I'm not sold on any QB after Bulger...

[cavern 70]

i'm surprised there's not more talk of kitna in this thread. he's got martz, roy, nd now calvin johnson. i know he'll throw some picks, but he did that last year as well and still scored very well from a ff standpoint.

 

plus he says he'll throw 50 tds! ok the last line was a joke, but i DO think he'll be good this year

[jgcrawfish 232]

The Saints snuck up on a lot of people last year, won't happen again. They had the benefit of never having been seen in their current setup, ie...new head coach w/ new staff, new starting qb, new guys at WR and RB. I cannot imagine them having that level of success.

 

Now, that said and to contradict myself, I think they have the possibility to be even better. Bush is such a weapon and will only get better in his 2nd season. Deuce was coming back from major knee surgery and was noticibly limping in training camp and early in the season. Now in his 2nd season back from that surgery, he should be as close to the old Deuce as we're ever gonna see. And please do not underestimate the addition of Eric Johnson at TE. When healthy he's a pass catching machine and Brees loves the TE pass. Add in Meachem (if he ever gets the knee healthy and loses some poundage) and they have an extremely loaded team with a somewhat suspect Defense that should force their offence to put up lots of points.

 

I can't see myself paying 3rd round price for Brees, but if for some reason he were to still be there in the late 4th or heaven forbid the 5th he's be really hard to pass up. In my big $$$ league the QB position is a bit devalued (despite us getting 6 pt per TD) because everybody is hot-n-heavy for RB/WR to fill flex spots. But yearly it seems like the guys competing for the championship have a stud behind center.

 

The Saints snuck up on a lot of people last year, won't happen again. They had the benefit of never having been seen in their current setup, ie...new head coach w/ new staff, new starting qb, new guys at WR and RB. I cannot imagine them having that level of success.

 

Now, that said and to contradict myself, I think they have the possibility to be even better. Bush is such a weapon and will only get better in his 2nd season. Deuce was coming back from major knee surgery and was noticibly limping in training camp and early in the season. Now in his 2nd season back from that surgery, he should be as close to the old Deuce as we're ever gonna see. And please do not underestimate the addition of Eric Johnson at TE. When healthy he's a pass catching machine and Brees loves the TE pass. Add in Meachem (if he ever gets the knee healthy and loses some poundage) and they have an extremely loaded team with a somewhat suspect Defense that should force their offence to put up lots of points.

 

I can't see myself paying 3rd round price for Brees, but if for some reason he were to still be there in the late 4th or heaven forbid the 5th he's be really hard to pass up. In my big $$$ league the QB position is a bit devalued (despite us getting 6 pt per TD) because everybody is hot-n-heavy for RB/WR to fill flex spots. But yearly it seems like the guys competing for the championship have a stud behind center.

[hotgumbo1 12]

Actually, it's more the Saints I have concerns about. They had a magic season what with the national pity party after Katrina. They were inspired and played somewhat out of their heads.

 

While I've seen Brees have a few good seasons, I'm not entirely sold on the Aints being a consistely solid team. Maybe they were a losing culture for so long that it's tough for me to shake in just one year, but I'm just not as high on them in general as everyone is.

scoot..well said!

i'm from here and believe me, i'm as big a saints fan as anyone else and wish them well. but as i had discussed with some rabid saints fans recently, sometimes emotion can really help rally a team forward...that over pure talent and skill. momentum that simply can't be derailed. the dirty birds versus the saints on "homecoming" was one hell of a catalyst. it's like those stories you hear of high school teams who have the odds so stacked against them but yet find a way...

 

i just have a feeling it'll be different this year. we're back to football...plain and simple. no hype, no history! there's still some holes in the defense that concerns me. i think it'll be more like 10-7 or 9-8 for the Saints. i think brees, colston and bush will be fine on the FF end as once again, the Saints will have to play catchup.

[JackARoot 2]

I could definitely go with Kitna this year.

[football_scooter 0]

The Saints snuck up on a lot of people last year, won't happen again. They had the benefit of never having been seen in their current setup, ie...new head coach w/ new staff, new starting qb, new guys at WR and RB. I cannot imagine them having that level of success.

 

Now, that said and to contradict myself, I think they have the possibility to be even better. Bush is such a weapon and will only get better in his 2nd season. Deuce was coming back from major knee surgery and was noticibly limping in training camp and early in the season. Now in his 2nd season back from that surgery, he should be as close to the old Deuce as we're ever gonna see. And please do not underestimate the addition of Eric Johnson at TE. When healthy he's a pass catching machine and Brees loves the TE pass. Add in Meachem (if he ever gets the knee healthy and loses some poundage) and they have an extremely loaded team with a somewhat suspect Defense that should force their offence to put up lots of points.

 

I can't see myself paying 3rd round price for Brees, but if for some reason he were to still be there in the late 4th or heaven forbid the 5th he's be really hard to pass up. In my big $$$ league the QB position is a bit devalued (despite us getting 6 pt per TD) because everybody is hot-n-heavy for RB/WR to fill flex spots. But yearly it seems like the guys competing for the championship have a stud behind center.

 

Couple of thoughts in response...

 

1. Eric Johnson can't stay healthy. Period. He never has. It's not underestmating the signing, it's realistically evaluating the player. I'm a Niners homer as you know, and you see the numbers he put up on that team when he played (which was 1 season) - I was as high on EJ as anyone. But the Niners wouldn't have brought in VDavis if Eric Johnson could stay on the field. I see that as a somewhat worthless signing, and a player that FFB-ers should avoid as a TE1, and take with extreme caution as a TE2. 6 games is my over/under for EJ. And he's not the beast you indicate - he had 1 real good year. Other than that, not much. When VDavos was out last year Eric Johnson looked terrible. Dropped a lot of passes, ran shoddy routes, didn't get much after the catch...he looked like he was just going through the motions. They pretty much used him to block for Gore after a couple games. 34 receptions for 292 yds in 9 games started isn't exactly lighting the world on fire.

 

2. Bush is a talent - he could also have a sophmore slump. One never knows with 2nd year backs. He had a few amazing plays last year - couple really long runs/receptions which may have skewed his numbers a bit. McAllister just had surgery on his knee again this off season. Not as significant as ligament replacement as he went through before last year, but to say Deuce is 100% healthy is inaccurate at this time.

 

3. That suspect defense could mean abandoning the run and becoming 1 dimentional - this is not always a recipe for success for a QB. Sure, it could produce some seriously bloated stats for a game or two, it could also result in more blitzing, more double teaming of the receivers, more interceptions & more sacks.

[RicemanX 20]

Alright, so in my new mock, I went:

 

RB RB WR WR WR RB TE WR RB QB QB

 

I got Alex Smith and Matt Schaub

 

I think it worked out pretty well!

 

Alex Smith

Matt Schaub

Addai

McGahee

Adrian Peterson

Brandon Jackson

Fitz

Moss

Reggie Brown

Galloway

Kellen Winslow

[GobbleDog 1,010]

i'm surprised there's not more talk of kitna in this thread. he's got martz, roy, nd now calvin johnson. i know he'll throw some picks, but he did that last year as well and still scored very well from a ff standpoint.

 

plus he says he'll throw 50 tds! ok the last line was a joke, but i DO think he'll be good this year

 

Kitna really padded his stats in the final two games last year (playing CHI and DAL, both of which had already earned a playoff spot). Kitna threw 7 TDs in those games giving him the (inflated) total of 21 passing TDs. And to go along with that - 22 INTs, 9 lost fumbles.... and sacked 63 times.

 

He's a good back-up, but he's not reliable enough to start every week IMO.

[Skinny_Bastard 159]

Couple of thoughts in response...

 

1. Eric Johnson can't stay healthy. Period. He never has. It's not underestmating the signing, it's realistically evaluating the player. I'm a Niners homer as you know, and you see the numbers he put up on that team when he played (which was 1 season) - I was as high on EJ as anyone. But the Niners wouldn't have brought in VDavis if Eric Johnson could stay on the field. I see that as a somewhat worthless signing, and a player that FFB-ers should avoid as a TE1, and take with extreme caution as a TE2. 6 games is my over/under for EJ. And he's not the beast you indicate - he had 1 real good year. Other than that, not much. When VDavos was out last year Eric Johnson looked terrible. Dropped a lot of passes, ran shoddy routes, didn't get much after the catch...he looked like he was just going through the motions. They pretty much used him to block for Gore after a couple games. 34 receptions for 292 yds in 9 games started isn't exactly lighting the world on fire.

 

They should had went after Greg Olsen from Miami instead of Robert Meachem.

Brees, Colston, Olsen and Bush...

That would had been one hell of a core on the offensive side of the ball over the next 3-4 years.

[Henwah 1]

Kitna really padded his stats in the final two games last year (playing CHI and DAL, both of which had already earned a playoff spot). Kitna threw 7 TDs in those games giving him the (inflated) total of 21 passing TDs. And to go along with that - 22 INTs, 9 lost fumbles.... and sacked 63 times.

 

He's a good back-up, but he's not reliable enough to start every week IMO.

 

Good point. I think that he'll have success with the amazing WR talent, but he can't throw from his arse. Did the Lions do anything worth while with their O-line this offseason, or did Millen forget about it again?

[GobbleDog 1,010]

Did the Lions do anything worth while with their O-line this offseason, or did Millen forget about it again?

Don't know. Then again, I can never tell if a team has upgraded their o-line. Mainly because o-linemen have no stats. It seems like every time a team replaces a previous o-lineman with a free agent, they proclaim to have "upgraded".

 

Regardless, I think people drafting Kitna in the 6th round as their main QB are going to be disapointed.