Misc Stuff

Posted: June 22nd, 2012 | Author: | Filed under: Philadelphia Eagles | 46 Comments »

Sorry for my lack of interaction yesterday.  I was out of town to go see Iron Maiden in Charlotte.  Amazing show.  Any hard rock/metal fans should go catch them on tour.  The guys might be in their 50’s, but you would never know it by the way they perform.  Sounded great.  Looked great.  Lots of fun.

* * * * *

Q & A (from yesterday)

If Howie was the lead negotiator in the past, would that have changed things with Lito and Sheldon?  I don’t think so.  Lito wanted big time money because he saw himself as an elite CB.  There were times when he was elite.  He always came up big when Jim Johnson put him on Randy Moss all game long.  Lito made big plays in some games.  The problem is that he didn’t play like this consistently.  Lito didn’t get fired up to cover so-so WRs.  He didn’t get fired up for “average” games during a long season.  Great players are great all the time, not just situationally.  Lito’s demands weren’t realistic based on his play.

Sheldon is tougher to discuss.  He was a great locker room player.  He was durable, consistent, and reliable on the field.  He played the run well.  The problem with Sheldon is that he wasn’t a playmaker or great cover guy.  He was very good, but that was his ceiling.

I think Sheldon was ticked off when the Eagles paid Asante $10M per year.  That was double his salary (or more).  For parts of 2008 and all of 2009 Sheldon went from Steady Eddie to doing a lot more gambling.  My guess (and I don’t know this for a fact) is that Sheldon saw Asante getting big bucks for making plays and thought he would try to play that way.

Sheldon had 5 INTs and 35 PDs from 2006-2008.  After playing with Asante for a year, Sheldon responded with 5 INTs and 17 PDs in 2009.  I think he was heavily influenced by that.  The problem is that Asante is a very talented gambler.  Sheldon isn’t.  He got burned quite a few times that year.

Sheldon wanted the Eagles to give him a raise.  They didn’t want to.  They felt he was being adequately paid as a #2 type CB.  That’s when the Eagles decided the best course of action was to trade him.  They knew he wasn’t going to be a happy player without more money and the team didn’t want to give a raise to a player that was about to turn 31 and was going to start declining.  That just didn’t make good business sense.

People can point out the Todd and Trent deals from this year, but they are so different.  Trent Cole has been a Pro Bowl player and remains an outstanding DE.  He’s shown no signs of slowing down.  Todd Herremans moved to RT and that’s a big part of why he was given a raise and new deal.

If you could take Lito’s natural talent and athleticism and put it in Sheldon’s body, you would have an elite CB that would make tons of money.  As two separate players, they each have weaknesses.

Kevin Turner on Twitter?   Here he is – https://twitter.com/#!/KevinTurner_NFL

Could Dan Klecko have been another Derek Landri?  No.  Klecko was 5-11 and in the 270-280 range.  He made for a good role player because he had an odd build and a good skill set.  He would do whatever you asked of him.  Great motor, attitude.  Finished his career with 30 solo tackles, 5 sacks, and 1 TFL.

Landri has been a starter in the NFL.  He’s 6-2, 290.  He has 77 solo tackles, 8 sacks, and 19 TFLs.  Both guys played in 63 games.  Not all of Klecko’s came on defense and that has to be factored in, but you can see that Dan is a good pass rusher, but that’s about it.  Too small to be a functional run defender.  Landri was the backup NT for us last year and battled his butt off vs double teams.  He’s not big, but is very tough and plays with great leverage.

Andy Studebaker.  Glad  you guys remembered him.  Slipped my mind.

* * * * *

In case you missed it, here is my Short Term Eagles Team of the last 20 years (PE.com column).

Let me know what you think.

* * * * *

Steve Spagnuolo was on WIP to discuss OJ Atogwe signing with the Eagles.  Sheil Kapadia listened and took notes.

If Atogwe stays healthy and plays up to his potential, the Eagles will have to get him on the field.  I just don’t know if either thing will happen.

I am interested to see if being on a talented team has a positive effect on him.  I wondered that with Ernie Sims, but the answer was no.  There are a couple of differences.  Atogwe is a better player.  He’s also smarter.  Infinitely smarter…or much more smarterer as Homer Simpson might say.

Atogwe was on an 8-8 team in 2006.  That is the most successful group he’s been a part of.  He has been on some awful defenses.  In Philly Atogwe will have a dynamic offense and talented defensive teammates.  If that doesn’t bring out the best in him, nothing will.


46 Comments on “Misc Stuff”

  1. 1 Anders Jensen said at 2:07 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    You forgot to link the Landri video on PE.com

  2. 2 TommyLawlor said at 2:22 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    I haven’t had a chance to watch it and write some stuff out. Later tonight, maybe.

  3. 3 Anders Jensen said at 3:22 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    haha I thought you would have seen that at all cost

  4. 4 TheRogerPodacter said at 3:07 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    thanks for the heads up, i never would have seen the video.
    pretty good stuff in there.

    i’m glad they showed a lot of his plays and not just the top 5.
    i really enjoy watching this guy play his ass off and get the job done on the field.

  5. 5 Sam Lynch said at 2:14 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    For the record, I disagree with Tommy regarding Sheldon Brown. First, the degree to which the logic he presents meant that the Eagles were cutting off their nose to spite their face is alarming. Rather than have a crabby Sheldon Brown, they went with Ellis Hobbs. Rather than overpay a player who might be worse, they went with a player who was already as bad as they feared Sheldon might someday become. And they paid Hobbs a ton to play that badly.

    That aside, the logic for redoing Sheldon’s deal always was that it wouldn’t cost them that much to give him a bump — he wasn’t asking for a ton of money, he didn’t really need more years, he basically wanted escalators already existing in his deal guaranteed — and that what you’d get back in terms of leadership and in terms of letting the locker room know that ‘we value Sheldon’s style of effor not Lito’s lack thereof and we reward it’ was worth the cost. Especially in an era without legitimate cap (or cash, for that matter) constraints, where paying Sheldon Brown more didn’t mean sacrificing elsewhere.

    The Sheldon Brown situation was a classic case of worrying so much about getting the team’s own player’s value precisely right that they forgot that the goal was to make the team as strong as possible.

  6. 6 TommyLawlor said at 2:28 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    Value was a central part of the situation. And you could be right that the team was too stringent in that regard.

    The flip side is that you do have to be careful about giving veterans raises. That can set a tricky precedent. They could do it with Cole and point to the fact that he’s a Pro Bowl DE and star. With Todd they had the move to OT as an excuse.

    Sheldon would have just been giving a guy a raise because he wanted it. As you point out, that wouldn’t be a terrible thing because of his presence in the locker room. I do see this as a tricky situation with problems no matter how it was handled.

    As for Hobbs…he was a band-aid. That’s it. You prefer not to have those guys at critical positions, but let’s not make this out to be “we replaced Sheldon with Hobbs”. He was just keeping the seat warm until we could find a player the team really wanted.

  7. 7 SebastianAubrey said at 3:16 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    Sheldon’s last year with Eagles you could visibly see his play decline as season went on. In that playoff lose to the cowboys it looked like he was running on fumes. I had no problem with trading him at that time. The same can be said about Dawkins. In that terrible playoff lose to the Cardinals Demps was in for Dawkins quite a bit. Which is strange because Brian never left the field. The NFL is a business and the Eagles handle theirs. That’s why they are loaded with stars and have the second most cap.

  8. 8 Sam Lynch said at 3:59 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    I don’t see how you can’t look at it as ‘we replaced Sheldon with Hobbs.’ That is what happened. We made a business decision without regard to the trade-off. You don’t fake it until something reasonable comes along. Not if you expect to compete. The Sheldon Brown fiasco was idiotic and preventable and a clear representation with everything that was wrong with the Eagles’ organization — and still may be, if the inflexibility was Howie’s and not just Banner’s.

    Cole and Herremans are not different than Brown. We reward guys who outperform their contracts, guys who are strong leaders in the clubhouse, guys who set the example for how the Philadelphia Eagles play. Making an example of Sheldon Brown is EXACTLY why players hated the front office. They didn’t hate it for Lito. They didn’t hate it for Duce. They didn’t hate it for letting Vincent go, or even Dawkins. But screwing over Sheldon Brown? Sheesh.

    Especially when the top pro personnel guys at the time, Heckert and Sandusky, were ultimately the very ones who gave Sheldon a raise in Cleveland. This wasn’t about talent or ability. That is bogus, at least to the guys who were paid primarily to evaluate that talent and ability. This was about Joe Banner and possibly Howie Roseman and their inability to get past their financial model. And it was to the detriment of the team *exactly* because their model didn’t consider the alternative, Ellis Hobbs. If a player’s behavior about his contract is so negative that your fear it hurts his play (he gives you, say, 75% of the value he otherwise would), and if you have no good alternative to that player who can give you more than, say 50%, you have three choices. You can live with 75%; you can pay up and get 100%; and you can cut the player and get 50%.

    The Eagles chose the approach that hurt the team the most. That was appallingly stupid especially because the way they (predictably) chose to solve it was to overpay a free agent to fill that gap by a margin that far exceeds anything that Sheldon Brown ever even dreamed of.

  9. 9 Mac said at 4:21 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    I don’t mean to be ignorant here, but didn’t the Eagles trade for Ellis Hobbs? I am not aware of how much that contract cost, so it may well be virtually the same thing as going out and overpaying a FA.

    Also, I for one was o.k. with the play of (pre-injury) Hobbs, plus I appreciated the fact that he was coming in to be the #2 CB, had success playing with Asante in NE and had kick off return ability (which the Eagles were sorely lacking).

    I do believe Sheldon got a raw deal, but to my non-talent evaluating eyes he looked like a player on the decline, and the “Jason” mask thing was pretty stupid.

  10. 10 TommyLawlor said at 5:28 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    We did trade for him, but I think Sam’s point is that his salary was hardly cheap. Based on EaglesCap:

    2009 Brown was $3.3M
    2010 Hobbs was $2.8M

    Little monetary difference, but Brown was definitely a better CB. In terms of pure value, Sam is absolutely right that Brown, even with a raise, was the better value.

  11. 11 Sam Lynch said at 5:51 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    We traded for Hobbs in 2009. He struggled and was out 4th CB. He never was even close to bei gconsidered a challenger for Brown’s spot.

    We then re-signed him in 2010 for the ridiculous amount below because we needed him to replace Sheldon.

  12. 12 TommyLawlor said at 5:55 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    I forgot he was here in 2009.

  13. 13 TommyLawlor said at 5:17 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    @ Sam…

    Sheldon was a long term answer at RCB. Hobbs was a band-aid. He was never going to be the long term answer at RCB. That’s why I don’t think you say we replaced Sheldon with Hobbs. Was the the immediate replacement for a season? Of course. I’m not trying to be irrational. But Hobbs was only going to have the job for a year. I think there is an enormous difference in being a temp and a long term replacement.

    Had the Eagles dealt Brown and then signed Hobbs to a 4 or 5-year deal, I’d be very much in agreement with you.

    In the NFL, there are some short term solutions that teams settle for despite them being less than ideal, to put it mildly.

    As to the Browns…they were desperate. They were 29th in passing yards allowed in 2009. They were 29th in INTs. They needed a starting CB in a major way. Dealing for Sheldon was a no-brainer. We had Asante in place as our top corner. The Eagles obviously felt they could stand to lose Brown and deal with a lesser talent for a season.

    As to the team and value…we simply see things differently. The Sheldon of 2009 was not a top shelf player. He gave up a 49-yd TD in a tight loss to Dallas. He struggled vs SD. He gave up a huge play vs the Giants. He really struggled in the season finale vs Dallas. He made a critical mistake in the Dallas playoff loss. He also had some good games. I’m not trying to paint a false picture that he was a bum.

    The question becomes whether you give a raise to a player that is on the decline. That can be seen as a way to increase morale in the locker room since he’s a popular figure or as a dangerous precedent. Do other veterans start to think they also should get a bump when they’ve been good soldiers for the team?

    I do agree that this was very much a Banner issue. Would Howie handle it differently? I still don’t think so, but that is purely a guess on my part.

    One other angle here…I don’t think the Eagles weren’t committed to Sheldon for much longer anyway.

  14. 14 Sam Lynch said at 6:00 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    Brown has declined to two more years of solid 16 start seasons. Yes, the Browns aren’t good, but you can’t tell me they are just too dumb to know Sheldon sucks. He’s still fine. Christ, his gaffes in 2009 could have been made by even a $12 million CB.

    This is not about talent. It is totally inconsistent with every actual thing that other decision makers who knew him best did.

    This was just a failure. An abject failure.

  15. 15 austinfan said at 6:31 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    Brown 2010: 51-10 2 Int 10 PD
    Wright 10 starts, and Haden 7 starts, were the other two CBs. Haden had 6 Int, 18 PD, Wright 1 and 9.

    Brown 2011: 38-10 2 Int 13 PD

    By 2011 Brown was a pretty middle of the pack CB and I think they’ve been talking about moving him to safety in 2012.

    So the harm was really only 2010, while Hobbs/Patterson were pretty bad, they had 5 int and 15 PD, and it’s not like Brown wasn’t getting beat at times by that point in his career. So it would be hard to claim a huge falloff, or that Brown would have made a huge difference in 2010.

    2009: 61.0% 6.5 YPA 27-25 44 sacks
    2010: 57.6% 7.0 YPA 31-23 39 sacks
    2011: 58.1% 7.2 YPA 27-15 50 sacks

    It would be hard to blame the falloff in 2010 on the absence of Brown. In the same fashion, it’s hard to imagine the absence of Asante will make that big of a difference given they only had 15 Int with him starting.

    I’d say the biggest key will be getting more consistent play from the safeties and better coverage by LBs, and asking CBs to do less. The better pass defense of 2007 and 2008 probably had more to do with Dawk and Mikell working together so well with 2 veteran CBs, before all four starting losing steps in 2009.

    The problem wasn’t Dawk, Brown and Mikell leaving, it’s that they didn’t have a replacement for Dawk and Brown circa 2008. And Sean put Patterson on an island gambling with blitzes, put Sheldon circa 2010 on that island and he’d look pretty bad.

    Demps, Harris, Hobbs, Patterson, Lindley – not exactly what was needed.

  16. 16 TommyLawlor said at 8:48 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    Nobody said “Sheldon sucks”. Never said he was anything less than solid.

    And we’ll just have to disagree. I think it was about talent.

  17. 17 ian_no_2 said at 5:26 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    When the Eagles dumped Sheldon, it was like when the driver of a car is driving into a cone and no one can get him to move the steering wheel. What I read indicated that indeed he was asking for some more guaranteed money and not more cap space per year. I was screaming and getting into arguments on a regular basis.

    What I found frustrating was that the pro-Sheldon contingent wasn’t saying that he would be immortal and a decline in play wasn’t possible, even immediately, but simply that you don’t subtract an integral player at CB unless you have a replacement in place, which they didn’t. What they had was the narrative “Asante and Ellis won a Super Bowl” which no one in football really believed.

    It was annoying, also, that there was a PR campaign against Sheldon, who even though his physical gifts were going to decline at some point always learned the coverages and busted it.

  18. 18 ian_no_2 said at 5:34 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    also I heard “then everyone’s going to restructure mid-contract.” Every team restructures contracts. When it’s not in their interests to do so, they can always say no.

  19. 19 Eric Weaver said at 2:53 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    That’s kind of what I was getting at with asking the Howie v. Banner question in the first place. I think Howie values team chemistry far more than Banner did. If you want to boil it down to that most basic thing.

  20. 20 P_P_K said at 2:16 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    “The guys might be in their 50′s, but you would never know it by the way they perform. ”

    Yea, like the readers of Iggles Blitz.

  21. 21 izzylangfan said at 3:00 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    I think you missed the point a bit on Sheldon Brown. He seemed to be upset about the way the team treated Lito, the money that we gave Asante and the fact that he was underpaid. Yes, he was underpaid a bit — all we had to do was give him a fair wage. Instead, we went with that guy we got from the Patriots. I forgot his name – most likely because he couldn’t cover.

    The other blunder was Dawk. Yes he wasn’t as good as we used to be but he had 8 FFs his last year with the Eagles and he had three times more than Allen and Coleman combined over the last two years and he might have been a tad better than Macho Harris. If he was still an Eagle playing in a system he knew and loved he probably would have been better than he was in Denver. Its bad enough to get rid of a hall of fame lifetime Eagle in a way that left a bad taste in everyone’s mouth — but he actually would have made us better.

  22. 22 TommyLawlor said at 3:07 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    Dawk is a situation where Banner erred and admitted so. He negotiated inappropriately with a player of Dawk’s stature. That still doesn’t mean we should have handed Dawk a blank check to stay. Joe just was wrong in the way he dealt with him. I think a better style would have led to the two sides agreeing on a deal.

  23. 23 P_P_K said at 4:45 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    I give Banner a lot of credit for man-ing up and admitting he made a mistake. But Dawk got a ton of money from Denver, likely more than the Eagles would have matched. Perhaps way more. Dawk still might have left the Eagles. We’ll never know, of course, but I’m glad Banner was the bad guy here so my memories of Brian remain nothing but stellar.

  24. 24 Eric Weaver said at 4:58 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    Perhaps it wasnt necessarily about money but the attitude banner brought to the negotiating table.

  25. 25 austinfan said at 6:45 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    The problem was by 2009 Dawk and Mikell were the same player, former FSs who had lost a step or two and were better suited playing in the box. JJ had Dawk playing LB in his nickel package and Demps at FS, if that doesn’t scream your range is gone I don’t know what does!

    The real problem wasn’t Dawk leaving, it was Jones/Demps/Harris trying to replace what he was in 2007 and 2008. If they had gone with Dawk – Mikell – Asante – Brown in 2009 and 2010, they’d pretty much would have had to commit to a cover 2 scheme – which in retrospect might not have been a bad idea. But in that case, Dmitri Patterson might have been a pretty good CB.

    2009 they overestimated Demps, 2010 they got unlucky with Allen’s PCL. 2011 Coleman started the year with his head up his butt and Page simply wasn’t a NFL caliber player (which they should have realized given his career trajectory).

  26. 26 TheRogerPodacter said at 3:00 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    i’m a little hazy on the playoff injury to blaine bishop…
    i remember liking him back there for most of the season, but by the time the season ended, i was crushed that we had him back there. i didnt know he was injured, though. that changes everything i (barely) remember about that year…

  27. 27 TommyLawlor said at 3:08 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    I think he had a partial groin tear. It was obvious he was struggling to run. I don’t know how Andy/JJ missed it. Should have played Mike Lewis in that game. We still might have lost, but Bishop hurt us on some key coverage plays.

  28. 28 Anders Jensen said at 3:44 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    Reminds me of the Titans game where Hobbs couldnt run at all and Britt burned us for way to many TDs and yards

  29. 29 Mac said at 4:22 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    The decision to not pull Hobbs after the first time he was burned was ridiculous. The dude was clearly at much less than full speed.

  30. 30 D3Keith said at 7:52 PM on June 23rd, 2012:

    Agree. Cost us a W.

    Sometimes players need to self-evaluate too. It’s one thing to be tough, man up and take one for the team. It’s one thing to hurt the team worse because you’re hurting. Get out of the game.

    Vick probably should have done it too against Ariz. last year.

  31. 31 laeagle said at 5:20 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    The thing I remember most about Blaine Bishop in that game was his ridiculous introduction. You know, the little thing on the screen where the player’s heads say who they are and where they went to school. “Donovan McNabb, Syracuse”, “Brian Dawkins, Clemson University”, etc.

    Blaine’s?

    “Blaine Bishop. Old School.”

    There aren’t enough crewmen on the Enterprise to generate the facepalms sufficient to deal with that asinine performance. (reference to Picard/Riker double facepalm meme).

  32. 32 ian_no_2 said at 5:29 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    If Landri plays as expected this year and expressions of male affection escalate, he can add to “my wife reads me fan columns” the suggestion “I’m not like Dan Klecko at all. First of all, I don’t go both ways…”

  33. 33 T_S_O_P said at 6:36 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    I saw Iron Maiden in 1982, Bruce’s first tour. I’ve said that before, I’m sure. I’m sure they’re closer to 60 than 50.

  34. 34 Jamie said at 6:45 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    You keep saying Lito was more of a play maker than Sheldon. He may have had more talent, but I don’t think he was more of a play maker. For one, Lito had bad hands. If he could catch, he would have had 10 int’s in 2003. He did have the 2 long returns for TD’s against the Cowboys. Sheldon will always be remembered for his big hit on Reggie Bush, but he had a bunch of other big hits too, like the two on Reggie Swinton his rookie year. He had the big hit on Eli in 2006 that caused the ball to float up in the air and land in Trent Cole’s hands that he returned for a TD. Those hits are big plays too. He also had the big int for a TD against the Chiefs to spark the big comeback in 2006.

  35. 35 A_T_G said at 7:28 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    The one on Steven Jackson left me surprised that Jackson’s head wasn’t still in the helmet rolling across the field.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3c5jwoWPRpI

  36. 36 D3Keith said at 7:53 PM on June 23rd, 2012:

    That was the first game of the season. I remember being so jacked up after that one that *I* wanted to hit someone.

  37. 37 EJ said at 7:18 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    It always amazes me that a football player, like Lito, can’t motivate themselves for a game. They only play 16 games a year! Can’t they motivate themselves 16 times a year? I can understand it in the other sports where they play over a hundred games a season.

  38. 38 the guy said at 8:11 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    Getting motivated 16 times a year when you choose the time and place? Easy. Doing it on a schedule, regardless of what’s happening in your life? Not so much, I imagine.

    I have to think that no matter how special it seems when you get drafted and get that big check, at a certain point it becomes a job. Those who love their jobs enough to put in that kind of effort all the time (it’s not just games, practice/study is just as important) are very rare people.

  39. 39 D3Keith said at 8:01 PM on June 23rd, 2012:

    It’s human nature.

    Some people are affected by it more than others, but just sharing my personal D-III experience, I know I used to struggle with it when we played a team we knew we should beat, or when the game plan didn’t involve me much (I played corner and then free safety). Likewise, we had a couple games a year when the spread was still kind of new that I knew I would be under duress the entire game, and I knew if I wasn’t at my best every play for an entire game, we were liable to get embarrassed out there.

    One year our coach cooked up a scheme against a Wing-T where the corners took on the pulling guards to keep the outside linebackers free to tackle ballcarriers. I got pummeled that game, but I was integral to the game plan, so even though there was barely any passing, I remember being locked in. And really sore after.

    It’s easy to say you should get motivated for every play of every game for every season, but I think human nature varies from person to person. Some people are just wired to be juiced up for every play. Some guys aren’t talented enough to go at anything but full speed. Some people thrive on challenges and confrontation. I was that way — as a cornerback it’s kind of part of the mentality.

    And I don’t think you ever think you’re dogging it, until you realize how much better you play the more you’re challenged.

    Short story long, I hate to admit it, but I totally get where Lito is coming from. And I totally back Tommy’s analysis too — as a fan you hate to see that. You want guys that go hard all the time, no matter the circumstances.

  40. 40 the guy said at 7:42 PM on June 22nd, 2012:

    RE: Short Term team

    I don’t know why, but the Leonard Weaver situation still stings with me.

    I’m imagining him on this year’s team and wondering how far they could have gone.

  41. 41 Steve H said at 12:38 AM on June 23rd, 2012:

    I dunno I’ve always felt Sheldon was undervalued. Sure he wasn’t an elite playmaker, but jesus the guy was consistent and didn’t get burned very often. I mean how many more games would we have won last year if we had had a Sheldon Brown at CB instead of the mess we ended up with? I could be wrong but I really feel like sometimes the “playmaking” aspect is overvalued drastically. Also if I recall in ’08 or ’09 Sheldon was playing out of his mind for the first 8 games, was giving up some ridiculously low number of catches and yards, and that was in the middle of his contract squabble.

    I normally don’t take sides but I gotta agree with Sam on the Hobbs/Brown discussion, if they had managed to keep Brown happy there never would have been a need for a “bandaid” solution, and we probably all would have had a much more pleasant 16 game season that year. I like thinking long term but its stupid to undermine your chances for a whole year because you’re playing hardball over what weren’t even unreasonable demands.

  42. 42 T_S_O_P said at 2:19 AM on June 23rd, 2012:

    The fact that he moved inside and played the slot too, may have meant they did not need to give Hanson the money they gave him. You can see why Todd Herremans made the statement he did after his contract had been renegotiated, which was along the lines of being happy (obviously) because he felt the club had got away from signing/extending their draft choices rather giving money to other teams draft choices. When you look at the money given to Hobbs and Hanson over renegotiating Sheldon’s contract, you can see his point more than in Dawkins situation where they Eagles had attempted to replace him through the draft. I know I felt that way, I felt there had been a sea change in the way things were being done.

  43. 43 D3Keith said at 8:08 PM on June 23rd, 2012:

    The other aspect is at the time, Sheldon had two years to go on his deal and the Eagles were steadfast that they do not renegotiate until 1 year to go. At the time, especially given the fact that Sheldon took guaranteed money when his career could’ve gone the way of Reggie Brown, it seemed prudent.

    In hindsight, a small extension or incentives or a conversion of some money somewhere would have been far more prudent. It might have been regarded as a tip of the cap for a job well done.

    I know I was one of the people who said if Ellis Hobbs is the worst thing about this team, we’ll have a pretty good team. In hindsight, I would have rather had another year of Sheldon, but I think it was pretty hard to know that at the time. I think the Eagles feared opening the floodgates of renegotiations knowing how many young players they had who would soon be asking for more money.

    If we learned one thing this offseason, it’s that there’s a way to have standards without going overboard playing hardball. Players who earn the new deals should get them, and if they are reasonable, the entire team stands to benefit.

    And as a last remanant of the T.O. situation, the more success the entire team has, the more opportunity everyone has to get rich. Slow-playing it instead of going for the all-out money grab can be smart from a player’s perspective as well.

  44. 44 teltschikfakeout88 said at 10:35 AM on June 23rd, 2012:

    Tommy, Sam and Austinfan….your exchanges on the terrible decision to let Brown go is absolute solid gold. I love the posts, but the comments section is why this place is the best to come to for real Eagles dialogue. This sort of discussion on the PE board would have been riddled with people dropping F bombs or calling you guys out as idiots. Phenomenal take and anlaysis on that situation and another potential reveal as to why Banner is now gone.

  45. 45 D3Keith said at 8:02 PM on June 23rd, 2012:

    Agree

  46. 46 juggadore said at 11:37 PM on June 23rd, 2012:

    thanks for the klecko mention!