Quote:I don't know where you find the confidence. I look at the whole picture of what Dave has brought in and just do not see this great talent evaluator. He hit on marks. Who else? Linder?Bowanko?Beadles? Robinson? T.Smth? Gratz? Bryant? This is the same man who also looked at hours of Jokel, and saw something that made him think he was a building block, an anchor for years at left tackle. Not just tape but in person at right tackle, and still was so confident in Luke he made him LT. When most fans could tell he couldn't handle RT. What kind of sense does that make, seriously? I understand missing on a pick, I cannot fathom having a player on the team that they watched hours and hours of play from and said "yeah he gets abused at RT, lets put him at LT and get rid of Eugene.". THAT IS MIND BOGGLING BAD DECISION MAKING. Unless the player makes a 180 degree turn he is a bust at his spot in the draft. Major swing and miss.Made worse by as I said not recognizing how bad even when he was on the Jaguars.
This is just like "rating the rookies" thread, evaluating the top rookies, and I find myself saying, "who was good?". really good, not rookie excuse good, but showed flashes of greatness. Who were the great FA pickups and practice squad guys he signed off other clubs? Is there a good Jaguar team out there hidden away near the river at Everbank? Because I see lots of Jokels and ZIggy Hoods and Gratz and I get that old Gene Smith Feeling again. I think we are so used to mediocre players the fans are like starving haitians thrown a MRE. It's all gourmet until the season starts and we face other teams and realize what is really on our dinner table. Heck, some don't see it even then.
Well... I'm not going to argue with you about a whole bunch... Or maybe I will...
Let's start with concessions... Joeckel has been bad--really bad. Gerhart was also pretty bad, but he did pick it up a bit towards the end of the season. Another bad signing. Beadles was a part of a horrible O-Line, but some say he showed progress. I don't know, I look at the o-line as a whole, and they were awful.
But... There are slight signs we're better than what our record shows...
McCray is a second year player DC picked up. Colvin is positive rookie that looks like he'll come on strong. They look to be our CBs next year, and I think they will turn out to be VERY good.
Gratz... Yes, he's a head scratcher... He seemed like the only player that was playing on glass while everyone else was playing on turf. He seemed to always be slipping around while the WRs were making their cuts. But... With that said, he played mediocre. Yeah, he got burned alot, but I thought we were (including myself) hyper critical of him throughout the season. Mainly because he didn't get better.
Cyp... Also a head scratcher. Horrible angles, seemed to be out of position alot. He came on strong at the end of the season though.
Gratz and Cyp are 2 players where the full evaluation will come next year.
People ignore Clemmons, but he was a good player and was a very good piece to our D-line. I'm not sure why he get's ignored or crticized. I thought he played well and consistent overall throughout the year.
JT Thomas--- Also another pickup, I think from the Bears whom I thought played pretty darn well at LB.
Telvin Smith also appears to be a solid pickup. With Poz back, I think we got a good LB corps to work off off.
Those pickups on the D-side (either in draft over the last 2 years or in FA)are all on DC and I think there's more positive than negative.
So while I really can't argue to much with your criticism, I think there's alot of positives to still have some faith in DC. And this is not even mentioning the WRs we got.
And Shoelace is a great pick is as well. That dude has heart, he's gonna continue to get better, barring this foot injury being worse than reported.