Ray_T

the Denver WR were supposed to do this when Wilson arrived in Denver. Not sure I'd call that a success. but at the same time Wilson performed better last year. too little too late to save his job there, but maybe things will be different this time.

The value of the QB position seems to have increased over the last decade or so. and some leagues now exist where the rules make it so QB's do have more value. when I did my post mortem on the july mock, all the top teams had a top QB. granted not all those top QB were early round picks, but the majority of them were. so you can still have success drafting a QB late, but you have to be one of the one or two teams who hits on one late. its both a know your league thing, but its also a know yourself thing. if you are the type who will do your research you can increase your chances of hitting on a QB late. but if you are the type who doesnt do their research, you may be better advised to grab one earlier if you feel good production at the position is important (based on the rules of your league)

I found another article. apparently there is a new technique that improves recovery time. they did it with Akers, but I dont know if the end result was that much better. What happened to Cam Akers? How Rams RB made remarkable recovery from Achilles injury to play in playoffs | Sporting News

ok I got curious and found a link that may be helpful here. RB's have recovered but the odds still are not great. Cam Akers and the History of Achilles Injuries For NFL Running Backs (sports-king.com)

you are right. I got my injuries mixed up. my bad for some dumb reason I thought it was an achilles. although a Lis franc injury is just as bad (worse usually if its bad enough to operate on)

agreed. Gus is the short yardage guy. no question about it. though I am wondering if it depends on the nature of the achilles. you are fully correct. that used to be a career ender for RB. but Etienne seems to have recovered fine. I dont know if its better medical technology or if he just injured it in a way that was easier to repair. I have been trying to get some info on this because it will allow me an edge if I can predict a recovery from injury on a player everyone else has written off. That said..... I dont know a ton about this Vidal guy, but if coach hand picked him, he must think he can develop him into a player. given that he likely played against this kid I am guessing he knows stuff about him the rest of us dont. either way I am hoping training camp reports enlighten us. but I will say one thing..... between Vidal and Dobbins, one of them likely puts up numbers and you should be able to get both very late in the draft. would it be fair strategy if you draft on the turn late to take both in short order in the hope one turns into a starter?

thats a very big IF. I have always liked the guy. drafted him last year and regretted it. That said, if I can get him on the cheap, I may buy him again at auction late but the price needs to be right. while I'm down on his injury history, hes not a guy who should go undrafted. while healthy, he should produce. the questions I have is: how much will the most recent injury affect his production? for this, I'll be looking at camp reports to see how he is looking and the second question is what are the odds he gets hurt again? hes a nice late round lotto ticket, but dont overpay.

I think it depends on the TE depth that particular year. I waited to the double digit rounds in the July mock last year and I personally believe it cost me. there just were not enough productive TE's available at the time to warrant the strategy. dont get me wrong, I've done well with this strategy in the past, but it just didnt work out for me last go. if you have 8 good TE's you need to start thinking about a TE when 5 or 6 have gone off the board. if there are 10+ good TE you can likely afford to wait a bit. with a fair number of new TE prospects being drafted I suspect this strategy will be a good one for a couple years but we may be at the end of that window where you need to take one a little earlier. maybe round 8 or so obviously it depends also on the size of your league. in a 10 teamer, you can wait longer than you can in a 12 teamer.

Shhh. keep this quiet. yes, pits quietly looks like a good value pick at his ADP

I doubt he abandons it. but I'm sure hes wanting a more balanced offense.

well, this is the direction they should be going. Jackson is getting close to the age of 30. so his Athleticism will start to fade soon enough. if they keep running him he will be done by the time he hits 31. similar to Cam Newton, Donovan McNabb, Mike Vick and most other running QB's you can name whose career ended likely sooner than it should have. hes a good enough passer that he doesnt need to run the way he did. The threat to run should be enough on most nights. in important games when the defense is keying on the pass alone with some success, I could see him pulling this out of his bag of tricks to get the defense unbalanced before returning to his normal game, but I'll be clear this cannot be an every game strategy anymore. if they do keep running him the way he has been his career wont last long. I imagine the Henry add will take some of this burden off of his shoulders. might as well beat up the old war horse who is still good in short yardage situations and preserve your 50 million dollar QB (or whatever value his contract is at... I fully admit I'm too lazy to look it up)

another possibility is they go Henry almost exclusively until the post season and then hit them with the changeup come playoff time. Team is good enough that they can play the long game and not tip their hand to show this until playoff time.

they will for sure still use him. but likely a bit less. the advantage is that they stop the defense from keying on one specific person running the ball. they have to account for the possibility it could be either of them. That completely will change the way a Defense needs to defend the red zone runs and will make it more difficult. I suspect what will happen is they will use Henry exclusively the first couple of games to get people thinking hes the guy, then they will start to sneak some Lamar carries back in. At some point they will find a balance that will keep defenses unbalanced and that's where they will try to stay. my belief is that one in 3 or one in 4 will still go to Jackson.

the year before the line was functioning a bit better I think. if my memory isnt out to lunch I seem to think they had some key injuries to that O line which led to some really poor performances

agreed. nobody is picking him. does he actually have an ADP? might actually be a waiver wire darling if he ends up producing. That said, with the new WR they have in I can see a bounceback of sorts. Will it be enough to make him anything other than a quality backup? I cannot say but if hes gonna turn it around it needs to happen this year. I dont think he will get another shot to turn his career around.

to be clear, I was a major Tomlinson fan and this debate looks an awful lot like the debate they had about LT when he turned 30. but the dropoff was there. Though I think his issue was more with a nagging foot injury that affected his on field production. next year he had a bounce back year of sorts, but was never a top 5 RB after he turned 30.

me too. dont get me wrong, I'm not a hater. I'd love nothing more than to see Henry pull this off.

yeah, and hes a mobile QB too. imagine if they had a less mobile guy in there. too bad too. this might actually be a case where a QB prospect was ruined by continuously putting him behind a leaky line. but it looks like they are making a significant attempt to fix the line this year so it will be interesting if Jones production improves as a result.

I agree. Henry probably will be slightly slower than last year. Thats what happens at this age. but the fact he will be running behind a better line and playing on a better team should make up for all of that. the only thing that really scares me is his age. once RB's pass the age of 30 2 possible scenarios can play out to prevent your RB from being worth their pick: 1) they are less productive due to skill deterioration associated with their age. (addressed mostly in the conversation on this thread) 2) they are at far higher risk of injury. and from what I can tell (though I have not done any formal analysis) the first option and the second option each take up around 50% of the cases where the RB doesnt perform. so the greater risk of injury is something none of us can quantify but the risk is there whether you want to believe it or not. Personally I think if the dude stays healthy the sweet spot to draft him is on the turn between round 1 and 2. but taking the health thing into account there is no doubt he should be a second round pick (in my opinion) Normally I'd discount even more than this and say he should be a third round pick, but Henry has been overall fairly durable as a RB, so I'm giving him a bit of latitude on that. Either way, if I was in a redraft league, I would not be taking him in round 1 and that likely means he wont be on my team. I am ok with this. I love Henry, but at this age (moreso than any other age) it is important not to overpay for a player who fits into this category. and I think a lot of people will overpay for Henry this year.

I was about to say that its rare that any TE is productive in their rookie year. it happens. but the number of cases in the history of the NFL where it did I can probably count on one hand. to that end, I agree. hes a nice late round rookie (or free agent) buy in dynasty. but I'd be surprised if he was highly productive this year. Granted now that I said that his chances of blowing up statistically are probably a lot better. but seriously, you dont need to draft him in redraft leagues. you can put him on your watch list and if he lights it up week 1 you can pick him up on waivers for free. TE is a position people dont generally pay much attention to. so unless hes projected to be one of the top 5 or 6 TE's nobody will be paying attention.

certainly possible. but at the same time I have no info that would confirm or refute this. either way, its not really relevant to the discussion. the important thing is we dont draft him this year for fantasy football. thats the takeaway.

yeah but 80% of where he was 2 years ago is better than likely all but one or two TE's in the NFL. and he has the better QB. so I figure thats still a fair comment to say he is in decline. no shame in it. it is what it is. but we know where he was late last season what we dont know is where he is now after a few months off. I still think he will be a top 10 TE. likely even top 5. I just dont know that hes gonna be top 3. He likely will. but its not a lock like it was in past years.

he has had problems with injuries. and New York actually used him to block more than I anticipated. TE's generally dont have long careers that go much beyond the age of 31. their body takes the pounding of an O lineman and then they take some hits when they go out for passes. personally I wouldnt have used him as much in a blocking role in an attempt to preserve his health and I think that was a mistake on the part of the Giants coaching staff. but either way, its not abnormal for TE's to retire at this age.

8 games where they've averaged 6.7 per carry? wow!

well, that time is good enough that if he can run a good route and catch balls, he would be fast enough that teams may have to have a safety cover him as some LB's might not be able to. in the end, that is key because it will open things up elsewhere in the offense.