Report: Burrow pushing for Bengals to draft Chase

[Whatever]

(04-09-2021, 12:21 PM)bengals67 Wrote: Chase and Pitts are great prospects but I will never change my opinion that throwing a lot of capital into the o line is way more important that adding a possible superstar WR.

Drafting Pitts or Chase might have made sense if they had spent more money on one of the top level free agent o linemen. The guy we signed is better than Hart but he is not a long term solution and is on the downhill side of his career. He is not a top 10 OT. Maybe not a top 15 OT.

Wouldn't it be nice for the Bengals to have a dominant o line. If the Steelers and the Ravens had to worry about Mixon getting over 4 yards a clip and possibly breaking a long one, how much more effective does this make Burrow in his passing game and having time to go through his progressions?

How much better do the WRs look if Burrow is regularly getting 4 seconds to survey the field and they have single coverage because the D is loading the box to stop the run?

Munoz and Lapham both want Sewell. I trust their judgment, particularly our greatest player in team history.

(04-09-2021, 12:56 PM)Whatever Wrote: There is nobody in the NFL that consistently gets 4 seconds to throw.  There are only a couple of guys consistently get 3.  The difference between the elite OL's and bad ones is .6-.7 of a second.

Teams single covered our WR's most of last year.  Burrow was on pace to be the most blitzed QB in the league by a wide margin before he went down.  That's because defenses don't respect our WR's.  If we go three straight OL, we'll just be running at 8-9 man boxes all day and getting overwhelmed by the blitz on third and long because we have no one to keep the D from loading up the box.

Our WR corps is a lot worse than people seem to think.  Something to think about is Tate, Thomas, and Morgan(our current WR3-5) have 2 career TD's in 10 combined years of NFL experience.  That's pathetically bad.  

(04-11-2021, 08:37 PM)Shake n Blake Wrote: It isn't absurd to consider Chase. It's also not absurd to consider letting our rookie WR who just had 900+ yards grow into the role of top guy before deciding he's incapable after 1 year.


1. Who said that our QB should consistently get 4 seconds every play? Strawman right there. What I'm saying is that a better line is more consistent at not allowing blown up plays, as well as more consistent at allowing enough time for big plays to develop.

2. The guy you're referring to (Chase Claypool) was the 49th overall pick in the 2nd round. He was 3rd in targets among Steelers WR's last year. That's exactly the type of production we need, so maybe we should copy the Steelers and take a speed guy in the 2nd. 

3. Reiff has moved around before though, so I take him at his word. As far as the drop off, anything is within the realm of possibility. Is it likely that Reiff - who has played RG before - will be worse at that spot than Alex Redmond? Nope, and you know it. It's not like he'd even be shifting to a different side.

Sewell played RT in high school. So he's familiar with the spot. Fwiw, I've never seen such a lengthy discussion about an o-lineman changing spots. Yes, it's an adjustment. Yeah some guys see some drop off...but it's not the gargantuan and ominous task you're making it out to be.

4. I'm not saying we don't need a speed guy opposite Higgins. We do. I just know Dalton started his career with solid numbers on deep throws, and that tailed off in a major way when the line fell apart (which started in 2016)...even with a prime AJ Green on the outside. That only continued under Burrow. This is a big reason why I believe the line will be more integral than speed WR...even though I do see a speed guy as a need.

5. Teams don't like locking themselves into need over BPA. That's more how fans think. If there is any player who is far more talented than the best need player, that team is 99% going to take the way more talented player. If we take Sewell, and the top WR in round 2 has a 3rd round grade, we're (hopefully) not going to reach.

So it makes more sense to wait for the position that is deeper throughout the draft, than the one that has the most talent graded as 1st-2nd rounders.



Tbh, I made a sweeping generalization in that post that can't be proven and was kinda silly. That said, what you say here is equally ridiculous. There are posters who hyped Binns and want Chase, and guys who didn't hype Binns etc, and don't want Chase, either. I was all aboard the John Ross train the year we took him, but I'm a Sewell guy this year.

It's a different era than 4-5 years ago? Why? Because the last couple SB winners had a lot of weapons? Seems kinda silly to say the league has changed based on the last couple years. New England wasn't loaded with weapons when they won in 2019 or 2017. Nor were the Eagles in 2018. We're basing all of this on the last 2 seasons??

It's not elite, but maybe we should give Higgins some time to grow before declaring him incapable of being WR1?

1.Quoted above is the point you jumped in and started debating.  There's no strawmanning on my part, though you continue to try and debate the point.

2.Problem is, last year was considered a generational type WR class.  The WR's that went in 2 are guys that would go in the first in any other class.  Claypool put up measurables that rival Calvin Johnson, and he fell to the middle of the 2nd.  That's how stacked it was.  This year, it's OL that's stacked.  There will be OL in 2 that would be 1st rounders in other classes, not WR's.  Besides which, I thought you didn't want to be locked into one position group in 2.

3.Reiff played G in college.  Sewell played RT in high school.  NFL caliber players can get away with technique issues at lower levels that they can't against the elite in the NFL.  Sewell was 6'4", 319 in high school.  With that size and his feet, it doesn't matter if he starts his pass set with the wrong foot or leads with the wrong hand.  No high school kid can physically match up to him.  There have been multiple quotes from former NFL players that switching positions/sides isn't a simple matter at the NFL level in this thread, but if they don't give you pause, there's nothing I can say that will.

4.AJ was on pace for a career high in 40+ yard catches in '16, with 6 in 10 games.  I think you mean '17.  Hard to say in this period due to AJ losing a step with his consistent injuries.  Andy was good with deep throws to the middle of the field, post routes especially, but was terrible on the sidelines.  The OL falling apart definitely hurt them, but the injury in '16 was also the beginning of the end for AJ.

5.Which is why you can make a big argument for Chase at 5.  With the OL class being so deep, it's much more likely you can get a good value on an OL in 2 than a WR.  Smart GM's try to put themselves in situations where team needs intersect with BPA.  

Philly had an All Pro TE in Ertz.  Plus, they had the #4 defense.  Just winning the SB with a backup QB makes them an extreme anomaly.  I love how the Pats have been trashed on these boards for years for cheating, but they are the go to now for people that want to argue that you don't need elite WR's.  Burrow isn't Brady, Taylor isn't Bellicheat, we don't have their defense, and we don't cheat like they do.  2 seasons is more than enough for trends to start in the NFL.  

Maybe we should give MJ, Adeniji, and Johnson another year to see if they can develop into quality starters.  No?  Thought not.  Higgins had trouble getting open when he was facing #2-#3 CB's.  What's he going to do when Cleveland sticks Denzel Ward on him like they did AJ last year?  Besides which, 3 of the final 4 teams last year had multiple All Pro weapons in the passing game.  If Higgins makes that leap, who's the other guy?