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2026 Offseason Thread

Simba said:
That's a bridge you cross when you get there, not preemptively. It's not Madden.
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Call it planned obsolescence if you will. I'm just not buying that they going into Lamar's age 30 season with a pass catching corp of 40% rookies. Where the bottom 60% has a combined 7 NFL catches. That's not how EDC builds a roster.
 
Simba said:
Those players never get better if they’re blocked by veterans year after year
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Even if you replace one of the kids with Njoku or Diggs, there are still a bunch of snaps to be taken by the youth movement. Make no mistake they are going young here, but I don't think it will be this young.
 
Baltimorican said:
Even if you replace one of the kids with Njoku or Diggs, there are still a bunch of snaps to be taken by the youth movement. Make no mistake they are going young here, but I don't think it will be this young.
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Tez played 164 snaps total as WR4

Charlie Kolar played 402 snaps as TE3 (and that’s with Likely missing time early in the season). If you split that assuming Smythe and a rookie take those snaps, that’s only 200.

That’s not a bunch.
 
Simba said:
Tez played 164 snaps total as WR4

Charlie Kolar played 402 snaps as TE3 (and that’s with Likely missing time early in the season). If you split that assuming Smythe and a rookie take those snaps, that’s only 200.

That’s not a bunch.
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Even with Smythe taking Kolar's snaps, you got Likely/Ricard/Hopkins snaps to go around.
 
Baltimorican said:
Even with Smythe taking Kolar's snaps, you got Likely/Ricard/Hopkins snaps to go around.
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And those snaps go to Njoku and Diggs in this scenario, not the young guys you want to develop. That sits the young guys on the bench more often than not.
 
I think sarratt is gonna be ready to take snaps week 1 and I think some of us are sleeping on jakobi lane. Bateman and tez are still here and we know when Bateman is on, he’s really on, for the wr corps we have guys that need to get snaps on the roster already and I believe we’re gonna be fine there.

I’m not convinced Andrews is as far off a cliff as many are saying and I think as long as Lamar isn’t laser focused on him then he’s gonna do fine, let a rookie win the TE2 job and let the chips fall where they may, it’s TE2 it’s not a huge deal.

I think those are 2 positions where we really don’t need to add anyone, I’m excited to see what these rookie pass catchers do, especially the WRs. I am not sleeping on those guys at all, zay is wr1 and is a high volume guy and he will take a lot of pressure off the rookies
 
Baltimorican said:
You got 2 rookie TE's and 2 rookie wr's. 3/4 of them are 3rd day picks. Somebody is getting stashed.
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Wouldn't be so sure. Vet WR market isn't any good right now, so I'm not sure which one of those WRs you think is not going to make the team, given the depth chart.
I also wouldn't expect guys drafted in the 3rd or 4th round to clear waivers, so if they're not making the 53, they'll likely end up on another team all together.
 
Simba said:
And those snaps go to Njoku and Diggs in this scenario, not the young guys you want to develop. That sits the young guys on the bench more often than not.
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There's like a 1000+ snaps to fill. njoku would prolly take about 400 and about 50 of those would come from Andrews. Diggs would be like 500, but they don't sign him if Bateman and Tez are both looking good in PS. It's either/or not both.
 
Baltimorican said:
There's like a 1000+ snaps to fill. njoku would prolly take about 400 and about 50 of those would come from Andrews. Diggs would be like 500, but they don't sign him if Bateman and Tez are both looking good in PS. It's either/or not both.
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not quite 1000+ snaps. We have to remember that Bateman missed some games last yaer due to an ankle sprain. Some of those snaps will hopefully go right back to him. He played about 275 snaps less than 2024.
 
rmcjacket23 said:
Wouldn't be so sure. Vet WR market isn't any good right now, so I'm not sure which one of those WRs you think is not going to make the team, given the depth chart.
I also wouldn't expect guys drafted in the 3rd or 4th round to clear waivers, so if they're not making the 53, they'll likely end up on another team all together.
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Nobody is waiving anybody. They'll find a way to stash whoever they want to redshirt.
 
redrum52 said:
We cant keep asking why guys dont develop when we dont give them snaps
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Sure, but its a double edged sword. If the idea is you just throw these guys out there and play, and you lose games because of it, is that acceptable? If I'm a team that's not looking to win this year, that's precisely what I'd do.

Teams that are actively competing for a Lombardi, generally, prioritize short term over long term. They'll obviously use draft picks willingly, but they don't really have the luxury of letting a 5th rounder struggle as a starting C in the hopes that they develop into a good player 2-3 years later. By the time that happens (if it ever does), the HC and GM have probably been fired, and half the team is gone.

I don't think we should go signing a ton of vets either, but there's some very obvious areas of the team where we are young and lacking proven depth (WR and TE notably). If a team is looking to compete, decisions will need to be made whether you prioritize long term development over short-term upside.
 
Baltimorican said:
Nobody is waiving anybody. They'll find a way to stash whoever they want to redshirt.
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So yeah that's not how rosters work. Every team in the league loses drafted players every year at roster cutdowns while trying to "sneak them through to the PS". Happens to the Ravens every year.

Injuries are about the only way to redshirt somebody without exposing them to other teams. Sometimes that works itself out, but sometimes it doesn't.
 
Baltimorican said:
Nobody is waiving anybody. They'll find a way to stash whoever they want to redshirt.
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And "redshirting" a guy also means they aren't developing. If you're just going to backfill with veterans year after year, why even make the picks?

To be clear, I'm not saying that they won't make a move. We could get into camps and find these guys are indeed not ready. But there's absolutely 0 sense in burying them right now. This is the time for them to get the reps.
 
RavensMania said:
not quite 1000+ snaps. We have to remember that Bateman missed some games last yaer due to an ankle sprain. Some of those snaps will hopefully go right back to him.
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Even a healthy bateman jumps from 550 to about 700 snaps. he's too fragile for more than that. And you're not factoring the 200-300 snaps lost from whoever gets dinged up this year. I highly doubt all 4 of those rookies get significant snaps this year. you're probably talking about finding 600-700 snaps for 2-3 of them plus the uptick for Tez. Njoku or Diggs leaves enough snaps for that.
 
rmcjacket23 said:
So yeah that's not how rosters work. Every team in the league loses drafted players every year at roster cutdowns while trying to "sneak them through to the PS". Happens to the Ravens every year.

Injuries are about the only way to redshirt somebody without exposing them to other teams. Sometimes that works itself out, but sometimes it doesn't.
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And that's exactly what's going to happen. If nobody gets hurt, they'll make sure somebody gets "hurt".
 
Simba said:
And "redshirting" a guy also means they aren't developing. If you're just going to backfill with veterans year after year, why even make the picks?

To be clear, I'm not saying that they won't make a move. We could get into camps and find these guys are indeed not ready. But there's absolutely 0 sense in burying them right now. This is the time for them to get the reps.
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I'm a bit surprised at the push back. 4 rookies drafted in rds 3-5. Highly unlikely all 4 of them are legit NFL players, much less legit NFL players in yr 1.
 
Baltimorican said:
I'm a bit surprised at the push back. 4 rookies drafted in rds 3-5. Highly unlikely all 4 of them are legit NFL players, much less legit NFL players in yr 1.
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Because it's not Madden. You can't just have extreme depth across the entire roster as a "just in case" option. You've got to spread your resources, and you just used some resources to fill those positions already.
 
Baltimorican said:
And that's exactly what's going to happen. If nobody gets hurt, they'll make sure somebody gets "hurt".
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And they've failed to do that every single year also. The NFLPA will gleefully file grievances for healthy players landing on IR to redshirt. Has happened plenty of times before also.
If they have a legit short term injury, sure, they'll stash them. But every year players leave for this very reason.
 
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