shoulder catches, makes contested catches, can track the ball in the air, he can stop on a dime, make the catch and accelerate to full speed in a second.He does the Mackenzie jet sweeps, he does the Beasley slot, he does the brown over the top, he run blocks amazingly well and not one other player in the draft comes close to this explosive skill set. Defense will have to game plan against him and will roll the safety coverage to him which will open up the rest of the field. There is nothing not to like. Also our trade up from #22 to #16 for Edmunds was our 1st & 3rd rounder and we got a 5th in return. Value won't be much different to go to 15 and, even if you have to go to 13 - you can't pass this up - the talent differential is too great First, I don't hate Shenault - I want to get that out there. He said, "Shenault is a final piece to an already explosive offense"; our offense is no nowhere near explosive and that is what I am calling out, because frankly I don't see it and no stats back up that claim.

Not at all, WR is the most pressing need we have, "we didn't score enough points" Brandon Beane. Look at the receiving stats for last year: 1.) We desperately need someone who is a threat to score every time they have the ball, we were 29th in YAC as a team 2.) Beasley had the most YAC on the team at 330, 44th best and grouped around players like Mixon, Goedert, Fant, Cobb & Edleman. McKenzie was 2nd and ranked #110 in YAC w/ 206 & Brown was ranked #112 w/205. This is John Ross and Amendola territory. Robert Woods was 6th in the NFL. 3.) Yards/Catch we were 12th and Brown was 23rd in the league, Beasley was 2nd on the team and was 73rd in the league. We are terrible in these 2 categories How is this offense already explosive? Name me our playmakers and where they rank in the NFL = we are not a final piece away Entirely misread on my part

hated making it that long, but I felt providing a bit more info was worth it. He also indicated during this offseason that he would look to use the later round picks to move up or trade them for future year picks because we don't have to fill out the roster like we did in the past and there is a good chance the 4th-6th rounders might not even make the team. Granted all of these scenarios will started to narrow down as we get through FA. In the end, he will stay true to his board and if talent is slipping he will compare and go grab it, especially if it is at a position of need & WR will be the most likely position of biggest need heading into the draft, as is the point this thread (Cooper is not coming here - and I don't necessarily want to pay him what he will want). I love the idea of using other picks on WR as well as we only have 2 viable ones and letting them develop behind Brown & Beasley will be very important for rebuilding the depth there. I try not to get to wrapped up in the combine numbers, but they do provide some value. We desperately need someone who is a threat to score every time they have the ball, we were 29th in YAC as a team Beasley had the most YAC on the team at 330, 44th best and grouped around players like Mixon, Goedert, Fant, Cobb & Edleman. McKenzie was 2nd and ranked #110 in YAC w/ 206 & Brown was ranked #112 w/305. This is John Ross and Amendola territory. Robert Woods was 6th in the NFL. https://www.footballdb.com/stats/stats.html?lg=NFL&yr=2019&type=reg&mode=C&conf=&limit=all&sort=recyac Yards/Catch we were 12th and Brown was 23rd in the league, Beasley was 2nd on the team and was 73rd in the league. We are terrible in these 2 categories

So I want to both encourage discussion and make sure that shades 2014 does not color our views on this draft. Just because it is a deep WR class does not mean that, what we are missing on our offense overall will be found in any round and that all of the WRs are ranked closely in overall skill. The top 3 guys are yes, much better than the next 3-4 guys and the group below them and so on. Beane frequently has talked about this very concept and we all know he will move to get a player who is sliding down the board they have a high value on, especially if it is a position of need. On Knox: Beane: We were looking at, there was [the] same thing, there was starting to be a run on tight ends and you’re kind of holding your breath and you start looking. Our next pick was 112, I believe, so we started going. He fit the value where we picked him. There’s enough teams that could still use tight ends and we just didn’t see any way that he would fall. The next one that we had ranked was starting to be significantly lower and we just felt that this was the time to jump. That was still another position that we wanted to address in this draft. Beane: I was honestly exhausted after the first [trade up] because we were trying so hard to get Cody [Ford]. We were patient with Devin [Singletary] and then there was the run on tight ends right after we picked Devin. It’s Murphy’s Law, we saw some running backs there we liked and we saw some tight ends that we liked; and it was like ‘ok, it looks like maybe there’s a little more depth still at tight end,’ so we go with Devin, and then the tight ends start going and you start pressing, going ‘alright, how long do we want to wait before we address it. And that felt like the right time to make the move.’ Beane: There’s two things, the value on the board, and secondly, we thought it was a position we did need. And again, let’s say he got picked and we’re at four now, I didn’t want to be reaching in a lower round to grab him. It made sense to me, for us to trade up there because we had that value on Dawson [Knox]. On Edmunds: “He was sticking out on our board, and it’s a need,” explained Beane. “If a guy is sticking out on our board, and it’s really not a need, you might not do it. But with the hole we had there, and where he was on our board, it was a no-brainer. Even if we could have got to 14, we would have done it.” We can't compare the 2014 draft and team to the 2020 draft and team, different cap situations, different holes and at different points in their trajectory. There is no need to doa full rundown on 2014, but in a nutshell (Sammy, Evans & OBJ were the top tier, blue chip WR guys) at 9 we would have had a choice of one or even 2 of them. The FO chose to trade up when other areas of the team could have been focused on. As we have discussed ad nauseam over the years. (most of the following notes and comments came from Nolan Nawrocki & Walter football) Landry & Adams well there are reasons for them not being in the top tier. Landry ran a 4.77 40, had the 2nd worst vertical at the combine, and had issues with separation against better DBs in college, he only started in 12 games, he also was listed as 6'1" by LSU but measured 5'11" and had a lean frame. His lack of size and speed would cause issues with better DBs in the NFL. What he did excel at was the route tree and making contested catches (reason for many of these was due to his lack of separation). All of these question marks caused him to drop and his pure athletic talent cannot match the top 3. But great route running and strong hands allowed him to carve a role and be successful, Keenan Allen is the same and Mike Wallace is a guy who faded out due to not being able to develop a route tree. Adams was a third year sophmore entering the draft, average to below average acceleration from a dead stop, did not play against elite competition. When Adams is asked to run more complex routes, he's often sloppy. He frequently rounds off his routes and doesn't consistently display the sharp cuts that can create separation. The sloppiness of his play raises some concerns that he's willing to play down to the level of his competition, because on occasion he did show the necessary explosiveness to win against NFL-caliber defensive backs. He ran only a portion of the route tree at Fresno State, running a high percentage of go routes, comebacks and screens—routes which require relatively little timing and explosiveness. Both of these types of players can take time to develop and are good choices for RDs2 & 3, but are by no means the blue chippers who could come in and contribute immediately to start a run on our current team. The further you go down into the talent, the more questions there are and the more time it will take to develop these guys. How long are you willing to wait for that development and hope it comes? the lack of a blue chip pass catchers on our team is the primary are we need to fix this year. Beane end of the season presser: Hopefully, we’ll just be able to add some pieces here and there to help us take the next step... “Sometimes Josh, he wants it so bad that sometimes he tries to do too much. If we’re not moving the ball at times, I think that’s probably one of the things he has to work on, is still playing within himself. I think he tried to put all 45 other players on his back and do things that he shouldn’t do . . . He’s a fiery competitor, and I would much rather have those errors than check-down-charlie, being timid, all those types of things... At the end of the day, it’s maturity, and it’s me doing a better job of increasing the talent around him, too, so that he can trust, have more players that [he] can trust and make plays for him, where he’s just got to get the ball out, hand it off, do whatever, and not feel like he has to do too much.” For Edmunds in 2018 we gave up Pick #22 in RD1 and Pick #65 in RD3 to move up to pick #16 and Pick #154 in RD5; with this kind of value Beane will move for a top 3 WR. Ithink this makes sense around pick 14-16, need to jump in front of Philly & the Raiders. Easy trade to make especially with our extra 4ths and 5ths we can easily get back into RD3 and even still package them to move up in RD2 or grab another second rounder. In 2017 to move from pick #10 we got #27 in RD1, plus #91 RD3 and 2018#1. Would Beane pull the trigger for Jeudy or Lamb and give up something similar? He might and this is tougher to predict. Just remember we at least had talks on both AB & OBJ last year = big game WR fishing. OBJ was a #1 a 3rd and Peppers for a huge contract and a Diva. Personally I would rather make a trade like that for one of the top in this draft. I'm not addressing AB at all.. Edit: @Virgiljust adding you because this more fully explains my trade up for Ruggs and why (if I was free at work during the selection) I would have gone to 13 for Lamb....

Ruggs is way better than Shenault; sorry Also the real trade would be closer to this: For Edmunds in 2018 we gave up Pick #22 in RD1 and Pick #65 in RD3 to move up to pick #16 and Pick #154 in RD5; with this kind of value Beane will move for a top 3 WR. Ithink this makes sense around pick 14-16, need to jump in front of Philly & the Raiders. Easy trade to make; especially with our extra 4ths and 5ths we can easily get back into RD3 and even still package them to move up in RD2. Just as an FYI In 2017 to move from pick #10 we got #27 in RD1, plus #91 RD3 and 2018#1. Would Beane pull the trigger for Jeudy or Lamb and give up something similar? He might and this is tougher to predict.

I couldn't help it dude! TBH, wasn't sure that I saw you as a Motely fan and then it just seemed like fun to mess with you LOL!

I'm shocked that Hapless knew the words to that song and that band. He seems like more of a Bette Midler/Tina Turner type person

Great point and 100% agree. i would rather spend on a younger guy entering his prime than an old guy who will give you a year or 2. While there are things I like about Knox, he was the last guy available they had ranked in that tier of TEs in the draft and his biggest knock was not catching the ball much in his career. So if it takes 2-3 years to fully develop a TE and this guy needs more experience with playing the Wr portion of this position and still has suspect hands (and sat for Kroft a bit). I am sure as hell not hitching my wagon to him developing fully. I'd rather have 2 good TEs with one in the middle or near the end of his contract when Knox is coming up. I want options and talent.

who?

I get this is a deep class and good WRs can be had in any round, but we need elite playmakers on offense(we have none) at least 1 WR needs to have the tools to be elite, not just more #2s & #3s. You can't be scared of Watkins either. The 2014 draft class: http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap2000000346685/article/mike-mayocks-position-rankings-for-2014-nfl-draft https://walterfootball.com/draft2014WR.php has the same rankings. When we traded we were at pick #9 and at least 1 of the top 3 should have been there for us, but yet we went up to pick #5 to grab Sammy (who was the #1 WR in the draft ranking wise) our problem is that there were 3 WRs in the top Tier (Sammy, Evans & OBJ) and we foolishly gave up too much to grab what we thought was the top one, when there were 2 other players in that tier of WR who were not that far off. This would have been comparable last year if Beane traded up this last draft for Q. Williams & Oliver was taken by the Jets at our pick. In this draft yes there is depth, but again there is a drop of from the Top 3 to the next tier. Given how terrible our roster depth is at this position, we sure as hell can use a top tier WR; we have a roster full of tier 2 and worse.

This almost feels like the organization covering their asses from the fan backlash when he ultimately leaves. Try to paint it that they want him, he is the one who doesn't want to be there even though they say they want him. I do think it sets a bad example when you tag someone who doesn't want to be there - it certainly does not help culture or make other players on the team or FAs feel like they should stay away. Not one players wants to be tagged let alone 2 years in a row on a 1 year contract when they refuse to sign long term. I am pretty sure no one wants to play for Doug and there is no way all of this displeasure was all on Coughlin. You are also 1000% correct on your point $20M it is & Foles is staying - it will cost them $33M to get rid of him. Calias is definitely a targetto be cut if they want Yannick, but if Yannick doesn't want to sign it turns into a Clowney situation

Ruggs is better

and unless it is some curve ball like an RB, we will all be happy with who we chose

I like Jefferson if we stay put and move up in rd2 for him, but Jefferson is not nearly as explosive and you can get a player closer to him in rd3, such as Mims. Aiyuk is a good choice too, Ruggs is 6 foot 190, plays a very physical game and has beyond elite speed with great hands.

Have you even watched video of him? He has insane acceleration, can track a poorly and underthrown deep ball, makes back shoulder catches, has great hands and is a tremendous run blocker. https://youtu.be/CePxgfhbkec For the record, yes I like other wrs in this draft who will be available at 22 or later, but this kid is gonna be damn good.

Without a doubt, I would say that comparing the situations is much different as where the team's are cap and talent wise. We have very few (none) blue chippers who can score, while the wr depth is tremendous, you can't rely on past draft bust rates in rd1. He is a highly ranked prospect, who is a tremendous athlete and if one of those fall, you go after it. It isn't an over draft either. Edit: yes you rely on the strength of the draft, but that doesn't mean you pass up better talent, that is shown on film, and hope to get someone close or with a few more question marks with other picks. If great talent falls in a position you desperately need you go get it.

we are signing an edge in FA and as Beane said, we lost in Houston because we didn't score enough points...