Not even close to my point... At no point did I say this was going to ruin the team, In fact, this year we landed players in some key positions that we needed (OT, RB, DE, + a healthy OLB)
The whole point of when I made this thread 5 months ago, was pointing out that where we currently have a weakness, we have inadequitly replaced the player that previously manned it.
The Jarius Wynn/ CJ Wilson combo for example... He have had these bad players in a position vacated by Cullen Jenkins because Mike Neal has not worked out. Leaving 1/3 of our line in the hands of people, who cannot handle it. As evidenced by their poor performance.
The "non CM3" LB has been a weakness for FOUR years, and had been manned by late rounders and UDFAs (sound familiar maybe??.) and was unaddressed until we selected perry. Unfortunately we had to wait a bit longer for him.
Is this team awful? feck no. In fact, I love the additions this year.. weve (supposedly) upgraded 3 of the __ positions i listed. But I defiantly don't believe "the best QB in the game" deserved to have his weapons come out of the "Erik Walden" pile. And that soon, the position will need to be addressed.
And as for my "artificial benchmark", it is hardly unfair for a team that passes as much as we do to have that.
Not all criticism lands into a doomsday scenario.
Originally Posted by: RajiRoar
I totally get where you are coming from RajiRoar.
This is high stakes poker. Ted is thinking his safer route to talent replacement is draft & develop. While it DID work for us in 2010, we stood poised to win one or two more Super Bowls these past two seasons, and we came up really short in the exact areas where we lost talent, namely the DL and via injury at S.
The problem I see with a strict adherence to draft & develop is if you miss on keeping a great player from moving on in FA, your replacement in terms of true talent and effectiveness in your system may not be realized until years down the road.
Not all draft picks work out. Not all FA acquisitions work out either. But, for me, I would rather add a veteran presence at a key position of need via FA to insure an NFL level of play and competency, one that may pay real dividends now, while Rodgers et al are hot, vs. waiting 2 or 3 years for your draft class to develop into another hopeful winner.
Here we are 3 years after drafting Neal, hoping he turns into something? We've got a rookie in Datone, who is very promising, but, it is 3 years later... And Perry... That hasn't been the fix to this point either.
We have to hope our players continue to develop, while Rodgers, Matthews, Jones, Raji, Finley are in their prime.
Personally, I wish we had just a bit more balance in talent acquisition: draft & develop + adding a top FA talent or two every year or two. Just to even it out. I think we are always too young. Far too young.