2016-2017 NFL Thread

[xskarma]

Uhhhhhhhhh.

There is nothing to talk about for weeks. How do you guys endure the doldrums? I'm looking forward to the draft if for nothing else it is SOME football news

Well, I just check my twitter feed for football news regardless, so if there's anything interesting I go back here and post about it. There's still some things going on, players being released, chatter about free agent fits, stuff like that.

To be honest this period is less dead than the June/July period between mandatory minicamp and training camp. That's really when you hear nothing apart from injuries and arrests.

Right now it's like 6 days till the first day of the Combine (which is just first group arriving and weighing in and stuff I believe). 9 days till the actual on field drills for the first group.

Combine, the actual on field drills and stuff, aren't interesting to many people, BUT there's TONS of news that comes out during those days, not just about combine players, but also about teams, what they are doing, what their intentions are in free agency and the draft, stuff like that. LOT of chatting and gossip during the combine, cause it;s basically THE major place where all the GM's, coaches and player agents meet, mere days before free agency begins. Speaking of...

1 day after the Combine ends, the tampering restrictions relax (they call this the Legal Tampering period) and players who are about to hit free agency and teams can have some discussions about interest and some basic contract parameters.

2 days after that and 3 days after the Combine ends, on March 9th, Free Agency starts, and hopefully all hell breaks loose again.

In recap:

In 6 days: 28th of Feb: Start of combine
In 9 days: 3rd of March: Start of on field drills at combine
in 13 days: 7th of March: Start of Legal Tampering period
in 15 days: 9th of March: Start of Free Agency


IN ADDITION TO THAT:

The new thread for the 2017-2018 season will go up somewhere on the 6th or 7th of March, depends a bit on exactly when the combine ends and legal tampering starts and how my schedule fits.

So come get a whiff of that new thread smell in about 12 days!

[draynay]

Yea, this period is definitely better than post-draft. Nothing interesting happens then unless some team loses their mind and rescinds the franchise tag or something.

[apepi]

IN ADDITION TO THAT:

The new thread for the 2017-2018 season will go up somewhere on the 6th or 7th of March, depends a bit on exactly when the combine ends and legal tampering starts and how my schedule fits.

So come get a whiff of that new thread smell in about 12 days!

No we can't! We have to hit the magical page 500!

[draynay]

No we can't! We have to hit the magical page 500!

That would be difficult. I could try and post every single piece of Saints news minutiae, but then I wouldn't be able to act superior to xskarma when he does the same thing with the Patriots. Not worth it.

[apepi]

That would be difficult. I could try and post every single piece of Saints news minutiae, but then I wouldn't be able to act superior to xskarma when he does the same thing with the Patriots. Not worth it.

We could just take time talking about irrelevant things like Todd Gurley.

[Crissi]

We could just take time talking about irrelevant things like Todd Gurley.

Why not Romo drama news? Everyone loves QB speculation!

[Grube]

Why not Romo drama news? Everyone loves QB speculation!

Not much drama news when he is going to Houston, Garoppolo to Chicago and either Cutler or Cousins to SF.

[draynay]

Bears are actually trying to trade Cutler, isn't he doomed to be cut? Why would anybody waste a draft pick on him?

[xskarma]

That would be difficult. I could try and post every single piece of Saints news minutiae, but then I wouldn't be able to act superior to xskarma when he does the same thing with the Patriots. Not worth it.

Psssh, I for one would LOVE if everybody came out with interesting stuff about their teams. I'd love to know your 3rd safety has been dealing with a hamstring and might not play, opening the door to a rookie that you have high hopes for. Absolutely love it.


Also, I read the tweet about how Gurley destroyed this guy on the court and how embarrasing it was, and then I looked at the video and saw a clearly superior athlete make a half decent fake and rumble past a guy instead and was like "that all?".


And QB drama suits me fine. Still hoping that we can unload Garappolo for some high draft picks at some point. Will be interesting. I don;t think any of these QB's are set to go anywhere specifically yet, contrary to what Grube thinks. Teams and agents and players are mostly lying their asses of right now in the run up to Free Agency.

Fairly sure teams won't show their hand in this regard till closer to 9th of March, when they have to be cap compliant and have to start to shape their roster in earnest.

- - - Updated - - -

Bears are actually trying to trade Cutler, isn't he doomed to be cut? Why would anybody waste a draft pick on him?

Crazier things have happened, but this would be pretty far out there. I could see them maybe getting a conditional future late rounder if they hang on to Cutler and some team just completely misses on their intended targets and is left without a QB, but that chance seems slim to none.

I mean, there's already been stories that both 49'ers and Bills are perhaps going to hang on to Kaep and Tyrod Taylor. It's probably blowing smoke, but you have to wonder, especially in the Bills case, just how much roulette you want to play.

I think the Bears hanging onto Cutler is going to happen for about as long as they haven't settled their own new plans or run into cap space issues, and then he's gone.

Same thing for the Cowboys. They'll try to hang on to Romo for now, but at the first sign they either need cap space or know for sure that they won;t be able to move him, he;s gone.

[Crissi]

Well fund somehting you might find interesting then xskarma. Although, its more Dak stuff, but in addition to the DUI, may also help explain why he dropped so far down.

http://sportsday.dallasnews.com/dall...back-134-times

[Blobfish]

I am starting to get NFL withdraw symptoms
All I can do is go to you tube and NFL,com to watch replays.

We have Rugby League starting soon.. that may fill some of the gap between now to September.

http://www.nrl.com/

[xskarma]

Well fund somehting you might find interesting then xskarma. Although, its more Dak stuff, but in addition to the DUI, may also help explain why he dropped so far down.

http://sportsday.dallasnews.com/dall...back-134-times

That was really interesting! Just goes to show how much looking at just the face value stats like completion % without taking into account the receivers being throw to matters. There's probably dozens of players where you can make hindsight adjustments like this for.

Reminds me of Manziel and how much some people expected him to be a really good passer cause of his success at Texas A&M with Mike Evans. And then it turned out that, nope, actually, Mike Evans was just such a ridiculous WR and he made Manziel look good, not the other way around.

Almost impossible to tell such things sometimes or at least, the truth about things like that tends to only really come out for sure once players hit the NFL.

It's part of what makes the draft so fascinating.

[Northern Goblin]

Last summer wasn't too bad, between the Bosa holdout and the sudden DROP EVERYTHING THE PANTHERS RESCINDED JOSH NORMAN'S TAG as well as "will Von sign?" we had plenty of talking points.

[draynay]

Last summer wasn't too bad, between the Bosa holdout and the sudden DROP EVERYTHING THE PANTHERS RESCINDED JOSH NORMAN'S TAG as well as "will Von sign?" we had plenty of talking points.

Yea, I mentioned Norman as something interesting, but how often can something that dumb happen?

The Bosa holdout was just depressing.

Chargers still haven't signed Bosa, man those guys are idiots. How easy does something have to be before the Chargers quit fucking it up?

...those Chargers...

[Pendulous]

I'm still not seeing why there's talks of ditching Tyrod Taylor. Even if you think he's a mediocre quarterback, there isn't anybody out there right now better.

I knew Mike Evans was a beast coming out of Texas A&M. Couldn't say for sure how much was Johnny Manziel, but I knew Evans was going to be huge in the NFL. Didn't seem like he had that much hype early on.

[Crackleslap]

I am starting to get NFL withdraw symptoms
All I can do is go to you tube and NFL,com to watch replays.

We have Rugby League starting soon.. that may fill some of the gap between now to September.

http://www.nrl.com/

Dude I'm feeling the same. Having serious withdrawals at the moment. Yeah NRL starting soon, but I feel like NFL's stolen the show for me! xD

[draynay]

I'm still not seeing why there's talks of ditching Tyrod Taylor. Even if you think he's a mediocre quarterback, there isn't anybody out there right now better.

They should keep him, maybe not on that contract though.

[Pendulous]

I don't know man, if the best ever at his position begs you to come back, maybe consider do it.

[xskarma]

They should keep him, maybe not on that contract though.

Tricky thing is, how are they going to convince Tyrod to take a less rich contract, when he can simply refuse, and get paid on the open market? I'm not sure they really have that option.



In other news, Jay Cutler is apparently considering retirement. The takes I've read on it vary from "He's made 100+ million in his career and been hurt every season for the last 7, why would he go on a bad team for 8-12M?" to "He's just going to retire to prevent being traded where he doesn't want to go"


I hope he does retire. More demand for QB's that way.

[Vetali]

I don't think Jimmy's stock value will be affected by Cutler. The person that has, did it a year ago.

Jameis Winston said some really stupid shit again, but this time in front of a bunch of kids.