2023 Offseason

[wco81]

Well 2022 season isn't officially over but 49ers are clearly planning for next seasons now.

[Pattersonca65]

Well 2022 season isn't officially over but 49ers are clearly planning for next seasons now.

LOL, so is every other team not in the super bowl.

[CrimsonCrew]

Given the situation with the cap and draft capital, it should be a pretty quiet off-season. Though I expect we will restructure some guys and try to retain a few of our FAs. We should still have one of the better rosters in the league, but we will lose some quality starters this year and will have to hope our young guys can step up.

[CrimsonCrew]

Given the situation with the cap and draft capital, it should be a pretty quiet offseason. Though I expect we will restructure some guys and try to retain a few of our FAs. We should still have one of the better rosters in the league, but we will lose some quality starters this year and will have to hope our young guys can step up.

[CrimsonCrew]

Not truly offseason news, but Patrick Willis didn't get into the HOF again. BS, man. The dude was as dominant as they came at the position. Obviously he had a relatively short career, but he was the best in the league for basically all of it. If/when Luke Kuechly gets in on the first ballot (or second or third), I'm going to lose it. They are virtually identical players.

Both played eight years. Kuechly played 118 games to Willis' 112, and that difference is basically all Willis' last season when he only played six games. Both made seven pro bowls and five first-team all pros. Both were defensive rookie of the year. Kuechly snagged that one DPOY his second year, but Willis was in the discussion repeatedly and no one would have batted an eyelash at it. Very similar numbers. Kuechly has more tackles (1092-950), but they're both very high and Kuechly played on worse teams - and without Navarro Bowman next to him stealing tackles. Kuechly has noticeably more INTs (18-8) but Willis forced significantly more fumbles (16-7) and had significantly more sacks (20.5-12.5) and QB hits (41-31).

This is not meant to be any kind of a knock on Kuechly, who was elite his entire career and deserves to be a first-ballot HOFer. Just that I will personally guarantee it does not take him over four years to get into the hall, and that's absurd when Patrick is languishing.

[CrimsonCrew]

Jets had both the offensive rookie of the year and the defensive rookie of the year. Wonder if that's ever happened before. Not a bad draft for them....

[CrimsonCrew]

Jets had both the offensive rookie of the year and the defensive rookie of the year. Wonder if that's ever happened before. Not a bad draft for them....

Apparently 2017 Saints and 1967 Lions. I had forgotten about the Saints with Lattimore and Kamara.

[thesack12]

Not truly offseason news, but Patrick Willis didn't get into the HOF again. BS, man. The dude was as dominant as they came at the position. Obviously he had a relatively short career, but he was the best in the league for basically all of it. If/when Luke Kuechly gets in on the first ballot (or second or third), I'm going to lose it. They are virtually identical players.

Both played eight years. Kuechly played 118 games to Willis' 112, and that difference is basically all Willis' last season when he only played six games. Both made seven pro bowls and five first-team all pros. Both were defensive rookie of the year. Kuechly snagged that one DPOY his second year, but Willis was in the discussion repeatedly and no one would have batted an eyelash at it. Very similar numbers. Kuechly has more tackles (1092-950), but they're both very high and Kuechly played on worse teams - and without Navarro Bowman next to him stealing tackles. Kuechly has noticeably more INTs (18-8) but Willis forced significantly more fumbles (16-7) and had significantly more sacks (20.5-12.5) and QB hits (41-31).

This is not meant to be any kind of a knock on Kuechly, who was elite his entire career and deserves to be a first-ballot HOFer. Just that I will personally guarantee it does not take him over four years to get into the hall, and that's absurd when Patrick is languishing.

To piggyback on this a bit, Zach Thomas got in this year over Willis.

Their accolades are basically even. Both have 7 pro bowls, 5 all pros, and an all decade team. However, Thomas played 4 more seasons than Willis.

While Thomas' tackles are significantly higher (about 800 more), the majority of the other counting stats are pretty even between the two. Which considering Thomas played in 70+ more games than Pat did, you have to be more impressed with Willis' career than Thomas'.

I think Willis' is being dinged because of his relatively short career. And in a league with brutal physicality being able to sustain a long career is a + to a hall of fame resume. Still Willis was dominant from jump, and he sustained that dominance for the duration of his playing days. I think peak Willis is clearly better than peak Thomas.

[thesack12]

Arik Armstead will carry a $24 mil cap hit next season.

For that high of number, you would expect that player to be a true game wrecker. Armstead is far from that caliber of player.

Jeeze, what a godawful contract they gave that guy. I realize his cap numbers have ballooned because of restructures, but if the initial contract wasn't so terrible the need to restructure wouldn't have surfaced.

[Jikkle]

Late to the party but I do like bringing in Steve Wilks to be DC.

As good as Saleh and Ryans were as DCs I do felt the defense has been plagued by the same issues for years and I hope getting a fresh face from outside the ecosystem we've had since 2017 will clean up and improve some of those issues.

He's a guy with a secondary background and the secondary play has been sloppy for years and I'd love to see it get tighten up and cleaned up.

And I don't know if I can take another year of watching this defense give up easy first downs on 3rd down. Like I'm going to stab my eyes out if I watch another year of QBs getting easy 8 yard completions to move the chains because the DBs are playing soft coverage to avoid getting beat deep for some reason.

[Pattersonca65]

Late to the party but I do like bringing in Steve Wilks to be DC.

As good as Saleh and Ryans were as DCs I do felt the defense has been plagued by the same issues for years and I hope getting a fresh face from outside the ecosystem we've had since 2017 will clean up and improve some of those issues.

He's a guy with a secondary background and the secondary play has been sloppy for years and I'd love to see it get tighten up and cleaned up.

And I don't know if I can take another year of watching this defense give up easy first downs on 3rd down. Like I'm going to stab my eyes out if I watch another year of QBs getting easy 8 yard completions to move the chains because the DBs are playing soft coverage to avoid getting beat deep for some reason.

I am on the fence with this hire. I am open minded about it but his resume as a DC in the NFL is limited. I did some research on him as a DC. There is not much there. On the plus side the players seem to really like him. There may have been issues on the teams he coordinated but at the same time there isn't really anything there that sticks out at you. At Carolina, the site gave his defense a C+ that year. He will have a lot of talent to work with in SF. I am on wait and see with this hire.



https://nflspinzone.com/2018/01/29/carolina-panthers-grading-2017-defense/

https://www.cleveland.com/browns/2019/12/how-browns-defensive-players-graded-for-the-2019-season.html

[CrimsonCrew]

Whole lot of Niners on this list:

https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/34096853/highest-paid-nfl-players-tracking-most-money-guaranteed-per-year-every-position

And Big Trent isn't one of them. Neither is Nick Bosa, who is about to be at the top of the pass-rushers. It's a real question how long we can maintain the caliber of the current team.

[Pattersonca65]

Whole lot of Niners on this list:

https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/34096853/highest-paid-nfl-players-tracking-most-money-guaranteed-per-year-every-position

And Big Trent isn't one of them. Neither is Nick Bosa, who is about to be at the top of the pass-rushers. It's a real question how long we can maintain the caliber of the current team.

Wow. Russell Wilson and Kyler Murray,

[CrimsonCrew]

Arik Armstead will carry a $24 mil cap hit next season.

For that high of number, you would expect that player to be a true game wrecker. Armstead is far from that caliber of player.

Jeeze, what a godawful contract they gave that guy. I realize his cap numbers have ballooned because of restructures, but if the initial contract wasn't so terrible the need to restructure wouldn't have surfaced.

The Niners have not been operating in the best way financially lately, IMO. Paraag Marathe is great at fitting things under the cap, but I feel like he isn't on the same page with Shanahan and Lynch. We've seen initial contracts and restructures that are really kicking cap hits down the road in a way that's starting to pinch. Restructuring Dee Ford was criminal. We're still paying him off instead of just eating the hit. The Armstead restructure has also made for some tough-to-stomach figures, and we basically can't cut him this year. Could next year, but for a $14 million cap hit.

The Samson Ebukam contract is also illuminating. Different from the restructures, but similar in a way. We signed him to a two-year, $12 million, which seemed a bit high at the time, but it was broken into a little less than $4 million and a little more than $8 million. I can't seem to find it now, but I don't think the dead money would have been that high to cut him after one year as he only got about $3.5 million in signing bonus. I expected that's what we would do, and what I think Marathe had in mind, but then Lynch and Shanahan don't cut him, and instead pay him $8.25 million this year when his performance was basically solid starter who doesn't bring much to the pass rush.

At this point, we can't keep paying these guys these huge contracts. We need to keep Bosa whatever the cost, but I'm not really sure where we can trim the fat. Desperately need some young guys to step up.

[CrimsonCrew]

Whole lot of Niners on this list:

https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/34096853/highest-paid-nfl-players-tracking-most-money-guaranteed-per-year-every-position

And Big Trent isn't one of them. Neither is Nick Bosa, who is about to be at the top of the pass-rushers. It's a real question how long we can maintain the caliber of the current team.

Wow. Russell Wilson and Kyler Murray,

Didn't even look at that. That hurts.

[CrimsonCrew]

Eagles have lost both coordinators to HC gigs. Lots of FAs, and possibly/probably a few retirements. They will have a hard time sustaining this year's success, though they're still a really dangerous team with a good, young core and a dynamic young QB who should continue to improve.

[CrimsonCrew]

Really interesting article in The Athletic about Purdy's cognitive ability. I'll summarize here, as I know a lot of people don't have an Athletic subscription.

Apparently in addition to the Wonderlic, they've been giving guys a test called the S2 Cognition Test since 2015 that tests how quickly individuals can take in and react to information (seemingly mostly non-verbal, like shapes, images, etc.), impulse control, etc. Purdy scored in the mid-90s, along with guys like Brees, Burrow, Mahomes, and Allen.

There's a strong correlation between a good score and success as an NFL passer (and other positions to an extent, too). Of 27 starting NFL QBs who had taken the test, 13 had ratings above 90. Those 13 players averaged a score of 91. Obviously there could be some outliers, but not many with a score that high. The 14 guys with ratings below 90 averaged in the 60s (which is still probably good for an average person, but not elite).

Of note:

As for the 49ers’ other young quarterback, Trey Lance?

Ally couldn’t reveal the exact number but said Lance “scored well.”

“He’s not in the Brock Purdy range but he didn’t score poorly,” he said.

When we talk about a QB's tools, this is the sort of thing that we never really seem to discuss. But it's every bit as important, and very likely more important, than the pure physical tools. There will never be a shortage of a big, strong guys who can throw a football. But can they throw it accurately to the right place? Jury is still out in Lance's case.

[Pattersonca65]

Really interesting article in The Athletic about Purdy's cognitive ability. I'll summarize here, as I know a lot of people don't have an Athletic subscription.

Apparently in addition to the Wonderlic, they've been giving guys a test called the S2 Cognition Test since 2015 that tests how quickly individuals can take in and react to information (seemingly mostly non-verbal, like shapes, images, etc.), impulse control, etc. Purdy scored in the mid-90s, along with guys like Brees, Burrow, Mahomes, and Allen.

There's a strong correlation between a good score and success as an NFL passer (and other positions to an extent, too). Of 27 starting NFL QBs who had taken the test, 13 had ratings above 90. Those 13 players averaged a score of 91. Obviously there could be some outliers, but not many with a score that high. The 14 guys with ratings below 90 averaged in the 60s (which is still probably good for an average person, but not elite).

Of note:

As for the 49ers’ other young quarterback, Trey Lance?

Ally couldn’t reveal the exact number but said Lance “scored well.”

“He’s not in the Brock Purdy range but he didn’t score poorly,” he said.

When we talk about a QB's tools, this is the sort of thing that we never really seem to discuss. But it's every bit as important, and very likely more important, than the pure physical tools. There will never be a shortage of a big, strong guys who can throw a football. But can they throw it accurately to the right place? Jury is still out in Lance's case.

Interesting. I've never heard of that test before. I don't know that the wonderlic is much of a indicator of success other than a guy who scored real low might be too dumb to even understand a playbook. Both Kaep and Alex Smith scored highly on the wunderlic test and both were actually really smart classroom guys although neither turned out to be great on the field processors. The jury is still out on Lance. People love his physical skills and assume he will just pickup the mental aspects of the game but that is far from certain. He could very well end up being good enough to be a mid-tier QB or just above that but can he turn out to be an elite level QB remains to be seen.

[CrimsonCrew]

Really interesting article in The Athletic about Purdy's cognitive ability. I'll summarize here, as I know a lot of people don't have an Athletic subscription.

Apparently in addition to the Wonderlic, they've been giving guys a test called the S2 Cognition Test since 2015 that tests how quickly individuals can take in and react to information (seemingly mostly non-verbal, like shapes, images, etc.), impulse control, etc. Purdy scored in the mid-90s, along with guys like Brees, Burrow, Mahomes, and Allen.

There's a strong correlation between a good score and success as an NFL passer (and other positions to an extent, too). Of 27 starting NFL QBs who had taken the test, 13 had ratings above 90. Those 13 players averaged a score of 91. Obviously there could be some outliers, but not many with a score that high. The 14 guys with ratings below 90 averaged in the 60s (which is still probably good for an average person, but not elite).

Of note:

As for the 49ers’ other young quarterback, Trey Lance?

Ally couldn’t reveal the exact number but said Lance “scored well.”

“He’s not in the Brock Purdy range but he didn’t score poorly,” he said.

When we talk about a QB's tools, this is the sort of thing that we never really seem to discuss. But it's every bit as important, and very likely more important, than the pure physical tools. There will never be a shortage of a big, strong guys who can throw a football. But can they throw it accurately to the right place? Jury is still out in Lance's case.

Interesting. I've never heard of that test before. I don't know that the wonderlic is much of a indicator of success other than a guy who scored real low might be too dumb to even understand a playbook. Both Kaep and Alex Smith scored highly on the wunderlic test and both were actually really smart classroom guys although neither turned out to be great on the field processors. The jury is still out on Lance. People love his physical skills and assume he will just pickup the mental aspects of the game but that is far from certain. He could very well end up being good enough to be a mid-tier QB or just above that but can he turn out to be an elite level QB remains to be seen.

I hadn't heard of it either, but it makes a lot of sense.

Re: Lance, the physical skills are theoretically there - though I consider accuracy a physical skill, and he hasn't demonstrated that consistently. He's also a super mature, thoughtful, smart, hard-working kid by all accounts. But as said, just being smart isn't worth all that much in the NFL. Sure, it's important to be able to pick up and retain a dense playbook. You need to recognize concepts and patterns. But when the bullets are live, you need that fast reaction time that this test seems to do a better job of assessing.

A more athletic Brees is basically the hope for Purdy. A lot of people question his upside, which is fair, but ultimately, so long as you are above a minimum threshold, you don't need absolutely elite physical skills to succeed in this league. If he can improve his strength, Purdy's upside could be nearly as high as the elite QBs out there, assuming he can also continue to develop mentally.

[Jikkle]

Really interesting article in The Athletic about Purdy's cognitive ability. I'll summarize here, as I know a lot of people don't have an Athletic subscription.

Apparently in addition to the Wonderlic, they've been giving guys a test called the S2 Cognition Test since 2015 that tests how quickly individuals can take in and react to information (seemingly mostly non-verbal, like shapes, images, etc.), impulse control, etc. Purdy scored in the mid-90s, along with guys like Brees, Burrow, Mahomes, and Allen.

There's a strong correlation between a good score and success as an NFL passer (and other positions to an extent, too). Of 27 starting NFL QBs who had taken the test, 13 had ratings above 90. Those 13 players averaged a score of 91. Obviously there could be some outliers, but not many with a score that high. The 14 guys with ratings below 90 averaged in the 60s (which is still probably good for an average person, but not elite).

Of note:

As for the 49ers’ other young quarterback, Trey Lance?

Ally couldn’t reveal the exact number but said Lance “scored well.”

“He’s not in the Brock Purdy range but he didn’t score poorly,” he said.

When we talk about a QB's tools, this is the sort of thing that we never really seem to discuss. But it's every bit as important, and very likely more important, than the pure physical tools. There will never be a shortage of a big, strong guys who can throw a football. But can they throw it accurately to the right place? Jury is still out in Lance's case.

I've always said that the ability to process information is absolutely vital for a QB and it's something you either have or you don't.

Most media and fans unfortunately mix it up with overall intelligence and they are two separate things. You can be extremely smart but you still might not be able to answer a question with a gun to your head and less than 2 seconds to answer it before the trigger is pulled.

That's why when it came to Justin Fields I didn't care if he had a photographic memory because all that meant is he'd remember the exact number of the guy he threw the pick too. The question was never if Fields was intelligent but if he could quickly process information which not everyone is born with.

In the case of this S2 Cognition Test you'd really have to know who scored what to analyze just how much it contributes to a QB's success. You'd have to know who are the 13 guys that scored high and who are the 14 guys that didn't to judge how much it contributes to a QBs success.

It doesn't change the question of if Purdy's physical abilities are going to limit him in his career. Because Mahomes, Allen, and Burrow are right there with him and they are all clearly more physically gifted than he is and odds are you'll be seeing one of those guys in the Super Bowl so Purdy can't rely on being the smarter guy in those matchups.