2018 NFL off-season thread: Mr. Alex Smith goes to Washington

I think ESPN catches a lot of the riff-raff because of the requirement that every team play at least once in prime time. Guess when Titans-Jags gets played?

 

The start-up league that Bill Polian is working on had an interesting idea. Instead of an onside kick, the team gets a 4th and 10 play on their own 35, and have to convert it in order to keep the ball.

I'd think it would have a greater chance of succeeding than onside kicks do now.

 

Absolutely. Between the chance of a penalty for a first down, just moving the chains on a short pass or going deep with the clock ticking - a lot more opportunities than the onside kick which isn't even a coin-flip, 20 percent in the closing minutes of a game.
One thing that would be interesting to try would be requiring the team receiving the kick to have 8 players within 15 yards of ball at the time of the kick, and giving the kick returner "slide protection" like quarterbacks get.

 

Might make a case for this being the biggest offseason NFL move - King goes from SI to NBC Sports.

End of an Era: Peter King to Leave Sports Illustrated After 29 Years

 

Matt Ryan is now the highest-paid QB in the NFL:

Matt Ryan, Falcons agree to five-year, $150M contract

 

It's time to start thinking about what we'll call the start of the game once kickoffs are no longer in existence.

Kickoffs set to undergo makeover in order to make play safer

 

Bye bye on side kicks.

 

Man - I don't even recognize half the names appearing these days in the magazine. I wouldn't be surprised if they made all of their senior writers "contributors" and paid them a small retainer and paid them by the piece.

 

Elite.

 

Steelers-jack ahead:

Big Ben is obviously not happy the Steelers drafted Rudolph. For the last 2 weeks on his radio show he's expressed displeasure about the use of the pick, about Rudolph, and any willingness to help.
"I'll point to the playbook."
Ben said he plans to play 3-5 years. And that may be true. I don't think think those last two or three years will be in Pittsburgh.

He's taking cues from the Favre/Rodgers transition.

Great QB. Not much else.

 

I don't think he's going anywhere, but Roethlisberger has always been an immature jackass. At least once that we know of, he was something far worse. He's not a good guy.

I would have liked to see more of a focus on helping the team in 2018 in that draft, too, but he could have easily kept his mouth shut.

 

He got the message out last year he was thinking of retiring. He’s been in the league going on 15 years. What does he expect the team to do?