2023 Season

[CrimsonCrew]

I was reviewing the Eagles' recent record. Talk about an incredible collapse.

Since the bye, they are 3-4, and they are 1-4 over their past five. They beat the Chiefs by four, but Valdes-Scantling flat out dropped a TD pass with like 1:45 left to play (they had all three TOs, so no guarantee they don't win). The following week, they needed (but got) a 17-point fourth quarter and a 59-yard FG in bad weather to for OT and a win in a game that they really should have lost.

Bad losses to us and Dallas, a last-minute loss to the Hawks, the Giants drove deep into their territory with a chance to tie the game in their only win, and this week they blew the win at home against the Cardinals - despite a pick-six on a 99-yard return that resulted in a minimum 10-point swing as the Cards were in FG range.

The Eagles are the sort of team who can probably right the ship and get back to being dangerous pretty quickly, but they have been absolutely flailing for over a month now. Makes our road to the SB that much easier if they keep it up. Though odds are their first game will be at the NFC South champ. I guess TB could give them problems with their offensive weapons, so better root for Mayfield.

[CrimsonCrew]

Incidentally, not very likely, but if the Panthers beat the Bucs and the Falcons beat the Saints, you would have three 8-9 teams in the NFC South, and I believe the Falcons would win the division.

[RIPskaterdude]

Rams are resting players

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[CrimsonCrew]

Just as well that we don't feel more pressure to give our guys a lot of playing time. I'd still give the starters some time - we'll have the bye to rejuvenate and could have some concerns about rust - and definitely don't want Darnold to get the start, but I'd pull them fairly soon.

[CrimsonCrew]

I guess the team already announced Darnold will start. Man, that kind of sucks. If he starts and we win, he gets like a $1.5 million bonus. I'm usually in favor of players getting theirs, but Darnold has made plenty of money, and we need all the cap room we can get. And he isn't exactly earning this by starting for an injured player. At least put Purdy in for the first drive. Especially if Donald is sitting.

[arich35]

I guess the team already announced Darnold will start. Man, that kind of sucks. If he starts and we win, he gets like a $1.5 million bonus. I'm usually in favor of players getting theirs, but Darnold has made plenty of money, and we need all the cap room we can get. And he isn't exactly earning this by starting for an injured player. At least put Purdy in for the first drive. Especially if Donald is sitting.

Not a great look for the franchise if they put Purdy in for one drive to intentionally make a guy miss a bonus.

[CrimsonCrew]

I guess the team already announced Darnold will start. Man, that kind of sucks. If he starts and we win, he gets like a $1.5 million bonus. I'm usually in favor of players getting theirs, but Darnold has made plenty of money, and we need all the cap room we can get. And he isn't exactly earning this by starting for an injured player. At least put Purdy in for the first drive. Especially if Donald is sitting.

Not a great look for the franchise if they put Purdy in for one drive to intentionally make a guy miss a bonus.

I'm totally fine with it. He didn't really earn the bonus. Only reason he's playing is because the starter in that spot has been so good.

[wco81]

I don't know if there are such things as ring chasers in the NFL, that is free agents willing to sign for a low 1-year deal with a contender in hopes of getting a championship and putting them in position to get a better contract in the following season.

Nature of the sport is that players could suffer injuries which could shorten careers and reduce market value.

So NFL teams are a lot less beneficent than NBA teams in that regard, that is try to burnish a good rep.

OTOH, maybe they plan to play Trent minimally or not at all so maybe they're compensating Darnold for taking some hits for the team.

[CrimsonCrew]

I don't know if there are such things as ring chasers in the NFL, that is free agents willing to sign for a low 1-year deal with a contender in hopes of getting a championship and putting them in position to get a better contract in the following season.

Nature of the sport is that players could suffer injuries which could shorten careers and reduce market value.

So NFL teams are a lot less beneficent than NBA teams in that regard, that is try to burnish a good rep.

OTOH, maybe they plan to play Trent minimally or not at all so maybe they're compensating Darnold for taking some hits for the team.

I don't think Darnold did them any favors in terms of joining the squad. He saw an opportunity to rebuild his reputation in Kyle's offense, with Lance struggling and injury prone and the jury out on how long Purdy would be out and how he would look when he returned.

Absent the salary cap, I'm all for throwing a guy a bone on bonus money. But there are plenty of guys I'd look to do that for before Darnold, who has earned some $55 million in his career to date. And we are jammed up for cap space over the next few years, so every dollar counts.

[thesack12]

Spotrac has Darnold's bonus at only $300K and it reads a win while taking 25% of the snaps.

Who knows if that's the accurate figure and language, either way I personally am not concerned about it. 9ers are rolling like $40 mil in cap space over to next season. Even if the bonus is indeed $1.5 mil, that small of figure could easily be created if it became absolutely imperative to do so.

Besides it only takes 1 play for a guy to get hurt. What happens if Purdy starts and gets hurt on the first possession? If that happens while the only reason Purdy started was to avoid paying Darnold a peanuts sized bonus, it would be a catastrophic exercise of short sightedness while reaching for basically no reward.

There is also the possibility that they would like to bring Darnold back next year. Putting aside our own personal opinions on that, if they are leaving the door open for Sam to come back next year it makes sense to build some goodwill with him.

[thesack12]

Read on Twitter

So there are 21, 49ers that are in the pro bowl equation. That's an astounding 39%

Also worth noting that there are only 22 starters for a team, well plus the 3 specialists so 25.

The roster is incredible. Hopefully that leads to no 49ers playing in the probowl as they prepare to bring home the Lombardi the following week.

[thesack12]

Read on Twitter

Dang, besides Logan Ryan are the 9ers going to have any natural safeties available for this Sunday?

So glad, everything got locked up last week

On the + side its looking like Jennings and Ray Ray will return this week. Getting those guys some live action to help them get back into form before it counts will be good.

[thesack12]

Read on Twitter

Dude was a rock solid pickup, that was pretty unheralded and basically unnoticed at the time.

[CrimsonCrew]

Spotrac has Darnold's bonus at only $300K and it reads a win while taking 25% of the snaps.

Who knows if that's the accurate figure and language, either way I personally am not concerned about it. 9ers are rolling like $40 mil in cap space over to next season. Even if the bonus is indeed $1.5 mil, that small of figure could easily be created if it became absolutely imperative to do so.

Besides it only takes 1 play for a guy to get hurt. What happens if Purdy starts and gets hurt on the first possession? If that happens while the only reason Purdy started was to avoid paying Darnold a peanuts sized bonus, it would be a catastrophic exercise of short sightedness while reaching for basically no reward.

There is also the possibility that they would like to bring Darnold back next year. Putting aside our own personal opinions on that, if they are leaving the door open for Sam to come back next year it makes sense to build some goodwill with him.

My understanding is that that bonus counts against the cap already because it's considered a likely-to-be-earned bonus based on Darnold's last season. So it would come off the cap. We have a lot of cap to roll over, but we also have a lot of dead money stacking up in the years ahead thanks to several restructures.

Obviously if Purdy gets hurt it's a disaster, but taking three weeks off seems somewhat excessive. If it was my call, I'd give him some plays to stay sharp. Though not having Trent would be a consideration.

[Jikkle]

I was reviewing the Eagles' recent record. Talk about an incredible collapse.

Since the bye, they are 3-4, and they are 1-4 over their past five. They beat the Chiefs by four, but Valdes-Scantling flat out dropped a TD pass with like 1:45 left to play (they had all three TOs, so no guarantee they don't win). The following week, they needed (but got) a 17-point fourth quarter and a 59-yard FG in bad weather to for OT and a win in a game that they really should have lost.

Bad losses to us and Dallas, a last-minute loss to the Hawks, the Giants drove deep into their territory with a chance to tie the game in their only win, and this week they blew the win at home against the Cardinals - despite a pick-six on a 99-yard return that resulted in a minimum 10-point swing as the Cards were in FG range.

The Eagles are the sort of team who can probably right the ship and get back to being dangerous pretty quickly, but they have been absolutely flailing for over a month now. Makes our road to the SB that much easier if they keep it up. Though odds are their first game will be at the NFC South champ. I guess TB could give them problems with their offensive weapons, so better root for Mayfield.

Eagles were playing on razor's edge all season until the 9er game where they got hit with a devasting uppercut and now they've been stumbling punch drunk ever since.

I think out of all the teams that needed the #1 seed and the bye week it was the Eagles and without that bye to catch their breath I don't think they'll fully recover.

In a sense they sorta just regressed back to the mean at least defensively for sure. They had 70 sacks last season which is an insane outlier as the sack totals typically top out somewhere in the 50s from season to season.

They still have a lot of talent so you can't sleep on them but their back end on defense is just garbage and it's hard to see them getting far with a defense that bad.

[Jikkle]

Rams are resting players

Read on Twitter

It's actually the smart play on the Rams' part.

This season there is little difference between having the 6th or 7th seed as Dallas/Philly and Detroit are pretty similar to play against.

Not to mention the odds of getting a home game as a 6th seed is astronomically low as it would require both the 6th and 7th seed to make it to the NFC Championship game.

Also odds are pretty high if you win as the 6th or 7th seed you're probably playing the 9ers so it's best to keep the cards close to your vest for a potential matchup.

You just have more to gain giving your key players a week off to rest and recharge for a playoff run than fighting to keep the 6th seed.

And you know you're opponent isn't playing for anything either so you're not necessarily giving up on winning either.

[thesack12]

Spotrac has Darnold's bonus at only $300K and it reads a win while taking 25% of the snaps.

Who knows if that's the accurate figure and language, either way I personally am not concerned about it. 9ers are rolling like $40 mil in cap space over to next season. Even if the bonus is indeed $1.5 mil, that small of figure could easily be created if it became absolutely imperative to do so.

Besides it only takes 1 play for a guy to get hurt. What happens if Purdy starts and gets hurt on the first possession? If that happens while the only reason Purdy started was to avoid paying Darnold a peanuts sized bonus, it would be a catastrophic exercise of short sightedness while reaching for basically no reward.

There is also the possibility that they would like to bring Darnold back next year. Putting aside our own personal opinions on that, if they are leaving the door open for Sam to come back next year it makes sense to build some goodwill with him.

My understanding is that that bonus counts against the cap already because it's considered a likely-to-be-earned bonus based on Darnold's last season. So it would come off the cap. We have a lot of cap to roll over, but we also have a lot of dead money stacking up in the years ahead thanks to several restructures.

Obviously if Purdy gets hurt it's a disaster, but taking three weeks off seems somewhat excessive. If it was my call, I'd give him some plays to stay sharp. Though not having Trent would be a consideration.

https://www.spotrac.com/nfl/san-francisco-49ers/sam-darnold-25098/

Again, I don't know if that is the accurate language or the correct figures but its the only place I've seen a breakdown of the specifics of Darnold's incentives.

It shows only $1.2 mil in total counts against the cap due to being likely to be earned. With only $300k per regular season win where he plays 25% of the snaps, I really don't see an issue here. If anything his cap hit is going to be lowered because he's going to trigger less than the $1.2 mil in total incentives.

I get we always need to be mindful of the cap, but in this particular situation I don't think the juice is worth the squeeze. As I mentioned in the previous post if it becomes absolutely critical to create that small of a number of cap space it would be quite easy to do so.

[Pattersonca65]

I don't know if there are such things as ring chasers in the NFL, that is free agents willing to sign for a low 1-year deal with a contender in hopes of getting a championship and putting them in position to get a better contract in the following season.

Nature of the sport is that players could suffer injuries which could shorten careers and reduce market value.

So NFL teams are a lot less beneficent than NBA teams in that regard, that is try to burnish a good rep.

OTOH, maybe they plan to play Trent minimally or not at all so maybe they're compensating Darnold for taking some hits for the team.

I think ring chasers exist. They tend to be older players who are on the downside of their careers. They made their money. Not players that are due big paydays but players that might turn better deals elsewhere to try and win a ring before they retire. Players in their prime are not going to do that. It would be rare

[CrimsonCrew]

Read on Twitter

So there are 21, 49ers that are in the pro bowl equation. That's an astounding 39%

Also worth noting that there are only 22 starters for a team, well plus the 3 specialists so 25.

The roster is incredible. Hopefully that leads to no 49ers playing in the probowl as they prepare to bring home the Lombardi the following week.

It seems like every year I'm struck by how screwed off-ball LBs get by the pro bowl. You've got effectively six pass-rushers making it for both squads (NFC: Bosa, Sweat, and Hutchinson at DE, Parsons, Hunter, and Reddick at OLB; AFC: Garrett, Crosby, and Hendrickson at DE, Watt, Mack, and Allen at OLB) and only two off-ball LBs, both of whom are basically MLBs (though both the Ravens guys made it as 3-4 ILBs). WLBs and SLBs - specifically Greenlaw in this case - basically have no chance. I guess that works to our advantage in terms of his contract, possibly incentives, etc., but it seems really dumb to have six guys at effectively two starting edge positions and only two guys at effectively two or three true LB spots.

[CrimsonCrew]

Spotrac has Darnold's bonus at only $300K and it reads a win while taking 25% of the snaps.

Who knows if that's the accurate figure and language, either way I personally am not concerned about it. 9ers are rolling like $40 mil in cap space over to next season. Even if the bonus is indeed $1.5 mil, that small of figure could easily be created if it became absolutely imperative to do so.

Besides it only takes 1 play for a guy to get hurt. What happens if Purdy starts and gets hurt on the first possession? If that happens while the only reason Purdy started was to avoid paying Darnold a peanuts sized bonus, it would be a catastrophic exercise of short sightedness while reaching for basically no reward.

There is also the possibility that they would like to bring Darnold back next year. Putting aside our own personal opinions on that, if they are leaving the door open for Sam to come back next year it makes sense to build some goodwill with him.

My understanding is that that bonus counts against the cap already because it's considered a likely-to-be-earned bonus based on Darnold's last season. So it would come off the cap. We have a lot of cap to roll over, but we also have a lot of dead money stacking up in the years ahead thanks to several restructures.

Obviously if Purdy gets hurt it's a disaster, but taking three weeks off seems somewhat excessive. If it was my call, I'd give him some plays to stay sharp. Though not having Trent would be a consideration.

https://www.spotrac.com/nfl/san-francisco-49ers/sam-darnold-25098/

Again, I don't know if that is the accurate language or the correct figures but its the only place I've seen a breakdown of the specifics of Darnold's incentives.

It shows only $1.2 mil in total counts against the cap due to being likely to be earned. With only $300k per regular season win where he plays 25% of the snaps, I really don't see an issue here. If anything his cap hit is going to be lowered because he's going to trigger less than the $1.2 mil in total incentives.

I get we always need to be mindful of the cap, but in this particular situation I don't think the juice is worth the squeeze. As I mentioned in the previous post if it becomes absolutely critical to create that small of a number of cap space it would be quite easy to do so.

Yeah, I can't find the term that I thought was in there, so I could very well be wrong. If it's $300K for 25% of snaps and a win, it's not really worth the risk. I thought we were looking at more like $1.5 million, and that starts making a difference.

Assuming that lower figure, ultimately I think you make the best decision for your team on this one. I'm still not entirely sold on that being sitting Purdy, but it would be a nightmare if he got hurt in a meaningless game, so I can understand it. And we've seen this OL really struggle without Trent. Not to mention it's a pretty beaten-up unit in general.