What a draft.

[Luvnit2]

(04-30-2017, 01:21 PM)PlayerFormerlyKnownAsMousecop Wrote: The thing about last year is that even though we were clearly a bad team, the talent was still there on both sides of the ball. I think that's what made the season so difficult to watch. You could really see in the games against Philly, Miami, and Baltimore at the end there that this team definitely had talent. Made a run at Pittsburgh, didn't get blown out by anyone for the most part and allowed 30 points only one time and that was to New England in Brady's first home game back during a game that we led in the 4th quarter.

The challenge now is putting it all together. Marvin Lewis has shown that he can put together a regular season winner, so nobody should be surprised if that happens. The real question is whether this team will EVER be able to make a postseason run with ML leading the team. At this point, it's psychological as much as it is a competency issue from Marvin's standpoint.

Weird year in 2016.

1. Our OL was supposed to be a strength and same guys got a lot worse who were very good a year earlier.
2. Our kicker costs us at least 2 games.
3. Burfict suspension and I think lack of his fitness upon return hurt the team. By end of the year, he was back playing at the Burfict high level.
4. Loss of Eifert, Gio and Green all killed the offense.
5. I think we replaced Reggie Nelson, but got worse in the process. S. Williams or someone needs to step up in 2017.
6. Peko had to play too many snaps again due to injury.
7. Our 1st round pick did not play a snap and our projected backup 4th rounder Billings also sat out.

As others have stated, our OL is a key ingredient in 2017, will they improve over a poor OL performance in 2016? That and of course season ending or major injuries have to be avoided to our stars.