Raji got $4M for this year. If he had no other offers (which I'm certain he did), Thompson vastly overpaid.
HOFer
Raji got $4M for this year. If he had no other offers (which I'm certain he did), Thompson vastly overpaid.
"There's a lot of interest in the draft. It's great. But quite frankly, most of the people that are commenting on it don't know anything about what they are talking about."--Ted Thompson
I still say you don't NEED a huge space occupier in the D Line, not for the base D anyway - just maybe for short yardage/goal line D. I'm actually rooting for Raji to snap back even though I have about as low an opinion of him as anybody. If they use him more as a penetrator and mobile NT, it could happen. Does nobody else consider Jerel Worthy even worth a comment? I see him as possibly the 3rd best D Lineman after Daniels and D. Jones.
Ding ding ding!Originally Posted by HarveyWallbangers
I couldn't possibly disagree more about Quarless shining as the starter. The way I feel about him-- he'll never be more than marginal, and he might not even make the team if some of the other guys step up.
Worthy does not have the body type needed to play nose tackle in base defense: he's too light in the pants. You want a squatter body in the middle, one that won't easily get leveraged by the center. And when he has been able to stay healthy, his performance on the field has been underwhelming. He seems to be afflicted by that double curse: an underachiever who cannot stay healthy. I think there is a decent chance he doesn't make the final roster this year.
Last edited by hoosier; 07-21-2014 at 11:30 AM.
He possibly overpaid some, but Raji probably could have picked up an offer for a good bit above vet minimum (2-3 M) at some point. By signing him when he did, TT could worry about other limits in the roster come draft day. Without Raji, the only NT is a Viking castoff. 4M vs 3 or 2.5 won't kill the Packers or prevent them from re-signing the critical other players.
Vastly overpaying Raji would be paying him what he was offered before last year.
Fire Murphy, Gute, MLF, Barry, Senavich, etc!
HOFer
we've been over this a few times already this offseason. the only person saying there was other offers was raji. with every other single free agent we heard who was interested, where they were interviewing, how much money each team offered. accept for raji, there was absolutely nothing. no talks about teams interested, no teams wanting to bring him in, nothing.
and the fact that he had to come back with his tail between his legs to the team that he had already mentally left months before, and do it for half the money he was offered months before, shows me that either he didn't have other offers, or those other offers were for far less then what we were offering
either way, to me it shows that there was little to no interest in him, and i doubt interest will grow if he has another shit year
as for him getting better because he will be a NT instead of a DE this year. i believe if you look at the stats he played about half his snaps last year at NT, and sucked
I agree the out of position stuff is overrated. He was a 3 tech for his base snaps and he was put there specifically to get him chances to penetrate and let Pickett absorb double teams. In nickel, he was a 3 or 4 tech. Everyone describing his as a DE is as inaccurate as calling him the team NT last year.
Now, players have been wrong before about what they do best, so Raji may have liked the 3 tech Eagle Oakie originally, but he might have come around on it.
I have no idea whether the position switch was all that ailed Raji (I doubt it). But this season will put that explanation to the test.
Bud Adams told me the franchise he admired the most was the Kansas City Chiefs. Then he asked for more hookers and blow.
The key is whether there will be a usage switch for Raji this season. Whether he lacked physical strength in that huge body, or whether he just lacked the motivation, the fact is, he didn't do a very good job as a space-occupier. If he is used that same way at NT this season - as was pointed out, part of his snaps last season were NT/space-occupier, we can probably expect the same crappy result. If, however, he is used differently - as an attacking mobile NT, maybe he will return to the form of his first years. I WISH the Packers would either use Raji that way or use some smaller more mobile NT. For years, I watched Jay Ratliff play that position that way for the Cowboys. There have been other NTs going all the way back to Curly Culp who didn't have that huge immobile body type, and who attacked and actually penetrated and made tackles. THAT is what we need - IMO. As I said, I see Worthy as possibly that kind of player; Boyd showed signs last season; Whatshisname, the third round pick from Mississippi seems like he might fill the bill. I'm extremely thankful that the Packers have apparently gotten away from having two fat space-occupiers in their base D. Now let's reduce it from one to zero.
I'm hoping that seeing the clear upgrades on D around him inspires the old Raji to come back.
All hail the Ruler of the Meadow!
HOFer
and that was the basis of my rants a couple months ago, no whispers, no rumors, nothing linking raji to any other teams other then raji saying "there were other teams"
my argument was that raji was not worth much more then the vet minimum, i can't for the life of me believe that anyone would offer him more then 2 million a year.
so IMO, yes, TT overpaid for him.
but throwing away 2 or 3 million more then i think he's worth for one year isn't the end of the world, so the argument kind of just died
now if we had signed him for 8 million a year like we originally offered, i'd be cutting my ear off right now
HOFer
You having an opinion that he isn't worth much over the vet minimum does not make it a fact that he had no other offers and might be out of the league next year. That's all I'm pointing out. I trust Thompson wouldn't pay somebody $4M/year who had zero interest from other teams. I'm sure Raji got offers. I'm guessing some were of the 3y/$9M variety. Considering he was projected to get a pretty good chunk of change before his miserable year, he decided to roll the dice on having a good year and making more next year.
For what it's worth, after Raji signed his contract he said he got offers from 3 or 4 other teams.
"There's a lot of interest in the draft. It's great. But quite frankly, most of the people that are commenting on it don't know anything about what they are talking about."--Ted Thompson
Exactly, Harv. He probably got offered a 2yr, 5mil or 3/8 something and just decided he would take more money this year, play his butt off (this is relatively obv) and then go get a real contract. Makes more sense than "no one wanted the guy".
Maybe so but do you agree Scott has the better arm?
Honestly, I am shocked to find out you have any ears left.
I don't hold Grudges. It's counterproductive.
If he had real, actual offers that he could have signed on the line for, we would have heard about it from the team(s), officially or unofficially. Did we even hear of him visiting anywhere? I don't remember even any rumors that he did, but there may have been.
I suspect it was more that his agent talked to some teams, the teams said they might be interested in him at 2-3M per year, but no actual offer was ever made, and he never visited there. In agent/player speak, these become "deals" he could have had.
I suspect Raji was waiting for injuries, retirements and suspensions to open up the market for experienced, but young DTs with warts on their resumes. You never know when lightening, or the reincarnation of of Al Davis might strike, and a team in panic offers a better deal than expected. GB needed to offer enough to out-weigh whatever chance Raji thought there was for that, and even allow him to save face, a bit.
This is my take as well. I bet even $4m made the decision not to wait for Al Davis hard. Technically Raji is a probowler, although I think everyone but Raji has given up on him being special but he's far from being out of the league as well. I see him as a solid starter at a position where solid starter means situational.
70% of the Earth is covered by water. The rest is covered by Al Harris.
Stronger arm yes, but less accurate so far, and he's kind of a statue. I'd take Flynn 10/10 times over Tolzien right now. Heady player who doesn't make many mistakes and produces when given a shot. Neither of them is going to win you a superbowl though.
What are the chances that Ha Ha and Hyde are at safety, if not out of training camp, before season end and Burnett on the bench?
If Burnett plays like last year, pretty good (unless Richardson claims a spot). If Burnett's bad play was due to having to cover for a dog shit safety playing next to him, he will probably remain a starter, even if the others have more talent. Safety is a spot where experience and savvy more than make up for small deficiencies in athletic ability.
Fire Murphy, Gute, MLF, Barry, Senavich, etc!
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