I get that, but that’s not what I’m doing/saying.

I don’t think he’s perfect by any means, but I do think he’s one of the best in the business.
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I think he's quite good. It's hard to rank GM's past 'tiers' but I'm comfortable putting him in the top tier - probably top 20-25% w/ little compunction.

But Christ I get tired of folks that sit back and then wait to just defend anything he does. Or when I spend a whole offseason saying "My kingdom for a DL overhaul!!" and then folks get all hot and bothered when I get frustrated about our inactivity there.

What the hell do they expect? It ain't like I didn't go on record there and state precisely WHY I think it's necessary. Of course it's going to irritate me.

I've flat out said I liked his first round, love the Chenal and Kinnard picks and that I find the Moore pick underwhelming with the Cook pick being flat out bad given the state of the roster. I have no problem calling them as they come.

It's this bullshit where some nancy comes along and says "hey, he's won some stuff so everything he does is beyond reproach" that is just annoying as hell.

If one's sole purpose here is to dick-ride, what's the point?
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We've already had the "fix problems in FA, not the draft" crowd shift to "getting younger through the draft is essential" crowd and much of the "fix the DL!" crowd become the "we needed to sort the secondary" crowd. People change their minds, but also people want to believe in the team I guess.

Problem is, we've been here before. The DL was a dumpster fire last year. I think our whole defence needed help, and I'm happy with what we got by and large, but I was banking on another DL pick as well as Ingram coming back.

We're now horribly thin with little quality or depth, and not a huge amount of options or time. It's going to be...interesting.
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This is a large and weird sub-section of CP. Performatively aggressive responses to any suggestion Veach can make mistakes. Very odd.
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Hell man - maybe Clark plays with his hair on fire and gives us 16 healthy games. In which case most of the hand-wringing is moot.

But that's my issue - we're at a point where that's less luxury and more necessity.

Hope ain't a plan, son. And right now that possibility is nothing but hope.
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Sure, maybe Karlaftis is an immediate Pro Bowler, maybe Kaindoh is something. But yeah, there's a lot of "maybes" at DL going in to a season that follows a pretty horrible one for the DL.

I think the secondary improves and that improves the defence. I think Karlaftis is an upgrade at DE. But it's hard to see a mountain more pressure from our DL at this point, and that's going to be a grind.
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But they didn’t. Key was here and they let him leave. Why do you think that is?

I think a trade and/or vet signing will happen. Lot of good pass rushers still out there who could serve for a year.

Clowney, McKinley, Dunlap, Kerrigan, JPP.

Also wonder if they are higher on Kaindoh than we think? Who knows but I think next year is gonna be another year of fixing the defense.
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It will be interesting to see what they do here. If they sit still, I'll be (1) surprised and (2) concerned.

I AM interested to see if they adopt more of a 3-3-5 look on passing downs, or at least experiment with it. If they don't bring in another DE, that's the route I'll be hoping for most.

Karlaftis-Jones-Clark, with Chenal and Gay on either side of Gay, would add a lot more speed to the defense and ensure that - when you rush 4 - one of the guys rushing him is a really fast and physical guy. It also would be less predictable (all 3 of those guys can blitz and handle short zone responsibilities).

They're not likely to find a truly complementary "bendy" DE in free agency. Maybe they DO have something in the works for Robert Quinn (and shoot, with all the pending draft capital for KC that would make sense). Otherwise, I think you're still in a situation where you're adding someone who probably works best reduced inside on pass downs.

But at the end of the day, I do wonder if their best set ends up being one where they go:

Clark-Jones-Karlaftis

Chenal-Bolton-Gay

Sneed-McDuffie-Fenton (or Johnson)

Thornhill-Reid

With that LB group, you could conceivably send any of those LB on a seek and destroy the QB mission and get a nice rush from them. Asking Bolton or Chenal to turn and run with a TE or slot is probably a recipe for disaster if you do it much, but you could probably get away with it occasionally, just to break tendencies.
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I know I am stating the obvious but no GM is perfect they all make mistakes including Veach. Also none of his decisions are made in a vaccum, Reid is probably the real GM at least when it comes to ultimately deciding who is part of this team.
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Chief Pagon, please read this s post. All of your questions answered since you did not understand what I was trying to tell you.
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I’ve said why I think that is.

I think they expect Frank Clark to be a starting caliber player.

And I think that’s a MASSIVE miscalculation. About the 5th of which they’ve made as it relates to Frank Clark.
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I just don’t think that’s the case.

Did you hear what Andy had to say about Clark? It was about as negative as Andy gets when talking specifically about a player.
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I’m the one that transcribed it. Yeah, I heard it.

But look at the roster and tell me that’s not how they’ve played it to this point. Again, they took on an additional $9 million in long-term liabilities to keep Frank Clark on this roster.

That’s not something you do for someone you envision as a rotational depth piece.
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I like to give Reid\Veach the benefit of the doubt 99% of the time but if they are banking on Clark producing because this is a contract year for him.... Well I agree with you I think it is a huge mistake\gamble.
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I think they plan on Karlaftis playing the majority of the snaps at one spot and they want a vet in the Ingram mold to split reps with Clark and keep them fresh.
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