Chase v Sewell

[CJD]

(04-24-2021, 01:58 PM)Whatever Wrote: Not really. If you go Chase at 5, you have to take an OL in 2.  If you take Sewell, you have to take an X WR in 2.

You can't let your (admittedly washed up) starting X WR walk, not address it in FA, and kick the can down the draft board when your HC's seat is heating up and he runs an offense that puts 3+ WR's on the field over 80% of the time.  You can't set your own HC up to fail, can him, then expect to get anyone with options to come here.

The other issue is the way the board falls.  There are a ton of OL in the 25-50 range and a lot of different ways the Bengals could go to address OL.  They could draft a G.  They could draft a C and move Trey to G.  They could draft a T and kick either Reiff or the rookie to G.  That means the Bengals have flexibility and while a team could probably guess they are going OL, who they are exactly targeting is hard to pin down and the abundance of quality talent in that range makes it unappealing to give up picks to move up.  With X WR, there are only 2 guys(Bateman and Marshall) in the 25 to 50 range.  There is also a huge gap between Marshall in the mid30's to Dyami Brown in the mid 60's.  Obvious need+limited options=recipe to get jumped for the guy you need.

I disagree for one reason: 
If we took Chase, we HAVE to take an Olinemen in the 2nd round

If we took Sewell, we don't HAVE to take an X WR in the 2nd round. 

It would certainly be ideal, as that is our 2nd biggest need, and we should target the position as a priority, but there is no imminent danger if we do not.

And that's how I draw the line between these two positions. OL we capital letters NEED. WR we should draft if we want to increase our offensive efficiency.

If we don't get a good day 1 starting Olineman in this draft, Burrow's reconstructed knee and possibly his career will be in jeopardy. This is not fear mongering or scare tactics, it's just the reality of not putting a starting quality line in front of him. Maybe he doesn't get injured with a terrible line in 2021. We would hope he doesn't. But a worse Oline makes that threat more possible and it would definitely increase the number of hits he takes.

If we don't get a good day 1 starting X receiver in this draft, Burrow will just have to make due with what we have which, for the record, resulted in 282 passing yards per game, 22.4 ppg and a 65.3% completion percentage over the 9.5 games that he played as a rookie. And that includes the bad outings he had against Pittsburgh and Baltimore.

And he did this all with a terrible Oline (he was sacked 32 times), a defense that couldn't keep a lead and a virtually non-existent running game.

Unless, of course, you believe that losing AJ Green will severely hamper Burrow, which I find hard to believe since Green performed worse than a replacement player in 2020. 

Adding any weapons to this offense will make it MORE explosive, and that's obviously the goal and would be great, but it won't ruin his progress as a player and it won't jeopardize his future and the franchise's future if we don't add a #1 WR to this offense.

Not fixing the Oline will risk those things.

Add onto that the fact that there are more starting level WRs from outside of the first round than there are offensive tackles and you have a really solid argument for going Sewell, with a bit harder sell for Chase.

As far as teams knowing our needs but not necessarily who we covet, maybe they don't know exactly who we're targetting, but a team can look at who is available at 35 and say "okay, there are 2 more offensive linemen we consider day 1 starters at guard on the board. We know that the Bengals are going to take 1 of them at 38. I want my choice of the two because I don't want to risk the Bengals taking my preferred player, so I will trade to 37 just so I have my choice of the two."

Like I said, it's happened at least 3 times in the past 3 drafts.

Plus, and this is a lesser issue overall, but I REALLY don't trust Duke Tobin's ability to evaluate Oline talent in recent years. He is the one who traded up for Michael Jordan, he drafted Ogbuehi, Fisher, Price and Bodine. The only offensive lineman he's drafted who many would consider a success in the past 10 years was Kevin Zeitler. The jury is still out on Williams, but he looks pretty good, assuming he can stay healthy.
So I'd really prefer we nab the more "secure" prospect in Sewell and then start digging through the WRs in the 2nd and 3rd rounds, as Duke has a much better track record with WRs in that draft range (Tyler Boyd, Tee Higgins, Chris Henry, Jerome Simpson, Andre Caldwell, Mohamed Sanu).

That's anecdotal evidence and is kind of secondary to my main argument, but I think it's worth noting.