The LiveBall Sports Arizona Cardinals Season Preview
Checking in on the 32 NFL teams, continuing from the bottom.
What we said about the Cardinals prior to the 2012 season
By staying with Kevin Kolb in 2012, the Cardinals made a much wiser decision with their quarterback position than the Cleveland Browns did with Colt McCoy in almost the same situation. They were rewarded for their decision by a strong three-and-a-quarter game stretch by Kolb that led to a 4-0 start by the Cardinals.
The Cardinals were not a trendy playoff pick last year, pretty much because of their problematic quarterback situation, but they entered 2012 with a well respected defense and the natural homefield advantage that comes from playing in a modern stadium in the pacific time zone. In other terms, it shaped up to be your average Cardinals year.
What should we have known with hindsight?
Kolb got hurt, was replaced by John Skelton, and Skelton was so bad that he got pulled on a coaches decision for Ryan Lindley at quarterback, a player so overmatched that we will likely never see him in an NFL game (if on a roster) again. Skelton was released by the team after the season and the last year of his contract was picked up on waivers by the Cincinnati Bengals. Kolb did not return from injury, but as very much an effect of the size of his contract, Kolb was released by the Cardinals after just two seasons.
Most metrics and predictions had the Cardinals pegged pretty accurately, but I’m not sure anyone saw the historical awfulness of the Cardinals offense coming, specifically given the start to the season that Kolb gave them. The running game fell off the face of the earth behind a Beanie Wells injury, and nothing will derail a team more quickly than a young player who appears to be coming into his own being useless to a franchise. Wells was released due to a knee injury and is still unsigned as I write this.
The bigger issue for the Cardinals is the lack of development of their receivers. Larry Fitzgerald was the league’s best offensive weapon in 2008. Five years later, there’s not a whole lot of evidence that we’re still dealing with a star here. While Fitzgerald continues to get the benefit of the doubt with poor quarterback play, he’s not putting up numbers that other top receivers with poor quarterbacks do. There’s some bias in Fitzgerald’s advanced statistics thanks to forced passes in his direction, but what the statistics can tell is is that Fitzgerald is simply not the player he was earlier in his career. And while a rebound season in 2013 is likely, I don’t think we’re going to enjoy another great season by Fitz again.
Where does the team appear to think it’s at?
On some level, every team is going to be guilty of overrating its current situation: no one (non Reggie McKenzie division) ever wants to admit that the job that they just signed up for is going to be difficult to turn around. However, in the case of the Cardinals it sure felt like new General Manager Steve Keim went into this offseason to target the team’s biggest needs instead of rebuilding.
Obviously, a team can address only so many needs in a single offseason without skimping on some things, and the skimping is the art of team building beyond the science of resource analysis. But at some point, filling needs becomes rebuilding, and for the Cardinals, they can’t compete this year without better performance on the edges than last season.
If the Cardinals don’t compete this year, their veteran offensive acquisitions won’t be around when they are ready to compete in the NFC West.
How did the team improve in the draft and free agency?
The Cardinals identified the interior offensive line, running back, and quarterback as the greatest needs on the team, and addressed all of those needs in the offseason. The problem may be what they did not address: offensive tackle, tight end, and wide receiver.
The Cardinals get positive grades for the quality of players they brought in to address those needs. Carson Palmer and Rashard Mendenhall are A+ grade buy low opportunities in the offensive backfield, and should take the Cardinals from 32nd in the league on offense to about 25th or so. Any further improvement would come from head coach Bruce Arians and his internal development of his receivers.
The Cardinals focused mostly on the defensive side of the football in the draft, addressing the offensive line when they had the value to do so. I have my issues with Jonathan Cooper as the seventh overall pick, but there aren’t many football scouts who don’t believe that is a good selection. Getting DE Alex Okafor, DB Tyrann Mathieu, and LB Kevin Minter in the same draft should be a nice series of building blocks as the defense switches schemes.
What is the team’s outlook for the 2013 season?
The Cardinals just don’t have enough to put it together in the NFC West this season. The acquisitions they made this offseason have a good shot to work. But while they made strong investments, they didn’t get a ton of upside, typically because upside is expensive. Jonathan Cooper is not a high upside player because of the position he plays, and neither is Kevin Minter. Palmer is bound to have a good season before his career is over, but he lacks the pre-injury upside from his early Cincinnati days. Mendenhall is going to have another strong NFL season, but he’s not going to be the player that is expected from a first round running back. Even Fitzgerald’s best years are in the rear-view mirror.
The best case scenario is that the Cardinals ride a strong defense, a nice special teams unit, and homefield advantage to a couple of in-division upsets and a 8 or 9 win season. But the more likely outcome is that the Cards claw their way to a 5 or 6 win season and play in more close games than they did last season. Measurable progress, but still very much a standard-level Arizona Cardinals season.
Previously: Kansas City Chiefs, Jacksonville Jaguars, Oakland Raiders, Philadelphia Eagles, Detroit Lions, Cleveland Browns,
The LiveBall Sports Cleveland Browns Season Preview
Checking in on the 32 NFL teams, continuing from the bottom.
What we said about the Browns prior to the 2013 season
The Browns were a really bad team in 2011 running a really primitive offense and any hope of competitiveness in 2012 would lean heavily on Trent Richardson coming in and making people forget that Peyton Hillis was ever a Madden cover athlete (he was, for some reason). The incumbent quarterback was Colt McCoy, but when the Browns’ plan A to trade up in the draft for Robert Griffin III in the 2012 draft fell through, the team settled on using a lower first round pick on QB Brandon Weeden.
Weeden replaced McCoy as kind of a quick-fix style of draft choice for a team that really needed to rebound from a 2011 season that disappointed even the most reasonable expectations, not to mention those who expected that Browns team to make the playoffs. Based on how poorly the Browns had played in 2011, it was hard to see them improving without Richardson and Weeden being a major part of the improvement.
What we should have known with hindsight
The Browns were better in 2012, but Richardson and Weeden hardly contributed. Richardson failed to hit the 1,000 yard milestone, despite being one of just a few feature backs left in the NFL. That makes it seem like Richardson was a failure: he was not, he just was not a high efficiency player as a rookie, averaging under 4,0 YPC. Weeden on the other hand, offered little to lean on going forward from his age-29 season. Weeden was worse in 2012 as a 29-year old rookie than McCoy was in 2011 as a 24-year old sophomore.
McCoy has since been traded to San Francisco to be Colin Kaepernick’s backup and low-probability relief ace should Kaep’s NFC-winning half season prove to be a total mirage (it won’t). Weeden has a very tenuous hold on the starting gig in Cleveland.
This is a great example of why it makes more sense to change up your front office leadership one year too early than one year too late. The Browns spent two first round picks in 2012 trying to upgrade their offensive backfield, but could have done it just as easily without spending either first round pick. McCoy flashed vertical playmaking ability from inside and outside the pocket in 2010 and 2011 as the Browns starter, but surrounded that ability with general inconsistency at the position. Using a first round pick on a McCoy successor four years his senior with a similar college resume isn’t just a move that didn’t work out, it’s a bad process. Richardson was good enough to defensibly be the third overall pick, but even then, it’s clear the Browns overvalued him as he likely was not a top ten running back in 2012.
The disposed front office deserves a lot of credit for getting 21-year old rookie WR Josh Gordon for a second round pick in the Supplementary draft, a good move for all the reasons that Weeden was a bad move. It cost the new front office a second round pick, which is unfortunate, but when the Redskins traded two future first round picks to jump the Browns and acquire RG3, there wasn’t a ton of outcry about what that might do to hamstring a future front office. If ownership leaves a front office group in power too long, the status quo seems to be that mortgaging the future to save a job or three or seventeen is fair game.
The Mike Holmgren-Pat Shurmur era in Cleveland was a bad process that yielded disappointing results, but something about the current iteration of the Browns remains salvageable. This is not a talentless roster, and there aren’t a ton of bad contracts on it. With the old regime pushed out the door, there are reasons to be optimistic, pessimistic, and apathetic about the 2013 Browns, and their new management led by Michael Lombardi.
Where does the team appear to think it’s at?
The team feels like 2013 is just the beginning of what they are building towards, but without the team’s long term solution at quarterback on the roster, expectations will remained tempered. That’s a pretty large hole on the roster: Weeden’s going to get a fair shake to meet expectations, but that leash isn’t going to be long. It might not even last through the preseason.
The team’s other holes include vertical receivers not named Josh Gordon, and inside linebackers who can stack and shed, and just generally make plays without the defensive line in front of them keeping them clean. Those are pretty big holes, but overall, it’s nothing compared to what a lot of the competition in the AFC is looking at.
So the Browns sit in the no-man’s land between quarterback-driven contender (which they clearly are not), and rebuilding project (which they really aren’t). They can choose either direction, and should be able to contend for the division (and obviously a wild card berth by extension) as soon as this fall. But they aren’t yet one, two, or three pieces away, and like many AFC teams are going to have to ask their coaching staff to plug a lot of known weaknesses throughout year one of the Rob Chudzynski era.
Their lack of overpaid veterans and declining stars give them a significant leg up on the competition, particularly in division with Pittsburgh (and Baltimore, although they’ve turned over the aging stars this offseason).
How did the team improve in the draft and free agency?
The Browns spent a ton of money, adding two outside linebackers in Barkevious Mingo (6th overall draft pick), and Paul Kruger ($$$) who they may have overpaid. They also added an nice talent on the defensive line, Desmond Bryant ($$$), though they really overpaid. They did get value in getting two years on QB Jason Campbell’s contract, and I would guess that he’s a slight favorite in the QB competition, though a tie would go to Weeden.
The Browns couldn’t do a ton of maneuvering in the draft because of the Josh Gordon selection, but Gordon will be just 22 this year, so they aren’t complaining.
Because of the relatively low payroll the Browns carried through the Pat Shurmur era, Lombardi and his front office had the ability to spend a lot of money. They identified the players who fit the Browns now, and gave up that future spending power to upgrade the roster. The free agent market is still one of the most inefficient ways to spend a team’s resources, but when your team has very few established veterans on long term contracts, you have to use the free agent market effectively to add talent so that you aren’t just drafting players onto a non-competitive team.
The downside is that Lombardi won’t get another chance to get it right if Mingo and Kruger don’t rush the passer that well, and the other main signings, Bryant and Quentin Groves, look like they’ll be cap casualties at best in a few years, if they aren’t wastes of money in the meantime.
The other issue is that every dollar the Browns spend now is a dollar they will not have to build around their quarterback once they find him.
What is the team’s outlook for the 2013 season?
The Browns are in a shockingly strong position, and it gets even better when you consider that no team is going to get as much of a boost going from last year’s coaching to this year’s coaching. There is nothing Chudzynski and Norv Turner can do to be worse than the coaching they had last season. It’s probably going to get a lot better.
And even a small improvement in the talent is getting the Browns over .500 for the first time since 2007, when Chudzynski was the offensive coordinator. I don’t think that improvement can be just assumed, in which case, the Browns are a .500 team. But the 2013 Browns are a .500 team with a considerable amount of upside. They can’t compete to win the AFC title without guys like Weeden and Richardson at least hitting the expectations that the Browns had for them when they picked them. They’ll probably fall short of that. But eight to ten wins is within the range of what the Browns can accomplish this year.
Previously: Kansas City Chiefs, Jacksonville Jaguars, Oakland Raiders, Philadelphia Eagles, Detroit Lions,
The LiveBall Sports Detroit Lions Season Preview
Checking in on the 32 NFL teams, continuing from the bottom.
What we said about the Lions prior to the 2012 season
A very good team likely to regress towards .500 thanks to youth, some discipline issues, and simple statistical regression. The Lions went 10-6 to make the playoffs in 2011, and the sky appeared to be the limit for a very young team. The whole world knew Calvin Johnson was sensational, and Matthew Stafford’s 5,000 yard passing season seemed to validate the first overall pick on him in 2009 (although those two facts were more related than Lions fans wanted to give credit for).
The Lions had a really strong defense in 2011 that fueled its playoff run, but it faded down the stretch. Stafford was incredibly clutch in 2011, beating the Chargers and the Raiders with sensational passing performances, while the defenses was giving up yards at a historic rate. To Carson Palmer and Matt Flynn.
They would need to stay healthy again thanks to lacking depth, but if the defense could so much as fix what ailed it down the stretch in 2011 (they did not get even one second half stop in New Orleans on Wild Card weekend, mitigating another strong performance by Stafford and Johnson), the Lions would certainly find a way back into the playoffs in 2012.
What we should have known with hindsight
The Lions started the season 1-3 with a couple of close losses, which was very predictable given the barnburner season they just came off of. At that point, the Lions righted the ship, at one point beating Russell Wilson and the Seahawks, making it back to 4-4 by Halloween. And then…
The wheels fell off the Lions season. The defense was highly underrated in 2011 when it gave up a lot of yards and points, but also forced a lot of three and outs and QB sacks and got the ball back to the offense. In 2012, the Lions defense was penalty ridden and generally pretty bad. We probably should have seen that coming.
Also, despite Stafford’s hot streak to end the 2011 season, it proved to be just that, a hot streak. Stafford is still a wild and inconsistent passer. Johnson ended up setting the single season record for receiving yards, which he was able to accomplish thanks to a record amount of passes thrown by the Lions in losing effort…which is in part due Stafford’s overall inaccuracy. The Lions season should dispel the myth once and for all that great receivers cannot get their numbers if they have inconsistent quarterback play. Receivers cannot change the course of seasons by themselves, but in the case of someone like Larry Fitzgerald, it’s okay to point out that he is just not a great receiver anymore. Calvin Johnson just had one of the all time great receiver seasons on a 4-12 team with inconsistent and at times downright poor quarterback play.
With hindsight we should have realized that players with an extensive concussion history simply cannot be relied on to have impactful pro careers. To an extent, concussion risk is going to be a factor that teams cannot control and can only prepare for because head injuries are a simple reality of the game of football as it is currently played. But Jahvid Best might be at the end of a very brief career given it is simply not safe for him to engage in contact sports anymore.
Where does the team appear to think it is at?
The Lions believe they will be a serious playoff contender in 2013. They are the only team picking in the top five who made the playoffs in 2011, although the Raiders, Chiefs, and Eagles all got relatively close. The Lions shouldn’t have any issue rebounding to where they were in 2011, but if they are going to be more than just the fringe playoff contender they were that season, it’s going to take an excellent effort in all three phases of the game. The entire Lions organization finds itself at a crossroads in 2013.
If making an allowance for Stafford’s “decline” (not that he was worse, he just put together a couple of mirage games at an arbitrary endpoint), the Lions offense was overall improved in 2012. They had receiver issues outside of Johnson, highlighted by Titus Young’s spectacular brain lapses, a mid-season trade for an ineffective Mike Thomas, and Kris Durham getting playing time. But those issues were there in 2011 as well. Brandon Pettigrew had an up and down season, but he had that problem in 2011 as well. The offensive line had the best season by a Detroit OL in a decade. Detroit lead the NFL in adjusted sack rate, and finished above average in run blocking measures.
It’s hard to be anything but optimistic about an offense that Scott Linehan has built into maybe the most multiple attack in the entire NFL, a fully implemented system that can only beat itself with penalties, turnovers, and leaving plays on the field (and the lack of sacks allowed is a huge advantage).
The issue for the Lions is that the defensive talent (particularly on the defensive line) has been called into question by a mostly dreadful performance last season when every possible age-based projection suggested the Lions defense was ascending. That’s why the Lions’ most important offseason acquisition is the reuniting of revered defensive line coach Jim Washburn with head coach Jim Schwartz, after two disappointing seasons in Philadelphia. Washburn got good results from the defensive line in Philly, despite the team’s overall ineptitude.
How did the team improve in the draft and free agency?
Detroit believes itself to be established on the interior line where they are strong (although they have to get more snaps from Nick Fairley this season) and have depth, but they decided to rebuild the defensive edges after they didn’t get much return at all from Kyle Vanden Bosch and Cliff Avril. This year, that tandem will be rookie Ziggy Ansah (the fifth overall selection) and Eastern Michigan product Jason Jones, the team’s top free agent target.
They also attacked the safety position, re-signing Louis Delmas to a very manageable contract and adding Glover Quin from the Texans, upgrading their revolving door from last year and giving the team two cover safeties. Reggie Bush adds flare to an offense that may have benefited more directly from a substance-type addition. Bush does fit the kind of offense the Lions have been in recent seasons, although I think I would have focused on what I wanted to be — something Green Bay did a good job of this offseason — rather than what I have been.
Overall, the defense still has as many questions as answers and the team was unable to address three major losses on the offensive line, when the team released RG Stephen Peterman due to contract and performance, while longtime Lions LT Jeff Backus (Matt Millen’s first draft choice) finally retired, and RT Gosder Cherilus (Millen’s final first round draft choice) left for Indianapolis in free agency. The Lions offense should keep rolling in 2013 with plug-and-play offensive line tactics, but with C Dominic Raiola nearing the end of the line, the Lions will be dealing with even more turnover in the near-term future.
What is the team’s outlook for the 2013 season?
I’ve flirted with the idea that the Lions remind me a lot of the 1998 Vikings, the team that went 15-1 with Randall Cunningham at quarterback, and Stafford reminds me a lot of Cunningham in more than a few ways. So while the upside of the Lions is the number one overall seed in the NFC, the realistic picture is a lot more murky.
Washburn may have a huge effect on the Lions, but if the defense was likely to be significantly improved, we would have seen the signs before now. Detroit couldn’t rush the passer at all last year, finishing in the bottom five in adjusted sack rate. The personnel is different this year, but I’m not sure they will have any more success. Detroit wasted great coverage linebacker seasons with a poor pass rush last year.
If the defense can improve just a little bit, the Lions can get back to the playoffs, and if they can take at least one game from the Packers, they can challenge for the division title. However, there isn’t a whole lot between this team and last place either. They ask a lot of their quarterback position, and while Stafford has been a lot healthier these last two season than in his first two, he’s still young, inconsistent player who could still be a couple years from overall consistency as a passer.
Detroit is a very volatile team, as they have been the entire Jim Schwartz era. They went 6-10 in 2010, but played like a .500 team, tipping off that they might be ready to break out. Detroit played like a 10-6 team in 2011, which they were. Last year, despite trying to work through a lot of disasters, they played more like a 6.5 win team than a 4-12 team, and even that felt like underachieving given their talent. After a three year period where the Lions averaged 6.5 wins but played like an above .500 team in terms of point differential, the Lions could be ready for a real breakout on offense, which would take them above 10 wins in terms of raw talent. But given how volatile the Lions have proven, they could take a real step forward, and I still wouldn’t feel great predicting them to win more than 7 or 8 games in the NFC North.
There’s just a lot of teams there in the same boat as the Detroit Lions. Given where they were five years ago, that’s a good thing. Given where they were two years ago, that’s a bad thing. Your perception of the Lions may vary, it just depends how much you want to give the current regime credit for, and how high your expectations for the future are. If up against high expectations, I don’t think Jim Schwartz and Martin Mayhew can go much higher in Detroit as a tandem. 2013 could be the last run for this group in Detroit.
Previously: Kansas City Chiefs, Jacksonville Jaguars, Oakland Raiders, Philadelphia Eagles,
The LiveBall Sports Philadelphia Eagles Season Preview
Checking in on the 32 NFL teams, continuing from the bottom.
What we said about the Eagles prior to the 2012 season
The Eagles will almost certainly open 2012 as the favorite in the NFC East. They have quarterback questions: if it’s not Mike Vick’s health, it’s his abilities, but he does happen to be at the controls of the most dominant offense in his division. This may not be a dream team, but it’s a team that has Michael Vick, LeSean McCoy, Brent Celek, Jason Peters, Todd Herremans, Evan Mathis, Cullen Jenkins, Trent Cole, Jason Babin, Nnamdi Asomugha, and Asante Samuel on the same roster. That’s pretty good.
The Eagles won their final four contests in a 2011 season that was superficially disappointing given the team’s own high expectations, but the underlying performance to the 2011 Eagles season suggested that they managed to improve a fair amount from the team’s division winning season in 2010, and the sky would be the limit for the team going forward into 2012.
Defensive coordinator Juan Castillo’s unit was universally ripped for its performance in 2011, but the unit improved in his first year as coordinator from the year before, albeit not by quite as much as the increased payroll might have raised expectations. But when looking for reasons the 2011 Eagles year went south, it really just starts and ends with turnovers. There were no indications of deeper issues, and 2012 looked for the whole world to be a strong rebound year.
There were questions around Michael Vick, no different from the questions that have been there his whole career, but the presence of Andy Reid, quarterback whisperer, mitigated those concerns to an extent.
What should we have known with the benefit of hindsight?
Even with the benefit of hindsight, the total collapse of the Andy Reid era is still without clear explanation. One thing that hindsight shows pretty clearly is that the management/ownership of the Eagles didn’t exactly go all in supporting its coaching staff. The Eagles ended up firing Juan Castillo after five weeks, and then the defense got much, much worse under Todd Bowles. The offense also collapsed: not only did the Eagles not stop turning the ball over, but they also regressed in the running game, and never really improved in terms of throwing the football. Jeremy Maclin, Brent Celek, and LeSean McCoy moved from the category of future stars to the category of players who the Eagles just don’t know what they have. DeSean Jackson had a good season, but no longer looks like the future star he looked like earlier in his career. The Eagles talent development machine just seemed to stop producing.
Which is fine (though hardly ideal) if the team can just lean on its veterans. But the veteran contribution began to fall apart before the season started when left tackle Jason Peters was lost for the year. Nnamdi Asomugha and Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie were worse in 2012 than in 2011. Asante Samuel was a Falcon. The Eagles didn’t take any strides to solving the safety position that became a problem prior to the dream team era, when Quentin Mikell left for St. Louis. The offensive line was an abject disaster. The Eagles have not drafted well since 2010. And at the conclusion of the 2012 season, they cleaned house, getting rid of all the big contracts from the 2011 offseason.
What lessons can you learn from a situation that went sour as quickly as the Eagles? It was unfathomable that an Andy Reid team could be as bad as the team he took over of in 1999. But the decision to fire Reid became obvious when the team’s future and current prospects collapsed last year. Any lesson would have been related to how the Eagles could have prevented such a collapse rather than what we could have done to predict it. There were no indicators that everything would come crashing down around Reid and Vick.
Where does the team appear to think it’s at?
This is such a tough question to put my finger on. Quality writers who follow the Eagles much more closely than I do think that the Eagles are entering a long rebuilding period under Chip Kelly, which is certainly something that last season would justify, except the Eagles haven’t really done anything in the offseason indicative of rebuilding.
There will certainly be a rebuilding period of the season, as the team moves its defensive scheme from the even front they ran through Jim Johnson and Sean McDermott and Juan Castillo during Reid’s tenure to a 3-4 front. The immediate returns for a team moving from a 40 front to a 30 front are typically very good, but the Eagles probably still haven’t learned their lesson from being in the same division as the Redskins — the last team to struggle when it switched to a 3-4 defense. And as the Eagles transition to the 3-4, there’s no real reason to think there is immediate help on the horizon on defense. Three years ago, Trent Cole, Connor Barwin, and Brandon Graham would have been an excellent edge rush rotation. Now…Graham’s in his prime years but the Eagles probably should not expect great edge rush production.
The team’s linebackers have been weak for years, but the strength of the defensive line has always made up for it (until last year when it simply could not redeem the linebackers and safeties). Now, with the defensive line changing philosophies 180 degrees, they’ll be two-gapping up front to stop the run and take some pressure off the linebackers. Once the Eagles get their linebackers of the future, that is.
Maybe the Eagles think they can compete this year, and the 3-4 switch will help them compete, but there are still major questions about Michael Vick, questions that have been unanswered throughout his career, but the presence of Chip Kelly dispells some of those questions.
How did the team improve itself in the draft and free agency
A 3-4 edge rusher would have been a good spot to go in the top four of the draft, but the team may not have had a high grade on Barkevious Mingo, and ended up drafting OT Lane Johnson with the fourth pick. The Eagles offensive line likely should be taken care of at this point, but they’ve switched coaching there as well, and I don’t know if any unit in the NFL is being asked to relearn as much as the Eagles OL is going to be asked to going from Andy Reid to Chip Kelly. A cornerstone OT makes sense, and getting Peters back healthy cannot hurt, but it could take years for Kelly to get his offensive line to where he had it every single year at Oregon. The Eagles organization may simply be underestimating the shift in philosophy they have undertaken.
They are giving Kelly pieces through free agency. The Eagles continue to be near the top of the league in really well structured contracts, a competitive advantage they have enjoyed for years, but the players they are giving those contracts to seem to be having a weakened effect towards helping win games. Keep this in mind with the Eagles signing a new secondary: CBs Bradley Fletcher and Cary Williams, and S Patrick Chung and Kenny Phillips: the Eagles got good contracts here, but those players do not make me think the Eagles will have a good secondary next year.
They drafted Matt Barkley, who is not in a good situation to produce in year one, because if Barkley gets on the field at all next year, it’s not because his teammates have been playing up to par.
What is the team’s outlook for the 2013 season?
The Eagles play in the NFC East, which is about as good a situation as a team can have in the NFC. A question of whether the Eagles can make the playoffs next year is basically a question of whether or not they can win their division. They can win their division, but would have to have the longest odds at this point.
They have the second highest upside of any team in the division after the Redskins, but also have the lowest floor by far, and there are significant design flaws in the roster as well as the organization. And while the upside is there, the Eagles were not a good team last year, and didn’t do a ton to improve themselves in the offseason.
With that said, Chip Kelly’s tactics give the Eagles a lot of opportunity to improve on an organizational level over the course of the regular season. 2013 may not be a pretty year for the Eagles, and they may be even somewhat uncompetitive in a lot of their early games, but it’s a high leverage season for the Eagles front office. They very well may find they wasted a year by not starting a necessary rebuilding if their offense struggles behind Michael Vick again, should quarterback whisperer Chip Kelly not be able to reach the veteran QB. Or they might find out that they need a good six to seven game stretch to win the NFC East, not unlike the 3-6 Redskins were able to do next year.
The Eagles’ management team could look like geniuses at the end of the season. But it’s more likely that they’ll look like an organization that has lost it’s way, and needs to shake things up above the coaching staff level.
Previously: Kansas City Chiefs, Jacksonville Jaguars, Oakland Raiders,
The LiveBall Sports Oakland Raiders Season Preview
Checking in on the 32 NFL teams, continuing from the bottom.
What we said about the Raiders prior to the 2012 season
I picked the 2012 Raiders to make the playoffs on pretty much the same hunch I picked the 2012 Dolphins to make the playoffs. I saw the Broncos, Bengals, and Steelers as major candidates for regression, and as a team that played all three of those teams, the Raiders made sense as a team that should have been able get over .500 for the first time in a decade. It wasn’t a team that had enough talent to win more than 9 or 10 games, but it was one that had enough talent to win about half of its games, maybe more.
I did not think that the Raiders were the favorites in the AFC West, however:
Instead of taking one last run in 2012 with Hue Jackson’s guys (a personal friend of McKenzie), the Raiders will field an average roster that they can build towards bigger things in 2013. That decision was questioned at the time, but looks a heck of a lot better now that Peyton Manning has signed on with the Broncos. With San Diego and now Denver fighting atop the division, and Kansas City able to improve at a greater rate than the Raiders, Oakland couldn’t have done anything to be the favorites in the division.
It’s not like the defense could have been any worse than it was in was in 2011 and the pieces of the decade-best offense that Hue Jackson built in 2011 were still intact, fueling the optimism in Oakland.
What should we have known with the benefit of hindsight
The Raiders will not be “building towards bigger things” in 2013. The 2012 season was a major disappointment, even by the standards the Raiders have set. An 8-8 ish roster went 4-12, and at times looked worse than a 4-12 team.
The Raiders weren’t a deep team last year, and they were a really injured team in 2011, so it was reasonable to expect the Raiders to not get their depth tested in quite the same way as 2011. That was wrong. The 2012 Raiders was a team that lacked depth, got that depth tested, and lost. Then they released everybody, but that’s a story for later in the article.
Darren McFadden has never been a great player, by the numbers, but I picked him to win offensive player of the year (which was won by AFC West rival Peyton Manning). McFadden was perhaps the worst running back in the league last year. Some of that was scheme, some of it was poor blocking up front, most of it was McFadden trying to bounce everything and be a hero on a team that had a very competent quarterback in Carson Palmer and an offense built around Palmer. Instead of finding a way to positively contribute, McFadden torpedoed his offense as much as any non quarterback did in the NFL. He also got hurt and missed about half the season which, he’s still Darren McFadden, so yeah.
We probably should have known that a team that had absolutely no chance of getting any impact from its draft class (its top 2012 draft pick was Tony Bergstrom, a 26 year old guard) wasn’t going to compete over the long haul, though in my defense, 9-7 isn’t exactly competing over the long haul, it’s really just six good weeks (see: Bengals, Cincinnati).
Palmer threw for 4,000 yards last year, but largely disappointed any reasonable expectation for his performance. Palmer did not play poorly by any measure, but the offense was built around him, and the Raiders passing offense has been fairly progressive the last two years. Palmer left too many plays on the field, and the Raiders did not have a very high margin of error in most of their games.
Also, a team that cannot tackle well is likely not going to improve much on defense. The Raiders improved their tackling in 2012, but Doug Martin was not aware of this and all that improvement in tackling just exposed the real problem: personnel mistakes such as Aaron Curry and Rolando McClain. One of those players ended last season out of the league, and the other is currently out of the league.
Where does the team appear to think it’s at?
The Raiders are more or less an expansion team at this point.
How did the team improve itself through the draft and free agency?
The highest paid member of the 2013 Raiders will be “deadcap”, who will receive a $50 million salary on this team. Deadcap does not count towards roster limits, and cannot play any sports.
The Raiders were frugal in free agency, waiting until last week to add their biggest offseason acquisition, WR/KR Josh Cribbs. Cribbs feels like he’s been around forever, and he may very well be done as an elite returner, but he’s just thirty years old. When you compare Cribbs to another special teams ace that switched teams this year, Lorenzo Alexander who signed with Arizona after six years with the Redskins, Cribbs has every advantage: more accomplished, younger (by 9 days), plays a premium position in offensive sets, more value in those sets than Alexander offers, and shorter contract for less money. He may look pretty done at this point, but at age 30 hes still a really good pickup.
The Raiders had a really nice draft, one that can be the cornerstone draft for the next eight or so years of the franchise, one that would not have been possible without the assistance of the Dolphins, who liked Dion Jordan enough to make the trade up to the Raiders’ third overall pick. Oakland got the player they wanted, CB DJ Hayden, who profiles as a cornerstone defensive player at a position where the Raiders have been weak since letting Nnamdi Asomugha walk to Philly two years ago, and so weak last year, that Michael Huff (a safety) let them in starts at cornerback. Getting a projectable RT project in Menelik Watson makes sense so long as by project the Raiders mean “in the starting lineup as a rookie” because Watson, a former amateur boxer, will be 25 this season. And the Raiders are going to enjoy watching LB Sio Moore wreck people on special teams before they have to worry about finding a spot in the starting lineup at this time next year.
The Raiders had little choice but to let some of their strongest contributors from 2012 walk in free agency. Phillip Wheeler signed a five year deal with the Dolphins. Tommy Kelly was released and signed with the Patriots. Darrius Heyward-Bey was released and signed with the Colts. Rolando McClain was released, signed with the Ravens, then retired. Mike Goodson signed with the Jets. Michael Huff was released and signed with the Ravens. Matt Shaughnessy signed with the Cardinals. But the player that general manager Reggie McKenzie really wanted to retain, Desmond Bryant, signed with Cleveland for a lot more money than he was worth to the Raiders. More of the teams’ cornerstone players will be eligible for free agency next year, and while the cap constraints may keep Oakland from extending those players during the season, they will have plenty of money after the season to make moves and keep those long term pieces in Oakland.
What is the team’s outlook for the 2013 season?
Pretty poor, but maybe not as bad as it’s been suggested. The Raiders do have some semblance of their identity, and they don’t have any candidates for regression on the roster, which will happen when you get rid of everybody that is established and only shop for bargains.
Palmer was traded to Arizona in the offseason, which is strangely a footnote in a fairly dysfunctional offseason. Matt Flynn is the quarterback of the Raiders until he isn’t, which is not a statement intended to be so obvious, its just meant to describe Matt Flynn’s place in this league.
Flynn needs to keep winning to keep his job, but the Raiders are going to struggle to string together wins in the early going. An upset here and there is probably the best case scenario for what appears to be a four win team.
Previously: Kansas City Chiefs, Jacksonville Jaguars,
The LiveBall Sports Jacksonville Jaguars Season Preview
Checking in on the 32 NFL teams, continuing from the bottom.
What we said about the Jaguars prior to the 2012 season
Not much.
Jacksonville Jaguars
The Jaguars probably made a catastrophic mistake with the Laurent Robinson contract. It’s unfortunate that Robinson will get paid like a no. 1 reciever, because he won’t be the no. 1 receiver even on a team with Mike Thomas. Robinson, when healthy, improves the Jaguars starting lineup.
But the Jaguars continue to find pieces to build their defense, leaving a pass rusher as the only need remaining on that side of the ball. With the Texans losing Jason Allen and Demeco Ryans, the Jaguars enter 2012 as potentially the strongest defensive unit in the NFL.
I liked the offseason the Jags had on the defensive side of the ball, but didn’t think they added enough to the offense. Maurice Jones-Drew ended up holding out, and didn’t play the first series of the teams Week 1 game against Minnesota. The Jags started off competitive behind competency at quarterback from Blaine Gabbert, but quickly faded as Gabbert faded, then got hurt.
The Jaguars defense was excellent in 2011, and while defensive unit performance tends to be very tough to predict from year to year, I seemed to be confident that the Jags could sustain a majority of their gains from 2011, when they went from being one of the worst units, to one of the best. I certainly didn’t see any reason to suggest the Jags would fall off while the division rival Texans would manage to maintain their gains.
What should we have known, given the benefit of hindsight?
The Jags did not sustain their defensive gains and were a considerably worse team in 2012 than 2011. Blaine Gabbert made the necessary strides to maintain viability, given how awful his rookie season was. A better quarterback, and the 2011 Jags probably compete. With a better quarterback the 2012 Jags are dead in the water the second Maurice Jones-Drew got hurt.
Two things I surely overrated about last years Jags were the invulnerability of Jones-Drew, and the impending regression of the defense. The regression on defense probably was more obvious than I gave credit for — I thought Mel Tucker and the Jags defense was capable of sustaining and I gave them the benefit of considerable doubt. Specifically, the back seven just collapsed, as Daryl Smith and Paul Posluszny made the dive from useful veterans to over the hill linebackers.
Given how poorly managed this Jacksonville franchise was, they do not deserve our sympathy. However, one of the main reasons I had overrated this team is because they had years and years of established consistent performance from Smith and from Jones-Drew, and all of a sudden, that production simply wasn’t there in 2012, and likely isn’t coming back in 2013.
Where does the team appear to think it is at?
Full scale rebuilding. The Jags did absolutely nothing brash this offseason, taking the same approach the Seattle Seahawks did in 2010 when Gus Bradley was a first year defensive coordinator under Pete Carroll and John Schneider. That approach is to not make any major decisions on players on the roster without first seeing them play in your system. The first year under this group is a mulligan year, and the real test will begin in 2013.
The Jags did not force Blaine Gabbert out of the lineup, because the mere probability that Gabbert isn’t a starting NFL quarterback isn’t certainty. Under Jedd Fisch, he will be learning his third offense in three years. That is never a good thing, but this coaching staff will have an advantage the other one did not: their jobs are not tied to Gabbert, and they are free to go in a different direction at any time. Gabbert will be challenged by Chad Henne, but Henne hasn’t looked great. Jacksonville appears very comfortable finishing in the Teddy Bridgewater-Jadaveon Clowney realm of next year’s draft, but it doesn’t take anything more than a short hot streak where a team plays well to knock them out of contention for the first pick.
How did the team improve itself in the draft and through free agency?
Addition by subtraction, only. You have to feel a bit for former Jags head coach Mike Mularkey, who simply made a bad career move to take a head coaching job on a sinking ship. When you went as far as Mularkey did between head coaching gigs, you can understand that decision, but he was saddled with Blaine Gabbert, a dreadful roster, and a superstar running back who didn’t want to be there, and was expected to save a bad general manager’s job. Mularkey didn’t save anyone, and was promptly let go from what is likely his last head coaching gig.
Getting rid of that group of executives and coaches was an immediate addition by subtraction upgrade, and the other coaches who weren’t Mularkey landed on their feet (Tucker will coordinate the Bears defense this year).
The team drafted Luke Joeckel with the second pick in the draft, meaning the team’s two best current players are left tackles. Obviously, one of the two will start at right tackle this year. Gabbert is still the quarterback. Denard Robinson is on the roster, and gives you a reason to watch the Jaguars. Jonathan Cyprien comes up the road from Florida International and should start as a rookie at safety. Free agency focused on adding young (26-28 year olds) players at bargain prices.
Overall, the Jags focused on best player available, and will spend the 17 week season worrying about finding its cornerstone players. They know that they won’t have to worry about offensive line in the future, but every other position is fair game. Changes will be made throughout the season as players play themselves into what is a coherent plan in Jacksonville for the first time since the Tom Coughlin days.
What is the team’s outlook for the 2013 season?
Overall, it’s pretty bleak in the short term, though the competition level in the AFC South isn’t scaring the Jaguars or any pundits. The Jaguars rid themselves of enough dead weight in the offseason. It’s hard to tell how long Blaine Gabbert’s leash is going to be — it could be anywhere from yanked in training camp to getting the majority of the season before the Jags will consider a switch. I get the sense that the Jags aren’t worried about Gabbert “proving” anything to them, or have him on any sort of developmental timetable.
Gabbert is a very young player, and who knows how Philip Rivers’ career would have turned out if he was forced into his lineup the first two years he was in the league? He could be a case of NFL fans just getting to see too much of the developmental process too soon. As fans and observers, we are conditioned to pass judgment quickly on players, and it is clear that the Jags are very determined to not do that here.
This could go a long way towards changing the culture of the new administration that comes in and wants to change everything in the building from the desk chairs to the team culture to the quarterback. One certainly get the sense that ownership is behind management’s plan here. If things go according to how many expect, you can bet the Jags will be aggressive in the quarterback market next season.
Once the Jags strap it on for training camp, any talk about the team tanking the season will be forgotten. This is a team that is capable of winning games with the amount of talent it currently has on the roster. It’s a more talented roster than what the new Chiefs management inherited, which is why it’s so interesting (and pretty cool) to see two very divergent philosophies: the Chiefs who see a weak conference and a short term opportunity, and the Jaguars, who are taking their time and not rushing to judgement off any parts of the roster based on a mere scouting hunch. It does mean that the Jaguars, who have little depth at a lot of key positions, are probably going to be overrun in November and December by more cohesive teams who have been building for longer.
But nothing is a certainty, and all Jacksonville has to do to get to .500 is put together two or three quality performances a month, from coin toss to final whistle. A 4-12 season sounds about right, if you ask me in May (you didn’t, but you can pretend you did). The real intentions of the Jags will come clearer in pre-season. Right now, the team is content to sit back, conserve its resources, and not tip its hand about its true intentions.
Previously: Kansas City Chiefs,
The LiveBall Sports Kansas City Chiefs Season Preview
Checking in on the 32 NFL teams, starting from the bottom.
A question: will the next Kansas City team to score 10+ be the Royals or the Chiefs?
What we said about the Chiefs prior to the 2012 season
“too talented to ignore this season“
I wrote a pretty extensive article expressing enough optimism for the 2012 Chiefs season to talk about them in the same breath as the Ravens as teams that could represent the AFC in the Super Bowl. The Ravens went on to make me look smart. The Chiefs…not so much.
The Chiefs are a more interesting projection, because we know about how skilled they are on defense, and how they can now get after the passer with regularity. Losing Brandon Carr will hurt more in the long term than the short term, because Stanford Routt can play the second corner position at a high level. Eric Winston is a huge upgrade at RT, the team’s most problematic position.
The Chiefs have to overcome Matt Cassel at quarterback, but there is at least some evidence he can deliver a season in between his performances in 2010 and 2011. He will have better players to throw to and is very comfortable in the offense. It’s the combination of Peyton Hillis and Jamaal Charles at running back that should make the Chiefs the favorites in the AFC West. The Chiefs have a lot of talent coming off of injury and as that talent gets healthier and healthier as the year goes on (provided it does get healthier), the Chiefs are going to be a tough out in the AFC playoffs capable of beating the NE Patriots or Pittsburgh Steelers.
Oops.
I was clearly really optimistic on the Chiefs running game heading into 2012. Overall, it performed quite well, thanks to the bounceback season enjoyed by Jamaal Charles in his first year back from a torn ACL. Charles, understandably, posted a career low YPC average in 2012. Less understandably, that average was 5.3. Charles is preposterously good at football. Unfortunately, the overall production of the running game was dragged down by the ineptness of the passing game, posting a -7.0% DVOA for the year. Peyton Hillis ended up being the same guy he was in Cleveland during a down 2011 season: this is who Peyton Hillis is.
Matt Cassel did not rebound, instead giving his middle finger to the plexiglass principle and dropping his interception rate to 1:2, an amazing decline from the 4:1 it was in 2010. We can say what we want to about Charlie Weis — and he’s the kind of personality that gets run out of town on a rail — but they haven’t at all been the same team since Charlie Weis was run out of town on a rail.
Speaking of Charlie Weis, Brady Quinn quarterbacked the Chiefs in 2012, and not particularly well. Ricky Stanzi did not quarterback the Chiefs in 2012, not even once, which tells you what you need to know about his NFL prospects.
Stanford Routt did not play the corner position at a high level for the Chiefs, in fact, he didn’t even make it though the season on the roster. The biggest issue was that Tamba Hali struggle more than expected as a pass rusher, negating a lot of the contribution of the breakout season that Justin Houston had. Houston was Scott Pioli’s best draft pick as GM of the Chiefs, which is one of the many reasons the Chiefs won twice last year. Other players the Chiefs relied on in 2011, such as WRs Steve Breaston and Dexter McCluster, got hurt and weren’t the same players in 2012.
What should we have known, given the benefit of hindsight
The Chiefs did not change their defensive coaching in 2012, so it was pretty hard to have seen the total collapse of the front seven. One year ago today, Scott Pioli didn’t look like a great GM, but he also didn’t look like a guy who had no idea how to draft. Tyson Jackson looked like a pretty good defensive lineman. But the Chiefs didn’t do a good job replacing the depth on the defensive line so when guys like Ropati Pitoitua and Dontari Poe weren’t able to jump in and contribute. opposing offenses moved the Chiefs defensive line this past season like they were playing on roller skates. That would have been less of a big deal if Tamba Hali had contributed, but he failed to have an impact season, despite breaking the 8 sack mark for the fourth straight season. Hali is likely not done so the Chiefs can count on bookend pass rushers this year, but given Houston’s emergence, one may have expected Hali’s production to have increased. Instead, it declined.
Even with strong hindsight, we could have easily missed the mistakes Pioli made on the defensive line, and his successor John Dorsey took great strides to make sure the Chiefs got the defensive front right in 2013. But one thing that was more apparent at the time — and something that the 2012 season made very clear — is that Pioli really screwed the pooch on the secondary. Letting Brandon Carr get away despite having advantageous cap position was a major mistake. The Chiefs should have ramped up their efforts to sign Carr after adding Stanford Routt last February, and instead let him go to the highest bidder (Dallas). Brandon Flowers was maybe the best we’ve ever seen Brandon Flowers: he’s a top CB entering his prime years. But Eric Berry wasn’t exactly Jamaal Charles coming off his ACL tear, Javier Arenas isn’t really a defensive player in the NFL, and the young, less established pieces in the Chiefs secondary that Pioli added never developed.
Also: Dwayne Bowe by himself is not really a “passing game.”
Where does the team appear to think it’s at?
This is the million dollar question with the Chiefs, who have come out really aggressive in the offseason to compete in a down AFC in 2013. The Chiefs clearly feel like they acquired a top ten quarterback in Alex Smith via trade with the 49ers. There is not a whole lot of pieces on the Chiefs offense that would help enhance Alex Smith’s skill set. The Chiefs tipped their hand a bit when they added Chris Ault to the coaching staff. Ault created the pistol offense at Nevada eight seasons ago, and then coached it for eight seasons, four of which he coached Colin Kaepernick, the man who took Alex Smith’s job. This is also a coaching staff that is using Brad Childress as a spread game analyst. Then you look at the actual offense that Andy Reid and Marty Morningweg ran last year in Philadelphia, and it’s not hard to envision the Chiefs as a slow, midwest version of the offenses that took the NFL by storm last season.
Clearly, the Chiefs believe they can scheme around their offensive personnel weaknesses, but then I’m not entirely sure how drafting Eric Fisher with the first pick and retaining Branden Albert under the franchise tender is making the best use of their resources. The team thinks it’s close — close enough to send Donald Stephenson back to the bench, and close enough to sign Anthony Fasano, retain Tony Moeaki, and draft Travis Kelce to be very multiple in personnel — but the team’s only major receiving threat is still Dwayne Bowe, and I’m not sure that Alex Smith is the best possible quarterback to oversee Bowe’s breakout anyway. The offense is obviously going to look very different from Philadelphia’s speed-based passing game from the last few years, and the pistol will help keep defenses honest…but you can play this Chiefs offense honestly and still shut down everyone except Charles.
The secondary is still an issue, and to have even average expectations for the defense, it’s going to hinge on a rebound year from the front seven.
How did the team improve itself in the draft and in free agency?
So beyond the Alex Smith trade…how many positions are the Chiefs honestly better at now. They made an offensive lineman the number one overall pick, which may look great come 2016, but OL was not a Chiefs weakness last season, and won’t be the reason they win this season. The Chiefs signed Donnie Avery, who even if you pencil him in for the same season in the Chiefs offense that he just had for Bruce Arians in Indy, is just a solid number two (admittedly, something the Chiefs lacked last year). The depth behind Avery isn’t good. Dexter McCluster will align all over the formation, but a space player that hasn’t established himself by his fourth season isn’t a good bet to stay in the team’s plans.
They are legitimately improved at TE, but that’s damning with faint praise.
I think signing former Jets DL Mike Devito gives the Chiefs a really strong contingency plan if the new regime finds they cannot trust Tyson Jackson any more than the prior regime did.
The Chiefs attempted to address the secondary by signing CBs Sean Smith and Dunta Robinson. Smith is still just 26, so he might be better than he showed last year in Miami — Chiefs fans should hope so. Robinson is over the hill and hasn’t been more than a quality reserve (one paid like a starter) in years. Sanders Commings from Georgia is a day three draft pick that can contribute at either corner or safety.
I think the Chiefs overdrafted Knile Davis (Arkansas) in the third round, but the team clearly sees him getting 60-70 touches as a rookie.
What is the team’s outlook for the 2013 season?
The optimism surrounding the Chiefs in 2013 has as much to do with what the other AFC teams are not doing as it does with what the Chiefs have done. The bottom line is that if the Chiefs get what they think they are getting with Alex Smith — then they improved by more at that position than any other team did, and will enjoy a greater points per game swing than any other offense in the league. The Chiefs look a whole lot better at the quarterback position with Alex Smith and Chase Daniel at 1 and 2 on the depth chart than with Matt Cassel and Brady Quinn.
The Chiefs will do everything necessary to keep the Smith trade from looking like the Cassel trade, and they’ll have ample opportunity to avoid a repeat of the Pioli era, but the further you get from the Chiefs situation and the more generally you look, the more similar the last two Chiefs quarterback trades were. At a highly detailed level of analysis, it’s clear that the trades were different enough to suggest that the Chiefs aren’t merely repeating history here, but at some point, the bullets are going to start flying, and no matter how much preparation the Chiefs have done, they’re still going to have Alex Smith sitting back in the pocket on third and seven, which has not historically been a winning situation for the offense.
Smith is giving up the elite defense he had in San Francisco, and is taking over an offense that absolutely will be relying on the PPG averages (23.667 PPG) he put up as a 49er in 2012 without many of the resources he enjoyed in San Francisco.
The Chiefs were a dreadful team in 2012. They weren’t a talented team. I had clearly believed in their talent a year ago, but it simply didn’t show up on the field. They are going to be a better team in 2013, maybe even a lot better. They will not go 2-14 again. To approach .500, even in a weak conference, they are going to need to win their Alex Smith gamble, and get some better performances on the defensive side of the ball.
While that’s within the realm of possibility for the Chiefs this year, they look at the moment as more a 5 or a 6 win team that probably overrated it’s current situation and didn’t maximize it’s resources in the offseason for the future. It is a team that will be competitive on a week to week basis, and will probably be well coached. It will probably play 10 or 11 games that are decided by a touchdown or less. And unless the Chiefs have figured out a way to win a disproportional amount of those close games, 5 to 6 wins feel like a comfortable range for a Chiefs prediction in 2013.
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