Andy Dalton, Corner Turned or Weapons Gone?

[Shake n Blake]

(06-07-2016, 01:24 PM)Nately120 Wrote: I'm not saying Lafell isn't an upgrade THIS year, I'm saying he might not have been an upgrade LAST YEAR.  This entire scenario requires us to imagine if people are injured vs. uninjured and otherwise concoct scenarios that can neither be tested nor proven.

Whatever, I'll relent.  We're better now.  2015 was great, but changes were made for the better.

1. Zampese > Hue
2. Lafell > Jones
3. Core/Boyd/19th round nobody > Sanu
4. Eifert is fine, totally not hurt and even if he is hurt....
5. Kroft is Eifert
6. Hill will be back to form

so on and so forth.

1. I'll give you this. Hue was great for this team, while Zampese is an unknown. 

2. Not sure I'd say LaFell > Jones, but I do think it's closer than some think. 

3. Lets face it. Sanu had 390 yards and 0 TDs last year. Is it really a tall order for a 2nd round prospect to replace that? Heck, Jordan Shipley (a 3rd rounder) had 600 yards and 3 TDs as a rookie.

4. Eifert is hurt, but as of now it doesn't look like he'll miss more than 2-4 games. Like Fred pointed out, he missed 3 last year. 

5. We don't really need him to be. He was solid filling in for a few games last year. I expect the same this year. I'm surprised more people aren't hyped about Kroft. He wasn't some late round scrub. He was a 3rd round pick, and he looked good filling in last year.

6. Imo, Hill can only go up from 2015. So this is actually one positive for this year. 

_________________________

I don't think we're in better shape for 2016, but I do think we're better off than some seem to believe. What's more likely?

A.
Eifert is going to miss damn near the whole season
LaFell is going to be Brandon Tate 2.0 combined with Ted Ginn's hands
Boyd is going to be utterly useless and put up less than 390 yards and 0 TDs
The offense will be in shambles with Zampese, even with Dalton's input

or...

B. 
Eifert will only miss a few games, same as last year
LaFell will be productive (say 700ish yards) just as most of our secondary WRs have (Simpson, MLJ, Sanu, Hawkins)
Boyd will help fill the massive void left by Sanu 
We might miss Hue some, but the offense will still be one of the league's best, with guys like Dalton, Green, Gio, Eifert, etc leading the way

Pretty easy choice for me, and fwiw, I don't think we need the offense to be as great as last year's in order to make a playoff run. For example, the Broncos offense was blah all last season. If Dalton is healthy and this offense is even close to what it was, then the Bengals should be a SB favorite in 2016. The only reason they probably won't be is 0-7.