If Penei was drafted at 5, is this a playoff team?

[Nicomo Cosca]

(01-07-2022, 01:19 AM)Whatever Wrote: FWIW, my take was based on simply swapping Chase and Sewell with everything else playing out the same.  Otherwise, the exercise quickly turns into "If we took Sewell, plus did a complete redraft where we got the best/worst player in each subsequent round..."

I will say that I think people aren't properly valuing Amon-Ra's hypothetical impact on our win total.  When November ended, he only had 353 receiving yards and no TD's.  He went on a tear in December to put up a nice total for a rookie on the season, but his slow start likely dooms any playoff chance we have.  Higgins started slow this year and only had 560 yards and 3 TD's before December.  Chase had 906 TD's and 8TD's in that same span, which is a ton of production to have to replace.  

It also took St. Brown 109 targets to get to that 800 yds 4 Td’s, too (which I’d hardly call “elite WR play”). And he wouldn’t have gotten that here playing with both Tee and Boyd. Chase got the targets he did because - - well - he’s Ja’Marr Chase. The Lions literally had no one else at WR. The next two guys target-wise are a TE and a RB. You add in the fact that St. Brown only averaged 9.8 Y/R and you’re talking about an absolutely massive drop off in our ability to push the ball down the field.