Crazy at how far Thomas has come, and how much further he still has to go. Once our OL gets some games under their belt, watch out. Lock up VC!
Donald Thomas reminds me of Keith Sims. I love when guys come outta nowhere (even though Sims was a 2nd round pick) and end up starting. Hopefully we found a serious gem.
What's crazy to me is how far Roth has come. That the coaches feel comfortable enough w/ him dropping back into coverage after only a few weeks working at the position to name him the starter- that says a lot. Of course, one caveat is that this D is going to be geared to stop the run first and foremost, so I don't expect Roth to be dropping back to cover deep curls and out routes a whole lot. I think we'll go nickel in those obvious passing situations, giving up bulk for agility and speed. Then again, if Roth continues to improve and loses 5+ lbs. to up his speed and agility, they may just leave him out there. It will be interesting to watch how it plays out this season.
If thomas truely plays well and solidifies that position, that would be a huge advancement for a team trying to add talent at all positions. It would help next years draft and potentially the draft after that. Our oline would gain cohesiveness lots sooner and its very young. It would be a great piece to add two starters in their first year to the oline in one draft. I'd be in shock for a long time and wouldn't forget the 2008 draft for a long time. That is great scouting in my opinion, as we've been hard pressed to find gems like that for a long time, outside of say Yerimiah Bell.
Yeah, I think they may get him out of there in the obvious passing situations. However, it wouldn't surprise me to keep him in there like you said. He's not bad at covering. Also, on the passing situations, he could be used as a stand-up pass rusher. I agree. Ireland has a knack for finding gems and adding practice squad guys from other teams I believe. He seems to have convinced us all with the finding the gems, now hopefully he can find some of those no-name guys and allow the coaching staff to make them into something.
[ I agree. Ireland has a knack for finding gems and adding practice squad guys from other teams I believe. He seems to have convinced us all with the finding the gems, now hopefully he can find some of those no-name guys and allow the coaching staff to make them into something.[/QUOTE] Man thats encouraging to the speed in which this team could potentially turn around, knowing that we don't need 5 years of top 10 first round picks to turn the tide. If we can get starting talent from various areas' including other teams practice squads, this revitalizing a great franchise could be here sooner than any of us expect. I'll keep my enthusiasm in check until we see how they play come september but its still been a truely encouraging offseason.
This news means more to me than all the preseason wins in the world!!! We are set on the o-line. Will there be mistakes, sure, but these guys will grow together.
I'll be glad to say the least if we can salvage Matt Roth as a SOLB. He needs to lose even more weight but my pet project over the off-season has come to fruition. Kendall Langford starting is truly impressive to say the least. LE- Langford, Starks NT- Ferguson, Soliai, Starks RE- Holliday, Merling, Wright Practice Squad: Dotson Seems to be the agenda to me. I think they'd like to find a way to keep all of the 3-4 DEs as they are the most talented and deep group in camp.
We'll see what happens with Shawn Murphy. I have hope that he'll be a good backup G otherwise they would not have released McKinney. Out of the RBs I expect one to workout, the other to not. Dotson may get to the practice squad. That's an incredible draft to start things off.
Add the UDFA NT Toribio to the practice squad, as they are pretty high on him, the last I heard. That gives us some real building blocks on the Dline also!
