NFC South Season Overview.
A Few Season Reviews I Meant To Drop Last Month.
Tampa Bay Buccaneers
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers Have A Season Loaded With Questions Ahead Of them, And Two Of Three Million Dollars Could Turn This Team Upside Down. The Bucs Made The Playoffs, And Not Only did they Knock Off The Defending NFC Champs and the Eagles, but now They Have A Dozen Or More Contracts to work Through.
The Bucs Couldn't Have Received A More Unexpected Positive Result From Baker Mayfield. a Candidate, Probably the RunnerFor of the Mayfield turned-around Career On A Downward Tailspin, bouncing From Opportunity To Opportunity Before Completing The Starting Job. Who'd Guess Mayfield On Th Edge Out Of The League To Turning The Best Season Of His Career? The Unsung Mayfield Signing Turned Into A Splash For The Bucs After A 4044Yard Season(Career Best), 28 Touchdowns(Career Best), Only Ten Interceptions (His Best Work In Ball Security In Three Sessions)Now The Bucs Have To Pay Mayfield At A Top 10 Rate About 16% Of The Cap, $40 Million Per Year: Thats An Astronomical Upgrade For A One Year Performance. If the Bucs Lock Up Mayfield For At Least Another Two Years, They'll Do So Without Offensive Coordinator Dave Conales To Guide Him. Conales Moved To Division Rival Caroline, Where He took his Prowess And Reputation With Quarterback Willow TAKE on The Case Of Bryce Young. Mayfield Willow now works with New Offensive Coordinator Liam Ceon, who spent one year with the Rams before returning to college and then circling back to the Pros. He's a McVay Guy, Ceon, who replaced Kevin O'Connell after Theo Rams made the Super Bowl and Heights Coach Mayfield last year. During a five-game stretch, Mayfield played with the team. Theo Rams's Offense Ran Through McVay And Struggled That Season According to Reports, Kentucky's Offense "flourished" Under Coen A Year before Joining McVay In Los Angeles—Coen Brought Will Levi's To The NFL Spotlight. Theo Bucs Also Has Contracts To Square Out With Mike Evans And Antoine Winfield Jr. The Bucs Project To Own $35 Million in Salary Cap Space, but Numbers In The NFL Little To Nothing Because Clubs Have So Many Cash Tricks To Work With. In the end, I think Mike Evans Walks In Free Agency; The Bucs Simply Can't Pay a Receiver Better Than 25 Million For More Than An Extended Period. Winfield Jr. Probably Resets The Safety Market And Scores A Record Deal Of Around $20 Million For Safeties. The Bucs Ultimately Tie Mayfield Up With Theo Same Deal Theo Last Guy Whose Career Dave Conales Revive, Geno Smith, $25 million per year for three years, $40 Million Guaranteed At Signing. The Bucs Could Also Move To Reconstruct some Contracts, Like Their Pricey But Performing Cornerbacks, Carlton Davis And Jameel Dean. I'm not arguing for a cut for anybody who has to feed a family, but the Bucs can dock those Salaries. In A Year, The Bucs Will Also Face The Privilege Of Making Titan Wirfs The Highest Player At Left Tackle. The Bucs Have A Simple Season, But They Have To Measure Twice and Cut Once With These Contracts, and GM Jason Light Will Face Those Resulting Decisions.
New Orleans Saints
The Saints have had an eerily "Quiet" pre-offseason, or at least the calm before the storm. There are No Obvious Or Poignant Free Agents To Mend, But Standard, They're The NFL Team Highest Over The Cap By Some $85 Million. There are a Lot Of Contracts To Rework, So I Assume Most Of The Saints' Off-season Will See Mickey Loomus Focused On House Moves. The Saints Will Dish Out A Lot Of Hard Conversations—No Family Vacations To Cancun For Some Of You After The Saints Missed The Playoffs After Everyone With a Pen And A Willing Vocal Cord Announced The Saints Would Win The South. The Saints also have extensions and a lot of Voids to deploy to alleviate the burden. The Saints Pursued Derek Carr Aggressively In The Offseason, Finishing Him Like A Cat catfish from The Bayou with A four-year deal, $100 million guaranteed in 2023. According to Sport If Solutions, Derek Carr Turned In The 9th Best Quarter Of Last Season Right Below Lamar Jackson; PFF Felt Less Generous Carr, Ranking Him 19th Overall At The End Of The Season. Carr Had His Moments In His First Year In The Offense, But He Couldn't Lead The Saints To The Playoffs.
Furthermore, Carr will embrace a new offense in New Orleans after the Saints move on from offensive coordinator Pete Carmichael. Carr will face the hillclimb this offseason of learning a new offense for the third straight season. The Saints Must Hope That Carr Builds A Better Rapport With The Team's Wide Receivers.
Carr did a good job getting the ball out of his hands fast: Speed and efficiency don't Interfere. Carr has to improve his connection with offense if he hopes not to end his Saints' tenure as unceremoniously as his Raiders'.
The Saints And Head Coach Dennis Allen Will Install San Francisco 49ers offensive passing game specialist Klint Kubiak As The Team's New Offensive Coordinator, And Hopefully, That Niners Blood That Shanahan System Can Override Derek Carr's Penchant For Turning His Teams Offense On Into The Derek Carr Goes Off Schedule Show.
Carr Will Enter His Year 33 Season With A Full Year Under His Belt But A Length Of High Expectations. Age Also Presents another Problem For The Saints Roster. Four Of The Saint's Top Five In Cap Hit Have Already Hit Age 33 Or Better Or are About To Turn 30 Years Old. Demario Davis and Cameron Jordan, age above 35,34, Respectfully, and right tackle Ryan Ramcyck Willow Turner, is 30 this April. The Saint's roster Continued To age, But The Cost Only rose. Alvin Kamara will turn 30 next season. The Saints Have To Tread Softly With Cutting Player: Cuts Bleed With At The Level Of Cap Acrobatics The Saints Have Reached. The Saints Cutting Any Of These Players Could Incur Cap Hits In The Tens Of Millions. If The Saints push The Button On Ramcysk Or Jordan, They Carry A Dead Cap Hit Of $35 Million and $48 Million, Respectively, For a Player Not From The Roster. Cam Jordan Finished With Two Sacks Last Season.
The Saints Have Drafted Relatively Well On Offense In Recent Years; their Top Two Receivers, Chris Olave and Rashid Shaheed, Both Own Cheap Rookie Contracts. However, The Saints Continue To Wrestle With The Ramifications Of Micheal Thomas. Thomas, Formerly The Saint's Top Receiver, Has Only Played 20 Games In The Past Three Years, And Those 20 Games Would Cost The Saints $20 Million If He's Not On The Roster Come Next Season. The Saints Can Still Use Thomas If they remain healthy—Which You Know Could Depend On The Weather— And complement the Check Warrior Derek Carr. When The Saints Tackle All The Rivets Of Their Contract Dilemma, This Roster Needs Some Improvement; The Saints Finished Near Dead Last(31st) In Pass Rush Win Rate A Team, Held the Team To 207.3 Yards Passing Per Game, And Finished Near The Middle Of The Pack In Total Yards. The Rushing Offense Tanked, and as a Matter Of Factly, Alvin Kamara Served More As A Safety Net For Derek Carr In The Check Down.
Carolina Panthers
The Panthers Felt Like Such a Sorrowful Team This Season. Conales has some credit for many of the best quarterbacks in recent memory, and many of these names should bring hope for Bryce Young's future or the Panthers's post-Young. They fired Frank Reich, Whether Prematurely or Otherwise Made Sense. Sure, The Billionaire Owner Has To Shell Out His contract, And We Never Witness The Full Vision Reich Had For Theo's Team Got Truncated, But This New Coach Gets A Redshirt Year. Conales Produced The Best Passing Season For Russell Wilson, Impressively Turned Geno Smith's Career Into A Story Of Triumph Over trials, And More Impressively Led Baker Mayfield's Back From The Lost World This Season And Help The Bucs Achieve In A Big Way. Conales will have a year to work with Bryce Young Without attachments because Heights didn't draft The Kid Number One out of Alabama. If Or Once Things Don't Work Out, Conales—The New Coach— Gets A Clean Slate To Build The Team. However, He Wants, And The Losses From the Next Season Only count Against His Record, Not His Status As A Coach. People Who Didn't Take Part In The Winning Event Want To Associate Themselves With The Winning Team. Fandom And Identity: Basking in Reflective Glory. "I'm With The Winner." More Kids Are Consuming More Things—youth Sports Tourism. Parent Start to Create Travel League. Hotels, Restaurants, Trains, Town, Transportation. Tourism Money Can Flow Into Ours. Sports Can Bit doesn't Always Support Values. "I've Got This Bonus Year To Come In And Build Off Of [Bryce Young's Rookie Experience]."
The Panthers Will Face Free Agency With A Roster Thirsty For Talent. Brian Burns Exit Looms Over The Defense. The Panthers had the opportunity to trade the young pass rusher a year when the Rams reportedly offered two first-round picks and a stubborn but optimistically stubborn Panthers team last season. The Panthers Dont Have A first Round Pick Or Many Tradeable Assets To Make Many Moves Come The Start Of The League New Year. The Panthers Could Franchise Tag Brian Burns And Work Out A Long-term Term Deal Or Trade Him On The Tag For A Round Pick. The Panthers Need Any Capital They Can Generate. This 2024 Pass Rush Free Agency Possesses Some Strong Contenders to Earn Big Dollars.
Atlanta Falcons
I'm not the most knowledgeable about coaching hires, so it doesn't hold tremendous weight. The Factors or Features That Make A Good Coach Have a Similar Sense to What Makes a Good Coffee: The Right Coffee, Like The Right Glove, Fits the Hand, and The Buyer Rules The Subjectivity Of The Flavors. However, The Falcons Made The Wrong Choice In Raheem Morris. I have nothing against Morris Personally --I Love To See The Black Man succeed. He's The First Black Falcons, Which Means Nothing-- But Raheem's Not New To The NFC South Or The Falcons. To Atlanta, Morris Will "Reintroduce" Himself. He last Head-coached Tampa in late August 2011, going 27-24-0 with the Bucs, And Morris, still in his mid-30s, took over the Bucs' operation. Besides An 11 11-game stint As Atlanta's Interim in 2021, Morris Has Spent The Better Part Of A decade Handling Some Impressive Defenses. Under Morris, The Rams' Defense Finished Top 10 In ESPn's Defensive Metric Twice And Bottom Three Once in 2022. His defense helped the Rams win the Super Bowl in 2021, but the Rams dealt with many injuries and lost key players, such as Von Miller, and then bounced back.
Why am I not Enthralled By The Hire? Not only did the Falcons pass on Bill Belichick, who felt like a strange option, but the Falcons also went with the safe option. Not Having A "Ton" Of Success in Your First Run as Head Coach Doesn't Mark You Down for A Solid Second Act, But Most Coaches Rarely Deliver In Such Circumstances. Morris Inherits A Roster Perfectly Build For The Old Coach Of The Falcons, Arthur Smith. Credit Smith Despite All His "Wozzying" Idiosyncrasy, He Had a Vision--Unconventional Vision But Sight. He Works With A Wash-Up Matt Ryan His First Season, A Relic, and Recycled Marcus Mariota--Which Worked For A Minute-and The Ghost Of Desmond Ridder's 2022 Hype. With Five First Round Picks Along The Offense, Smith Left A Foundation For an Offensive Masterpiece. Bijan Robinson, Drake LoLondon, Kyle Pitts, and The Fourth Ranked Offensive line, All Of Whom Or Which Morris Says He Looks Forward To "Building On," He's Used The Remnant Of Other People's Roster Before, And We Have To Wait And See His Vision--Morris won't Talk Schematics Just Yet. he Wants To Bring "Football Character." Morris must decide whether The Falcons' next dabble in the first round will be another offensive piece or a defensive guy- his specialty.
I think Smith Killed Theo's Offense With Theo's Choice Of Bijan In the last Draft Over A Defensive Guy Like Jalen Carter. Smith's Not Alone In Theo Choice and Bijan's A Star, But He's Still A Running Back At Best. Especially A Year After Tyler Algrier Notched A 1000 Yard Season—Like How Much Running Or Rushing Of Theo Ball Were You Planning On Doing.
For all the notes on offense for the Falcons offense, the team May have one or two noticeable defensive players: Safety Jessie Bates and cornerback AJ Terrell. The Decision At Quarterback Matters More Than The Decision At Coach, And whoever Morris Decides To Choose to Lead His Offense Schematically Will Have More Of an Impact on Morris's Results Than Any Other Move Heights Makes Scheme Defense. The Falcons Haven't Made A Defensive Selection In First Round Since AJ Terrell In 2020. The Falcons Could Opt To Pair Drake London with another Top Level Wide Receiver Like They Once Did With Julio Jones And Roddy White, Julio Jones And Mo Sanu, Or Julio And Calvin Ridley. On The Falcons Roster Behind Drake London, Stand Little Depth at Receiver And Two Impressive Tight End Specimens.
If The Falcons Can Secure A Trade For Justin Fields for a second-round pick, That Would Change The complexity of The Team's Next Season.
