Quote:Very negative as usual but I do not fault you for it. I am not an expert in the cap numbers and never claimed to be,

however we have never spent up to the cap, nor aggressively went after top FA.

 Not close to it. In fact just the opposite, so I will believe it when I see it. Please name a top FA we went after when they were at the top of their game and known to be so and would be expensive?

 

There are perhaps other issues which might signal the hole in the bottom of the boat is getting bigger.

 Caldwell's Plan from the start was blow up the team and start from scratch. That phrase is often used, but Caldwell pretty much did it for real.

He replaced starters with rookies. Some of these starters could follow one of two trajectories, up or down. Whether

Daryl Smith, Eugene Monroe, Derek Cox,MJD,Landry,he was unloading salaries and players who were not bad, sometimes good, and the primary reason appeared to be money. To be replaced with Rookies that cost less.

Is that a plan to save money or a plan to produce a winner?

 

In hindsight, Caldwell admits he was reckless, or made bad choices to be nice. This is a red flag. Does he have a clue what he is doing, or playing it by ear as far as how much to spend and what to spend it on. His head coach hire certainly seems immature and just failed at his first OC hire.

 

These are major decisions about the club's direction which were failed by the new GM,and he conservatively followed the same frugal spending habits that have been the case since the early Coughlin years. Perhaps he did not want to go out on a limb with a major FA hire. Gerhart was gambling Dave?

It makes for a lot of built in excuses for Dave to Khan,  the youngest squad ever, all that potential, more top draft picks. He managed scared and more protective of money than fielding a winning squad. The new promises to spend money sound good(maybe his quote can be interpreted that way, maybe not), but I have a feeling we will not spend any more than in the past, the jags look for VALUE in free agency, not for stars. We will see rookie churn again and again, and if a player gets expensive we will ship them away to a higher spender at the end of their contract.

 I don't feel good about the direction this team is going, whether it is planned failure or failure by incompetence.

 

You do not spend money up to the cap just to spend money.  That happened at the end of our run in the 90s and we saw what happened there. Dave has hit and has missed on FA contracts that havent had to break the bank for us.  Marks and Miller are guys that were signed to cheap veteran deals, and look how that worked out for us.  The deals in FA that haven't worked haven't been back breakers because of the lack of guaranteed money.  So yes, free agency is about value. Not about stars. I do not understand how that is a bad thing.  You want someone gambling your franchise's money? Thats a terrible way to build a team. 

 

As for Caldwell, he has never said he was reckless or "made choices to be nice." He said he wish he had more of a veteran presence.  Caldwell will be willing to pay money for a guy, but only when he has been proven in Jacksonville's system.  As for the veterans you listed off, MJD was washed up, Landry was mediocre, and Derek Cox has been bouncing around the league. The only one I can give you from that list would Smith.  Smith wasn't resigned because of his injury. Caldwell took a chance, and it didn't work out.  And even then, we would most likely have to start looking for a replacement for Smith if he were on our roster right now.  Monroe wasn't going to resign because Dave wanted Luke, so he traded him for picks. 

 

Bottom line: I fail to see how Caldwell has been "reckless" and if you dont think there was more talent on this roster than there was two years ago, then you are just blinded by an agenda.

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