Mlb

[raven43]

hey maybe I'm crasy, cus a lot of people thind we should be going WR or DB in the first round, but I think that both those cores have been playing great all year [b]with[/b] injuries. soooooo....

I think we should adress WR in the FA market and pickup Housh.
Next get some youth at D-line, but no big name guys required.
First round of the draft, we should get Bart Scott's replacement, either James Laurinitas or Ray Malauga (probably spelled wrong). That's if we can't keep scott. Then second round we get more depth at O-line. then maybe think about drafting Lorenzo's replacement if he packs it in.

I think this would make us a pretty complete team.

[wspencer]

i like that you're thinking outside the box. i'm of the belief that the ravens WILL NOT use a first round pick on a WR. in fact...they might not take a WR until round 3....or at all if they grab a FA WR. why?

you have to weigh the pros and cons here, folks. next year, mason will return along with clayton and a healthy DWill. we also have a developmental guy in Marcus Smith, who does have some pretty good upside, but needs work.

what do we have returning at LB? maybe suggs...maybe ray....probably not scott. who do we have to step up? is tavares gooden ready? jameel mcclain? antwan barnes? all of which are VERY young and still pretty raw....and yes...one could say "developmental" about them.

what about corner? CMac probably won't be back. will samari? even if samari does, we're going into next year with Rolle, Washington, Walker and Martin (who i think is a decent developmental nickel back). i don't believe cory ivy will return...frank walker might not even return. can we really play a season with that as our secondary? aside from asoumugha, there aren't any stud free agents out there that we can plug in for man coverage against a 1 or 2 WR.

how about DE? trevor pryce is getting up there and ngata is a bit big playing DE in our 3-4 scheme. who do we have to play DE behind pryce? ...........no one. pryce is our only TRUE DE on this team. the rest are OLB/DE tweeners or DT/DE tweeners. now that works to a point but...wouldn't it be nice to generate pass rush from your down lineman? we're great at stopping the run, but the majority of our pass rush comes from the edge.

so here's my question: are you willing to WEAKEN the strongest part of our team to add another WR? yes....i agree that adding a big time, deep threat WR could be huge for this offense. but our offense is already playing at the highest level in YEARS with our current corp of wideouts, minus a possible deep threat wildcard in DWill. are you willing to take away from our defense to add another WR? what if we draft a top WR and DWill comes back healthy and shows to be a solid deep threat? then what? who plays? mason is going to play. clayton at the very least would be a solid slot WR. i'm just not so sure that we need a BIG TIME WR at this point without seeing what a healthy DWill, a developed marcus smith, and oh yeah....having flacco go through all the off season reps as the starter (and having that much more experience).

now i'm not saying we shouldn't add a WR. i'm of the belief that if we went after a guy like Bryant in FA, then we have a taller target that could be a redzone threat. but i only see a few WRs in this draft that i believe are NFL ready......Crabtree will be long gone....Maclin is similar in play style to Clayton....the only WR AT THIS POINT that i'd feel comfortable adding to our roster would be Juaqin Igelesias....but i'm not sure we don't already have someone similar to his style in DWill.

but if you go into the first two rounds of the draft and you add a tyson jackson.....everette brown......alphonzo smith.......mike mickens........then we're improving part of our team that is on the verge of falling off. and we're going to NEED pass rush and coverage to succeed in this division......and they just happen to be parts of our team with limited depth.

so you tell me....is it worth it to go WR first?




now to talk about who you mentioned.......

rey maualuga is probably the best LB in the draft. i like him a bit more than aaron curry, but we'll see what happens at the senior bowl and combine (and when i look at MORE tape). i honestly believe that james laurenitis is a bit overrated. i still think he's a solid LB....but not a top 15 pick like many have projected. i think you'll see him go in the end of round 1, barring GREAT senior bowl and combine peformances.

depth at O-line is certainly another option that we certainly should look at. willie anderson may not be back. jason brown MAY not re-sign (though i think he will). we need tackle depth more than anything. we have 2 good developmental guys in David Hale and Oneil Cousins.....both of which could play G or T in a pinch if we needed them too. also, yanda will return, who can also play RT in a pinch if we needed. we are in a fortunate position in that most of our o-lineman play multiple positions

Jason Brown: C/G
Chris Chest: G/C
Marshall Yanda: G/RT
Adam Terry: LT/RT
Jared Gaither: LT/RT
Oneil Cousins: G/RT
David Hale: G/RT

the biggest spot i see lacking is a good developmental LT prospect. we had that in jared gaither. now we need someone else to sit back and learn that spot.


the only positions on our team that i believe we're absolutely SET at are:

QB, S

i think we could draft any other position on the board.



wow...didn't realize how long that took, but that's just my opinion, i could be wrong.

[52Kia Kaha92]

im going to talk about the bottom of your post, you think we need a development LT when Gaither is only 21??
are you insane dude,

and to the topic, unless Maualuga falls to us i dont want us to go linebaker in round 1, we can pick up someone later in the draft but we should focus on CB and DE in the draft as Moderater9 pointed out

Tyson Jackson
Peria Jerry
Alphonso Smith
Vontae Davis

[RoflDogs]

Aaron Maybin declared today (at least, according to what i heard on the radio)
this year the DE and DT class is pretty DEEP
Aaron Maybin
Brian Orakpo
Everett Brown
Bj Raji
Senderrick Marks
Tyson Jackson
Greg Hardy
George Selvie
Michael Johnson
Clint Sintim
Peria Jerry

Those guys are all 1st round talent

we can get at least one of them

[wspencer]

[quote name='52Kia Kaha92' post='128870' date='Jan 13 2009, 08:41 PM']im going to talk about the bottom of your post, you think we need a development LT when Gaither is only 21??
are you insane dude,[/quote]

i'm not sure you know what i mean by "developmental".....but if you do....then i GREATLY disagree with you.


developmental guys are not supposed to be day 1 starters. you don't want them to be. they're supposed to be quality backups at a minimum and if they're better than that, it's icing on the cake! by definition, you take a DEVELOPMENTAL guy because they need time to DEVELOP. in the mean time though, they can hopefully fill in during an injury situation.

you don't draft a developmental guy as a replacement for a player. you draft them as an understudy for the position and as quality depth.

so when you look at our roster, we have 2 guys that can play LT....gaither and terry. what happens if anderson retires after this season and terry moves to RT.......then during the 09 season, gaither goes down with an injury. are you going to move terry to LT, which would completely shuffle the o-line (moving yanda to RT and chester back to RG)? wouldn't it be nice to have a guy that is a QUALITY backup that can play LT?

i really think you aren't understanding what i mean......it's not like i'm suggesting using a 1-2nd round pick on a LT. why? because that's NOT where you draft developmental players! they're almost always 3rd round and later........which is where you're drafting for depth anyway.

so if you'd feel comfortable going into 2009 with only 2 players on the roster capable of playing LT, then so be it. again, i'm not saying we should draft a LT to replace gaither. but another point of concern is, what if when gaither's contract is up, he's an absolute dominant LT and we can't afford to keep him? then what? adam terry might even be gone by then!

my point is, you don't draft to fill your team for a single season. you draft for the next 5 seasons....because most rookie contracts fall in the 4-5 year range. and if you aren't looking that far ahead.......then maybe you're the one that's insane?

[52Kia Kaha92]

i see, fair enough then