CincySportsFan

Sadly, I think the thing that has gotten washed over the most has been any treatments. We've gotten pounded over and over and over again on preventative measures/protocals/mandates. But any medicine to treat it, by comparison, has gotten barely a whisper.

Any chance? Sure, maybe. Never say never. That being said, re-signing Uzomah has got to be a much higher priority, in my opinion. Stats aside, CJ's presence in the locker room can't be ignored. So, if you can re-sign him, and Rudolph's still available for a lower, bargain basement deal...then maybe. Otherwise, I'd expect them to see if Moss can push Sample for more playing time as the #2. But any TE news has got to start with CJ coming back.

Being 5 months out is a whole lot different than 5 years, in my opinion. If you make money off of oil, why would you willingly forsake 5 years of higher profits? Heck, they jump prices just at the prospect of a refinery or two being impacted by a hurricane, even though they know they (the refineries) will eventually be back up. I think they are more of a "strike while the iron is hot" type of market. And right now, the market is sizzling. Five years might as well be an eternity.

I've heard rumors that a couple of parishes/locations in NKY have cancelled their fish fry for this year, not due to Covid, but due to higher food pricing. One said even if they raised their prices just a little, they still probably wouldn't make any money. So, rather than leave people with a bad taste in their mouth (no pun intended) by having outrageous pricing, they've just decided to not do it. Feel free to post the status of any that you know of.

Just saw a video that said England is "ending" the pandemic on Thursday...meaning that all legal requirements will expire. There may still be some recommendations, but nothing will be mandated.

Oh, absolutely. The question is, will the team short-arm the offers, knowing that players may want to play with Burrow? Last year, the Riley Reiff signing was a home run (money-wise)...I just hope they don't expect everyone to take that type of deal. Speaking of Reiff...is there any chance of him coming back to the Bengals? If we could re-sign him, get another big name free agent to sign, and draft well in the first round...that could go a long way to having an improved line.

A nice list, but I got to think some of those are just pipe dreams. A lot of it, I believe, will depend on the salary cap situation of their existing team, and I think some of it will be who they'd be playing in front of (QB). Armstead would seem to hit both of those categories, as the Saints are waaayyy over the cap, and have not only a question mark at QB, but also a new coach. Scherff or Norwell could possibly be another. But to expect Jensen to leave Tampa, Corbett to leave the Rams, or Brown to leave the Chiefs is a little bit of a reach.

They had a bajillion hours of pregame to fill. lol It was either that, or what color socks the groundskeeper wore the day of Burrow's first HS game.

Did you happen to catch Tony Dungy's comments during the pregame show yesterday? He called for a "moratorium" on hirings until 10 days after the Super Bowl. I believe his thoughts are that some of these good, qualified coaches who are coordinators may not interview well because their team is still in the playoffs.

Tanking the draft?!? Come on man. It's not like even having the same staff in place going from one year to the next is a guarantee of hitting it big in the draft. Sure, it may help. But, there's no sure thing here. If more time equaled better draft choices, teams would be firing their head coach with a month left in the season, so they could have time to find/hire his replacement and have him up and running as soon as the season ended. But, yet we had teams that just hired their coach THIS week! This year, the draft will happen April 26-28. In 2000, it was held April 15-16. And in 2014, it was held May 8-10. So, some years they had an extra week or two to prepare, and in other years they didn't. But, it didn't "tank the draft" by having it early, the same way it didn't necessarily make it any better by having it later.

Usually you see this when that person wouldn't make the US squad. This was, obviously, not the case here.

Well, obviously. Same could be said for a guy staying in your organization. If you don't perform, there's a likelihood that not only will you not be promoted, you may not even keep the position you've already got. The problem occurs when you have someone higher up the ladder that has more emphasis on loyalty than performance. Now there are always going to be extenuating circumstances around what impacts a guy's performance. But a head coach that's willing to cut bait and move on tells you he's concerned more about winning than just maintaining a friendship.

Bingo. And like I said before, I think having a guy advance up the ladder within an organization is good. But, if he can take those same steps up and changes organizations each time he advances, that's much, much better, because it's increased his exposure to the league. I think if a team knows that several of their peers have hired this guy before, it'll increase the likelihood of that team being interested in him for their position (whatever it may be).

Ehh...again, I don't know. Was just trying to show that some of those hires that Hawk pointed out would've probably come with or without the Flores lawsuit. I do think there are hires that should be getting some more pub. First time head coaches, like Mike McDaniel, should be making a splash. (Unfortunately in this case, it's replacing another black head coach.) But, the front office hires should definitely be highlighted. Having Sashi Brown as team president, Kwesi Adofo-Mensah as GM, and Brandon Brown/Champ Kelly as assistant GM's all named in this cycle is hopefully just a start of something more to come in future years.

You're right, we'll never know. But, just for context...8 of the 18 people he was pointing out, happen to be coordinators/position coaches on teams that are getting new head coaches this year...the Texans, Bears, Raiders, Broncos and Vikings. There were 7 teams that hired new head coaches last year. Two of them (Jags and Texans) rehired this year, so it was harder to look up. But I took the remaining 5, and opened their team pages to see this past year's coaching staff. Here's how many black coordinators/position coaches they showed...Jets (9), Eagles (6), Chargers (6), Falcons (10), and Lions (9). That's an average of 8 per team. So, to me, nearly half of Hawk's examples can be chalked up to normal occurrences, when there's a head coaching change. Like I said in my previous post, causation versus correlation.

Not saying there hasn't been any impact, but I think a deeper dive would have to be made into each hire to distinguish between causation versus just correlation. For example, Lovie Smith has already been an NFL head coach (actually, twice). The same for Texans OC Pep Hamilton, who held the same spot for the Colts a few years ago. So, it's they're not exactly "new" names, so to speak. Sashi Brown was hired, I think, just a day or two after the lawsuit was announced...so, I doubt he was suddenly added to the list of potential candidates, interviewed, and then given the job in that short of a time period (especially given the importance of that position). I think it's good when you see teams promote guys from within. I think it's even better when a guy takes a step up going from one team to another. But to say all of that happened because of a lawsuit just a little over a week ago? Ehhhhh...I'd pump the brakes on making that blanket statement. But, that's just me.

What's your thoughts on Ritchson's portrayal of Reacher? There were some times where it seemed like he was very stiff. His facial expressions in those scenes actually reminded me of Data from STNG, when he's trying to process something. Very robotic-like.

Any fan of the Jack Reacher books by Lee Child happen to catch the Amazon Prime series yet? I binged the 8 episodes over the past 3 nights and, in the end, enjoyed it for the most part. The main difference here is casting. If you're a fan of the books, you know that Tom Cruise was woefully, horribly miscast as Reacher in the two movies. That little shrimp would get lost in a line of kids waiting to use the merry-go-round. At least Alan Ritchson doesn't have that problem. While he isn't Reacher's full 6'5" from the books, his 6'2" size is still large for Hollywood, so he still towers over most every other actor. They've already said there's going to be a Season 2, based upon how the reception has been on this first one. This one was based off of the "The Killing Floor", which was the very first Jack Reacher book Child wrote back in 1997. (I had not read that one, so the plot was original to me.) It will be interesting to see which book they adapt next.

Then make it a hiring freeze across the board then. No coach, regardless of position, can change teams during that 6-week period. You want to promote from within? Fine. But that position that becomes vacated remains open until later. Look, I know it wouldn't be easy. But I don't think a time "constraint" should be a road block in getting these guys additional exposure. I mean, teams HAD to have two-a-day practices in training camp before...otherwise they couldn't get everything in. And yet they found a way. Teams HAD to have all these mandatory workouts and training camps...otherwise the players would slack off or not learn anything. And yet two years ago, they found a way to do it. Heck, even the four game preseason that's been around for 50 years, was eventually reduced to three, and there's talk that they may even go to just two. And the almighty combine that you HAD to have your coaches at...wasn't even held last year. Man, it's amazing that we've had football at all, given all these changes. All I'm saying is that things were done a certain way until someone decided that there was a better reason not to. If you want to seriously allow for an increase in exposure to black candidates, you can find a way to adjust everything else.

Not saying there aren't potential issues with it, but what's on the calendar that couldn't be moved? I mean, we've got teams that are still formally without a coach right now. What would an extra 2 weeks impact? The combine? (Asking seriously, not sarcastically)

Off the cuff, here's what I'd propose...a dead period in hiring. Six weeks from the end of the regular season before you can sign anyone. Gives a ton of time for interviews to be done, and has less of an impact on deserving coordinators who have their teams in the playoffs. I would hope most owners would look at that six week period as a positive, in the sense that they can find not only their best fit, but also their second best and third best, etc. Heck, you could easily interview 10-15 prospects over that time period if you wanted to.

This is the first Big Dance, as you put it, that's not had Mike's dad, Paul, around for it. We saw what happened when Mike had the reins to himself...the lost decade of the 90's. While he's still the owner, I don't think the operations are comparable with the structure today. Katie, Troy and Elizabeth have more than just titles on letterhead. I think Mike is 4 or 5 years older than what Paul was when he died. And he looked somewhat frail up on the podium Sunday. Not to sound morbid, but you have to wonder how much longer Mike will even be around.

Same. I don't think you post the record he did the past couple of years just as a fluke.

2006: Chad/TJ/Chris 87/90/36 Receptions 1369/1081/605 Yards 15.7/12.0/16.8 Yards per Rec. 7/9/9 TD's 213 Receptions 3055 Yards 14.3 Yards per Rec. 25 TD's 2021: Chase/Higgins/Boyd 81/74/67 Receptions 1455/1091/828 Yards 18.0/14.7/12.4 Yards per Rec. 13/6/5 TD's 222 Receptions 3374 Yards 15.2 Yards per Rec. 24 TD's Do we consider this year the new benchmark? I say "yes". I know there's an extra game, but only Chase played in (a little bit of) game 17. Higgins missed an additional game this year. Back in 2006, only Chad played all 16. TJ missed 2 games, and Chris missed 3. The most amazing thing about this year's numbers, is that the person throwing them the ball was playing his first full season, and coming off of a knee injury.

Looks like he's going to the Vikings. And on National Signing Day. Does this have any impact? It has to, doesn't it?