2014 Depth Chart

The questions would be first, can they stay relatively healthy. Locker, Walker, and Greene lost significant time and outside of Wright, they'd be your biggest assets so health would be hugely important. Second, I see almost no chance Stewart is our RT next year so who comes in at RT and how they play would have an impact as who is our FB and backup WR's and TE's. Third, who is our OC? Fourth, how does Locker play with? Does he play like he did this year at an 86+ qb rating? Better or worse?

But to answer your question, I'd say somewhere between above average say 14 to top 10. More importantly, we should score MORE points and rest our D more (so they play better and take pressure off the offense who then play better). With 3 better defensive starters our D should play better. Scoring more points and giving up less SHOULD translate into several more wins. Heck, we should have had several more wins anyway...even with a backup QB and a rookie OC. Plus, Id expect a lot more production from a downhill runner like Greene then we got from CJ this season. Better ypc means more consistency which means more first downs and better time of possession...which alone makes the defense better.

I think there is a real possiblity Nate is NOT on the team next year as he also has a high cap #. Then again, I'd say he's more important than Griff and Griff's cap # is higher. Locker also seems to trust him so If we're staying with Locker, we should try to keep Nate one more season if possible.

 

The flip side of this is that Verner a lot of times jumps routes because he has a S behind him. If HE is the S, it's much harder to gamble the way he does because if you guess wrong you give up an easy TD. I think he'd make more plays then Griff and have more INT's (then the zero Griff had) but IF Verner stays, he's staying at CB so not worth discussing really.

 

I'm not saying it can't be done. Heck, tom Brady was drafted where? But he's the ONLY big time QB drafted there. While it is much more likely to find gems in the 4th and 5th round, the chance of success is still quite low and we have enough problems!

If we take better players at need positions and we take an OT in rnd 4, so be it. but with the quality of OT in this draft in rounds 1 and 2, you can get better then 'starter' material so it would behoove us to draft for need keeping in mind the strength of the draft.