Officially Signed: Sheldon Rankins

[WeezyBengal]

(03-18-2024, 03:10 PM)PDub80 Wrote: I see where you're coming from, and the depth chart aggress with you, but I don't 100% agree with the concept from the sense of snap count.

DJ Reader was out there on downs he probably shouldn't have been, but the Bengals had no better option in those situations. I mean, who were they going to put out there over Reader? Even on obvious passing downs, who? Cam Sample? Zach Carter? No way. Maybe Murphy towards the end of the season, but I don't know if they had confidence in that. That would have been interesting, though.

I think Rankins, if healthy, allows the Bengals more situational flexibility at either DT spot. I'm not looking at Rankins as a "Reader replacement" because I think the defense is changing how it wants to function. Just not so sure that from a situational defense perspective we'll see a prominent NT role.

I will note...

This draft is SCREAMING for a 2 (or even 3) DT draft. The 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th round will have incredibly high value guys there. They can get some premium talent to replace Carter, Tufele, & Davis.

If they came away from this draft with 3 O-linemen, 3 D-Linemen, 1 TE (or any mix of those positions) & a splash of whatever the hell else I would be excited because that means they went for where the talent is in this draft. And, frankly, it should be easy for any rookies to come onto the Bengals roster at those positions and supplant the dead weight hanging around.

- Hill, Smith, Carman, & The INVISBLE MAN at RT on the O Line? Absolute BUMS. No thought at all to replace them all.

- Tufele, Carter, Davis at DT? Easy to bounce off the roster.

- I would love to see 2 TEs drafted this draft, too. Gesicki & Hudson on 1 year deals? Easy choice to grab 2 TEs in a loaded TE draft class.

I think they know they much have to flip the room completely and are well on their way. 

The question to me is, do you sign another free agenct (Tart) or rely on the draft in either the first two rounds to fill out the actual rotation? They CANNOT go into the year with the roster as is, and rely on even an early draft pick to account for STARTING rotational player snaps. 

They need to replace the DEPTH (Tufele, Tupuo) with draft picks and bring in another proven quality starter to play a long with Hill and Rankins. 

Think of the room of the Super Bowl team. It had Hill, Ogobjubi, and Reader. THAT was a solid rotation. Three solid players rotating. We have missed that the past two years and I dont want to rely on a draft pick to bring that back. 

I don't want to live in a world where a guy like Tupuo is getting rotational snaps.