HiAndTight

https://draftwire.usatoday.com/2019/01/29/2019-nfl-mock-draft-7-rounds-dwayne-haskins-kyler-murray-nick-bosa-quinnen-williams/2/ This mock isn't TERRIBLE. It does have us passing on Sweat, Greedy and a couple other studs for Polite and Hockenson going in the 2nd just in front of David Edwards....so like all of them, grain of salt.

I don't think it's bias, you see guys like Stephen Neal who never played football go from a National Champ to an NFL player for the Pats and have a really good career because he knows how to use his hands to handfight, and he knows about leverage. Kenny Clark, Mike Daniels both wrestled. Zietler's old man asked me to come work out with him when he started wrestling as Wisconsin Lutheran. I don't know if it was flattery or not(I'm guessing it was) but he said it goes him the scholarship to UW. There is no sport that can better prepare you for playing on the OL or DL than Wrestling. Brock Lesner wasn't even very athletic and he almost made a Vikings team. But I agree. It's not going to tell you if a guy is strong, it's really just gonna tell you if he's weak. I'd want a Tackle to be able to get up 20 at least(some have those 35 inch arms though, that's tough. A guard 25, a DT 25, a Edge 20-ish, MLB'er 15-20, WR'er 5-8, CB-10 or so. As long as they can do that many, I wouldn't have concerns. There'll never be able to come up with a fool proof way of doing it though. Jason Spriggs was explosive as hell and crushed his combine, but a guy can get inside on him and just walk him back to the QB.

Back to the good stuff. I can't tell you a good site. You go to NFL network and it has guys going late in the 2nd that ESPN has going in the top 15...I just look at a lot of them and try to get a full idea. One I just saw had Greedy Williams falling to 23rd. If that happens....there will have to be some La'ael Collins story behind it. He's just waaay too talented. I'm with you though, there's a goup, maybe 8 or 9 deep of really elite talents. If a Sweat, Oliver or Williams drops, nab 'em. If not, hope that one team loves Lock and move down 5-6 spots. Maybe you get another 1st next yera for your trouble. But last year was a perfect storm. They traded back, they were going to pick Alexander anyway apparently(though they say that now, I bet Davenport was in consideration) and they got the stud they wanted. In the King draft, unless he becomes a stud, they should have just dont the obvious and drafted the Wisconsin guy with the Brother who's challenging Reggie as the GOAT defensively. But yeah, maybe they drop back, they pick up Hockenson, a WR'er, Campell perhaps and then Fant with the 30th pick. Still plenty of defense available on day 2 and 3. I still would love to see a guy like Sweat, someone who can be the next Von Miller type be there at 12. Or even Ed Oliver(or as I've said, Grady Williams). Speaking of bad mock drafts, this one doesn't even have Williams as a 1st, and another one I just saw had two Alabama RB's in the 1st. http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap3000001022837/article/charles-davis-2019-nfl-mock-draft-10-steelers-fill-ab-void

Of course you're getting eye rolling from me. Nobody is saying that Bench Press is a great determining factor in how good of a football player you're going to be. It's one of SEVERAL tests. As I've said, I've trained with Badgers who've played in the league and worked with a Badgers who became a Strength and Conditioning coach at UW and then transitioned to helping athletes life for their sport. Bench press was one of the most important excercises. But just taking it alone means nothing. It's just an additional test. It's ONE factor that they use among dozens to evaluate a player. You said it was completely worthless and now you're suggesting that I'm putting a LOT of stock into it. I'm not. I am saying it's important. Hell, a better life would be doing 200 pounds using dumbells to see how strong you are and how strong your stabalizing muscles are. But they can only do so much. And with respect, I'm FULLY aware of how tiring wrestling is. Again, I wrestled for 22 years, in over half the states and 10 other countries. I don't understand what you mean by handfighting in a 3 point stance, but wrestling and handfighting, yes, my neck would get tired, my legs, my shoulders and my lungs, all before my chest. But I've arleady conceded that it's not really important in wrestling. Unless all you do is cradle a guy, ala Jeff Jaggers, it may be important, but it's well behind shoulders, neck, back, legs, core. But we're talking about football. And football isn't behind, football training is on the cutting edge. The Combine however can't put 300 people through extensive workouts to see how much they clean and jerk or how many reps they can do at 200 with dumbells. They just want to know what you alluded to. Is a guy weak. Not everyone has to bench over 500 pounds like Richie Incognito, but if a MLB'er can't put up 225 5 times, that's a problem. If a WR'er can't, that's a problem. It's far more of a pass/fail. Getting 38 like Bandon Williams is fine, but they want to make sure that you're strong ENOUGH to not get rag dolled out there. By the way, I've sat in the chair while I had family that wrestled Askren 8 or 9 times. Askren won 2 of them.

EDIT-For everyone else, you can probably skip this post. We're venturing slighly off onto the topic of wrestling which I'm guessing almost nobody but us cares about. I wrestled probably about 3 thousand matches in my life and the guys like Ben Askren are the exception. That said, the thing about Ben is he has some of the strongest shoulders and absolutely CAN rep 225 multiple times and more importantly, he has an absurdly strong grip and huge hands. That's what made Ben so good as his technique could get him into trouble, his ability to hang onto that leg and the strength and flexibiity in those shoulders saved him. Watch him wrestle Jake Herbert in the Midlands exhibition match. Askren is flattened out on his stomach time after time and Herbert is got his head stuffed, he's heavy hipping the hell out of him and all that strength and everything is on Askrens hands. Yet.....Johnny Hendricks still couldn't beat Askren because Hendricks was too explosive. What's more, if you know Ben, ask him about his redshirt year at Missouris. He broke down because he KNEW he wasn't physically strong enough to wrestle with these guys. Which is why he revolutionized the sport(he also was in ridiculously good shape). But picking Ben Askren out is like picking out Mugsey Bogues as an example. C'mon. If you wrestled in college, I'm sure you watch the D-1's. You don't see many guys out there build like Askren. Even on Penn State during their runs, those guys are still strong. ----As for the bench, you're just wrong. It IS EXTREMELY important. I work with a former Badger who was an AA and played in the NFL, is a Strength and Conditioning coach and now helps guys train for football. Now you're right, there are better lifts. A clean and jerk, squats, both better. But I don't know how you can say bench isn't important. Again, you're lower body is extremly important. But when you're engaged, if you don't have the horse power up top to get yoru hands into a guy and knock him back, it doesn't matter how much lower body strength you've got. As for the guys who couldn't bench 250 in college, what, you go to Lawrence or something We had to do a combine of our own and we had to rep 225 and there wasn't a single guy on the team(except this one slob walk on HWT who quit 2 weeks in) who couldn't do at least...5 or 6 and those were usually the 25 pounders. Now, I will say this. If we were talking about Wrestling, I would actually agree with you. Your bench in wrestling isn't really that important. Positioning is 10x more important. You need a strong core, hips and mostly shoulders and neck, but I would always screw around with our 41 pounder who was one of the weakest guys on the team, but he was so tough with his positioning, it was hard for me to move him(174-184). But I just don't agree that the same can be said for Football. Again, it doesn't tell the WHOLE story obviously, but it tells a good part of it. They have to use the vertical and long jump to judge the explosiveness in your legs....there are probably better ways.

I'd have bet everything that there would only be 2 QB's who had a chance of being a 1st round pick and that Kyler would likely be picked in the 20's somewhere after Herbert decided to go back to school for a year. But the more you hear these teams talk aboug these QB's and the reporters who have some credibility, it sounds like you really could have 4 QB's go high in the 1st. Maybe only Murray, Lock and the Ohio State kid in the top 12, but still, that leaves us some talent. Plus, who knows who's gonna do something stupid and go from top 4 pick to the 12th pick like Leremy Tunsil did a few years ago when someone(reportedly his agent or money manager after he dropped them) released a bad pic of him on his instagram. Now we just gotta hope that Bosa or Allen fail a drug test or wear a gas mask that they use to hot box their own heads before the draft! I also hope we're a LITTLE more open about some of the character concerns. Some of these can be pretty siliy. Like Jaylon Ferguson for example. A ideal guy to go from #15-#35, and perhaps higher, but before he even started playing football at La Tech 4 years ago, he got into a fight, pled guilty and had it expunged from his record. Yet he was not allowed to participate in any of the combine events. Tyreke Hill would have sure looked good in GB the past couple years(though I don't know what he did). Take a few risks after the 4th on high upside kids who have gotten into some trouble as long as it wasn't recent, wasn't too bad and they've tried to better themselves.

So lets say hypothetically that Greedy Williams falls to 12....a guy most thought would be a top 5, even a top 3 pick a month ago, would you be in favor of taking a lesser talent(the talent difference is going to be small, but for the sake of argument) in order to help the offense? Like for instance a Jonah Williams or Hockenson? I guess maybe I'm a bit too enamoured with Fant's 4.41 40 time and not impressed enough by Hockenson who can do everything and who's 40 time was 4.70 compared with Finley's 4.67. Add that one's essentially a Funchess type WR'er and the other is complete and I can see the love for the "slow" Iowa TE. I am just guessing a new offense mind coming in will get a flashy offensive target he likes. I just can't see them not going out and getting one. One of the top TEs makes a ton of sense and obviously has been a trendy pick after they went pass rusher happy in FA. Maybe Graham coming back makes a TE unlikely and I would venture to say they have a solid TE corps...but idk, I could see the pick. A big time TE in the red zone would be pretty huge for the offense. The only reason a specifically said edge rusher is because A) I think it is a focus for them now and B) I see a lot of edge rushers being floated in the Top 10 range where I could easily see one fall that they highly value. Really it could be any defensive player they highly value. I guess I also could see them easily going defense just because Top 10 offensive players are pretty far and few in-between this year. RB class sucks, WR class is poor and I don't see us targeting one anyway, OL class isn't all that impressive up top. The TEs seem to really be in our pick range though...which helps make it a trendy pick. Something about sticking Fant/Hockenson and Graham on the field at the same time seems fun. Yeah, I would agree with that. Look at last year. Gute tried to sign Allen Robinson to a big contract, just one of several impact players we lost to the Bears. I took your post to mean that they'd prefer to have a bigger, blocking TE instead of a ultra athletic one like Fant, but again, after comparing his times to Finley's, they're pretty similar. And he looked amazing when he played us. They keep using Gronk as an example for him. I do agree with OldSchool that the 40 is extremely overrated, but Hockenson has done well at both the combine and he's been productive in the B10 for a couple years. Let him learn his route running from Graham and his run blocking from Lewis and we've got the next Gronk!

I think the combine is for the most part useless. Beyond a gauge for how someone might perform under a lot of pressure, there is nothing about playing football you can actually take away from watching a guy run 40 yards straight ahead unobstructed, or my favorite, the number of times he can bench 225 pounds. The latter is truly worthless. The value of the workout of the combine is overblown and has led to some good players falling and some bad players rising, but it absolutely has value. How much you can bench press has a DIRECT correlation with playing the game of football. What are you trying to do as a DL? Get your hands on the OL first, extend them, find the ball and then disengage. That's hard to do if you can only bench 225 5 or 7 times. A WR'er who CAN bench 225 20 times is likely going to have a far easier job beating the press at the LOS The 40 is useful as a gauge...ie, if a corner runs a 4.8, he's likely not gonna be a shutdown corner, but it's certainly flawed, but the vertical shows how explosive you are, the agility drills show your change of direction.... All of these are extremely important when you're talking about guaranteeing millions of dollars to people. Also the measurements. You don't want a left tackle with 30 inch arms. Then there are all the interviews and the wunderlic test which are extremly useful. I agree, putting in a tape of Alabama vs Clemson and watching those guys go after it is a better way to evaluate than the combine, but you a few hundred schools that play football. You don't awlays have tape on a guy. And as FO guys will repeatedly say, they want to see the athleticism match what they see on tape as it can be mis-leading. You'll always have Darius Heyward-Bey who gets picked 7th because of the combine or a guy like Antonio Brown who IIRC ran a 4.69 drop because of it, but it's most definitely a useful tool.

LOL....honestly, and I'm ashamed to say this, when you first said this, this guy who ran a hedge fund named Lou Brown was the first name who came to mind and he lost people MILLIONS! You had me re-thinking my stance on ever abandoning the science! But after a second, "givve'em the heater Rickie," came to my mind and all was right with the world!

- Is it an outlier? Fact, though one can interpret outlier however they want. - Could he regress regardless of the injury after "figuring it out"? Yes, just like thousands of other players before him. Show me the people saying it is an outlier AND he can't change that or that he will end up exactly how Peralta did. I will wait. No one is trying to predict the future except you so you are the only one at risk of eating crow. Everyone else is just pointing out how he very well may never be the same. No one is saying he will never be the same. Well...they can, but there's really only one right way I'm just not getting the problem. I think if he doesn't return to his 2017 form, it'll be because he'll continue to struggle with shoulder issues, not because I don't that the 2017 Jimmy Nelson was a fluke. But me believing it doesn't change that it was only one season. I feel like everyone here is pretty much in agreement with the ONLY difference being that some are a little MORE optimistic that he bounces back from injury to pitch like he did and others who understand what a major surgery are tempering their expectations for this year a little bit more. Other than that, we all love Jimmy, we all think he CAN be an ace. WE all agree he was REALLY good in 2017, BUT that 2017 was the first time he was that good. I feel like when I went to Home Depot with my GF and she kept asking what color paint I liked and after a while, my eyes started glossing over and I kept pointing to the BLUE paint and she kept telling me she liked the "Lake Victoria," and they were the SAME DAMN COLOR!!!!

Must what? Enjoy it with the knowledge that we were absolutely right? Again, you're acting as if an outlier is an opinion. It's not. What part of his 2017 season does this not describe? And why is using Wily Peralta's name in the same sentence sacrilige. They came up at roughly the same time. Wily Peralta had more talent. Many thought Wily Peralta was going to be the Brewers next ace or at least a force atop their rotation for a while. Again, he had a heavy upper 90's fastball and nasty movement on his breaking stuff. He had some success. He apparently just wasn't mentally tough enough to reach his potential. There are probably a few dozen pitchers across baseball right now that for one reason(injury) or another(effort) have the potential to be an ace, but won't. But what's wrong with pointing out that a guy who came up around the same time as Nelson and had more talent but a far inferior work ethic, had a good season, bad season and then was so bad he got like 2 chances in the pen, a role in which you'd think his stuff would be unhittable? Explain to me what I've got wrong here?

The only think that keeps me from calling Nelson's 2017 a true outlier was the fact that injury prevented him from having the opportunity to either continue on that path or return to the mean. I guess given that, by definition, outliers can occur by chance in any distribution, he doesn't necessarily need to return to the mean for the word to ring true, if you believe that he had enough statistical data to reliably compare his 2017 numbers to previous numbers. I agree with your opinions on Nelson, but if Nelson pitched in 10 GAMES and he had 9 games in which he went less than 6 and gave up 3 runs, and then one in which he pitched 9, gave up hit, 0ER and struck out 14, that'd be an outlier. The term outlier doesn't leave room for explanation or reasoning. It just is. Take Nelson's season and put them on a graph. That 2017 season would stand far apart from the rest, hence, outlier. I agree that had he not got hurt he would have likely continued to be the pitcher I think he genuinely turned into. I also believe he's going to be back to the pitcher we saw this year. I think everyone's too hung up on what is an outlier. I also think people need to start watching the game more and breaking it down with raw data less. You can SEE Nelson becoming a better pitcher in 2017. You could SEE Braun hitting into a lot of hard outs and I thought I could see Cain hitting into a lot of soft outs, I could see Cain running a mile to easily catch a fly ball, you could see Yelich at times struggling out there relative to his GG reputation, you could see Keon Broxton pressing and scared of losing playing time. You could NOT see Phillips throw a ball from center to catcher as I believe that traveled faster than the speed of light, but most of the things you see are only confirmed by analytics. Analytics are awesome. They're great for teams, they're great for fans during lulls. They're great just to be better informed if you care to be(many people don't, they just want to watch the games, and that's fine with me). But for people arguing that 2017 might not have been the real Jimmy Nelson because of his ERA+ the previous seasons and what not, I feel like you just weren't WATCHING him. He was pitching with more confidence, he wasn't nibbling, he was attacking, he was getting ahead, he was putting guys away. He was a emerging pitcher.

Wily Peralta? Wow Sorry, speechless for a bit. Now that I’ve had a chance to recover let me just say Nelson in 15 and 16 young pitcher with good stuff and no command. His mechanical adjustment made in early 17 improved his curveball and command of all his pitches, hence ace like pitcher all of 17 til injury. He figured it out, like ALL good pitchers eventually do. If Jimmy not injured I’d say 90+% 2018 season similar to 2017 season. I think Wily Peralta is a perfect example. Peralta had better stuff than Nelson. Heck, Pertalta had an upper 90's fastball with good movement. Had he had Nelson's worth ethic, I think he'd have become a much better pitcher. Sadly, he didn't. I think the difference is, they're at the opposite ends of the spectrum. Peralta had more talent, Nelson had more than enough. Peralta tried to get by just on talent...and was able to for a while, Nelson was ok just being a thrower, but evolved and refined his mechanics until he looked like he was on the precipice of becoming an ace. As for Nelson's 2017 season, there's really not an argument to make that it's NOT an outlier....as of now. If you have one season that deviates greatly from the norm, that's an outlier. You can say it's because he just got better and he worked harder or this improved or that, but outlier isn't a subjective word. Nelson figuring things out and his 2017 season being the result of him just getting better AND that season thus far being an outlier are not muturally exclusive. Hopefully he can get 150-170 innings in with 30 of those in the post-season and make '17 look like less of an outlier. But as of this moment...it is.

[sarcasm]I guess we can hope that 'Bama's Williams has a Tunsil type moment on draft night![/sarcasm]

So lets say hypothetically that Greedy Williams falls to 12....a guy most thought would be a top 5, even a top 3 pick a month ago, would you be in favor of taking a lesser talent(the talent difference is going to be small, but for the sake of argument) in order to help the offense? Like for instance a Jonah Williams or Hockenson? I guess maybe I'm a bit too enamoured with Fant's 4.41 40 time and not impressed enough by Hockenson who can do everything and who's 40 time was 4.70 compared with Finley's 4.67. Add that one's essentially a Funchess type WR'er and the other is complete and I can see the love for the "slow" Iowa TE.

How is it you think Hockenson fits what LaFleur wants to do more than Fant? As I read this I'm thinking you're putting too much weight into his short time with the Titans, but I really don't know what HIS offense is so much as I know what Shannahan wants to do and McCvoy and his coaching tree and they seem to desire those Jordan Reed TE's. Not that Hockenson isn't a TE who fits everywhere..it just seems as if you're saying he's a better fit than Fant in this offense. Not arguing, just curious. White fills more than just a need, he MAY end up being a Kuechly/Deion Jones hybrid, but I hate MLB'ers in the 1st round. Even if everything suggests they could be super-star game changing players. That would likely be a prefect fit and despite my stuborn attitude, a guy like that could make an enormous difference. Look at what Leanoard and Vander Esch did last year for the Colts and the Cowboys. And White(and even Bush if they grabbed in later on) have the athletic ability to play the run and disrput the passing lanes like that. As for Martinez, I'd try to re-sign him right now to something like....4 years 28 million WITH this year tacked on and 12 million guaranteed, but try to get the Signing Bonus down to around 8. If we end up with White, he'll end up taking over, but together they could be a pretty nice combo. And I think it's really important we bring back Mike Daniels, but I'd try and extend Kenny Clark 1st. I know he has some time, but the sooner you get it done, the bigger discount you get. Take on 4 years 48 million, then go to Daniels with 3 years 30 million and 10 guaranteed. Those two bring an attitude that we'd been missing for a long time, and while I think the Smith duo can provide some extra toughness, we've been a notoriously soft defense for a while. Daniels has almost single handedly tried to toughen us up and it's worked for stretches. It'd also see him bounce back and stay healthy this year.

Cobb's numbers haven't been terrible. Not when you consider he was hurt for much of last year(as was Crowder) and then played most of the previous season without Rodgers. He's basically been a little better than Crowder and slightly worse than Humphries during Cobbs contract. It's just we saw Cobb go nuts and put up almost 100 catches and 1300 yards. But yeah, he got a little banged up(most slot guys do) and I think last year was easily Rodgers worst in terms of just missing people and I don't know that anyone was overshot or badly underthrown than Cobb last year. There were numerous times he had guys beat on double moves, or found that hole in cover 2 by running that deep cross and Rodgers just flat out missed him. Crowder and Humphries deserve more because they're 2-3 years younger than Cobb and it's the same reason we're paying Za'Darius Smith 66 million instead of Ansah or Houston, but I think there's a lot of anti-Cobb bias on here because he so under-performed his expectations. Similar to AJ Hawk who was the 5th overall pick and instead of people saying, "meh, he's pretty good) the first 6-7 years, a lot of people hated him because he should have been the 5th pick in the 2nd or 3rd round. I would say there's a reason New England wanted to trade for Cobb and is now interested in bringing him on board and it's not because he's a guy who's going to make 870K a year.

The rushers they got yesterday bump the reasonable expectation to being in contention in the NFC again IMO. They have needed guys like that for so long, it's really depressing to think about. They had an old but still really productive Peppers, but prior to that you probably have to go back to young Clay or a year of Cullen Jenkins for a comp. Anyone saying they overpaid is nuts. Overpaying is the name of the FA game. If you wanted edge players under 30 that have proven they can play that is what they cost. The residual effect is also huge. Blake Martinez can be the really good supplementary player he probably should be rather than the star you're trying to force him to be. Dean Lowry and Fackrell also seem like they'll get a boost from adding that kind of talent. And they haven't even drafted anyone yet. Just two huge additions. Hopefully they stay healthy. Well, that's virtually everyone. You can scoff at the "grades" for the signings, but most outlets came to the same consensus, the Packers upgraded their roster with younger, bigger and more athletic versions outside, but they overpaid to do so. You're paying Za'Darius Smith roughly the same AAV that Trey Flowers is getting in Detroit, and while I realize that there is a lot more than just the numbers, he's guaranteed about 34.5 over the next two years. He has NOT at any point in his career been worth that salary. Flowers is a far more proven player than Smith. I like the players they signed, but I hardly think it's "nuts" to say they overpaid. They paid a backup offensive linemen to a 4 year 29 million dollar deal with a 9 million dollar guarantee. That's reportedly significantly more than anyone else offered him. Amos got overpaid probably by a total of 4-6 million, but you're right, that's to be expected. You could argue that they overpaid the two Smiths about 30 million combined. But I've been saying for the last few years, I don't care about the salary cap. If in the 2021 season we're in the same position the Saints are now, we can go to Rodgers, guarantee him more money, add 2 or 3 years onto his deal and save 25 million in cap space pretty easilyi. So it's fine they overpaid, but 5 years 87 million for Dee Ford makes more sense on the surface than 4/66 and 4/55 for Preston and Za'Darius Smith. The good thing is when you dig deeper than just the sack numbers, you start to see those guys in more favorable company with regards to QB hurries, hits and they're both very solid vs the run. That said, they overpaid and they're paying based on what they HOPE they become, not what they've done thus far. Gute pretty much came out and said as much. But hopefully Pettine can really get the most out of these guys. If we can have a rotation with Clark, Daniels, Lowry, Wilkerson...maybe Adams has a great off-season and camp and then Lancaster looked good last year along with the two Smiths, Fackerall(who I have very little faith in), Gilbert(I like more than Kyler) and then perhaps Matthews and a 1st and we're a 12 win team next year, nobody's gonna care if we overpaid to get there. The only place I worry about it coming back to bite us is when guys like Kenny Clark are up for extensions and they're looking at what they gave to a guy like Z-Smith if he doesnt' produce. But again, not today's problem.

Yeah, I don't know when he'll be out of football and I'm not going to predict that, but looking at the two other slot WR'ers who signed for 8-10 million and while they're a couple years younger, they haven't been as productive as Cobb. I'm fine if you believe they have more value than Cobb, but Cobb definitely has more value than a vets minimum. I think he'll get 6-8 million per year. Are you referring to Humphries and Crowder? If not, NVM, but Cobb really hasn't been more productive. He was for a season in 2014, but that's prehistoric. He's had trouble staying healthy and has been topping out about where those guys are now. It's just Ascension vs. descension. I'd take both of those guys over Cobb at this point 10/10 times. His catch % dipped sharply last year which is usually a good sign a WR is falling off. Not withstanding Crowder getting hurt last year, both have gotten better every year thus far. He's never been the athlete Crowder is either. But someone will pay Cobb. I think he'll go the same route as Jennings. He'll wind up somewhere and probably be moderately productive for a little bit and then fade away. I thought he was a great player four years ago and one of the best at helping Rodgers through busted plays, but he has a ton of red flags signaling he's out of juice. I wouldn't argue that those two are worth more than Cobb, but the original premise was that there is no way Cobb gets more than a vets minimium. He's clearly worth more than that. And if you compare him to those other two players, he's not much older, though more wear on his tires, he was much better at his peak, though it was several years ago and he's been pretty similar the past couple years. Neither of those guys have had a huge season yet. So I didn't think the Cobb for 3/24 was unrealistic. The longer FA drafts on the less he'll get, but he is more definitely worth more than the minimium right now. THAT I think is ridiculous(and I realize you were not the one who said that's what he was worth). But just look at those two, there are some injury concerns there, their numbers aren't much different than Cobbs when you take away his breakout year...the only way I think he signs for less than multiple years at 6 per is if he comes back to GB on a short term deal to try and stay healthy and go back on the market next year.

This draft is incredibly important, as is this offseason as a whole. So far so good.... Sweat is increasingly unlikely to be there at 12, and I'm just not willing to give up the fantastic capital we have this year to move up unless Allen or Bosa start falling. I think what yesterday's moves have done is removed the 'need' to pick an Edge at 12, and they can go whereever they'd like. I'd be modestly surprised if 30 (if they stay there) isn't one of the TE's, but I'm increasingly convinced that they may look for value at 12 or trade down with a team looking to move up if a QB falls to there. Gute seems like the type that may go BPA with that pick.... i.e., are you better off taking the 4th Edge off the board, or the best OT/WR/CB/S if guys like Jawaan Taylor, D.K. Metcalf, Greedy Williams are there as one of them is likely to be. First of all, you're obviously right. We no longer HAVE to draft a Edge player, especially not at 12. There's still talk that Matthews wants to come back on a 1 year deal and has passed up meetings with other teams. I think Gute said that's something they're going to disuss in the near future, but he's let it be known that he has other priorities first. That's even more encouraging to me because you saw some of those plays with Clay just has that BURST last year. If he's only playing 40 pct of the snaps and with Za'Darius Smiths ability to lineup over a guard and rush, he could really help as a 3rd down rusher. Second, this draft obviously doesn't have to produce a elite, All-Pro caliber player at two positions(Lattimore/Kamara) and then two really steady starters at RT and Safety like the Saints did, but it is huge in that I do think we have to either hit on a star player, or hit on 4-5 very good players who can contribute in the first 2 years if we're to see a SB before Arod turns 38(not that we can't see one after). This is the biggest off-season since we signed Reggie just because we've had a top 5-8 all time QB since 1993 and we've got 2 SB's to show for it. We need a big influx of young talent into this organization to keep us in competition. With regard to Sweat, it's looking like he may not be there NOW, but hell, by the time of the draft, it could be Allen who's dropping down the draft board(really doubt that, but making a point). It ALWAYS seems to set at this time of the year or at least like it's settling and then the draft comes and these guys everyone has in the top 15 end up going in the 2nd half of round 2, or 4 QB's go in the 1st round, something I just heard with Lock, Murray, Hoskins and the Duke QB who could all be top 10 picks. THAT would leave us with several impact defenders agailable. But I'm 100 pct in line with your thinking. I just started a thread about the draft using this premise. It looks like Greedy Williams is dropping a bit and some have Washington's Murphy as CB1 now. At 12, I'd LOVE to get my hands on a 6'2, 4.38 CB who's fluid, athletic and was a beast two years ago before he struggled a bit last year. We don't need Edge, but we also don't NEED CB's. But what we do need is to have one of those two groups not just be able to hold up, but to be dominant. To have multiple pro-bowl caliber players there. Maybe it's Ed Oliver who drops. Maybe we're overthinking a 40 and it really is Sweat. But the bottom line, Gute spent a good chunk of money and what it bought him was more freedom to swing for the fences and less pressure to have rookies come in and try to help turn around this team into a playoff team in their rookie year.

I know we have a dedicated thread to the Packers FA signings and their off-season acquisitions, but the Draft is such a huge focal point for every NFL team, I thought I'd start a new thread here to discuss some of the guys we'd like to see picked, and then discuss those selections(as well as anything else the Packers may choose to do with their draft capital). EDIT-(MAN, sorry, this post got away from me a little bit. I put in bold and quoted the guys I'd like to see us pick, skip over and do the same if you'd like!) With the Packers signing the two Smiths, both of whom are looking better and better the more you dig into them, Preston among the top in the league in QB pressures the last 3 years, Za'Darius looking like a freak who can lineup over the guard and blow him up, we no longer NEED to draft an Edge in the first round. That coupled with possibility that at least 2 QB's go before our pick and now I've heard some experts even talk about 4 with the Duke QB and Lock going in the top 10 as well(the prior would really shock me, but runs on QB's aren't exactly unheard of) I'm hoping one of the premium talents falls to us. Greedy Williams the CB from LSU looked like a top 5 pick, but now he looks to be falling in some mock drafts as he struggled a bit as a redshirt Soph this past year. Still, can't look past 6'2 and a 4.38 40 time. CB is no longer a position of need like OLB'er was for us coming into the year, but it's also not a truly established position. If the Packers get a little Greedy, and Kevin King stays healthy next year, they could be working with two athletic 6'2-6'3 CB's on the outside and then Alexander could EASILY move intisde to the slot....a position he's suited to play equally as well as he played outside. Next two picks, I'd like to see offense, so I'm pulling for Fant, the Jered Cook type athlete(but faster) at TE, but from a school that we've had a ton of success at, and perhaps one of those OLE Miss WR'ers, or Parris Campbell, the speedy, versatile WR'er/Return man, Percy Harvin tye guy who'd be a awesome fit in our new offense where we're running quickk hitting WR'er screens and a lot of RPO's that often give the ball to a guy in space with just his man to beat for a 15+ yard gain. Of course I'd like to see Sweat with the first pick, even with rumors that BOTH Matthews and the Packers are open to Clay coming back on a 1 year deal for a huge salary gut if he's available. He seems like he could legitimately be the next Von Miller with his ability to bend and his ridiculously explosive 1st step, but his 4.41 MAY have dropped him out of our range. So my hopes for our 1st 4 picks 1st-12-CB Grady Williams 6'2 4.38 40 out of LSU, a ton of talent and the potential to be a #1 lockdown corner in the NFL. Could help give us a trio of studs and two outside guys with great length in King, Williams and Alexander. 1st-30-Noah Fant Iowa TE 4.41 40 He's like a Cook, but not as good of a blocker...but he was among the strongest TE's in the draft, so that's he can certainly develop with the Packers. He could learn for a year from Graham and then take over. 2nd-44th pick Deionte Thompson DB/S 6'2 210 Alabama He's a versatile safety who's more of a FS than a strong safety..which is fine because Amos can play either. He was listed in the top 15 on many draft boards during the CFB season, but a wrist injury and some foggy legal issues have seen his stock drop. But another big, versatile Safety who can play CB(similar to a Byron Jones) and play a legit CF could be the safety made Eddie Jackson(also from 'Bama) was to Amos in Chicago. Possible he ends even lasting to the 3rd if he doesn't run at his pro-day because the 4.45 projected 40 time doesn't do anyone much good, nor does the lingering wrist injury. 3rd-Jaylon Ferguson 6'6 260 LB OLB'er from La Tech Holds record for most sacks in career. 27 pct of his tackles were for loss. Went to combine after being disinvited due to a fight he got into before he started playing football, but after he enrolled into college. Supposed to be a high cieling, lose floor type guy and we could do worse than loading up at edge rushers with talent. Also, very good vs the run. Also, while I'm speculating, I'd like to see the Packers try and swing a trade for Daron Lee from the Jets. They have almost no reason to keep him any longer, but he's still just two yeras removed from being a 1st round draft pick, he has the physical ability to be a sideline to sideline MLB'er and I'd rather see us move a 5th and just get a guy who already has a couple years experiance than use a 2nd on a guy like Bush from Michigan. Devin White from LSU could be an impact MLB'er, but not a fan of drafting LB'ers that high. 4th round picks-BPA G/T, WR'er, RB. Someone like Alabama's Ross Pierschbacher, Alabama G/C, and then maybe a RB who fits the new system better than Jamal Williams. I'd like to see one more athletic back in there with Jones. If we hit and get lucky like the Saints did, we should have a lock down secondary in short order, at least one young OLB'er who can contibute right away, but whom we don't HAVE to count on to do so, a potential 1st year starter and a top backup at both guard spots and C, and that field stretching TE we've lacked since Finley teased us with his ability for a few years before suffering a unfortunate career ending injury just as he was bouncing back. Obviously there's no need to write a theisis paper here as I did, just excited about this draft after the Packers added 3 PROVEN starters to the defensive side of the ball and are talking to a couple other guys who could provide quite a bit of value for us THIS YEAR, namely Clay who'd only have to come in once in a whie, and trade for a former 1st round LB'er who hasn't lived up to the hype, but has 4.4-ish speed. Of course, as we all know, guys right now projected to be top 20 picks ending falling to the 4th round and some guys whoot up draft boards like Ferguson who could be this years Davenport. So I reserve the right to edit my choices as the season goes on. But with a healthy DL, a rebuild LB'ing Core, a CB coming off a great rookie season, a couple more who show great upside and a few leaders on D and just a HC and new OC who bring Arod back to life and I see no reason why the Packers can't do. Hopefully the Packers just took the first few steps to getting ARod what they could never get Favre, some talent to help him wrap up his career in GB like Tom Brady is in NE. Unlikely, I know, but I'm feeling a little giddy here.

What's there to apologize for? We should still be losing 100 games as we just start to get ready to rebuild under normal circumstances. Are there that many people who follow the team but who are critical or Stearns? Even the casual non- brewers fan would give Stearns a nice round of applause. And the fact that he laughed at the 3-5 years 100 loss tanking concept popularized by that wealthy large market team just a little south of Milwaukee should get a standing ovation. You would certainly think so. And it's much sweater that we came back and overtook the Cubs in less time than it took them to rebuild and when they were supposed to be at their best, but how many teams(without spending half a billion dollars in the off-season) can turn things around as fast as we did? Though I guess I do remember people were upset that Stearns wasn't doing anything when a few guys signed at the owners meetings. So I guess there's always a few....

You really need to look at what Humphries and Crowder just got before making this type of declaration. Also, just 3/24 is meaningless without guaranteed money. Cobb is most definitely worth more than a vets minimium right now however.

What's there to apologize for? We should still be losing 100 games as we just start to get ready to rebuild under normal circumstances. Are there that many people who follow the team but who are critical or Stearns?

It might hurt in 2 or 3 years adding Dallas...but I agree and you're right. The Brewers can likely swing a trade for someone of Gio's value during the trade deadline if they're in need of a lefty starter or like they did with Gio, the waiver deadline.