descent into the maelstrom

One thing that I haven't seen mentioned with respect to round 1 is that Humphrey, Allen, Howard and Foster were possibly the best 4 players available at the time we were on the clock and all from Alabama. We all know about Ozzie's Alabama connections. He would have had more insight into each of these players than possibly anyone else not involved with their program. That is the reason I simply cannot knock the decision to take Humphrey above the other three. He had all the information when making the pick.

I'd pay my share to keep the board going. I don't post much because I don't watch college football, film, other NFL teams or NFL network (I, too, find it unwatchable). Because of that, I mostly lurk, but enjoy the insights of many of the posters on here and enjoy participating when I have something relevant to add to the conversation. Because I'm no longer living in Maryland, I enjoy the connection to the team that this board provides. I'm disappointed that it's going away.

Maybe the Ravens will take him on as a coaching intern. As a player who went undrafted, he might have some knowledge that would be helpful to others regarding work ethic, technique, etc.

I wonder if the Patriots pick him up. He's clearly better than what they have.

And just to prove your point, here is a thread starting post from mid-December 2012: "This brand of football we are putting on the field lately is pretty bad to watch, the word is PUTRID. Mistakes all over the place. I have to look at the top for the undiscipline that keep costing us games. In a word, Playoffs? How?"

If this is true, as I'm sure it is not, I say, fix away. So far they have fixed it so that the Ravens are the only team to have made multiple Super Bowl appearances without a loss.

I'm amazed that the 49ers are last. Since having gone to 3 straight NFCCG or better, their front office has made even the Browns' look spectacular.

I can't imagine that any coach or gm cares enough about whether they start the game with the ball or get the ball to open the second half so much as to risk injury to one of their players - and to do so each and every week. Something different to earn the first overtime possession might be interesting, as long as it is not a serious injury risk. I'm not even sure about that since each team gets a possession if the first team with the ball fails to score a touchdown. I'm fine with a coin toss.

I've been sympathetic to Monroe, but hearing that he chose not to play a playoff game after having been cleared makes my blood boil. That could have made the difference between winning and losing that game - which essentially is the difference between getting to the Super Bowl and getting knocked out of the playoffs. Re the Le Clos/Phelps picture, that is really out of line. I'm glad Phelps won and hated Le Clos' pre-race antics, but the guy simply breathes to his side. Nothing "loser" or "focused on winners" about that, though I recognize the picture can be fun to be taken out of context in the manner that it has been.

I read the article about Nembot and I think I've found a new favorite underdog. Even more of a longshot (pun intended?) with the signing of Long. Just curious about what people who actually watch film think of him.

One guy who was a Raven for a short time and spent 2 years on and off the Steelers' practice squad amounted to something: James Harrison.

I wouldn't trade my life for playing in the NFL + the money that goes with it + CTE. I feel for the guy being worried at age 29 about his future health. I wish him the best. I think it says a lot about people who actually take the time to write derogatory remarks about the guy.

I wasn't using Graham as an example of a first round pick. Only as another example of a player wanting to play somewhere else. Re Grubbs, that is heading to a discussion of if we should overpay a first round pick to stay, and I'm not interested in going there. My point was only that we weren't clearly outbid, unlike the case of KO, for example. (And yes, I know KO wasn't a first round pick.) I think we can agree that we hope CJ doesn't have a childhood fantasy of playing for the Bengals.

I did it that way for my first Ravens game and "best available" for 2 seats together ended up being in the very top row of the upper deck. Since then, I've always use the reseller's sites and have no problem getting the tickets I want, though I pay a price since I get front row or at least low and close to 50 yard line. Re going to games out west, I've worn a Ravens jersey to San Francisco, San Diego and Denver and have had zero problems. And on topic, the only game I'm getting to this year is in Dallas.

I've seen Ben Grubbs mentioned in a lot of posts as an example of a player we lost because we couldn't afford him. That example is not proper, as we offered him essentially the same as New Orleans. Grubbs just wanted to play for them. Corey Graham was another player who simply wanted to play for a different, specific team, though I don't recall how close our offer was to the Bills'.

If I recall correctly, the only sub-50 yarder he missed was when he sunk into the turf in San Francisco. There's nothing anyone could have done about hitting that, so he's essentially perfect from less than 50. While I hate the tactics of his agent, letting him go only risks having someone who can't hit 32 yarders under pressure deciding games for us.

This cost him 1/4 of this year's pay, so over $100,000 off the top. Then there's a very good chance he'll never see a regular season game again with any team because of this, which potentially costs him millions. I can't understand how someone would make that choice under those circumstances. I was really rooting for the guy. What a disappointment. This is one reason I think very little of the 53 man roster guesses at this point in the off season. Injuries or addiction/stupidity (not sure which in Waller's case) will, unfortunately, trim people right on out of it. On a soapbox-esqe topic, I do wish the NFL would move on from suspending players for recreational drugs, unless there is a crime (DUI, etc.) involved. Hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars for something that has no effect on game day is crazy, in my opinion. Not excusing Waller though. The only thing more stupid than the policy is throwing one's career away while knowing the policy.

I hope Magee makes it somewhere else. He seemed pretty talented.

It looks like the Ravens believe they've hit on something by bringing in only really bright centers, continuing the precedent of Birk and Urschel.

You can do Luxor and Cairo in a week if you are not including travel time to and from Egypt. That's several days of travel, plus you'll likely be dealing with some degree of jetlag.

I hate to say this, but to read “[t]he progress has been really right on schedule” gives me shivers of fear because it reminds me of him "being out a few days" at the beginning of last year's training camp. I'd rather hear nothing at all because this means he's not fully healed.

Thank you. Yes, many years of travel which will hopefully continue many, many more. I love your idea of just heading out a very long journey. One piece of advice - when you're in the depth of a tough situation - and you will be - remember that those make for the best stories once your beyond them.

Just 2 of us traveled as I really don't like big tour groups - just too insulating from the culture. And I don't particularly like throng of tourist crowds and, for that reason, we didn't bother to go up river to Luxor. We also did not get to the White desert, but that is something I absolutely wish we had done in hindsight and I hope to do again. In a nutshell, fly into Cairo, bus to Alexandria, plane to Hurghada (mainland coast of Red Sea), ferry to Sharm-El-Sheikh (Sanai Peninsula), flight back to Cairo. One quick note - unless you have a non-stop flight to Africa, I highly recommend buying separate round trips between the U.S. and Europe and Europe and Africa. Even the exact same flights are a lot less when purchased that way. Plus you get to visit part of Europe. I find Europe to be a very nice, needed recovery point when coming back from Africa. Africa is wonderful, but it can be tough going. The bus was a pleasant trip and we had fun talking to some locals on that. The ferry doesn't run year round, which was a surprise to me, so I am glad they were running then. It is also the only large ferry I can recall having been on that does not have access to the outside. One Egyptian Red Sea ferry sunk the same day we were on ours. We stayed at the Ramses Hilton in Cairo, with a balcony overlooking the Nile and the pyramids slightly visible though the haze. There was a belly dancing show up at the top of the hotel around 11pm. Wonderful. The hotel could arrange trips over to the pyramids, but we decided to just go downstairs and hail a cab. (I had done that in Beijing - negotiated a price to take us to the Great Wall for the day and back, and it ended up a fun adventure as we figured out quite a way into it that the cab driver didn't know where the Great Wall was. Time consuming, but fun.) We did the same thing for the pyramids which, although it worked out great in the end for us, I wouldn't recommend as it was a bit uneasy at times. (Another long story that ends great but had its moments, to be sure.) I saw no evidence that Alexandria gets many tourists. We went there to dive, and that was mind boggling. Amphores from an ancient Greek shipwreck (ship had long since decayed); relics from ancient Egypt, including huge stones that had once made up the Alexandria lighthouse - one of the seven wonders of the ancient world; a submerged floor that was above the sea when the Romans were there; and an intact World War II Italian fighter plane. All of that history on dives in one day. While most of the really good Egyptian relics had been removed, there were still some small sphinx with their heads separated from their bodies. Almost as amazing as all of that is that there was only one dive outfit there and we were the only 2 customers that day. Afterward, we were having fun conversation with some locals. They asked us where we were from. With "America" as the answer, the conversation was DONE. From then on, we were Canadians. Everyone loves them, and we went back to having fun with the locals. Hurghada was a whole lot of construction towards being a tourist destination. We stayed at a picture perfect resort, but went out looking for local life. Nothing at all within walking distance, except a small gift shop, but we struck up a friendship with the owner. He ended up making us tea and sharing his shisha (hookah) pipe. (English was spoken everywhere in the country.) The diving in the Red Sea is unreal for shipwrecks and coral. Fish life was decent, but the visibility was spectacular. I recall being 90+ feet down and clearly seeing the surface above me, as well as quite a bit further down. Sharm-El-Sheikh has a wonderful little city center closed to traffic. Palm tree lined streets with nice shops and restaurants. It is unfortunately hit by terrorists attacks more often that other places, which is why I think cars are not allowed in the center. I believe that Russian jet the blew up recently took off from there. Speaking of Russians, there are a lot of them in Egypt as that seems to be one of their preferred vacation destinations. I don't recall meeting any other Americans. That's a very long nutshell of the trip. Again, I definitely want to go to the White desert. I heard wonderful things about it from people we met in Egypt. We're thinking of a trip to Turkey soon with Dubai and possibly Jordan mixed in. Perhaps we'll add that to the itinerary. Best wishes with your health

I'm an avid traveler and cannot recommend highly enough traveling as much as you can. A couple of thoughts: Learn to scuba dive because what is underwater in some places is at least as interesting as what's above it. Also, while you said the U.S. holds little interest for you, I suggest you are doing yourself a disservice if you don't at least explore the National Parks of Utah, Alaska and California. These are some of my highlights as ideas for you. I'd be happy to provide more details, but it'd take way to long and way too much space, so I'll just basically list. African Safaris. Pricey, but I've done them all over Africa and have never been let down. And while on the subject of Africa and because others brought up Egypt, I'll strongly agree with that suggetion. In addition to the pyramids, etc., I recommend diving the Red Sea and Alexandria for completely different reasons. I also recommend going into the Sahara with nomads as sleeping under the stars there is a rewarding experience. I did it from Timbuktu, which is likely no longer safe but going in from Morocco can be done. Get in the water with big marine life. Near Capetown, South Africa, there is a place where you can get into cages to watch Great White sharks. One even hit the cage when I was in it. Near the southern end of Cebu island, Philippines (and maybe other places), you can get into the water with numerous Whale sharks. Stunning to look into the eye, from less than arm's length, of fish that seem to be about the size of submarines. Norway is spectacular for the fjords, but I also suggest Spitzbergen Island. There are regular flights there and we kayaked across an Arctic Ocean inlet and climbed a mountain. It is halfway to the North Pole from the Arctic Circle, so the sun still doesn't set thru pretty much all of the summer months. It is also home to a lot of polar bears. It is also pricey. I've enjoyed the other parts of Europe that I've gone to, but I'll skip that since there's a ton of info and recommendations from others about that. The mountains of Patagonia are ridiculously impressive. Torre del Paine National Park, Chile is an excellent place to backpack. Afterwards, a boat ride across the lake provides extraordinary views. The New Zealand's south island is another great place to backpack. I avoided the most popular routes, instead opting for others that were still spectacular. Ayutthaya, Thailand is a short, very inexpensive train ride from Bangkok. We simply hired a guide at the train station to explore the stunning ancient temples in the area. As you mentioned, Asia for the most part can be done very inexpensively and it is very rewarding. Oops - long post. I'll cut it here, though I could go on and on. Enjoy your travels!

Beyond the shock of him being cut, my first thought was, why not trade him to another team? We could have gotten something for him. Suspension appears to answer that.