(05-13-2018, 09:26 AM)DragonFury Wrote: I'm thinking their rationale is that the other three teams have all fixed their largest deficiencies (QB for the clots and tinhorns and coaching for the tacks) and should improve whereas what they see as our largest deficiency (Bortles and the passing game in general) is still there. Combine that with thinking the defense might regress and I could see how people would think that a 9-7 tacks team will improve and a 10-6 Jaguars team will regress.

In my own opinion I think the chance of the defense regressing is the same as the defense performing to the level of 2017. And I think with the stability in the coaching department, and the decent year Bortles had in 2017 we will see even more progression out of him in the coming season.

I think you're right, essentially it comes back to the Bortles = bad and every other QB in the division = future hall of famer narrative, as misguided as it may be. His 2017 season was pretty decent in my opinion considering the Jaguars' WR situation through most of the season. A tape and bubblegum job to keep things together through most of the season. Even Bortles statistically bad games mostly seemed more to do with desperation in losing situations where the defense had meltdowns of their own (the cardinals and 49ers games stick out to me in this regard) and the defense almost let the team down against the Seahawks with two long blown coverage TDs allowed.

We'll see how things go this year, but I'm not assuming the defense will be worse overall, and I think the offense will probably be better if ASJ can get open in the deep middle a couple of times a game and the Jaguars can run a little more consistently through the season than they did last year. I know the rushing stats were good, but in the later part of the season Fournette was getting stonewalled in a lot of games, in 4 out of the last 7 games he played in last year he averaged less than 3 yards a carry, and only had one game in that span with more than 4 yards a carry. If he can have 4 yards a carry through next season with none of the disastrous sub 3 yard per carry games I think the Jaguars will be a contender for home field advantage in the AFC.

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