Fear The Chorizo

I'm pumped at the thought of the 2022 Packers' defense with Kenny Clark in the middle bookended by P. Smith and a surging Gary, Campbell back at MLB, and a healthy Jaire paired on the other side by Stokes in year 2 at corner. A bounceback year from Savage and another steady year from Amos, and this defense could be really, really good even if they can't get Douglas resigned. Hopefully they add some quality at DL/LB depth in the draft to support some really good talent on that side of the ball.

Bryant and Boras are looking for a patsy club to drive his price tag up so the team or two he actually wants to play for will pony up more $$$.

No, he has not yet signed an extension

He's 30 and has quite a few miles on the tires - and not necessarily his fault since it's not his best position but he's been a turnstyle at LT in the last 2 playoff losses GB has had in place of Bakh. To me Turner's release means they are pretty confident Bakh will be good to go in Week 1 next fall (really hoping so), and they are happy with the line depth they've put together the past few seasons to move one from him. Turner was a good player - but I can see them digging through couch cushions later this week to try and resign Campbell or Douglas, and they need to get substantially under the cap in order to make those soon-to-be FAs a decent offer.

you're probably correct - but my larger point is that this scenario is very unlikely to happen...I just think it would be more likely than both the Packers and Adams opting for Adams to play 2022 under the tag in Green Bay. They'll get Adams a new contract.

Not really a transaction for the hot tub aside from the fact it might be prescribed as part of rehabbing the injury, but it sounds like Tatis is out until AS Break time or so with a fractured wrist. Not a great start for an organization that's under a good amount of pressure to win now with all the contract dollars shelled out and trade capital shipped away in recent years. Meanwhile the Dodgers just print more $$ to maintain a super team.

Not really surprised by that at all - would be bad for both Adams and the Packers...Gute has all but confirmed tagging him now just buys more time to negotiate a new deal. Even with Rodgers back, if they can't sign Adams to a new deal the Packers would be better off trading him elsewhere rather than him carrying a $20M cap hit for 2022 - they're going to need some of that space for signing other players.

Sounds like Preston Smith is inking a new extension that's going to knock his 2022 cap number down at least $8M. All but a certainty now that Z. Smith is about to get cut, trimming about $16M from the 2022 cap. These two moves with the Smiths alone reduce their 2022 cap deficit to be about $20M....and that figure still includes Rodgers' cap hit on his existing deal (not his new one that is still being erroneously reported everywhere as a 4 yr, $200M contract without a contract being signed or confirmed) plus Adams' franchise tag #. A redone Rodgers deal probably shaves at least half that remaining deficit. Giving Jaire a new deal and cutting both Crosby and Cobb likely gets them under the cap by wednesday if that's all they want to do, then they can focus on a new deal for Adams by summer and use that cap savings for their draft picks.

1.) Where are you from? I'm from a small town in NE WI, went to Chicago for college and early professional life, then moved up into the outlying western burbs of Minneapolis about 6 years ago. 2.) Age Range? (41) 3.) How long have you been frequenting BrewersFan.net? Since college, probably around 20 years 4.) Highest level of baseball/softball played? College and a summer playing independent league baseball between my 4th and 5th years of school. Got to meet and play with some great players despite playing at a small college, and several summer league teammates went on to become very successful MLBers. 5.) Favorite Brewers Player, and favorite underappreciated Brewers player, and if you want, favorite current Brewers player? Ben Sheets would be my favorite player, just because he was the show for a handful of doldrum Brewer seasons as their organization was building towards something consistently better. Favorite underappreciated Brewer IMO would be Jeff Cirrillo - really good all-around 3B that didn't get the notoriety he deserved because his prime was in the midst of the steroid era and his game wasn't build around power. Favorite current Brewer player on the mound would be Hader and position player-wise would be Adames. 6.) Favorite Twitter follows? What's a twitter? 7.) Other interests outside of baseball. Fishing, outdoors, chasing around my 3 kids 8.) Favorite part of BrewerFan.net...The variety of topics, both related to and completely unrelated to baseball, that are discussed quite knowledgeably in various forums by people likely from many different walks of life/perspectives in a generally respectable and lighthearted way.

I think the Brewers aren't going to be signing a free agent DH just because the NL just adopted it - they're going to fill that role with in-house players and platoon it and try to strengthen their roster elsewhere. I'd much rather them go out and sign or acquire a legit corner IF with pop that fits in with Rowdy/Urias, not a DH-only bat at this point. I'll get slammed for this take, but I'm also hoping to see Hiura get a sustained look at being this team's DH at some point this season. Not saying he's done anything to earn that role over the previous 2 seasons on Game 1 and it's his to lose, but DH is tailor made for the 2019 version of his bat.

I think the MLB hot tub definitely needs to stay around here....to heck with the hot stove!

I never compared Trubisky directly to Russell or Leaf - you just cherry picked those two names from about a dozen other quarterbacks i listed drafted in the top 3 overall slots. That list was my attempt to make the point that just because Trubisky was drafted so high doesn't mean other teams are going to still view him as a guy that should be given another chance to be a franchise difference maker for them. Trubisky's body of work has proven him to be below average as a starter when he was supposed to be "the franchise" for seasons 2-4 as a Bear. I even said later in that post that Trubisky is likely to be a longterm veteran backup qb. Thats not a total bust for him as a player because he's going to wind up having a long career with a similar injury risk to a kicker, but it's a bust for the organization who picked him to be the franchise that high in a draft that had other qbs in it who were all pro caliber the moment they set foot on an NFL field that the Bears passed up. That all being said, of course the Giants may view him as an option to be their starter for a season while their trainwreck of an organization positions itself for a run at a qb very high in next year's draft. They may even continue being stupid and give him a multi year deal because Daniel Jones is basically a carbon copy of Trubisky - looks the part and has all the tools but can't play the position consistently at the NFL level to be a longterm starter. Their new coach was the Bills' o coordinator, so there's familiarity there while Mitch held a clipboard in Buffalo last year.

Bears know they won't win next year. This can be stated with just about the same level of confidence as knowing death and taxes are unavoidable. For what they gave up to acquire Mack and paid him to be a Bear that ultimately resulted in 0 playoff wins, yes they got fleeced. But then again the Raiders did very little with the draft picks acquired for Mack and invested the contract savings poorly on other players/free agents....kind of the tale of a great player getting shuffled between crummy organizations while he set the market for OLBers financially.

The Vikings are certainly in no-man's land...New GM and coach, still-talented but aging defense, huge skill position talent on offense in their prime with problems up front on the O-line, salary cap problems despite poor quality depth. If they trade Cousins they are essentially blowing it all up and mightaswell trade Cook and Thielen, too. Or they hold onto everyone to try and retool as a mid-tier playoff team that could make a run, but only have 7 draft picks in 2022 to work with (4 of them in rounds 5-6). If I'm their new GM I do opt to blow it up, get a bunch of draft capital this year and next via trades, and hope to find their QB in next year's draft assuming they find themselves picking in the top 5 after a bad 2022 record.

Non-union international prospects ride buses for meager wages too. An international draft removes their freedom to choose whichever organization offers the most money & replaces it with a forced slotting system, which is why the MLBPA is against it. Why not do away with player drafts and contracts altogether and give all players the freedom to play wherever they want at whatever price they feel is fair for all those evil owners to pay them? Plus, an international draft with forced slotting eliminates huge market clubs from just throwing $100K checks around like candy to boys just starting to hit puberty with hopes that one out of every 50 or so signing bonuses nets them an all-star caliber player, when small-mid market clubs need to be much more focused on how to dole out more limited funds towards international player signings...that amount is indeed life-changing money in many of the countries these kids originate from, but that doesn't mean it's the right way to go about an international player development system - particularly when it's led to all sorts of corruption that winds up exploiting these kids in a much worse way than them having to ride buses between games as 16 year old kids.

And if that’s true, and it may be, that’s why most NFL teams struggle to find QBs. Continually cycling through overpaid ‘veteran’ guys who are proven failures or mediocrity while wondering why they can’t get their franchise turned around. The fact that Trubisky is the hottest FA QB is literal lunacy. Hey, maybe Sam Bradford deserves a 4th (or is it 5th?) shot. I think with Trubisky there is still the pondering of "does he really suck or is it just that Matt Nagy really sucked?" Maybe the former, but you aren't a top 3 pick in the NFL without some traits that teams want. Or you can be Ryan Leaf, Baker Mayfield, Sam Darnold, Goff, Wentz, Jameis Winston, Mariota, Bortles, Bradford, JaMarcus Russell, Vince Young....or Trubisky. Some of these QBs had a good year or two, some were total busts....but all of them aren't franchise-changing quarterbacks. Trubisky fits in the mold of being a decent backup QB option IMO - definitely not deserving of being a 2nd overall pick in a draft that included much better quarterbacks with more complete and predictable playing credentials at the collegiate level. What still makes the Trubisky pick that draft year so egregious at #2 is the Bears moved up 1 spot to get him specifically (that trade included a 3rd and 4th rounder of that draft, plus a 2018 3rd round pick), while Mahomes and Watson were sitting there as well. The Bears identified Trubisky as being that much better than Mahomes that they were scared of other teams jumping up one spot ahead of them to pick Trubisky specifically. Even if the Bears didn't make that trade with the 49ers and someone else picked Trubisky, their consolation prize could've wound up being a far better quarterback in either Mahomes or Watson. The 3rd round pick the 49ers got from the Bears got traded to the Saints - who moved up to pick Alvin Kamara with that spot. Oh yeah, that 2018 3rd round pick the Bears shipped San Fran as a throw in to move up one spot for Trubisky? That turned into Fred Warner.

Anyone else find it funny how much people are running with the 4 year 200 million contract still? Yes - I've been looking at a bunch of articles and tweets using that as the assumed contract value, but to the best of my knowledge there hasn't been any pen to paper on a new contract. Since many of this comes from the same mouths of reports and "insiders" who spent the past few weeks attempting to scoop what trade packages various other teams had laid out for the Packers to acquire Rodgers as he was headed out of town, I'm assuming it's all still speculation like it tends to be with news surrounding #12. Wouldn't surprise me in the least to see other roster moves, including a new Adams contract, Alexander extension, new Preston Smith contract, trade(s), and a necessary cut or two prior to Rodgers' new deal actually being finalized right before the new league year starts next week in order for them to have a definitive 2022 cap # Rodgers' new contract has to get under.

The only ones who lose in that scenario are the fans. The end result of this is they're going to have one less avid baseball fan who spends $ on MLB, who happens to have 3 kids at that age where taking an interest in a sport would lead to lifelong allegiance - tickets, merch, cable sports package, MLBTV, etc....no thanks anymore. I'm still a baseball fan, I just will spend my dollars elsewhere

I think it's more a product of baseball writers trying to keep clicks on their twitter pages being overly optimistic when they don't have free agency/trades/hot stove/spring training articles to write - sure, the two sides reached agreement on a handful of gameplay measures. While technically that means a few fewer boxes to check in the overall CBA, the main impasse with financials still has a big chasm to bridge.

Well at least the bases will be bigger for more games that won't be played

I don't think they ever intended to because he was always going to be their starter, eventually. Love likely now isn't the heir apparent. Teams won't get to see a large body of onfield work, period. So you either take what you can get or hold. Then you hold and don't worry about speculation of what his trade value is because you're not trading Love at this stage in his career unless you're getting more than a 2nd round pick. Had Favre won consecutive MVPs in Rodgers' 1st two NFL seasons, people wouldn't have assumed Rodgers was the heir apparent. Hell, even after Favre sort of retired/was forced out TT drafted Brian Brohm in round 2 of the 2008 draft after handing the keys to Rodgers in case he fell on his face and GB didn't want to sign him to a new contract. Bottom line to me is that if you've got a quarterback leading your franchise capable of winning league MVPs, regardless of age, you hitch your wagon to that guy and ride him as far as he'll take you provided he wants to be there. That's going to inevitably lead to having to clean up a roster mess when it is finally over with, but such is life in the NFL. Glad Rodgers and Adams are back in the fold and looking forward to the next ~8 days of roster moves to make it all fit.

The Packers probably couldn't have gotten a 2nd round pick by trading Rodgers after his 2nd NFL season based on his larger body of onfield work, either.

I don't think the Packers trade Love for just a 2nd (particularly one not towards the top of that round) even if at this point many would view that as good value for him, so we'll never know...he's too valuable as a backup QB option in his 3rd year of development in this system with a ~$3.4M cap number for 2022.

I agree that they probably aren't inclined to trade Love for at least one more season unless they get an offer they can't pass up - they really have no great reason to at this point. Love has gotten one chance to play an NFL game (preseason or regular season) in 2 years as a Packer with starting caliber players in the lineup with him. That game came on the road at KC - he didn't play well but he also wasn't a total trainwreck against what turned out to be an underrated defense who held some very good offenses in check over the next 5-6 weeks following that game. Still thinking Love can be a good starting quarterback in the NFL - and he's going to have more consistent opportunities to prove that next preseason. After the debacle week 1 loss against the Saints after essentially giving all their starters the preseason off, I'm guessing this upcoming preseason will provide starters more playing time to try and get off to a better start when the games do matter.

Also, in looking at this season's upcoming draft in terms of available QBs, it wouldn't surprise me if the Packers wind up getting decent value if this news does prompt them to trade Love....but I can see them waiting until next offseason to do so assuming Rodgers is a Packer into 2023 and beyond. Yes the Packers gave up a 1st + 4th....but in reality it was a 4th round pick and exchanging 1st round picks to move up 4 spots of that draft year. Hindsight is typically a perfect 20/20, but following the 2018 and 2019 seasons there was plenty of reason to look at Rodgers as a great QB on the decline. It wouldn't surprise me in the least to wind up getting equal or more value in a Love trade than what the Packers gave up to move from #30 to #26 in the 2020 draft.