Zac Taylor vs Marvin Lewis

[Whatever]

(12-24-2021, 01:23 PM)fredtoast Wrote: Marvin rebuilt the roster with mostly mid tier free agents.  Zac got a lot more top players.

Here is a comparison between the per-year salaries of the top free agents Marvin signed to rebuild the roster and the guys Zac got.  (The salaries of Marvin's signings have been adjusted to today's dollars based on the increase of the salary cap from &75 million in 2003 to $182 today) 

Thornton ($9.1) + Hardy ($8.5) + James ($8.7) + Kelly ($4.0) + Clemmons ($2.8) + Herring ($5.5) + O'Neal ($4.1) + Nate Webster ($5.4) = $48.1

Hendrickson ($15.0) + Trae Waynes ($14.0) + Reader ($13.3M) + Riley Reiff ($7.5M) + Awuzie ($7.3M) + Ogunjobi ($6.2 M) + Bell ($6.0) + Hilton ($6.0) = $75.3

You can see that they are not even in the same ballpark. Zac at over 50% more than what Marvin got.

This is because of 2 main reasons.

First, Marvin's Bengals took Palmer #1 overall before there was a rookie wage scale and Palmer got a massive (at that time) 6 year, $42.7 mil rookie deal.  That drastically cuts down the money available for free agents.

Second, Marvin had nowhere near the complete rebuild that Zac had to do.  Look at the starters on the '05 club that were holdovers from previous coaches...

Rudi Johnson
Chad Johnson
TJ Houshmanzadeh
Willie Anderson
Rich Braham
Levi Jones
Justin Smith
Brian Simmons

Compared to for Zac in '21...

Tyler Boyd
CJ Uzomah
Trey Hopkins
Sam Hubbard
Jessie Bates

Marvin had 3 All Pro's and 5 Pro Bowlers that he would carry over 3 years into his rebuild.  Zac has 1 All Pro and no Pro Bowlers.  Marvin inherited a much stronger core of talent that was entering their primes.  The top tier talent that Zac got were past their sell by date.