rugger8

Maybe Sark. Maybe OL. Maybe just injuries. Or maybe he's just not as good as we want him to be. I'd be very pleasantly surprised if he comes out in 2019 and does as well as he did in his 2016 season. I wouldn't bet on it, but I'd be happy about it if it happened. At this point he can add age to the factors against him.

I see the purple, but don't understand it. Ryan has been elite (or just sub-elite) under what - 4 distinct systems/OCs? Freeman's 2 good years were under Shanahan, and for whatever reasons, has not shown anything worth mentioning under any OC not named Shanahan. At the time, I didn't want to give him a big extension without seeing him perform under Sark.

Shannahan has made a lot of 'guys' top ten guys. I'd love to be wrong, but I think that's all Freeman was- another back successful under the Shannahan system.

Context is everything. It wasn't some domestic dispute or random act of violence. My understanding is that he was defending his sister from being assaulted when he was in high school, and hasn't had an incident of any kind since then.

But let's be real - if your best player is a WR, your team has a problem. Julio is nice to have but you don't win Superb Owls on the back of a WR. Same could be said for AJ.

I think I'm in the gray area, then. If we had a young QB who we were trying to develop or showcase, I would have been in favor of sitting him. That wasn't the case, and as far as I know he was as healthy as could be expected in an NFL season so...

I did not want them to purposefully fail, and did not expect that. I guess where I have a bit of a problem is that there was probably pressure on Quinn to keep this season looking better than it was, rather than looking at building for the future. If those guys were never intended to see the field, we should have continued to churn the bottom of the roster until we found someone worth developing. From what I've seen before this season, we've actually been good about doing that. The trade off would be less likely wins for a more developed roster - or possibly finding someone who can really play (but perhaps not practice).

I've seen them play younger guys who needed development after being eliminated from tourney season or once a game is out of hand. Is that what you mean?

I guess I was looking further down the roster. I was hoping to see Gono, Harlow and Zimmer, and never did. I would have liked to see more of Senat as well.

I don't know that I'm a tanker, per se, but there was a time in this season that it made more sense to me to play some guys we weren't seeing during the meaningful portion of the season for the purposes of: limiting wear on minorly injured players; developing less experienced players; and evaluating players in-game who we may or may not want to keep next year. IMO, those activities were more important after week 10 or 11 or whatever than winning games that weren't going to get us into the playoffs. But I would have tried to win with those players I was trying to evaluate/develop.

It's the long game.

They could've just called that facemask and the Rams would've put it away right then.

1000/year rushing is not especially impressive. It's sort of the baseline of what is expected to be just good. To me, this looks like Shanahan:

Unpopular Opinion: We need someone to supplant Freeman. He's looking like a one year wonder to me. One great year and the others were just ok or injured. Personally, I haven't seen enough from him to believe that he's one of so many RBs who Shanahan made look better than he was. And let's not talk about his pass protection.

He's like 6'3 250lbs. He's considerably bigger than beasley - but not as stout as I think we need to get at DE. I'd prefer a true base end. Like 6'5" 275.