2023-24 NFL season

[Logan D. Hurricanes]

So it wasn't just me! I thought it was unusually busy. But then I saw the Jags specifically do a lot so I figured I might just be partial to it. 

 

Overall, I'm happy with our draft. I don't know all of the players we got, but the notes seem positive. Surprised we didn't grab a kicker at some point to be honest. But O line is being addressed, and a lot of D help. Feeling optimistic. 

 

[unclevlad]

Kickers (and punters) don't often get drafted.  It's just as easy to give them tryouts, sign them as free agents, and let them try to make the team during training camp.

 

Yeah, using ESPN's draft tools...3 kickers, 3 punters.  That's it.  

 

And don't worry, Logan.  Your bubble will burst soon enough;  the point of interest is the order of bursting between you, Mr. P, and Fuzzy Wuzzy.

[Cancer]

Man.  Seattle seems to have signed ten or so 25 UDFAs already.  Considering some of the UDFA names that have figured prominently on the team in the last ten years or so, the excitement is just started.

Edited May 1, 2023 by Cancer

[Logan D. Hurricanes]

Ex-Raiders receiver Henry Ruggs III to plead guilty in fatal Las Vegas DUI crash that killed woman, dog
 

[Old Man]

FBO has assembled their yearly roundup of draft grades for each team.  Seahawks fans, rejoice at getting the 4th best overall draft grade!  Broncos fans, skip to the bottom where it shows there is very little correlation between draft grades and team performance!

[unclevlad]

6 hours ago, Old Man said:

FBO has assembled their yearly roundup of draft grades for each team.  Seahawks fans, rejoice at getting the 4th best overall draft grade!  Broncos fans, skip to the bottom where it shows there is very little correlation between draft grades and team performance!

 

Oh my.  Yes, that last point is MOST amusing.

 

Quote

We're about 5,000 words in now, and it's fair to ask: does any of this really mean anything? And the answer is "probably not." After recapping the 2017 draft a few weeks ago, we broke out the Draft Report Card Report from that year and compared select evaluator's grades to the actual Approximate Value produced by each team's draft class. The good news is that every evaluator finished with a positive correlation—nobody was so wrong that you could make money betting against them. The bad news is that the strongest correlation was just 0.088, which is effectively random noise.

 

Yeah...a correlation of less than 0.1 is probably well within the statistical variance, given the coarseness of all the numerics involved.  No, they can't be called metrics, that gives them a status (for those of us who do this sort of thing) they don't deserve.  And the small sample size.

 

But hey, you know what they say.   Russell Wilson, the gift that keeps on giving.........

 

EDIT:  just noted, the reader comments on the story are also interesting.  Quite the surprise there.....

[Pariah]

Fun fact: Quarterbacks drafted by the Colts have won more Super Bowls with the Broncos (3) than with the Colts (1).

[Cancer]

On 4/29/2023 at 8:00 PM, unclevlad said:

Yeah, using ESPN's draft tools...3 kickers, 3 punters.  That's it. 

 

Does the immortal Russell Erxleben count twice?  He was drafted #11 overall in 1979 as both P and K, but only punted in the NFL.  By contrast, federal prisons have drafted him twice ....

[unclevlad]

45 minutes ago, Cancer said:

 

Does the immortal Russell Erxleben count twice?  He was drafted #11 overall in 1979 as both P and K, but only punted in the NFL.  By contrast, federal prisons have drafted him twice ....

 

First:  he was drafted by the Saints.  The same team that traded an entire draft for Ricky Williams...one of the 2 worst trades in history.  OK, hold that against Ditka primarily if you like, as he certainly shares much of the blame, but the GM still had the last word.  Fine, it was 20 years later....details!  That was a badly managed organization for quite some time.

 

Then...well, OK, the notion wasn't bad...if it worked.  It's still a pretty crazy reach, I'll grant.  Erxleben DID have an excellent college career, tho...even if it was at that obnoxious university in Austin.  And if he could free up a roster spot?  Well it'd be worth making something of a reach.  Not all the way to #11, of course.

 

Another factor...that was the OLD DAYS.  Football in 1980 was still run *massively* dominated by the running game and defenses.  There, a punter has far more value.  People scoffed at the Ray Guy draft pick, but his punts changed games.  Granted, I think he was the exception proving the rule.  But now?  The punter is an afterthought for many teams, where offense and passing rule.  The position that's lost the most value in the current game is running back...but punter might be close.  If not it's because they weren't valued overly highly even in 1980.  Plus, there are many good punters out there.  16 punters averaged between 41 and 44 net yards per punt, punting full time.  (One other only played in 7 games, punting 28 times.)  27 full time punters averaged 40 or more, and the overall spread among them was less than 5 yards.  When defense dominates...that's a big deal.  You win the field position game that way.  When everyone's shooting for 400 yards a game, that kind of difference isn't that meaningful.  And, quite often, decent punters have long careers.  Put these together...and there's little pressure to spend draft capital now, at least until the last couple rounds where many draftees won't make rosters anyway.  If you need a punter, invite them to camp.

[Cancer]

Another reason Erxleben crashed out was ... as a collegiate, he always did his placekicking off a tee.  He never successfully changed to bare-ground kicking.  I don't think anyone has made that mistake subsequently.

[unclevlad]

Checking Pro Football Reference...cuz I don't remember him at all as a pro...

 

Rookie year, 1 game.  MOST inauspicious.  Bad snap near the goal line in OT, in punt formation.  Obviously nothing good is gonna happen from that.  Turned into a pick-6, but hey, after the snap there were no good outcomes.  Then a pulled hamstring in game 2 and gone for the year.  Oops.  After paying the kid for a high draft pick, too.

 

Second year, his kicking was, as you say, miserable.  1-4 from 30-39 is Just Plain Bad.  They gave up quickly, he had only 5 attempts.  The Saints drafted someone else...who turned out to be Morten Andersen.  Yeah, he was now an emergency kicker.

 

The NCAA eliminated the kicking tee on FGs in '89, so there weren't that many opportunities to repeat the mistake.  Plus, you figure:  lots of kickers made the transition.  Erxleben, Wikipedia points out, was a straight-on kicker;  the tee, I think, helps them more.  The soccer-style kick allows a leg swing path to loft the ball better.  But you're also probably right:  I suspect after Erxleben, there was an increase in checking out kickers without the tee for those several years until the NCAA abandoned it.

[Cancer]

Changes ot media rights for the NFL this season

 

And international games schedule:

 

Here’s the International Series slate, with all kickoff times at 9:30 AM ET/6:30 AM PT. The home team is listed second:

Week 4 (Oct. 1): Atlanta Falcons vs. Jacksonville Jaguars (London - Wembley) - ESPN+

Week 5 (Oct. 8): Jacksonville Jaguars vs. Buffalo Bills (London - Wembley) - NFL Network

Week 6 (Oct. 15): Baltimore Ravens vs. Tennessee Titans (London - Tottenham Hotspur Stadium) - NFL Network

Week 9 (Nov. 5): Miami Dolphins vs. Kansas City Chiefs (Frankfurt) - NFL Network

Week 10 (Nov. 12): Indianapolis Colts vs. New England Patriots (Frankfurt) - NFL Network

 

That's a copy-paste from another source, so Jacksonville living in England for two weeks, if incorrect, is Not My Fault.

Edited May 10, 2023 by Cancer

[Pariah]

Jags have to play overseas twice in two weeks? Bummer. Hopefully they get to bring along their SOs. 

[Pariah]

There are a bunch of Chefs fans complaining on social media about the fact that the eagerly awaited (?) rematch against Tyreek Hill is happening in Germany instead of at Arrowhead.

 

But all is not lost! If Miami can keep Tua out of concussion protocol, I figure the team has a good chance at a wild card spot. If they can lock up #5, they'd get an opening round game against whatever 9-8 team limps out of the AFC South. That sets up a divisional game in Arrowhead. Problem solved!

[unclevlad]

Not surprised that ESPN pushes for a few more games.  The Black Friday game isn't even slightly surprising, and it'll be a day where Amazon blasts out a ton of promo stuff, I'm sure.  And note that none of the Thanksgiving games are TNF...they're Fox, CBS, and NBC.  So Amazon wants a game that week for their billions.

 

I wonder if any of the Monday doubleheaders will be during the flex part for MNF, weeks 12-17.  If so, well, could be more cases of fans irate because their game attendance plans get tossed at a whim.  But hey, we all know the NFL doesn't care about fans in seats, it figures they're replaceable.

[Pariah]

The Donkeys' 2023-24 schedule is out.

 

 

A couple of quick thoughts:

• We start and end the season with the archrival Raiders. There is something to be said for symmetry, I suppose.
• We get the J-E-T-S at home in week 5. I can't wait to see how the Denver fans greet Nathaniel Hackett on his return to Mile High.
• We get Kansas City at Arrowhead on a short week, then again in Denver 17 days later. Yikes.
• We get exactly one Monday Night game, which, frankly, is one more than I was expecting. It's at Buffalo, but it's also after a bye week.
• We get three consecutive road games in December, all against warm-weather teams (well, the Lions play in a dome, so close enough).

Should be an interesting year. Can't possibly be as bad as last year ... can it?

[unclevlad]

Remember that there's 20 MNF games, and that Fox and CBS won't like losing too many popular-team games...Chiefs, Pats, Steelers, Niners, Cowboys...divisional rivalry games like Eagles-Giants, or playoff matchups from last season...to MNF and TNF...and the international games, which grabbed the Chiefs, Pats, and Bills once already.  

 

Building the full NFL schedule now is likely VERY complicated because there are SO MANY stakeholders to try to keep happy.

[archer]

2 hours ago, Pariah said:

The Donkeys' 2023-24 schedule is out.

 

 

A couple of quick thoughts:

• We start and end the season with the archrival Raiders. There is something to be said for symmetry, I suppose.
• We get the J-E-T-S at home in week 5. I can't wait to see how the Denver fans greet Nathaniel Hackett on his return to Mile High.
• We get Kansas City at Arrowhead on a short week, then again in Denver 17 days later. Yikes.
• We get exactly one Monday Night game, which, frankly, is one more than I was expecting. It's at Buffalo, but it's also after a bye week.
• We get three consecutive road games in December, all against warm-weather teams (well, the Lions play in a dome, so close enough).

Should be an interesting year. Can't possibly be as bad as last year ... can it?

 

I think the Broncos have a real chance in week 2 and week 9....

[Old Man]

1 hour ago, archer said:

 

I think the Broncos have a real chance in week 2 and week 9....

 

I dunno, they'll be lucky to score any points at all in week 9.

[archer]

Just now, Old Man said:

 

I dunno, they'll be lucky to score any points at all in week 9.

 

Hmm...looking at the matchup, I think that's a tough one to lose.

 

Now if it was the Cowboys rather than the Broncos...I could see the Cowboys blowing it and having a few season-ending injuries to boot.

[unclevlad]

1 hour ago, archer said:

 

I think the Broncos have a real chance in week 2 and week 9....

 

I'd offer a snide remark about what that says about your feelings for that team in the Swamp...but...it just can't be done.  They're still a dump truck.

 

We all know power rankings right now are nothing but giggle fodder, but...it's still time for giggling.  So:

https://sportsnaut.com/nfl-power-rankings-all-32-teams-updated-weekly/

 

Packers in Denver...the early reviews put em adjacent.  At the Bears, they're #29.  At the Texans, who are #27.

 

And hey, ANY team should be able to take 1 of 2 from the Derps.

[Old Man]

4 minutes ago, unclevlad said:

 

And hey, ANY team should be able to take 1 of 2 from the Derps.

 

[Old Man]

10 minutes ago, unclevlad said:

 

We all know power rankings right now are nothing but giggle fodder, but...it's still time for giggling.  So:

https://sportsnaut.com/nfl-power-rankings-all-32-teams-updated-weekly/

 

Idk about these rankings.  Jets at #4 with the husk of Kaaron Rodgers at QB?  The Niners at #3 when their only healthy QB is Sam Darnold?  Bills way down at #8?  And of course Raiders at 25 is ludicrous, they can't possibly be higher than 28.

[Starlord]

Steelers, Bears and Saints each have 2 Thursday games.  Yuck.

[Logan D. Hurricanes]

This is the second list I've seen that ranks all three of the Jags' division rivals in the bottom six for the entire league.

 

Spoiler

 

And the Jags up at #10 on this list...

 

Spoiler