Packers in best shape for next three years (ESPN)

[HardRightEdge]

I’m not sure what it means that we’re discussing the OL in the 2017 season.

I think you answered your own question with your subsequent comments. Looking forward is more interesting and challenging than rehashing the past.

 

[vince]

Your numbers are too high for 2017. You haven't taken into account that we'll have new 10-12 rookies on the roster in both 2016 and 2017. They in some cases will be replacing medium/high priced vets.

I've taken the low contract guys into account. You can change the names but min. contracts are minimum contracts and you have to count 51. Some of those rookies (the high-round picks) will be more expensive than the 51 contracts I'm counting and some will be a $100,000 or so less but that won't change the picture. The med/high priced vets I've got already gone from the team, other than the guys I think should be re-signed like Daniels, Lacy, Bakh, Barrington, and Hyde.

Take a closer look and you might say Barrington won't be worth the $4 mil I projected, or Hyde the $6 mil, but those guys are lower than the $7 mil for Lacy, Bakh and Daniels - which may well be too conservative. With a rising cap and seeing a guy like House get $6 mil/yr. I don't see those guys signing for less than $7 mil/yr, but accelerating their cap hits probably puts their 2017 numbers in that neighborhood.

It's the $7 mil each for the aging Lang and Sitton that I don't think there'll be room for based on how I'd prioritize the guys who'll be hitting the market.

 

[Poppa San]

'bout the only benefit of missing on your draft picks a few years back is not [edited] having to worry about which ones to re sign. If your gm/scouts are any good, that isn't an issue very often.

 

[Deleted member 6794]

Post-2015 FAs include:

Daniels, Raji, Guion, Hayward, Perry, Neal, Richardson, Starks, Quarless (if he makes it that far), Kuhn, Barclay and Crosby.

If the defense plays well, which means most of those defensive players play well, then about $30 mil in available cap space can shirk awfully quickly without leaving a lot of carryover for 2017.

Of the top 13 offensive players in 3-wide/2-back/2-TE sets, only Quarless and Kuhn are unsigned for 2016.
If those defensive players (and Richardson as a core ST guy) don't do well in 2015, they'll get cheaper contracts in-line with questionable performances or will be let go, meaning the 2016 offense, never likely to be in such a prime position again given the talent, experience and age of those players, will be at risk of being squandered in a defensive retooling year. It would stand to reason Thompson would go some ways in stretching to keep "his guys" who play adequately or better in 2015 to keep the train on the tracks. But that would quickly diminish the cap carryover to 2017.

The Packers entered this offseason with $26 million in cap space. The team was able to re-sign both of their most important free agents in Cobb and Bulaga as well as hand out contracts to all of their draft picks and will enter training camp with more than $15 million in cap space.

A smart GM is capable of perfectly structuring contracts to be able to roll some money over into next season.

The Packers have their MVP QB signed through 2019 and their best defensive player for another four seasons. In addition the team is in a unique situation to have all of their starters on offense signed for at least two more years.

Of course the front office will have some difficult decisions to make over the next two offseasons but IMO nothing outside of the ordinary for an NFL team.

 

[Deleted member 6794]

I've taken the low contract guys into account. You can change the names but min. contracts are minimum contracts and you have to count 51. Some of those rookies (the high-round picks) will be more expensive than the 51 contracts I'm counting and some will be a $100,000 or so less but that won't change the picture. The med/high priced vets I've got already gone from the team, other than the guys I think should be re-signed like Daniels, Lacy, Bakh, Barrington, and Hyde.

Take a closer look and you might say Barrington won't be worth the $4 mil I projected, or Hyde the $6 mil, but those guys are lower than the $7 mil for Lacy, Bakh and Daniels - which may well be too conservative. With a rising cap and seeing a guy like House get $6 mil/yr. I don't see those guys signing for less than $7 mil/yr, but accelerating their cap hits probably puts their 2017 numbers in that neighborhood.

It's the $7 mil each for the aging Lang and Sitton that I don't think there'll be room for based on how I'd prioritize the guys who'll be hitting the market.

The thing you miss though is that while it's possible all of these guys could make close to $6-7 million per season on a multi-year contract their cap hit for the 2017 season could end up significantly lower.

 

[vince]

Yeah that's possible WIMM. I agree they'll accelerate cap hits over future years (which I've incorporated to some extent), but they've demonstrated that they're not going to mortgage the future too heavily also - an approach I agree with.

I could see Shields (cap hit $9 mil 2015 to $12 mil 2016 and '17), Burnett ($5 mil 2015 to $7 mil '17), Rodgers ($20+ mil/yr. thru 2020 who could be extended a few more years) and/or Matthews ($12.7 mil 2015 to $15.2 mil 2017) restructuring at some point too.

 

[Deleted member 6794]

I could see Shields (cap hit $9 mil 2015 to $12 mil 2016 and '17), Burnett ($5 mil 2015 to $7 mil '17), Rodgers ($20+ mil/yr. thru 2020 who could be extended a few more years) and/or Matthews ($12.7 mil 2015 to $15.2 mil 2017) restructuring at some point too.

It seems Thompson doesn't like to restructure constracts aside of when a player obviously doesn't perform up to his contract (Hawk comes to mind).

 

[HardRightEdge]

It seems Thompson doesn't like to restructure constracts aside of when a player obviously doesn't perform up to his contract (Hawk comes to mind).

I believe Rodgers and Matthews will be candidates for extensions or renegotiations come 2017 to free cap space.

In the case of Rodgers, some of the $20.3 mil in cap hit for that season could be pushed out further with a new deal that uses signing bonus to replace some chunk of his nearly $14 mil in salary and bonus, thereby deferring a chunk of the cap hit. Further, by 2017 there will be only $6.7 mil in dead cap on his contract, a residual of the signing bonus in his last deal, so putting on more dead cap in a new signing bonus in 2017 would hardly be mortgaging the future.

Rodgers may be willing to make a team friendly deal at that point in the interest of keeping his O-Line as intact as possible.

He'll be 36 years old at the conclusion of his current contract. If nothing dire happens to him by the time he hits 33 at the end of the 2016 season, adding a few years to his current deal while clearing some cap space would make sense. His current contract is practically built for a renegotiation/extension at the that point. 2018 at the latest.

In 2017, Matthews cap hit will be $15.2 mil, then dropping to $11.4 mil in 2018, the last year of his contract. He'll be 31 years old going into 2017 with 8 high snap count seasons under his belt. If he's showing signs of being an ageless wonder like the others in the "bloodline", his contract could be extended a couple of years, again with a signing bonus to defer some cap. His dead cap drops to $4.1 mil in 2017, so adding some deferred cap does not egregious.

 

[Deleted member 6794]

I believe Rodgers and Matthews will be candidates for extensions or renegotiations come 2017 to free cap space.

In the case of Rodgers, some of the $20.3 mil in cap hit for that season could be pushed out further with a new deal that uses signing bonus to replace some chunk of his nearly $14 mil in salary and bonus, thereby deferring a chunk of the cap hit. Further, by 2017 there will be only $6.7 mil in dead cap on his contract, a residual of the signing bonus in his last deal, so putting on more dead cap in a new signing bonus in 2017 would hardly be mortgaging the future.

Rodgers may be willing to make a team friendly deal at that point in the interest of keeping his O-Line as intact as possible.

He'll be 36 years old at the conclusion of his current contract. If nothing dire happens to him by the time he hits 33 at the end of the 2016 season, adding a few years to his current deal while clearing some cap space would make sense. His current contract is practically built for a renegotiation/extension at the that point. 2018 at the latest.

In 2017, Matthews cap hit will be $15.2 mil, then dropping to $11.4 mil in 2018, the last year of his contract. He'll be 31 years old going into 2017 with 8 high snap count seasons under his belt. If he's showing signs of being an ageless wonder like the others in the "bloodline", his contract could be extended a couple of years, again with a signing bonus to defer some cap. His dead cap drops to $4.1 mil in 2017, so adding some deferred cap does not egregious.

It wouldn't be a mistake at all to renegotiate either Rodgers' or Matthews' contract by that time. I thought the same way about Tramon's deal last year or Peppers' one this offseason, yet Thompson decided not to do it.

BTW the dead money is completely irrelevant with Rodgers as there's no way the Packers will release him. Most likely the same with Matthews.

 

[TJV]

I think you answered your own question with your subsequent comments. Looking forward is more interesting and challenging than rehashing the past.

I agree looking forward is more interesting but looking three seasons down the line is a little strange IMO. There’s only so much we can say about the upcoming season but that’s much more applicable to the 2017 season. Unfortunately, poor performance and injuries are likely to make some personnel decisions easier than we would hope three years from now. And on the positive side, some youngsters will emerge to make some of the personnel losses easier to take. The bottom line of my post was “The more core players there are, the tougher it is to keep them. But it's a good problem to have.” And that applies particularly to the OL: Just imagine the OL performing as it did at the end of the season with a mobile Aaron Rodgers directing the O. But there’s not much to say or analyze about that, so most of our discussions have centered on the D and STs and there’s more to talk about in those areas since they’re more in flux. There are a lot of unknowns going into the upcoming season; there are exponentially more going into the 2017 season.

 

[HardRightEdge]

BTW the dead money is completely irrelevant with Rodgers as there's no way the Packers will release him. Most likely the same with Matthews.

That would be true if you have a crystal ball.

If the Packers were to extend Rodgers in 2017 with a signing bonus in order to clear cap space that year, the contract would then go out to 2020 or beyond, when he'll be 37+. The dead cap created in the new contract as a result of the signing bonus, which is what clears the needed cap space in the first place, is added on to the dead cap that's present at that time from the prior contract.

In this case, the dead cap hangover is $6.65 mil, which seems manageable. Were it $29.45 mil as it is today, that would be entirely different kettle of fish, which is why I made note of it. The more dead cap that's piled on top of dead cap that already exists, the greater the risk.

 

[HardRightEdge]

I agree looking forward is more interesting but looking three seasons down the line is a little strange IMO. There’s only so much we can say about the upcoming season but that’s much more applicable to the 2017 season. Unfortunately, poor performance and injuries are likely to make some personnel decisions easier than we would hope three years from now. And on the positive side, some youngsters will emerge to make some of the personnel losses easier to take. The bottom line of my post was “The more core players there are, the tougher it is to keep them. But it's a good problem to have.” And that applies particularly to the OL: Just imagine the OL performing as it did at the end of the season with a mobile Aaron Rodgers directing the O. But there’s not much to say or analyze about that, so most of our discussions have centered on the D and STs and there’s more to talk about in those areas since they’re more in flux. There are a lot of unknowns going into the upcoming season; there are exponentially more going into the 2017 season.

Looking a couple of years into the future, besides being interesting and challenging, helps to clarify what is going in the present.

For example, lets look at the 1st. and 2nd. round 2015 picks. If one does not look past 2015, the rationale would appear to be simple...the #2 and #3 cover corners departed in free agency and needed to be replaced, either to compete for a starting job or, if failing in that, provide injury placement insurance. Right?

Looking out a couple of years and at the particular players selected, that's only half the story while also calling the 2015 competition aspect into some question.

In looking at 2015 in isolation, these player selections look a little odd. These players have limited college experience in the cover corner role. Rollins in particular played against weak competition. There is a developmental curve that needs to be climbed.

When looking into the future, we see Hayward is a free agent after 2015 and Hyde after 2016, and the rationale comes into sharper focus.

Having Hayward in the wings, with some organizational confidence that he can perform adequately on the island allowed the Packers to forgo overpaying Williams or having to guarantee House a starting spot with the associated money attached.

It's reasonable to think that in picking Randall and Rollins in particular, one eye was cast toward 2015 and 2016, perhaps more so than providing direct competition in 2015.

We've seen what happens when the options are limited. The Packers offered Raji $8 mil per year after a couple of lackluster seasons. That he fortunately declined is beside the point. There was money in that offer reflective of who was on the bench behind him and the difficulty of getting a plug-and-play NT in the draft.

 

[TJV]

My point is there are so many variables involved with personnel going into this season: How will the 2015 draft picks perform? Which UDFAs will make the roster? Will any of them - or the draft picks - contribute significantly? If so, which ones and to what extent? Which youngsters in their second or third seasons will emerge this season? Which other players who haven't established themselves will succeed or fail to do so? Which established players will fall off or show signs of doing so? Will the emergence of youngster(s) make a player otherwise deemed 'depended upon' become expendable? What will be the impact of injuries? Will injuries cause the acquisition of FAs? If so, how will they perform and how does their status project into the future? Will more off-the-field behavior impact the team? Etcetera.

Multiply those questions as the Packers go into the 2016 season and then again as they enter the 2017 season and the 'variance of the variables' become exponential. Besides all that, with regard to how draft picks will project going forward, there's no worry at all about that since Thompson purely picks BPA regardless of those, and other complications. Right AmishMafia?

Seriously, I just think it's an exercise in mental ************ even beyond the normal expression of that activity on this forum.

 

[HardRightEdge]

I linked the Packers Notes story Hoarding Money for 2017 previously on this thread (http://packersnotes.com/2015/06/packers-hoarding-money-for-2017/) and Rodney makes the point that the Packers have about $15M in cap space and only one must-sign UFA coming up next season in Daniels – and perhaps Hayward depending upon how this season plays out.

That's a myopic view.

First of all, Daniels will not be cheap, and if Hayward plays well enough to be a "must sign", he'll be very much in demand in FA and very expensive considering his age. Even if he proves merely adequate or worse, he'd still be in demand as a either a mid-priced cover corner or in a return to nickel corner, the latter a position that has seen some significant price escalation along with the increasing frequency of 3-wide sets and the trend toward TE/WR hybrids over the years.

Since the argument is that the Packers have plenty of cap for 2016, let's take the example that best plays into that.

Daniels gets his nice second contract. No problem. Hayward has a nice year and becomes quite expensive, but Randall develops nicely over his first year, showing some promise in dime or even in injury replacement spot duty. Hayward departs and Randall steps in. Check.

All the other defensive free agents are expendable as the argument goes.

These free agents include Raji, Guion, Perry and Neal. We can throw in Richardson as a dime safety, core special teams tackler and Burnett's backup. Lets assume Peppers continues to play at a high level and finishes out his contract in 2016.

Now take a look at the guys on the bench behind those 5 free agents. I think you're going to see little or no experience. And the guys who have a little experience, Pennel and Elliot in particular, have hardly inspired confidence. Then ask the question, how much experience (first time or supplemental) do you think those bench players will get in 2015? Not much if things go according to plan.

So if you sign none of those 5 FA, then you're replacing 4 high snap count guys, 3 of them potentially starters if Matthews continues in the ILB rotation into 2016, with rookies or inexperienced bench players, some of whom have not shown particular promise. And Randall will be in a prove-it year as a first time starter. And that's in a defense that is not all that good to begin with.

So, when looking at any one of these FA's outside Daniels, expendibility can certainly be argued. But collectively it cannot. Some of these guys will need to be brought back, even if it is difficult to judge specifically which ones at this juncture. That's going to take a chunk out of the cap, reducing the illusory bounty of cap carryover to 2017 when several quite expensive core players hit free agency.

 

[HardRightEdge]

Seriously, I just think it's an exercise in mental ************ even beyond the normal expression of that activity on this forum.

That's where you would be wrong. Or as is often the case among those reluctant to look into the future, afraid to be wrong or afraid of what you might see.

On second thought, THX, you posted a link that quoted a source that discusses this very topic, looking out to 2017, while citing one of his arguments.

That in itself is as masterbatory as anything I posted, so your comment comes down to the pot calling the kettle black. It's simply a case of you liking his rosier scenario better than my cautionary one.

 

[vince]

That's a myopic view.

First of all, Daniels will not be cheap, and if Hayward plays well enough to be a "must sign", he'll be very much in demand in FA and very expensive considering his age. Even if he proves merely adequate or worse, he'd still be in demand as a either a mid-priced cover corner or in a return to nickel corner, a position that has seen some significant price escalation along with the increasing frequency of 3-wide sets and the trend toward TE/WR hybrids over the years.

Since the argument is that the Packers have plenty of cap for 2016, let's take the example that best plays into that.

Daniels gets his nice second contract. No problem. Hayward has a nice year and becomes quite expensive, but Randall develops nicely over his first year, showing some promise in dime or even in injury replacement spot duty. Hayward departs and Randall steps in. Check.

All the other defensive free agents are expendable as the argument goes.

These free agents include Raji, Guion, Perry and Neal. We can throw in Richardson as a dime safety, core special teams tackler and Burnett's backup. Lets assume Peppers continues to play at a high level and finishes out his contract in 2016.

Now take a look at the guys on the bench behind those 5 free agents. I think you're going to see little or no experience. And the guys who have a little experience, Pennel and Elliot, in particular, have hardly inspired confidence. Then ask the question, how much experience (first time or supplemental) do you think those bench players will get in 2015? Not much if things go according to plan.

So if you sign none of those 5 FA, then you're replacing 4 high snap count guys, 3 of them potentially starters if Matthews continues in the ILB rotation into 2016, with rookies or inexperienced bench players, some of whom have not shown particular promise. And Randall will be in a prove-it year as a first time starter. And that's in a defense that is not all that good to begin with.

So, when looking at any one of these FA's outside Daniels, expendibility can certainly be argued. But collectively it cannot. Some of these guys will need to be brought back, even if it is difficult to judge specifically which ones at this juncture. That's going to take a chunk out of the cap, reducing the illusory bounty of cap carryover to 2017 when several quite expensive core players hit free agency.

That's one kick-*** post right there IMO, in addition to your others in this thread HRE. Great vision sorting through the muddle and clearly seeing the real picture. Sure there are a lot of unknowns but there's also a lot to know, including contingency planning like at CB/DB and DL/OLB as you indicate. Every team's challenge is to plan and position themselves effectively for the future while short-term challenges ("unknowns") block their view and/or catch them unprepared. Some teams do it better than others obviously.

 

[TJV]

Then ask the question, how much experience (first time or supplemental) do you think those bench players will get in 2015? Not much if things go according to plan.

But things won't go 'according to plan' because **** happens. Players emerge and others decline and no one has a crystal ball - not even you. Look at Linsley and Barrington - how much experience did you think they'd get going into 2014? You had no idea and that's the point.

Or as is often the case among those reluctant to look into the future, afraid to be wrong or afraid of what you might see.

Damn, you got me. I'm afraid of what I might see in 2017. Good Lord!

 

[PikeBadger]

The future is going to be a fun ride not knowing exactly how things will pan out at each position and with each player. What we do know is that we have exceptional people handling contracts, scouts that are very good at identifying and bringing in talent and a coaching staff that is very good at developing that talent.

Enjoy the ride! Embrace it!

 

[vince]

No one knows what's gonna happen, but they damn sure better be ready when it does.

 

[PikeBadger]

No one knows what's gonna happen, but they damn sure better be ready when it does.

Just like always. Long term planning and short term reaction to changing circumstances all play a role in roster formation. We wouldn't have won the SB in 2011 without the incredible deftness of mgmt and coaching staff patching that injury riddled roster together on a weekly basis like they did. That was truly an amazing job the way they pulled that off. Just about every transaction made turned into gold.

 

[HardRightEdge]

Let's try this again from a top down perspective. Start with the following link:

http://overthecap.com/salary-cap/green-bay-packers/

We see $136 mil in cap for the current top-51 roster. The top half of the list is well populated with veterans filling out the 31 starter, key rotational, key backup and special teams positions. There's an open position at part-time ILB and a spot or two in the D-Line rotation with the suspensions. Other than that, the snaps are nearly fully accounted for.

Now click on the 2017 tab in that link. The top-51 cap commitments currently on the books total $115 mil.

The top 10 shows 9 good-to-great players, paid accordingly. Check.

Now look at the rest. Linsley and Rodgers are there. OK. Other than those two guys, while discounting Janis' small handful of snaps and Goodson getting a couple of ST snaps, that's it. There are 11 players in the 2017 list who have played NFL football to date.

So, who are the 21 players missing in that 2017 list among the current top 32 in achieving that $21 mil in lower cap? Here are the missing names:

Offense:

Lacy
Sitton
Lang
Bakhtiari
Tolzien
Quarless
Kuhn

Defense:

Peppers
Daniels
Raji
Guion
Boyd
D. Jones
Barrington
Perry
Neal
Hayward
Hyde

Special Teams:

Crosby
Masthay
Richardson
Hyde (again)

It's easy to pick out any one of these guys as departures and think the impact is manageable. But we're looking at the collective affect. Setting aside the cap carryover and cap increases for the moment, which roster represents the better value proposition in light of the $21 mil cap differential?

The answer is, "it's not even close".

I substantially discount the projected $20 million cap increase by 2017. Every team gets that, resulting in salary inflation. There might be a few million per year value gain by 2017 as a result of early signings. but it will not be substantial. Players and agents have visibility into the future cap; they want a piece of that built into 3-4-5 year contract extensions.

Then there's the cap carryover. The current $15 mil drops to $13 mil once 52, 53 and the PS are signed. Then IR has to be accounted for. Assuming a conservative average of 4 players per week in-season on IR, with those 4 guys replaced by minimum salary guys, that takes the carryover down to $9 mil.

Jump to 2016 (click the link tab for that year). Current cap commitments for that year are $130 mil, which goes to a minimum $137 mil after filling out the 52, 53 and PS, $3 mil for the signing of the top draft picks, and $2 mil held for IR replacements against a projected $150 + $9 = $159 mil in cap space.

That seems fat, doesn't it...$22 mil in free cap to work with between now and 2016 post-draft with the whole offense signed for that year. Let's say Thompson/Ball use all of it post-2015 for Daniels and some key extensions. That might buy Daniels and some marginally discounted Sitton, Lang and Lacy extensions under optimal conditions with very "cap friendly" deferrals via signing bonuses. Consider the fact that Tramon Williams and Devon House represent $13 mil in cap hits this season with their new teams. $24 mil doesn't go all that far. And those cap hits for those players carry forward as subtractions from the illusory 2017 cap space we seen now.

So, going into 2017, the cap carryover "war chest" shrinks to zero with a small handful of 4 key signings under a favorable scenario.

Where are the other 17 of the top 32 players supposed to come from, including a Peppers replacement in particular? Draft (or sign as UDFAs) and develop, I'm told.

So the question becomes, how may rookies from 2013 have ascended to the top 32 in 2015?

Lacy, Clinton-Dix, Hyde, Barrington, Linsley, Bakhtiari, Adams, R. Rodgers. Throw in Tolzien even if he wasn't a rookie in 2013. That's it...half of the pace of what will be needed to stand still.

There are three problems leading up to 2017 that have not been present in the 2-year outlook in recent years:

1) If you look at the proven top 9 players in the 2017 cap list, they were core players in 2013 except for Peppers and Adams, with Peppers bringing his own fresh 3-year cap hit starting in 2014. What those players are being paid now is substantially more than what they were paid in 2013. In other words, the Packers are paying a lot more money for the same players, plus what Peppers is getting paid out of the war chest who will need to be replaced, sucking up a decent portion of the cap expansion from 2013 to 2017. That compounds the salary inflation hit to cap expansion.

2) The youth pipeline is not that strong. We were thrilled to see Clinton-Dix, Linsley and Adams assuming starting positions out of the 2014 draft. Well, 17 players are needed to fill out the top 32 in 2017 once the war chest is expended on the aforementioned 4 core players, with all of the most promising youth from the 2014 and prior drafts already accounted for. And the bottom-of-the-roster players who might emerge are not going to get many snaps in 2015 barring injuries to even evaluate that pipeline. And it's not as though some of them didn't have an opportunity to bump some the 17 players in question...and didn't...by the end of 2014.

3) The Packers have been getting bad value on the defensive side of the ball, whether that's a matter of talent or coaching is another discussion. The 2014 and 2015 cap hits on the defensive side of the ball were and are greater than on the offensive side. For the money being paid to the defense, there should be better performance. Or less should have been paid and will be paid with cheaper players for the same performance.

THX calls my detailed 2-year outlook masterbatory. Instead he prefers his very own version of self-stroking in the following link, which I would deem superficial and, quite frankly, "failing to get off":

http://packersnotes.com/2015/06/packers-hoarding-money-for-2017/

I really don't care to hear any responses to this post unless there is some concomitant attention to detail in rebuttal.

 

[TJV]

THX calls my detailed 2-year outlook masterbatory. Instead he prefers his very own version of self-stroking in the following link, which I would deem superficial and, quite frankly, "failing to get off": http://packersnotes.com/2015/06/packers-hoarding-money-for-2017/

I really don't care to hear any responses to this post unless there is some concomitant attention to detail in rebuttal.

As you should know, what you “care to hear” about makes absolutely no difference whatever. Just as “starting a thread bestows no right of ownership nor control of the topic”, making a childish comment about what you care to hear about in no way controls the responses of others.

I first linked that article with the comment 'Packers Notes has an article on this subject'. In a later post I posted, “Rodney makes the point that the Packers have about $15M in cap space and only one must-sign UFA coming up next season in Daniels – and perhaps Hayward depending upon how this season plays out. So he says don’t be surprised if that number doesn’t go down much in the meantime and don’t be surprised if more than that is available to roll into 2017. But a lot can happen in the next two seasons: A single play can change a player's fortunes - even a team’s season - so 2017 is far away in NFL terms.” That’s the sum and substance of my preferring my “very own version”. Three sentences.

Next I summarized my thoughts on HRE’s the ‘sky is falling’ in three seasons posting: “My point is there are so many variables involved with personnel going into this season: How will the 2015 draft picks perform? Which UDFAs will make the roster? Will any of them - or the draft picks - contribute significantly? If so, which ones and to what extent? Which youngsters in their second or third seasons will emerge this season? Which other players who haven't established themselves will succeed or fail to do so? Which established players will fall off or show signs of doing so? Will the emergence of youngster(s) make a player otherwise deemed 'depended upon' become expendable? What will be the impact of injuries? Will injuries cause the acquisition of FAs? If so, how will they perform and how does their status project into the future? Will more off-the-field behavior impact the team? Etcetera. Multiply those questions as the Packers go into the 2016 season and then again as they enter the 2017 season and the 'variance of the variables' becomes exponential.” And I should have included the impact of the 2016 draft picks which HRE analyzes in detail. Seriously, does it need to be said that neither HRE nor any of the rest of us can answer these questions? That’s why IMO detailed worrying about three seasons hence is akin to mental ************. But of course you’re free to stroke away. Just try not to get your feelings hurt if your postings don’t receive universal adulation.

And if you need something else to obsess about, Aaron Rodgers will be 39 years old at the end of the 2022 season. Whatever will the Packers do in 2023??!!

Also: I now ban HRE from making any reply whatever to this post!!

 

[I asked LT to delete my acct]

Also: I now ban HRE from making any reply whatever to this post!!

Whaaaaa ?????

 

[HardRightEdge]

Whaaaaa ?????

No worries, Bill. You'd have to read the last 2 posts in full to get his gist.

 

[HardRightEdge]

As you should know, what you “care to hear” about makes absolutely no difference whatever.

Since the clear intent of my comment was that I would not care about responses unless a detailed counterargument was presented, I'd say this most recent missive of yours, cluttered with vagaries, failed to pass the test. So...no reply is forthcoming from me at this time as to the substance of the issue.

Also: I now ban HRE from making any reply whatever to this post!!

Fine by me. However I reserve the right to respond to detailed counterarguments, which of course is what I said in the first place.