JosephC

LOL, if that's the case then it sure looks like the Badgers paid a dollar for every quarter's worth. It's all fake news anyway. Considering they literally put into law that NIL "contracts" will not be made public, and the Badgers athletic department are doing everything they can to prevent any of this information from leaking out, the only way they could get a somewhat accurate number on this is if they went to every player that transferred and then get the correct number from them (and then you would have to rely on the player giving an accurate number and not inflating it). Fake news.

Kind of surprised that the Badgers would be playing that low in the QB market after McIntosh swindled 14.6 million dollars of taxpayer dollars (annually) to pay football players. I figured with Kellner's money, plus all that free money (unless you are the taxpayer), that the Badgers would be looking to grab players in the top 10 at every position.

Dalman's contract was not like most other NFL contracts. It was a 42 million dollar deal, but only had a 6 million dollar signing bonus. The base salary, roster bonuses and workout bonuses were the same every year. Each year had a 14 million dollar cap number. It sure looks like he made the Bears aware that he could retire at any time and the contract was structured in a way that made it pretty easy for the Bears if he did. According to overhecap, the Bears will get hit with a 4 million dollar cap charge for the remaining pro-rated signing bonus, and if Dalman pays them that money back, it will get carried over to 2027 and give them an extra 4 million in cap room. It's just too bad it puts another team in the market for a center.

Mason Reiger looks like he might be an appealing target to Gutekunst with one of the later picks. Running a 4.78 40 at 251 pounds is nothing special, but his 10-yard time of 1.61 was one of the better times by an edge player and he posted a 40 inch vertical. There are enough athletic traits there where I think Gutekunst would be interested. Vinny Anthony measured in at 5-11 7/8 and 183 pounds, and the 40-time was 4.54. Normally there is nothng wrong with a 4.54 40, but in this year's class that is a near bottom 5 number at the wide receiver position. He already was handicapped by having mediocre college production, largely due to a pathetic quarterback situation, and it doesn't look like he did enough at the combine to get himself drafted.

You'll get no argument from me that Aubrey is the best field goal kicker in the league. But he's a restricted free agent. You don't give up a second round pick for one year of a kicker. You make that trade, and you are going to give him what he wants to keep him out of unrestricted free agency. That's likely something like 4 years, 40 million. At that price, he is earning 56% more than any other kicker in the NFL. Is he really worth that? Last year Aubrey was perfect within 50, missed 1 extra point and was 11/17 outside of 50. His three longs were 64, 63 and 61. No doubt the percentage of makes outside 50 is going to be depressed because of the number of "extra long" attempts he makes. You will get no arguement from me on that. Vikings kicker Will Reichard was perfect within 50, made every extra point attempt and was 11/13 outside of 50. His three longs were 62, 59, 59. It's very likely that his percentage outside 50 was better because he didn't get the number of "extra long" attempts that Aubrey got. All that said, is Aubrey so far and away the best field goal kicker in the NFL that he should get a 10 million per year contract? I think it's questionable, and when throwing a second round pick in the equation I think it becomes very, very questionable.

Considering they don't have a first round pick, are short on cap space and have all sorts of holes to fill, this seems like a terrible idea to me. With other likely cuts, the dead money hit on McManus would entirely fall under the 2026 cap, which totals 3.33 million. So when short of cap space, the Packers would be paying kickers 12.333 million when the #2 paid kicker in the league (Butker) has a contract that averages 6.4 million a year. Using a second round pick on a kicker, when they have pretty significant holes at center, cornerback, nose tackle, linebacker and are extremely thin on the offensive line seems like a poor strategy to me.

Tyler Biadasz got waived. I really like the center class in the upcoming draft, so I guess I wouldn't be so hot in picking him up. However, he probably would fit into the Packer's price-range if they like him as a player. He was playing on a 3-year, 30 million dollar deal, but with available centers in free agency and what looks like a solid draft class, I don't see him getting more money than that even when considering the recent increases in the cap. That type of deal probably carries a first year cap number of about 6 million, and perhaps even less than that if void years get stuck on the end of the deal. All reports on him say solid, not spectacular. Again, I like the rookie class and wouldn't have a problem with sticking a rookie in there. But with Banks (bad 2025) on one side, and likely Belton (a promising but "unestablished" player) on the other side, the case could certainly be made that a steady but unspectacular player like Biadasz is just what the doctor ordered. One thing that does bother me is that Washington has a bunch of cap room, so this is a move that they were not forced into. I'm under the impression that Biadasz was not a bad player in 2025, but there must be something that Washington did not like about him.

I like Desmond Ridder more than Richardson, and by a pretty good margin.

I would not. And that is entirely based on the first 6 games Fields started for the Steelers in 2024. Steelers went 4-2, Fields averaged 27 pass attempts per game, completed 65% of his passes and had a 93.3 QB rating. I'm not a Fields fan. Not at all. I thought the deal he got from the Jets was rather comical. But at least he has gone out there an been expected to execute a full offense and win games, and he did alright with the Steelers. Just those 6 games make him much more proven than what Willis has done. There is just a lot on Willis' resume that give me severe doubts that he will be successful when a team says he is the guy, here is the football, now you'll be playing 1000 snaps and making 450 throws and you'll have to execute a full NFL offense.

In 2025, almost all of Willis' passes were thrown against the Ravens and the Bears. The Ravens ranked 17th in yards allowed per pass play, the Bears ranked 26th. In 2024, almost all of Willis' passes were thrown against the Colts, the Titans and the Bears. In 2024, the Titans ranked 7th in yards allowed per pass play (surprise), the Colts were 28th and the Bears were 31st. It's also worth noting that, in all of the games that Willis has played for the Packers, he has attempted 20+ passes one time. 21 passes against the Ravens this past season in a 41-24 loss. Same deal with the Titans, in his two years there he attempted 20+ passes in a game 1 time (a 19-14 loss against Houston). There are some huge red flags on this guy when talking about a 20+ million dollar per year contract. Hard for me to believe that any NFL team could miss some of these things that are so obvious on the surface, but I have decades of experience watching NFL teams do dumb things with quarterbacks over and over and over and over again.

They have been in a good position the last couple years where it's been a pretty easy decision to sign a couple players out of the tier one or tier two group of players at a position of need. With money being tight and so many holes to fill, they need to sign more players at cheaper prices. They need to hit tiers three and four and pick some winners out of those groups. Traditionally, they've only signed younger players to longer contracts. While they can still keep that philosophy in the future, this is a year where bringing in some older guys on one-year contracts makes a bunch of sense. For example, Lion's defensive tackle DJ Reader. 31 years old, has been a solid nose tackle for the last decade. Only projected to get a 1 year deal in the 4.5 million dollar range (at least that's what PFF had put on him about three weeks ago, before they recently moved this type of info behind the paywall). They need to find about 4 or 5 guys like this in free agency to fill out the roster. Pro Personnel department really needs to earn their money this off-season.

Not hard to win "bidding wars" when you avoid the top couple tiers of players at nearly every position.

Myers was just as crappy with the Jets as he was with the Packers. The Jets just being the Jets.

That's modern day GM'ing in the NFL. GM spent a first round pick on another left tackle, and the team will just swim-or-sink with him. Considering there is very, very little in terms of LT in the free agent pool (and likely to be cut pool), if given the opportunity, I would draft another left tackle in the second or third round for insurance. And frankly, Packers OLine depth is so pitiful that it just makes sense to take a LT, C and probably a third offensive lineman in the draft, so it's not a big deal to take another left tackle candidate with an early pick. Hopefully Morgan will work out better for Green Bay than the McCarthy/Darnold situation worked for the Vikings. But it's the same thing....GM spent significant draft capital on the player, so that player is getting his chance no matter what.

Because the MLBPA has always been about not limiting what the top paid player makes. It's almost like they truly believe that if Ohtani makes 700 million a year, then that resets the top of the market and the next top player makes 710 million, and ultimately, this is the best system for players. They have always ignored what this does to the salaries outside of the elite group of players. Meanwhile, right up until the COVID years, every year we heard the MLBPA crying that MLB teams weren't spending enough, and the player's share of the pie was decreasing every year. I haven't heard very much about that the last two years, and maybe that's only because Dodger spending has been maintaining the status quo. The NFL CBA gives the players 48% of revenue. That number only goes up based on newer TV deals. There are some revenue streams that are exempt from the formula. I've seen estimates that NFL players eventually get between 46.5% and 47% of all revenue. It appears MLB total revenue is roughly $12,200,000,000 from various reports around the internet. I added up the 2025 Year End 40-Man at Cots Baseball Contracts, and the total was $5,276,400,000. So, if those numbers are somewhat correct, the players are currently getting 43.2% of league revenue. It they would get a CBA that gave them 45% of league revenue (that would likely be 1.5% - 2.0% less than football), it would be an immediate 213.6 million dollar raise for the players. Having an NFL type system with a cap and REAL revenue sharing (not a payoff to keep small market teams happy) would definitely limit what the top paid players would make, but overall the numbers do make it look like it would be a better system for the players as a whole.

Who was the last good Packer's special teams coordinator? Do we have to go all the way back to Nolan Cromwell?

For years the big market teams could essentially buy off the small market owners by guaranteeing them a nice revenue sharing check that would ensure that the small market teams would still make a profit. With the regional sports networks dying off, I'm not so sure the small market teams will be so happy to just get that check anymore. Attanasio should be spearheading the movement for massive changes. From his perspective - #1, I used to be able to depend on 38 million of local TV money every year, and then every 5 years or so could depend on a nice increase when it came time for the next deal. Now I don't know if it I will get 5, 10, 20, 30 million? It's a major revenue stream that is now totally up in the air. #2 - From 2018-2019, I had 5.774 million fans in the ballpark. We are now well past COVID, and in the last two years I've had 5.187 million fans in the ballpark. My attendance has dropped. That's over a 10% drop. #3 - We've averaged 94 wins over the last three years. There is no way I should have as much economic uncertainty as I currently have with as successful as my team has been recently. I would have to think there is easily another dozen owners that would feel the same way. Previously, I think most of the mid-markets would side with the big-markets to keep things rolling along. But it seems most of the mid-markets have the same local TV contract issues, which would likely swing them away from siding with the big market teams. And I also think some of the "back end big market" teams like Boston could be so turned off by what the Dodgers have done, that they could side with the small market teams as well. For the first time in a really long time, labor negotiations might not be big markets vs. small market vs. players. It may actually be owners vs. players, with the Dodgers, Yankees and Mets being erased because the other 27 owners would be united against them. At least that is what I'm hoping. The system is broken and a major overhaul is long overdue.

I'd consider myself neutral on Gutekunst. Hard for me to criticize him at all for the 2022 off-season. He pulled Zach Tom, Rasheed Walker, Romeo Doubs, Quay Walker, Christian Watson, Devonte Wyatt, Sean Rhyan and Kingsley Enagbare all out of one draft, which is pretty remarkable. Sammy Watkins had 815 receiving yards in the two previous seasons combined, and signed a smaller type contract that could have been worth up to 4 million if he hit all of the incentives. There was no way anybody viewed him as a replacement for Adams. He was just there to give more depth to a group that included Lazard, Cobb and the rookies Watson and Doubs. Looking back at the transactions list, it appears the only other "notable" free agent signing that year was Jarran Reed, who was a cheap, one-year bandage type signing who came in and did the job he was paid to do. He played in 68.25% of the team's defensive snaps, the second highest total for a defensive lineman, only behind Kenny Clark. Keisean Nixon was a scrap-heap signing that off-season, an excellent find for a minimal investment. I'd argue that the biggest blunder that off-season was trading away Cole Van Lanen for basically nothing. But even that is a very, very shaky criticism as Van Lanen hadn't shown much here and then rode the bench for 3 years with his new team prior to having a breakout season. And the Packers were never going to get for Rodgers what the Seahawks got for Wilson. When Rodgers was traded, he was heading into his age 40 season. If he would have been traded a year earlier, he would have been heading into his age 39 season. At that age, most teams figure the guy only has 1 or 2 good years left in him. When Wilson was traded, he was heading into his age 34 season. When the Broncos picked him up, he immediately got a new 5-year contract and they saw him as being the team's starter for the next half-decade...something that wasn't going to happen for a team trading for Rodgers.

James Pearce couldn't stay on the rails for 1 year after being drafted. Looks like all those pre-draft rumors of him being "unstable" were true.

Hobbs has a 6.25 million dollar roster bonus due on March 13. If he gets cut, it will be before that date. If he makes it past March 13, he will be on the 2026 roster.

Ortiz was a 3.2 fWAR player as a third baseman. The Brewers must see him as a good bet to bounce back with the bat a bit if they get him away from shortstop. What they really need now is a backup shortstop, because Hamilton's defensive metrics there are not that impressive. They also need an insurance plan for a Vaughn regression, because I trust the results of 2248 at bats more than I would trust the results of 221 at bats.

Rob Demovsky was on the Wilde-Tauscher show on Friday, and it wasn't a big topic of discussion, but he brought up Hobbs name a couple times and talked like it is basically a foregone conclusion that he will get cut. I guess I don't see that as a slam dunk. I'm certainly not arguing for Hobbs to be retained. They are already very weak at the cornerback position. Also, I would think Gutekunst would definitely prefer to keep him, because cutting a guy after 1 year of a 4 year deal is not a great look for the GM, and we all know those guys in positions of powers will pretty often put appearances ahead of everything else (while it's obvious to everyone else on the planet that bringing a guy back for another season will look twice as bad if he underperforms again). Overthecap adjusted the numbers after getting more clarity on the 2026 cap, and if the Packers cut Jenkins, Gary (post-June 1st designation) and Hobbs (post-June 1st designation), they would be about 44 million under the cap and that is after paying the rookie class and filling out the roster with minimum salary players. Normally, that's generally about the area they like to play in, but one would think they would like that number higher this year considering they have many more holes than usual to fill and lack a first round pick.

Not if his name is McDermott.

I don't understand why the NFL puts any effort at all into the Pro Bowl these days. Back in the 70s/80s, there at least seemed to be some lukewarm interest in the game from the public. These days, I just don't get the impression that there is any interest in the game at all. They keep moving it around, changing the format, adding sideshows...I can only assume that's because they are trying to generate interest because nobody is watching it. If I was an owner, I would just say that this type of game makes sense for other sports, but it just does not work for football. Do we need to keep dumping money into this turd, or is it just time to get rid of the entire thing and move on?

I don't think it's as much Leonhard, I think there is a large percentage, maybe even a majority of Packer fans that are just not going to give LaFleur a benefit of a doubt at this time. If they went out and hired a defensive coordinator that was a defensive coordinator last year and finished in the top five in both yards allowed and points allowed, then they would like the hire. If they had hired a defensive coordinator that had been a head coach with a good win/loss record, then they would like the hire. But he just went out and hired a guy that was coaching a team that has been terrible the last three years, and that isn't a way to get the fans that are against you back on your side. Despite the positive rankings as a defensive coordinator in Philadelphia...that was four years ago, Packer fans down on LaFleur are not going to be interested in what happened four years ago. Demovsky was on ESPN Milwaukee today, and when asked about Bisaccia, I don't remember the exact quote, but it was something like "if you take the Packer's fanbase opinion of Bisaccia, what he is thought of within the Packer's building is the exact opposite." He talked about how Bisaccia was respected by the players and coaches, and was a good sounding board for both the players and coaches, and thought there is basically no chance that the Packers replace him. Packer fans hear stuff like that from people like Demovsky, who is definitely NOT the typical ESPN hack, and they will continue to doubt and dislike LaFleur decisions until he can do better than what he has done the last four years.