OnTheBlack

Good to see you back. Aren’t TDs and INts for QBs the equivalent of W/L for Pitchers? Didn’t get the upgrade on Advanced stats for Football? 13-3

32 TDs, 6 INT's in his second to last year before he lost his entire offense around him. How many of those games were you able to watch? Plus a new OC in 2019. I guess Rodgers gets the pass for a new system, but Love doesn't. Rodgers threw for 24 TD's and 4 INT's in his first year in a new system. I don't think he needs a pass.

Yeah, I never said you couldn't afford to pay Football players and Basketball players(though the Mid-Majors and smaller schools wouldn't be able to in most cases). I said you'd have to eliminate just about every other sports for both Men and Women. Where do you think most of the money that they generate goes? Back into the Athletic Department and to the School. Even with the money from joining the Big 10 and the TV money, Rutgers athletic department had a 36 million dollar deficit. And that's a school that excels in many of the non-revenue sports. There are virtually no Women's sports that generate money even right now. Schools like UConn, Tennessee. And they certainly wouldn't after you eliminate about 90 pct of the other Women's BB programs that don't generate money and wouldn't be able to compete. And on the mens side, there are a handful or programs that make money as well. But again, if there are only 3 College Baseball programs making money and the rest can't afford to travel and compete, then there's not much money to be made for those 3 that are making money(I don't know if it's 3 or 8, but the point stands, very few make money). So again, you can take the money they make and pay athletes...but you can't maintain the non-revenue sports. That's the trade off. College Athletics would just be CFB and CBB. And that'd be fine with most people. I understand that. But again, there are 300+(I think it's just under 350) schools with Division One programs. The vast-vast majority of them do not make money. Even most of the Power 5 schools aren't operating at a profit. 28 of the Power 5 Schools athletic departments are in the red. It'd be 29 without Phil Knight throwing that Nike money to Oregon. So again, you'd basically be creating a situation where there are only a handful of Power 5 schools who can compete, but also you're eliminating every other sport for both Men and Women. Track and Field, Women's Basketball, Swimming, Wrestling, Baseball, Softball, Hockey...and on and on and on. In each case, there are a couple of sports that generate money. In baseball I think LSU might, in Track it's Oregon, again, Phil Knight, in Wrestling it's Iowa and Penn State, in Hockey it depends on the year, but it may be just a few teams. So basically, if you want to pay College Athletes, you're going to end up with probably 20-25 programs that actually are able to compete and within that pool, you're going tilt the recruiting even more towards the programs like Texas, Alabama and the like. The "Blue Bloods." And that'd be pretty much it.

It would not affect other sports at all. Top football schools are literally swimming in extra athletics cash, spending tens of millions on all sorts of unnecessary stuff. Just the salaries of the coaches are absurd. They don't know what to do with all the money. And my proposal is paying players who have to play playoff games which is bonus money that didn't even exist a few years ago. Many FBS schools lose money on their football programs and still manage to have other sports. Anyway, I'm sorry for bringing this topic up again, it affects my enjoyment of CFB and I think about it all the time. No more from me on this. Do you honestly believe this? This is absolutely 100 pct untrue. There is absolutely zero question it would impact other sports significantly. In fact, that's how they defend the large salaries, because the money they make not only goes back into the rest of the athletic departments, but also into the school. And please list these schools that are "literally," swimming in extra cash?" Especially to the point where they "don't know what to do with it." You've got a small number of big time Division one programs that actually make a significant amount of money. The Badgers generate far more money than most and they couldn't afford to give their assistant football coaches modest raises. So out of 300+ Division one programs, you're talking about a small fraction of them. Now I don't know which FBS schools lost money and still manage to have other sports, but there goes the paying the athletes right there. You start paying athletes, you're going to get virtually every top recruit going to a small pool of colleges, those athletic departments are going to losing even more money and you're going to have about 8-10 schools who can realistically compete on any level. The disparity between the Alabama/UGA/LSU's and the UW type schools is going to grow exponentially. Now paying them..50K for making the playoffs, that wouldn't have a huge impact. But now you've set the precedent that you pay college athletes. Now there's no obstacles to paying them outright, not just for bowl games, but for regular season games. And what do you pay kids? How many kids do you pay? All 105 that are on the roster in the off-season? The 120+ that many teams list during the season? Yeah, it's gonna have a enormous impact on the ~500,000 student athletes.

He might have been a nice backup with his athletic ability. The type of guy who could obviously be rim protector and still mobile enough to defend the 3. We missed that last year. Of course all this would assume a degree of mental stability he hasn't shown.

Greene and Summers. Remember, Howard's gone and they have a rookie from Iowa State starting(David Montgomery) and then Tarik Cohen...the human joystick. I feel much-much more nervous about our offense. I think we're gonna struggle the first half of the season. New offense, young WR'ers. It may take a while to gel. I also admit, I don't get why Jenkins isn't starting. He looked like he was obviously better than Turner and Taylor. So it'll be up to the defense. Montgomery isn't the power back Howard was, but he's not a scat back. Clark, Lowry, Lancaster and the Smiths/Gary should get some penetration in the backfield or at least keep the blockers off Blake and whoever else is playing LB'er and the two safeties. My first "Bold" prediction. 1st 8 games our defense will be ranked in the top 7 in the NFL in points and yards. Offense will be ranked 15th or lower in each. Schedule eases up quite a bit in 2nd half.

He and Alex Ogletree are too similar. At least that was the reason given. That would seem to be an encouraging sign as Ogletree had been a pretty good LB'er in coverage. The compensation was a conditional draft pick. The Giants get to swap their 7th round pick with our 7th round pick from the Ravens this year. I don't even think we actually give anything up. Just the potential that they get a higher 7th round pick. Similar to the Packers trade of McCray Seems like teams just scratching each others backs.

How likely is it that a team is going to put in a claim on an injured UDFA? I'd say not very likely. Other than the pre-season games, there probably isn't a lot of scouting that other teams are going to have on him besides his college tape, and his college tape wasn't enough to get drafted. I don't recall any formal announcement about the severity of his injury. Last I heard, they were seeking another opinion as the first MRI(s) were not conclusive. It's possible he might need to miss the entire season anyway, in which case another team is not going to want to pay him if there's no chance he can play this year. By releasing him, another team is going to have to pay for his medical evaluation, and he probably won't pass their physical anyway. It's not about putting a claim on him, it'd be about him being a Free Agent and other teams potentially signing him. I was and still am operating under the assumption that they'll reach an injury settlement. Lets say they agree that he'd have missed 5 weeks with his knee injury. The Packers have to wait 3 weeks longer than the settlement they agreed to in order to sign him whereas other teams could sign him. I think the only reason his college tape wasn't enough to get him drafted was because it was just one year, but he was a priority UDFA and he played well for the Packers. You make a good point however. We assumed it was a serious injury because he came back with it wrapped up in a brace and on crutches, then we heard how there was no tear and he was moving around on it. But yes, the closest we've got from him was "something with the ACL." It's good though. Realistically, the Packers aren't in their base D very often and they likely won't need another true LB'er next to Martinez out there most of the time. Raven Green should spend some time out there. The Packers got Lazard back, they got Nijam back and Summers looked pretty good as well. So any more hand wringing is pointless. What happens with Bolton will happen. The only thing I don't like about putting guys like him and St. Brown on IR is that they basically miss the whole years. They can't practice, they can't do anything on the field. They can be with the team, life, go to meetings. But there's very little actual growth there.

Just means they haven't reached settlements with some of them yet. They all cleared waivers. They most likely can't with Spriggs at this point...unless they're going through some process of getting multiple doctors opinions as it's all supposed to be done within 5 days of waiving them, though there are exceptions if there's a dispute. But anyone waived/injured will automatically revert back until they reach a settlement or they'll have to keep them all year and in these cases, pay them all about 300K except for ESB because he was not waived and Spriggs because he didn't have an up and down contract.

Ok, but if they're doing this so they can get him back in fewer than 8 weeks, then presumably they think highly of him, right? It would stand to reason than that other teams may value an athletic LB'er who performed pretty well in the pre-season, and now you're taking a significant risk that he ends up signing with another team just so you can get him back a few weeks earlier. Also, I could be mistaken, but I thought that there was something else that tried to make it more difficult for teams to release a player injured and then re-sign them. Maybe it's just whatever agreement they make, ie, they reach a settlement stating that the player will miss 6 weeks...that player is eligible to play with any other team if he's healthy after 2 weeks, but he can't return to the team that waived him for 6. I thought there was another restriction, but I could be wrong. I guess it's a bit telling how much they value him vs how much we might and that makes sense. He's a UDFA and while he had a good camp, he didn't have a great one and he suffered a knee injury. I certainly hope to have him back though. Summers and Bolton...it's not Urlacher and Briggs, but they could be very nice depth guys and excellent special teams players for a few years. Should be another interesting day. Probably the last day for the Packers to sign someone who would have any chance to contribute on Thursday.

Clemson didn’t have an issue doing it with Lawrence and he’s the best QB recruit to come out of high school in probably a decade. Clemson’s also winning Natty’s while the Badgers just came off an 8-win season. Really? Come on. That's got nothing to do with your initial argument. And Wisconsin was 13-1 with one 6 point loss in the B10 title game the year before. You're cherry picking arguments here. "Kids want to play right away these days." When didn't they? Alabama, the team that's dominated recruiting for most of Saban's time rarely starts Freshmen and they're getting elite recruits. If you're a real fan of Wisconsin Football, I don't see how you can argue with a straight face that you should just inherently start the higher ranked prospect over the veteran who performed better during the Spring and in Training Camp.

You're conflating who's the most talented and who's the best. Lets use baseball terms. Keston Hiura was more "talented," than just about anyone playing 2nd since he was drafted, but that doesn't mean he was better. Why do you think Chryst is choosing to go with the worse player? How do you think that helps him? Occams Razor-All things being equal, the simplest answer is the correct answer. Simplest answer=Coan is better right now than Mertz. Mertz may not even be the 2nd best QB on the Badgers roster at this moment. Maybe that changes in a month. One of the top recruits ever started as a backup for a team in South Carolina last year. So...lets be just a little patient and stop pretending we KNOW which QB is actually better and just simply trust the guy who's proven to be an exceptional College Football Coach.

Point taken on Nelson. I agree, lets wait and see how Coan responds. I don't know if he's just that bad at throwing the deep ball, or just a little amped up and trying to aim the ball a bit too much. The OL looked great....most of the time. This was a team with a lot of guys who were ranked very high. But they also had WAAY too many missed assignments and you can't afford to do that and beat really good teams.

Alright, final thoughts on the Packers cuts(sorry, I'm wired, been back and forth from Wisconsin and Texas 3 times in the past 5 days) I knew the Packers final cuts would differ from what I said I wanted them to do, but some of the moves seem confusing to me. 1-Curtis Bolton was on pace to be a starter. A really athletic, tough player at a position where you have no depth and the one established player you have at MLB'er is going to be a FA next year and expensive to sign. They could have put him on IR...gone with what they have, maybe signed Stephone Anthony, an athletic former 1st round pick who's got speed to provide depth and play ST's. But instead they waived him injured? He could still end up seeing the field for the Packers in the future, but it's a pretty convoluted process and not likely to happen. 2-WR'erI think Shepard had the best chance to clear waivers. It's a nice story, he was signed only after 100+ other receivers in his class signed, so that's cool. Wasn't drafted, wasn't signed as an UDFA until after a tryout. But St. Brown is done for the year, something that could hurt them if they suffer injuries. They also lost Lazard, a guy who's camp was at least as impressive as Shepard's when you factor in his special teams play as well. Lazard looked good covering kicks. Still, we're deep here. 3-OLThe more I watched and thought about it, the more I liked Nijman. Athletically, he was on par or better than Johnah Williams. The one area Williams was downgraded was his length, no such concern there as he's 6'7 with 34+ inch arms. And he looked good in run blocking as well, really finishing guys off and playing physical. If he clears waivers(which I'm uncertain of because of how hungry teams are for any offensive linemen). It'll be interesting to see who the Packers will look at on the waiver wire at MLB'er, RB. There are a couple FA's like Brian Hoyer, a smart, efficient QB, Jay Ajayi is a nice, one cut power runner. OLB'er depth...Nick Perry, I can't see that happen....I don't think I've ever seen a high priced player cut and then signed by that same team just a few months later, but for the minimum, that would be ideal. But this will likely be the team we see play the Bears. After that, we have a few extra days than the rest of the league to make some adjustments and or get any new guys ready. Really hope we see a practice squad that has Nijman, Lazard, Jamerson, Pankey, Kizer, Marcus Jones(or Ramsey) and then maybe Looney, Ento if we can't persuade a couple players to come over here rather than stay with the tam they went to camp with.

Or Jayrone Elliot. The man who'd be on his way to Canton if the Packers played the Seahawks every week, but seemed to dominate pre-season tackles and had the athletic ability, but never figured it out. Reggie Gilbert was second on the Packers last year in QB pressures....with 15. Kyler Fackrell who played a lot more snaps had 23 I believe. So not a surprise that the Packers went out and committed 100+ million dollars, plus the 12th pick in the draft to improve that number. I wonder if the Packers would have gone after Clowney had he been available at the start of the off-season. Obviously it makes no sense right now with 3 guys with similar size and skill sets, but he would clearly be the best of them. They're talking about him being traded potentially for a 2nd or 3rd round pick after the Tunsil stuff was put to bed. Underrated player. The difference between he and Mack is not Two firsts+ a 5. The question would be his contract. He's reportedly said he wants Donald/Mack type money. That's just not going to happen. He's worth a 5 years/110 with 65-70 guaranteed given how durable and effective he's been the last 3 years(actually better win rate on pass rushes than Watt and 2nd or 3rd among all edge rushers IIRC at ~33 pct) and he's one of the premier run defenders on the edge. I guess I'll say I'd rather have Preston Smith and Za'Darius now that-that's who we have and both are pretty damn good and the depth at that spot is so critical.

Light didn't even really get beat inside IIRC, it looked like he was expecting someone to come from the outside and it looked more to me like he was passing him off to Madison and Madison was a bit late to react. But it really doesn't matter. That's 1 of the 4 penalties and 1 play out of probably...75-90 he played in the first 3 games. He's rusty. Nijman is really intriguing. Very athletic, very long. He was very good tonight in finishing his blocks in the run game. Got beat outside on one play where it appeared he wasn't ready for the snap for whatever reason, maybe still communicating the blocking assignments. A long, athletic tackle who moves pretty well is probably worth keeping over your 4th/5th guard. This is all just guessing though. Watching FB on TV only gives you a fraction of the action and we obviously don't know what the coaches opinions of the players are.

I thought this was about Hiura. No, there's absolutely no reason to sign Grisham right now unless you give him a Kingery type deal. You'll be able to sign him in a year from now cheap if he hits well. "Great approach," is a rather vague sentiment to me, but a great eye? I think that's about the only thing he's proven in the minor leagues.

The difference being, Braun is 35 and a year from being done as a Brewer with no where to go. Hiura either this offseason or next could fetch a ton to help us. But carry on with you condescending remarks. That's one thing you can absolutely count on.

The guy was worn out because he went through all the rehab and uncertainty from the shoulder and now it's been a few months and they can't figure out what's going on with his lower leg. I agree, how smart he is doesn't inform if he's going to decide to come back in another 12 months or 24 months. Luck played the game with reckless abandon. Taking backers and safeties head on instead of sliding to get 1st downs. I don't remember a QB who played as recklessly as he did in order to try to win. You don't do that because of intellect, you do that because of your competitive nature. And as you said, in both Barry and Calvin's case, they wanted to play elsewhere. There were even discussions 2 years after he retired about teams trading for his rights.

The Packers apparently had a deal worked out with the Chiefs in 2008 at the deadline. Gonzalez wanted to be traded, so he was allowed to talk with other teams. It was the Eagles and the Packers. Gonzalez didn't want to go to the off-season workouts or OTA's, both teams agreed that he just need to attend 1 OTA. The deals were agreed to, Gonzalez basically had to pick, it was assumed he was going to pick the Packers and then at the last minute the Chiefs changed it from a 3rd to a 2nd. Gonzalez's agent calls him and tells him and he laughs, assuming he's kidding only to find out he was serious. Anyway, as for why the picks have value, that's pretty obvious. But if you're a team that's a contender and you have a chance to add an All Pro TE who's still playing at a High Level, that's gotta have more value than the potential you may get from a 3rd rounder. And realistically you're looking at getting a couple years of cheap production out of almost any 3rd rounder. Most take a year to develop, that 2nd year they might be ready to play, by the 3rd year, if you've hit they're going to be good and then the 4th year they're heading into free agency and even if you re-sign, they're no longer cheap.

That's exactly the problem, he's bounced around too much. He's not a tackle and it's pretty pointless to play him there. He's not athletic enough to play tackle. Perhaps the Packers will decide he's not athletic enough to play in their Zone Scheme, but I'm looking at him as a guard/center and I think if they stop trying to make him a swing tackle and playing him at all 5 positions like he did in WVU, he could settle in at guard and he's got more upside there than anyone other than Jenkins. I also think Madison and McCray make it as I think Jenkins has done enough and shown enough to beat out Taylor at Guard and I doubt the Packers carry a backup guard who's gonna cost ~11 million the next two years. I guess they could hold onto him this year since the savings would be minimal, but you could get something for him from a team looking for guard help.

Ok, I agree with you about the Badgers and I don't want to spend too much time in the Weeds here, but Hunter Johnson was a 5 star recruit...the top ranked QB in the country. He went to Clemson after they'd won the National Title, Bryant won the job his Freshmen year and he took his team to the playoffs again. Then Lawrence, one of the most highly touted Prep prospects ever comes and commits to Clemson and he shows up half way through Johnson's freshmen year(Lawrence started school in December). So I don't know if you can really point at Northwestern's QB situation and say "there's a reason he transferred," and assume they're going to be worse there. Several of the best QB's in the NFL right now transferred including...what, 3 top picks in Newton, Murray and Mayfield, Rodgers transferred, The Badgers best QB was a transfer. Plus...Kelly Bryant was a pretty good QB. He went 16-2 as a duel threat QB. But again, it'd be like if we got this all-world recruit this year who arrived in December and was obviously better than Mertz and Mertz decided to transfer. It wouldn't really be on Mertz or because Mertz wasn't good. It's more because of the guys ahead of him. Kinda like Fields, another Big10 transfer. I mean, there's a reason he transferred. But it's a pretty good reason. Nobody can take down Fromm!

I just saw TJ McDonald was a surprise cut from the Dolphins. He'd be a very good fit with the Packers as he'd apparently embraced the role of hybrid LB'er this past-off season and during camp. He's a proven vet and a physical safety. If not, wouldn't surprise me to see Greene serving at that nickel LB'er and playing in the box.

Remember Moss? The Pats ended up getting him because they were offering an earlier 4th. And he was coming off a bad run in Oakland, but everyone knew his effort level was directly related to production/team success. Antonio Brown who's production is always there was traded for 3rd and 5ths. Josh Rosen a QB taken in the top 10 just last year was traded for a pick at the end of the 2nd this last year. It certainly stings to lose good players(or at least high picks) for nothing, but that's football. And invariably those players end up on the Bears, Vikings or Lions.

This looks close to what I'd guess. I don't think they go with 3 QB's. I think Boyle would make it through waivers. I think Taylor's got a very good chance of being traded/waived at the end of this game. I'd be really surprised if they didn't keep Pankey. I thought the 3 RB's were kinda obvious before the talk started about them trying to trade for a back the last couple days. But given how much LaFleur says he wants to run the ball, I can't see this team heading into the regular season with just 2 RB's, neither of whom have practiced yet due to injury. And I think they'll keep Reggie Gilbert. I also agree it'd be so much easier if they could cut Lewis. If Tonyan, Graham or Sternberger were even average blockers I would think it'd be a no-brainer. But that looks pretty accurate. The only move that'd really shock me is if they gave up on Pankey. I think he can start and be a good player. Good chance IMO he takes over for Linsley as Jenkins move back to center when he becomes a FA. I was also pretty shocked they didn't keep Grey on the Practice Squad last year given how highly they'd praised his potential, so who knows.