[VeveJones007]

Originally Posted by sherck

I think that the whole theory of "holding back" on free agency because of a potential new coach is not true at all. While we may be getting a new coach next year (I hope), Ballard has repeatedly told us that "you build through the draft" and that you cannot shortchange that process.

Someone said it earlier, free agency gets you short-term stability but drafting well gives you long-term success.

Grigson built a solid enough team through free agency to get us to three back-to-back-to-back 11-5 season but his terrible drafting then did not deliver long-term success (Werner, Richardson, D'Journ Smith, Dorsett).

You spend a wad on free agency to push you over the top. You don't spend it to get up to stable; you instead sign a bunch of guys who are NFL average or perhaps a bit better than that in lots of position groups and wait to find difference makers in the draft or by developing and retaining your own.

I think someone else's comment recently about how the rising salary cap allows teams to retain their own superstars better and I agree 100% with that.

IMO, there were 5 defensive "difference makers" in free agency that fit a 3-4 defensive scheme: Dontari Poe, Calais Campbell, Dont'a Hightower, Stephon Gilmore and A.J. Bouye. You could probably add Brandon Williams to that list but I don't know if he was a true difference maker.

Poe's best years may be behind him; his production has dropped since his 2014 season and he obviously wanted a lot of money and/or to play for a team much closer to being a contender. Currently, he is rep and not production. We had him in, we offered him what was probably a good long-term contract and he chose elsewhere. It happens.

Campbell is 30 years old. Spending $15m a year on a 30 year old defender is foolish.

Both Bouye and Gilmore would have been good signings, IMO. Davis is in his contract year and we obviously needed a CB2 this year that could become CB1 next year. I would have been good with signing one of them but that also would have contradicted Ballard's "you build up front" concept.

Williams? $10.5m a year to do what he does? Okay, it would have been great to get a NT of his caliber on 1st and 2nd downs but he bring little to the pass rush area and he is getting paid pass rush money. His cap hit is "cheap" at $6m a year but is $11.75m $11.75m, and $12.00m in the final 3 years. No thanks.

Zach Brown? 2 year starter in a 4-3 defense followed by 2 years of injury and little play followed by 2016 where he killed it. Sure-fire difference maker?

Chris Baker? Logan Ryan? Tony Jefferson? Who else was a difference maker?



Lots of folks are complaining not so much about what Ballard has done but moreso that we did not sign "one impact guy" on defense.

Which of those guys would you have spent the money on? We tried Poe and it did not work. Perhaps one of the CBs would have been good given our situation but Ballard obviously did not want the pay that money at the back end yet.

Anyway, I agree that we did not "throw" free agency due to an upcoming coaching change. This appears to be Ballard's plan.

Draft the top 1/3 of your roster
Free Agent the middle 1/3 of your roster
Fill in UDFA/Street the bottom 1/3 of your roster

Cheers,

FWIW, I agree with this. What you said here and what I've said in this thread are not mutually exclusive.