Draft thread

[skinsinparadise]

SIP, mhd, and DWinzit are all here!? The gang is getting back together. Now we've gotta get KDawg back and find KB. A good bunch of us have made our way here, but there are a bunch of regulars still missing. It really sucks that we can't go back and look at the old draft threads so we can see a record of the names of the regulars there to help track them down.

I went searching for you SIP when I found out that ES had been started back up. I thought I found you in the Commanders discord channel, but I'd be kind of surprised if that was you. I tried posting in the Discord draft channel maybe like two times, and let's just say the discussion wasn't as substantive and rewarding as our conversations on ES have been.

Thanks. i didn't engage in any of the fan blogs. I scoped some of them out but never posted. I kept looking for this one to return in some fashion or form.

My one recommendation is for mods to post on twitter that its back. I checked TK's feed and didn't notice anything unless I missed a post, ditto TSO. I figured the mods would give the cue so every now and then I'd look. I found it this time but going through Reddit and it lead me to this.

Good to be back and as always enjoy your posts tremendously on this thread. I missed that. lol, because I've not had to share takes about draft prospects just yet in my circle because no one among them care even among my friends who follow sports aside from the big prospects, QB etc., so I've mostly been compiling lots of stats first which I like to incorporate with my watching. But now the pressure is on me to do more watching versus compiling stats.

Yeah I need KB in part to defend his take that Sinnott > Bowers. I liked Sinnott, he was my 2nd ranked TE. But I did say Bowers is the best college TE I ever watched. I know you were a big Bowers guy, too. Miss him and Kdawg, too here among others.

[skinsinparadise]

I'm not bailing on Sinnott just yet. Look at his usage #s compared to Trey McBride's in his rookie year and they're startlingly similar. The differences are:

1. Zach Ertz got hurt in Week 10. After that McBride's usage #s skyrocketed. Kyler Murray also got hurt(more on that in a bit).

2. The Cards had a bad year in 2022. They were 4-6 when Ertz got hurt. Kyler Murray also got hurt, missed two games, came back, played another two games, then got shut down. Their season was essentially over at that point, which is when you can start forcing playing time to more young guys.

McBride's #s before Week 10 of his rookie year: 4 targets, 4 catches, 31 yards.
Sinnott's #s in 2024: 5 catches, 28 yards

After Week 10, McBride's #s: 35 targets, 26 catches, 234 yards.

Its likely we had a similar plan for Sinnott. The difference was, Ertz stayed healthy and proved to be incredibly reliable(our 2nd best pass catching target). We were also in the thick of a playoff race with a rookie QB playing at an MVP level, so we couldn't start giving young guys more meaningful snaps.

Lets see what Sinnott's got next year before we make any judgments.

I got nothing against Sinnott. He made my top 20, my guys list last year. It's striking though to me that Logan Paulsen who knows a thing or two about the spot and loves watching film and also leans heavily on the sunny side of evaluations especially when it comes to our team -- comes off lukewarm about Sinnott.

Logan makes all his points politely and classy. But parsing them and using my words not his he seemed to be suggesting.

A. A meh training camp with almost no flashes. that's though more the beat guys watching practice than Logan.

B. Instincts seemed questionable and doesn't seem to be following his assignments as to route running very well.

C. Watching the coaches tape, they seemed to trust him less (not more) as to the passing game as the season progressed.

Paulsen was just recently touting this TE class and in the context of doing so made the case that he seriously doubts that Sinnott will develop into a seperator-pass catcher in the mold of an Ertz type -- and then went on to talk about some prospects in this class that he thought could be that kind of guy.

And again, Paulsen said this all in a nice way. But I've listened to him enough to know that he's not going to be Cooley who pulled no punches --Logan is super polite. But its not hard for me to miss in several segments that he's not high on the thought that Sinnott will develop into a gem of a pass catching weapon.

Personally, I don't know. I liked him (not loved him) as a college player. I expressed last year my concern with him was his ability to seperate. And if that's following him here -- and Logan who studies this offensive scheme and seems to have an idea of what the TEs are supposed to do is suggesting that Sinnott really struggled with it -- at a minimum I have some questions about him going forward.

And apples to apples, I am with Paulsen on some thoughts including a dude like Loveland is a better pass catching prospect that could ultimately replace Ertz on that front versus Sinnott.

[GhostofSparta]

our own selections are so late in each round that they probably won't be in demand.

I'd say that might actually help trade down, especially in round 1. I know the idea of trading out of the 1st round is a controversial one. But teams with top of the round picks have shown in the past a willingness to get back into round 1 if it's the last few picks. You can jump the teams at above you on day 2 (or 3) to get a guy they might be targeting, and depending on the position, getting that extra 5th year option on a guy can be very tempting bait. It gets less tempting as the draft goes on, but there can be some of that same thinking on day 2 when you hit the end of round 3. Some guys might be dropping that you want to jump at, and if you can get above the comp picks and can get ahead of the overnight/morning trades before day 3 starts you might be willing to make that jump.

I'm not saying I personally like or want to see those happen, but you can't deny that the last few picks in the 1st round can be very valuable trade bait because of that 5th year option.

[ACommanderNotCaptain]

SIP, mhd, and DWinzit are all here!? The gang is getting back together. Now we've gotta get KDawg back and find KB. A good bunch of us have made our way here, but there are a bunch of regulars still missing. It really sucks that we can't go back and look at the old draft threads so we can see a record of the names of the regulars there to help track them down.

I went searching for you SIP when I found out that ES had been started back up. I thought I found you in the Commanders discord channel, but I'd be kind of surprised if that was you. I tried posting in the Discord draft channel maybe like two times, and let's just say the discussion wasn't as substantive and rewarding as our conversations on ES have been.

He's been posting on BGObsession.com, it's where he's put his Next Day Threads. A lot of ESers went over there and might be staying? Unclear. I only just found out ES has a spiritual successor.

[GoingCommando]

Good to be back and as always enjoy your posts tremendously on this thread. I missed that. lol, because I've not had to share takes about draft prospects just yet in my circle because no one among them care even among my friends who follow sports aside from the big prospects, QB etc., so I've mostly been compiling lots of stats first which I like to incorporate with my watching. But now the pressure is on me to do more watching versus compiling stats.

Yeah I need KB in part to defend his take that Sinnott > Bowers. I liked Sinnott, he was my 2nd ranked TE. But I did say Bowers is the best college TE I ever watched. I know you were a big Bowers guy, too. Miss him and Kdawg, too here among others.

Yeah I really missed reading your info and takes, along with so many others in here. I didn't realize until this year how important this hobby was for me, and how much it relies upon communicating with other like-minded friends in the hobby. I really needed this cross-pollination of ideas that we get here. The Commanders discord has a pretty lively draft thread channel on it, but the nature of discord just doesn't allow for in depth post discussion like a forum, so the takes stay pretty surface level and people move on from them quickly.

Put less charitably: the guys who post on there are a lot younger, they lack perspective (Calvin Johnson is an OG to many of them), and the effort level of the posts is pretty low.

I need to watch a lot more film too. Normally by the Senior Bowl I have a way better sense of the class, but not having anyone else introduce players to me like I usually get from this thread put me far behind. I still usually watched games on Saturdays, but more as like a fan than watching for detail.

Also, I watched way more NFL games this year than college games. The magical Commanders season was the reason, but it was also really nice to catch up on the "state of the art" of NFL football specifically for then bringing that perspective to projecting college players. The NFL is a lot more innovative than I realized. For instance, stuff like Special Teams is one of those little theaters of war where NFL teams hunt for edges and try new things, and even just watching how different teams handle the kicking game was cool. Speaking of which, kick returner is a major need for this team and our weakness here is one of the biggest reasons we lost the NFC CG.

And a hot take dovetailing from that: is it already safe to recognize that Adam Peters made a significant mistake in trading Cooper DeJean to the Eagles?

[GoingCommando]

our own selections are so late in each round that they probably won't be in demand.

I'd say that might actually help trade down, especially in round 1. I know the idea of trading out of the 1st round is a controversial one. But teams with top of the round picks have shown in the past a willingness to get back into round 1 if it's the last few picks. You can jump the teams at above you on day 2 (or 3) to get a guy they might be targeting, and depending on the position, getting that extra 5th year option on a guy can be very tempting bait. It gets less tempting as the draft goes on, but there can be some of that same thinking on day 2 when you hit the end of round 3. Some guys might be dropping that you want to jump at, and if you can get above the comp picks and can get ahead of the overnight/morning trades before day 3 starts you might be willing to make that jump.

I'm not saying I personally like or want to see those happen, but you can't deny that the last few picks in the 1st round can be very valuable trade bait because of that 5th year option.

I hope you're on to something, because I like a scenario where we trade down from 29 and then are able to move up from 61 to target two players in that 40-50 range. I have a feeling that my favorite targets at 29 are going to be off the board when we pick.

[skinsinparadise]

Good to be back and as always enjoy your posts tremendously on this thread. I missed that. lol, because I've not had to share takes about draft prospects just yet in my circle because no one among them care even among my friends who follow sports aside from the big prospects, QB etc., so I've mostly been compiling lots of stats first which I like to incorporate with my watching. But now the pressure is on me to do more watching versus compiling stats.

Yeah I need KB in part to defend his take that Sinnott > Bowers. I liked Sinnott, he was my 2nd ranked TE. But I did say Bowers is the best college TE I ever watched. I know you were a big Bowers guy, too. Miss him and Kdawg, too here among others.

Yeah I really missed reading your info and takes, along with so many others in here. I didn't realize until this year how important this hobby was for me, and how much it relies upon communicating with other like-minded friends in the hobby. I really needed this cross-pollination of ideas that we get here. The Commanders discord has a pretty lively draft thread channel on it, but the nature of discord just doesn't allow for in depth post discussion like a forum, so the takes stay pretty surface level and people move on from them quickly.

Put less charitably: the guys who post on there are a lot younger, they lack perspective (Calvin Johnson is an OG to many of them), and the effort level of the posts is pretty low.

I need to watch a lot more film too. Normally by the Senior Bowl I have a way better sense of the class, but not having anyone else introduce players to me like I usually get from this thread put me far behind. I still usually watched games on Saturdays, but more as like a fan than watching for detail.

Also, I watched way more NFL games this year than college games. The magical Commanders season was the reason, but it was also really nice to catch up on the "state of the art" of NFL football specifically for then bringing that perspective to projecting college players. The NFL is a lot more innovative than I realized. For instance, stuff like Special Teams is one of those little theaters of war where NFL teams hunt for edges and try new things, and even just watching how different teams handle the kicking game was cool. Speaking of which, kick returner is a major need for this team and our weakness here is one of the biggest reasons we lost the NFC CG.

And a hot take dovetailing from that: is it already safe to recognize that Adam Peters made a significant mistake in trading Cooper DeJean to the Eagles?

Thanks. Vice versa for me. You already have me thinking about players like Watts who i haven't spent anytime thinking about as a potential fit here.

Yeah I know some football fans in my life but none of them care about the draft aside from at best the superficalities.

As for the Dejean trade its trending as a mistake but will see. Sainristill was good and is a culture guy but he doesn't yet at least seem to be as good as Dejean. It's amazing how most trade downs have burned us over the years. Trading down with Dallas so they can take D. Lawrence and we get Trent Murphy and change. Kerrigan is great but not worth the price of skipping on JJ Watt just to have Jenkins (who was a bust) as part of the deal. Crowder and change to give Seattle, Lockett.

Yeah I was deep into the NFL season too, even went to a playoff game, watched college football casually and like you didn't study it as much in real time.

I am on board with trading down. I think in theory its possible. Maybe for a QB? Dart? Shough? lol, maybe Roseman is zeroing in on a player? Seems to be Peters' style to accumulate picks and am betting he at least tries to do so.

I haven't dived much into the secondary yet. But looking at DE-DT-TE-RB that 40-60 range looks interesting.

[mhd24]

SIP, mhd, and DWinzit are all here!? The gang is getting back together. Now we've gotta get KDawg back and find KB. A good bunch of us have made our way here, but there are a bunch of regulars still missing. It really sucks that we can't go back and look at the old draft threads so we can see a record of the names of the regulars there to help track them down.

I went searching for you SIP when I found out that ES had been started back up. I thought I found you in the Commanders discord channel, but I'd be kind of surprised if that was you. I tried posting in the Discord draft channel maybe like two times, and let's just say the discussion wasn't as substantive and rewarding as our conversations on ES have been.

Haha thanks GC. Missed the draft thread and all the familiar names as well.

[GoingCommando]

As for the Dejean trade its trending as a mistake but will see. Sainristill was good and is a culture guy but he doesn't yet at least seem to be as good as Dejean. It's amazing how most trade downs have burned us over the years. Trading down with Dallas so they can take D. Lawrence and we get Trent Murphy and change. Kerrigan is great but not worth the price of skipping on JJ Watt just to have Jenkins (who was a bust) as part of the deal. Crowder and change to give Seattle, Lockett.

Not having him pick six us in a playoff game, and having him to return kicks would have significantly helped us in the short term window of the trade's impact. Who knows if we would have drafted him though?

I think Sainristil is a stud (kind of feels like the defense version of Terry), but the real issue in the value of that trade for me is that Johnny Newton didn't look that good. And that was surprising to me. He was supposed to be where we cleaned up on value from trading down, and his college film was so good that I thought he would translate for sure. Instead he just looked small and like a liability in the run game, and had a game ending offsides penalty in the most obvious hard count situation in football history. I'm using hindsight to criticize Peters because I liked the trade down at the time. I thought there was the potential for it to come back and haunt us, but I didn't think it would be so immediate and drastic. Newton is going to need to get good next year to salvage this trade for us.

I've been messing with mock draft simulators and keep trying to come up with trade down scenarios where we come away with the players I wanted all along, but maybe we should just take the hint from our team history and stop trading down. Bill Simmons used to say "never trade paper for coins" in the context of NBA roster building. I didn't think it applied to the NFL draft, but maybe it does.

Free agency is a different matter though. I think Adam Peters demonstrated that coins > paper in free agency dollars given the value we got from our free agent class. A little bit of money spread among a lot of pretty good players instead of loading up on just a couple really good ones.

[ACommanderNotCaptain]

I'm now excited to check out Watts. I don't want to pay Chinn. He was a good outcome, but I think at 5-10million more a year his holes start to become glaring.

If Watts can do a bit better reacting and closing on guys in coverage then I'm very intrigued. Chinn is good, but a beat slow to adjust to changing leverage due to motion and a quick in or speed out in coverage. Feels like he's close to the ball carrier but gives up the 1st down a bit too much in those situations. Then again with another season in the defense maybe he handles those examples better.