Ross struggled with consistency during spring practices

[*SHRacerX*]

(07-04-2019, 04:33 PM)jason Wrote: It's almost as if that guy's not very good or something...

Hated the pick, but I try to pull for the guy, but he doesn't give me much to work with. It was pretty damn exciting when he caught that long TD vs Buffalo last preseason though.

This has been the narrative from many fans (and seemingly his former coach, who really wanted Rueben Foster) and I get it.  We were defense starved and Ross felt like a luxury pick...until we saw what the offense did with him, Boyd, AJ, and Eifert in there together.  It was only a short while, but they were 4-1 with two of those wins coming on the road.  

I am not trying to say Ross was 100% the reason for this success, but he was absolutely a part of it.  I will explain:

Ross was largely used as a vertical threat between the 20s.  He was running and drawing coverage deep while Boyd, Eifert, and AJ worked underneath.  Look at AJs success in his snaps lined up in the slot vs. outside.  A lot of that was due to the coverage played against the Bengals.  Ross has decent success in the Red Zone and started to show much better effort in contested catches.  He also stayed healthy...something a lot of people said he would never do because he is too "frail".   The rushing attack also yielded its best YPC in over a decade.  Some of that could be attributed to Ross pulling safeties back from the LOS.  

If he has a dud of a season with the new offense, I will get on here and say that he probably shouldn't get another chance and we should try to trade him to KC as they will likely need to replace Tyreek Hill because that guy can't stay out of trouble.  Until then, I will give Ross this last chance and hope the coaching staff gets him more involved in the game plan with screens and slants that are high% completions and let him do his thing with the ball in his hands.  He is NOT just a straight ahead speed merchant.  The guy has phone-booth quicks that no one on the team has demonstrated before.  I would think Taylor is salivating at the prospect of getting him the ball early and drawing coverage off Green and Boyd.

This play-action heavy offense will take shots and I think it sets up perfectly for Ross.  Maybe I am wrong and he will never have the proverbial light go on but he had solid progress in what amounted to his first year last year.   I, personally, can't wait to see it.