Which again, calls into question what they're looking at when evaluating the position.

Because if this thing with Morris is as simple as him not having a plan B and ALWAYS biting on the same deke/swipe move....how the hell didn't that show up on tape from last season? Or camp/practice?

More than scouting outside players like Kingsley, that's a REALLY damning indictment of their self-scouting. If he has that glaring of a weakness, how did you go into this season with him as a viable plan B?

Now IF he's hurt and because he's hurt he's having to compensate and cheat a bit due to that knee being worse than we realize, that's a different animal. But we saw a similar regression to this last season just over a later time-frame because Smith started the first half of the season. If this is just an issue of exposure rather than injury, that's a real miss by our in-house scouting department and coaching/development team.

Okay, so I wasn't the only one a bit put off by the self aggrandizing tone he took.

Many won't agree with me, but if I'm Veach I'm not paying that contract he's going to command. That money will be best served distributed elsewhere on the roster to keep this train moving along.

I don't think many would disagree.

I hate that I keep coming back to this conclusion, but I really think Kingsley looked good because the guys he went against every day just...suck.

I mean we have ZERO speed to test him against (and those are the guys that really give him fits). And even someone like Danna doesn't have advanced technique - he's a motor guy. Hell, what little bit of bend/explosion we had at DE almost died on the field. He looked credible against Malik Herring and Mike Danna.

The staff's confidence in him was almost certainly misplaced due to really poor competition opposite of him. I just can't see any other viable explanation.

Yeah - I think that's probably a majority position 'round here anyway.

I think CP writ large is probably 2-1 against keeping Smith at the figure he'd require to stay.

I'd take an average LT over a blue-chip RG every single time. And again, if Robinson costs roughly what Smith would cost, I think Robinson is an easy answer there.

Yeah and we have Chris Jones but he beats everybody. Could totally see them hand wave those struggles bc of who Chris Jones is.

Chris ain't an edge speed guy. He ain't beating him the way the others are.

Eh, he'd have treated him about like Hendrickson did. Hendrickson is very much a power rusher who has the ability to bend an edge off that club move -- that's how Jones operates off the edge as well.

I'd just be surprised if we gave him a ton of reps vs. Jones in a group setting. You don't put 1s vs 1s very often and when you're doing that, I'd imagine most of those reps would've been Jones vs. Taylor or Jones vs the interior line.

There was something to be learned there - we just didn't learn it.

Great - just something else I can blame FAU for...

That was far from the only issue. There was footage of him in camp getting absolutely destroyed on an inside move in 1 v 1s and folks were shouted down for suggesting we might want to bring in a stopgap in case that's not improving come game time.

Why not hold them both to a higher standard. Smith occasionally looks like he's wearing concrete boots moving laterally, and Taylor isn't apparently capable of setting up less deep and not getting beaten inside. Said before but at least Smith is cheap!

What are you basing this off of? What comparables were there for Reid and Thuney to know they were overpaid?

I think Mitch is overstating the issue.

Taylor isn't just screaming up the arc and camping. Even in the Mahomes GIF thread, you see about half his sets deep but almost always square to the rusher (i.e. the rusher went up the arc, Taylor went with him) or maybe a stride off Smith.

Which is, y'know, a pocket. That's how OTs play. They give ground to lose slowly. Then occasionally you'll see obvious RPO blocking where they form that wall in case Mahomes hands the ball off, but those are quick throws and the blocking set doesn't matter as much.

Taylor doesn't set overly deep from what I can see. He's setting the pocket almost exactly where you'd want to set it for a shotgun offense. Yes, it's deeper than some teams will set their pockets (i.e. the Ravens) but that's because that's how our offense operates. Mahomes isn't coming from under center.

You can argue that he's early out of his stance sometimes and by reacting rather than reacting, sometimes he gives up his inside shoulder, but to connect that to Smith getting beat is an awfully tenuous connection. When that happens, we can see it and KNOW it's Taylor giving it up. And to say "Well Smith is aware that COULD happen and so he's watching his outside shoulder and it's making him lose on the inside..." Oh c'mon - that's a bridge too far. That's some person in an interview saying "My biggest flaw is that I work too hard and care too much..."

No, Smith is not getting beat because he's worried about the occasional instance of Taylor getting beat inside. That just doesn't make any sense. And to act like it's happening play in, play out and is clearly the CAUSE of Smith's struggles - I'm sorry, but that's just excuse making.

Neither guy was overpaid.

Reid got paid as a solid young FA safety. That's what those guys get and that's what he's been.

Thuney was paid as the best pass-blocking OG in football. That's what THOSE guys get and that's what he's been. There are 10 guards right now with a higher AAV than Thuney and there's not a SINGLE guard in the NFL that would've been better for this team over the 5 years he'll be here than Thuney has been.

He's mostly just wrong.

A lot of teeth gnashing in this thread.

We tried to get out of stop gaps and develop some young OTs. I'm sure plenty of discussions were had between Veach, Andy and Patrick and they decided they could deal with, coach and play around the growing pains. These guys just haven't developed fast enough so here we are. I bet in the process Veach also looked at the landscape and thought if need be we could pick up a vet as the season wore on and that's precisely what happened.

We're still 11-1 with all the shitty players Veach has drafted and brought in as well. Gnash away though...gnash away, gnash away, gnash away all!