Comments on: Just End It

By: Mark

Mark — Sat, 01 Sep 2007 00:47:51 +0000

Let the row of chairs come to session post haste!

By: Feejis

Feejis — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 23:37:57 +0000

I’m annoyed with myself that I was so wrong about the potential of Mills on this team. Nonexistent last year and he’s a longshot to make the squad this year.

Maybe it’s just a numbers game.

By: Scott

Scott — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 22:43:23 +0000

JGIG, I don’t think you’re missing anything. Cassel impressed me with some accurate well timed throws last night. More often than not, though, he just seems like a green kid. Which is okay, but he IS in his third year. Would it be too far out there to suggest that a guy that hasn’t started since high school just hasn’t played enough football to be able to handle it if Brady went down? As far as your boy Gutierrez, with the way he responded to his game chances, how can you not like the guy? And he seems to have a good head on his shoulders. You could probably get his tickets for road games this year for all the pimping you’ve done for him. Maybe he’s not the ‘second’ Matt, maybe he’s ‘THE’ Matt. We’ll see what happens this weekend, I guess.

By: Scott

Scott — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 22:31:52 +0000

Oswlek, good to hear you like the RT. Thanks. As Bruce points out, it will start its regular schedule next week, as will Bill Barnwell’s Thursday column.

By: bruce

bruce — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 20:12:56 +0000

Oswlek – The Roundtable will be a weekly feature here during the regular season. It’s hasn’t been easy this month getting everyone together to do one during the preseason…especially this week, with the game on Thursday night. We should have one next week for the season opener.

By: Oswlek

Oswlek — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 19:50:06 +0000

Scott, what is the deal with the Round Table. I really like that. Is it coming back?

By: jamesgarnerisgod

jamesgarnerisgod — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 18:51:47 +0000

Reiss’ piece brings up a prospect I had thought impossible, but intriguing — Gutierrez’s play might merit keeping four QBs in the fold. I like the idea, but I’m not sure what the cost would be, vis-a-vis the loss of another crucial position player.

I truly believe Gutierrez’s play has merited him consideration over Cassel, though the latter looked good last night also. Still, if you’re looking for a young arm for the future, and also need a veteran game manager available if the unthinkable occurs, no one has convincingly made the case why the Brady-Cassel-Testaverde depth chart is preferable to a Brady-Gutierrez-Testaverde one? Whenever I have brought this up in other venues — namely, talk radio (esp. the ‘BCN postgame show) — the proposition of keeping Gutierrez over Cassel has been dismissed, if not actually ridiculed. What has Cassel shown performance-wise, though? I’ll stipulate his work habits and an extra couple of years’ experience over Gutierrez, but I truly believe the “second” Matt can be a special quarterback in a couple of years, and I’m not getting that sense from Cassel. What am I missing?

By: Scott

Scott — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 16:57:59 +0000

Besides, practice is one thing, and games are another, and I would expect that personnel decisions involve ‘data’ from both.

By: Scott

Scott — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 16:55:54 +0000

Oswlek, it wasn’t my intention to be ‘disingenuous’ at all regarding the tight ends. Simply an observation based on Brady’s absence from most of camp, and Rivers’ performances in the games. I would certainly join you in hoping that Brady is able to rebound enough to suit up every week from here (as he’s done the past two seasons) but my point was mostly that Rivers has shown to me that he may be able to do it if Brady can’t.

On the LB’s, perhaps I could have been clearer. I don’t know enough about how it will break out eventually, and you (and Mike Reiss) could very well be right that Rogers makes the team, or at the least, the PS. Again, I was really calling out the fact that Woods finished well this week and is probably ahead of Rogers at this point, givin his relative experience. I acknowledge that my wording makes it sound like Rogers will be cut – again, I don’t know enough to say either way.

As far as Ben’s point, I don’t think you’ll find me saying anywhere in this piece that anyone made the team based on what happened last night. But Belichick noted at the top of his post game that they were anxious to see film today as part of their evaluation process over the next couple of days. I take that to mean – despite my lead, and to Oswlek’s point – that the games are not as irrelevent as that.

By: ben

ben — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 15:40:55 +0000

I’m going to go another route and say that the slew of practice performance data blows away a few random plays by a young player in a pre-season game against other stiffs. I don’t think players make the team in games unless, uniquely, they somehow are mediocre in practice but shine across the 3-4 games which, other than Lawrence Taylor, I don’t believe happens.