12-15-2021, 10:31 PM
(12-14-2021, 11:53 PM)fredtoast Wrote: Problem is taht you can not build an entire team out of expensive free agents. You have to be able to draft and develop players if you want to have a winning program. You also have to pay up for a few big dollar free agents to fill in the gaps. The draft is a bigger crap shoot (even for the good teams) than any of the "experts" want to admit. Every team is going to miss on some draft picks or lose key players to injury. That is what free vagency is for. But uou can't afford to just go out and sign top level free agents at every position.
According to Sportrac the Bengal have $7.5 million in cap space left over this year (2021 NFL Team Salary Cap Space Tracker | Spotrac ). That is just barely above the league average of $6.2 million. That could have gotten one more established solid starter for our O-line. The 18th highest paid OG makes $7.5 million this year (but I think that is yearly average). Nothing close to the $15 million people wanted us to spend on singing the top free agent o-linemen available.
We had Su'a-Filo (58 career starts) and Spain (74 career starts) under contract. Thye felt those guys could hold down the fort for a year.
Even though I never expected Hopkins to be ready to start the season (his injury was in January) I can undretsand why they did not want to invest big money in a guy they might only need for one season.
Considering how cheap they got Spain I felt that they should have done more. But it is not like they just ignored the line or projected rookies and/or guys who had never started before to start. There was a big turnover. Five guys who started a combined 32 games for us last year are no longer on the roster. But they had experienced vets lined up for every spot.
I agree with development, and development overall has been an issue with the current staff at multiple positions. The did indeed do something to try to fix it, but it was a bit of a half-step. There really isn't much money at all invested in this offensive line. Spain is dirt cheap and Jonah is on a rookie deal. Carman, too. Adeniji has a late-round rookie cap number. Hopkins got paid middling center money and Reiff got 7.5 mil for one season. A top tackle in this league gets into the 20s and a decent guard gets what Reiff, our highest paid tackle gets. The most painful part of what they did is the fact that Carman can't even get on the field. I expect more form a second round pick on a team this starved for better OL play.
Anyhow, the cap is going up significantly in 2022 and probably even more in 2023 when it catches up to where it would have been if covid never hit. That's probably not quite enough, but there's also some salary that will drop off and even more that should be reclaimed by cutting a guy or two. I think Trae Waynes is becoming a prime candidate for cap reallocation at this point. You would get back 18 mil by letting Reiff walk and cutting Waynes, and that by any measure should get someone that can help.
A final point: I'll repeat that your development point is very real. The team has to find a way to fill needs without buying talent from other teams. I'm just at a point where I trust other teams to develop o-linemen more than I trust the Bengals. I'd feel a lot better seeing the let Waynes go, draft a first round corner, and spend the money on a RT or C that will require some significant coin.
This offense has already shown that's is capable of putting up 40 burgers when it's clicking. I can recall games when they've "played bad" according to many board members and still scored 30 (Jets). I think that I'd be fine trimming some cap on the defense to re-invest it in the o-line and try to draft and develop younger players on the D. With legit to good blocking, you're not going to have to ask the defense to move mountains every week to win.
