(04-20-2018, 10:32 PM)JagFan81 Wrote:

(04-20-2018, 10:40 AM)Kane Wrote: At first glance that 2nd Q looks nasty.
BUT... who's to say that the Boys and Chiefs will be really good. Perhaps Dak just isn't the superstar some believe him to be.... perhaps their WR corp is just a bunch of dudes (and our dude Agent 88).
I think if we can get out of the first half of the schedule at like 5-3, the 2nd half is much more palatable.

5-3 First half
6-2 Second half
11-5 one game improvement and AFCS champs again is a real possibility imo.

This is where I am. I don't want to be the cloud on a sunny day but the first half of the schedule could be tough. I have a lot of faith in this team and think we know how close we were last year and can do it again, the fear is doing an Oakland.

Just some quick thoughts
*No West coast game!!!
*Odell vs Ramsey week 1! 
*Glad to get the Pats out the way early, don't want it to be a game were looking at all season, first home game, a week of Pats trolls and pure, sweet revenge. 
*I agree about the Chiefs, eggs all in the Mahomes basket, hopefully by then they'e hit the Chiefs mid season wobble and with the whole Mahomes vs Ramsey/Bouye, we'll see what the kid can do.

*Hopefully Dallas are Dallas and another W. I look at some of these games and see them as the confidence building, momentum building games. There's also the flip side to that.
*Pittsburgh at the Bank, under the lights,with Al and Chris. Someone get Scobee out of retirement!!
*Division games will be really important this year, got to smash the T*tans and who knows what Clots Tinhorns turn up.

But the second half looks solid, division games aside, only the trip to Buffalo in November looks a worry. Going to Miami and Washington at home, we can finish ssrong, just got to make sure we don't put ourselves in a hole at the start.

I am not too concerened about Buffalo this year.

Since we played them, they have lost four offensive linemen (Incognito, Wood, Glenn and Henderson).  Ducasse, their incumbent RG, sucks.  At minimum, they will need to replace 3 linemen.  At this stage, they will have to replace them all with rookies or stopgap vets obtained from post draft cuts.

On top of that, they have no receivers.  Kelvin Benjamin is their best guy, but is years removed from his best season, his rookie year.  He has not approached 1000 yards in a year since, and he was shut down completely by Ramsey.  Their rokie from last year, Zay Jones, was a disaster even before the incident a few weeks ago.  Their only speed guy from last year, Deonte Thompson, left in free agency.  To put their receivers in perspective, Keelan Cole outperformed all of their guys, and I am not adjusting for the half season either.

All of these shortcomings are on top of the holes at LB and at DE, where Lawson has not developed.

Now due to various trades, they have a lot of draft capital to fill these holes.  Problem is, they acquired all of these picks to fill their biggest hole at QB.  Their starter from last year, Tyrod Taylor, now toils in Cleveland.  Nathan Peterman is a prolific INT machine, and they brought in AJ McCarron, he of three starts.  Now they could get lucky and have one of the top prospects fall to them, but more likely, they will have to package picks to move up into the top five to get their guy.  This would greatly reduce their ability to fill the rest of those holes with those picks, and they would still likely end up playing us with a rookie QB with no help.  As I said, they could stay at 12, get lucky, and have one of the top guys fall to them, and then they could use those picks to fill most of those holes.  The problem with that is they would need an all time great draft to get immediate consistent and positive impact from rookies at all of those positions, including QB, for them to be a contender this year.  While that is theoretically possible, what is more likely to happen is they will draft a couple of good players, some depth, and some misses.

The above doesn't even factor in the schedule. Even if they did not have all of those holes, the first half of that schedule is absolutely brutal.

@ Ravens
Chargers
@ Vikings
@ Packers
Tacks
@ Texans
@ Colts
Patriots
Bears
@ Jets
Jaguars

Those first eight games have, at best, 2-6 written all over them before having two winnable games against the Bears and Jets before playing us.

They will likely be well out of contention before we play them.

2019 and beyond?  I'd worry about Bufalo being on the schedule.  But I am not overly concerned about them now.  At this stage, as premature as it may be, I count that as a W for us. 


As for the rest of your thoughts...I am thrilled we have no West Coast games.  Not only do we not play well there, the teams there look very strong except Seattle, who is starting a rebuild. 

That Giant offense...at least at the skill positions..should be a strong test for us.  I am more concerned with Engram at this point than OBJ.

I am glad the Chiefs got Rid of Peters.  If anything causes us to lose in KC it would be turnovers.  Peters created a lot of them, and is an excellent CB and now he is gone.

Dallas will be a strong test of our run defense.  In fact, this will look like a game from the 1980s with all of the emphasis on running.  For whatever reason, we always have problems against Washington.  That is a game that, while winnable, makes me nervous. Even though Watson is returning, I think we finally match up well with Houston, and we should sweep them.  I think Indy will still have a lot of holes and we sweep them again.  We have to get at least a sweep against the tacks though.

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