bioLarzen

Age? Health situation?

I think we'll have a new RT.

I think we all wish so... but that darn cap limit...

I guess the main cause of the false optimism about getting Mack was Mack's agent who said he could construct a deal that the Browns would find very hard to match. I think a lot of fans took it word by word - thinking that it's Mack's agent who constructs the actual deal - whereas he only said that IF HE WAS A GM, he could construct such a deal. that was nothing more than some PR work on his behalf. no wonder Mack seemed to raise no interest so far... I think it's almost guaranteed he'll end up back in Cleveland.

And I guess we can pretty much be sure that Zuttah had other suitors - reports say the Bucs were planning to cut him. If Ozzie didn't wait for that and agreed to the trade, that must mean there was competition...

OK, that's alright. He was probably brought in to start - and he has the pre-season to prove himself.

Still more than a month

Hahh, Aaron Wilson has just backed me up: "Sources say Ravens have high opinion of Alex Mack, but thought all along it would be too complicated and expensive to pull it off." (source: Aaron Wilson on twitter)

Shame the Ravens picked Ozzie as GM when you too were available...

You know the rule: facts are for the weak

What is telling you he won't? And... i don't think anyone here thinks that he will surely be great - we just see hope that he will.

And that should prevent us from being happy when we seem to make a good deal? No team is ever without holes to fill. That's one of the blessings of the cap system. So, we should never be happy?

Well... let's see the numbers. Week#15, the Bucs had 12 rushing attempts, of which Rainey had 11 - for 27 yards. Week#16 Rainey had 20 out of 23 carries - for 37 yards. Finally, Week#17 the Bucs had 18 carries, 11 by Rainey, for 35 yards. Combined, the last 3 weeks the Bucs had 50 rushing snaps, of which Rainey had 42 - that's 84% of the rushing attempts. He made 98 yards, that's an average of 2.31 YPC. So, sorry, but what you're saying is simply not true. Rainey's production didn't go down because he started to split carries. He didn't have less carries than before - and his average clearly reveals that he simply wasn't very effective during that span - in fact, much less effective than Rice or Pierce. Nice try...

OK, sorry.

Mack has always been a pipe dream. He's way too expensive. I'm quite sure Ozzie never seriously considered him. Far out of our price range.

That's Rice there in #27, right?

One source says it's a "2015 late-round", another says it's a 2015 6th round.

Well, we'll see.

Yep, he did. Yep, Gradkowski came at #35...

"Zuttah will also challenge incumbent center Gino Gradkowski for a starting role." LOL - who are wi trying to kid here? Ozzie will never trade away draft picks for mere "challenge". The sheer fact of the trade means he's meant to start.

Well, they might have... we may know squat about some of the discussions and negotiations going on in the background...

If you compare Clark's and Reed's last season, you'll see why... Ed Reed is gonna be Ed Reed for us, Ravens fans for ever, of course, and Clark is always gonna stay a steeler for us, no matter what. But last season... Clark was better, let's face it. Also, so far this is merely a rumor. We know nothing about the facts yet. Maybe Clark's name has never came up in the Castle... A week or two ago, everyone thought we would pursue Champ Bailey to convert him to FS - and then nothing happened... (altough, there's a fair amount of chance that both Clark and Bailey -. but at least one of them - will still be there in the garbage period of free agency... Ozzie's prime hunting season.

Ryan Clark is also one of Ed Reed's best friends - they grew up in the same area, if I recall it correctly.

Yep, and we also had a very serious cap space situation we had to handle. I love how all those "Boldiners" keep forgetting aboput this fact - and talk about that situation like we could have kept Boldin with his contract like that - and we cut him "just because"... The other thing I love is when this is pointed out, the Boldiners say "surely it could have been solved somehow" - yep, by releasing Boldin... The problem wasn't releasing Boldin, the problem was being unbale to replace him with a cheaper alternative. But yeah, I know...

I guess we won't get another big signing in the first wave of free agency - what we've been through these couple of days is more than what we've been through the first weeks of free agency of the last couple seasons anyway... I guess now we're going back to Ozzie's trademark finding-gems-in-the-trash approach, picking up some cap casualties later on, well after the draft. If he can find a good RT and a FS or a C, I think we're fine.