3122 replies to this topic

[makoman]

The 2020 draft now has an All Pro. Duvernay made it as PR. Led the league in PR average at 13.8, next highest was 11.9 so led by quite a bit. Good for him.

 

Andrews and Tucker also made it. Well deserved all around.

[Slidemaster]

Happy for Duvernay, but I wish they got more out of him as a pass catcher.

[TwentyThirtyFive]

Duvernay excelled as a pass catcher when thrown the ball. Love what that guy brings all around. One of, if not the most, underrated player on the team

[makoman]

Happy for Duvernay, but I wish they got more out of him as a pass catcher.

Agree, he's good with the ball. Like everything else, it seems like they have some success getting him the ball in creative ways, then they just stop.

[Biggsy]

Agree, he's good with the ball. Like everything else, it seems like they have some success getting him the ball in creative ways, then they just stop.

With the lack of options in the backfield, I'm slightly annoyed that they didn't even try to develop and employ Duvernay as a RB from time to time, like SF does with Deebo. He has a similar build and skillset to Deebo. Roman just chooses not to use it.

[Mike B]

Tucker and Andrews were no brainers, and Duvernay, is a little surprising, but he certainly is deserving.

[hallas]

If you weren't very popular than neither was I. I criticized it from the beginning. I said it didn't move the needle much at all in the WR department. He's always hurt. Even when he's healthy he doesn't add very much, imo,

We kind of needed him given that Bateman was hurt for the first 5 games. He got injured right when Bateman came back so the timing worked out pretty well.

If Bateman stays healthy then we definitely don't need him next season.

[Mackus]

You gotta recall that we signed Watkins before using a 1st round pick on a WR.  The need was much bigger at the time of the deal than once Bateman was selected and ended up looking like a contributor when available.  No complaints about the signing from me.

[TwentyThirtyFive]

No problem with signing Watkins. Hes a fine WR. The fact that he kind of disappeared as the season went along was a good thing. Both Bateman and Duvernay emerged and Brown stayed healthy.

[You Play to Win the Game]

I wasn’t using revisionist history, I didn’t like it at the time and that opinion has stood up. You can think that the thought of padding the WR room had merit, that’s fine, but I didn’t like the choice. And I realize there weren’t many options, but that was a waste of resources.

And Bateman, Proche or Duvernay shouldn’t be losing snaps to someone of Watkins caliber. Gotta stop babying the youth.

They paid $5M for 27 receptions, 394 yards and a TD. Curious what it would’ve taken for some of you to be critical of this move in hindsight?

[TwentyThirtyFive]

I wasn’t using revisionist history, I didn’t like it at the time and that opinion has stood up. You can think that the thought of padding the WR room had merit, that’s fine, but I didn’t like the choice. And I realize there weren’t many options, but that was a waste of resources.

And Bateman, Proche or Duvernay shouldn’t be losing snaps to someone of Watkins caliber. Gotta stop babying the youth.

They paid $5M for 27 receptions, 394 yards and a TD. Curious what it would’ve taken for some of you to be critical of this move in hindsight?

You had to sign someone opposite Brown in FA. Everyone would have bitched if we went into the season with Duvernay and Proche as our #2 and #3.

[hallas]

I wasn’t using revisionist history, I didn’t like it at the time and that opinion has stood up. You can think that the thought of padding the WR room had merit, that’s fine, but I didn’t like the choice. And I realize there weren’t many options, but that was a waste of resources.

And Bateman, Proche or Duvernay shouldn’t be losing snaps to someone of Watkins caliber. Gotta stop babying the youth.

They paid $5M for 27 receptions, 394 yards and a TD. Curious what it would’ve taken for some of you to be critical of this move in hindsight?

It would have taken a preseason season ending injury or a cap hit bigger than 5 million.

[makoman]

Duvernay excelled as a pass catcher when thrown the ball. Love what that guy brings all around. One of, if not the most, underrated player on the team

This catch...

 

 

[You Play to Win the Game]

You had to sign someone opposite Brown in FA. Everyone would have bitched if we went into the season with Duvernay and Proche as our #2 and #3.

So EDC should drive decisions based on what idiots on the internet are bitching about?

And $5M in our cap situation is useful space, Hallas.

But whatever, this doesn’t warrant some big argument.

[makoman]

I thought the Watkins signing was reasonable. The cap hit was lower than Snead's, who he was basically replacing, just the going rate for an average-ish vet. At the time Boykin would have been the #2 and that really wouldn't have been ideal. (Duvernay wasn't really trusted to run real routes in 2020 and Proche had 25 snaps all year). But fortunately we saw enough from our other guys this year that we don't need to do something like that this offseason.

[bmore_ken]

Who knows why certain players on this team get buried in roster purgatory with Harbaugh. Its been the case since he got here. After they release Tyson Williams next season, I hope someone signs him and he has a breakout performance. I genuinely hope he gets the last laugh.

I think he will. he's shown he's a baller. 

[bmore_ken]

 

Loved what he showed when he did play, which makes it more curious why he didn’t get more run. Unless there’s things he’s doing very poorly I’m not picking up on.

BTW, I wasn’t very popular when I came out hard against the Sammy Watkins signing, but combined with how he played, this type of thing is why I didn’t want to do it, plus, salary allocation, that was a dumb move.

 

 

If you weren't very popular than neither was I.  I criticized it from the beginning.  I said it didn't move the needle much at all in the WR department.  He's always hurt.  Even when he's healthy he doesn't add very much, imo,  

I wasn't against it, I just thought it was meh

[hallas]

So EDC should drive decisions based on what idiots on the internet are bitching about?

And $5M in our cap situation is useful space, Hallas.

But whatever, this doesn’t warrant some big argument.

I think that, between not knowing what we'd get in the draft, and the uncertainty of first year players in general, paying a talented WR a relatively small sum to play on a team with championship aspirations isn't a bad move by any stretch. The fact that Bateman missed the first 5 games, during which Watkins produced pretty well, lends support to the signing. I think it's somewhat irrelevant that Watkins' production dropped off when Bateman got healthy. It mostly dropped off because Bateman came back and performed well. Injury risk likely played into his relatively low contract number, so I'd argue that his missed games were already priced into his contract number. Maybe we could have used the cap, but I think it's hard to predict that 40% of your roster is going to end up on IR.

I understand why you disagree, though.

[You Play to Win the Game]

I just think with what they paid Watkins, and AV, maybe they could’ve gotten a more substantial piece for the line. Or a competent TE to go with Andrews given Boyle’s health. It was a misapplication of resources. After trading Brown, the investment needed to go into the line if we were in win now mode. I said exactly what Makoman said last summer when the signing happened, it won’t move the needle. And it didn’t. Not even close.

[Mackus]

I think it might have been an important signing if they hadn't drafted Bateman (or another WR) in the 1st round.

 

The first 5 weeks when Bateman was out, and the roster looked more or less like it would have without a 1st round WR, Watkins had 18 catches for 292 yards.  That's a pace for 64 catches for 992 yards.  Perfectly adequate #2 WR numbers, especially for a team whose TE is really the WR1.  Of course he was actually healthy those 5 weeks and you couldn't possibly project him to remain healthy for all 17 games, so he wouldn't have gotten there even without Bateman sending him down the depth chart.  But he would have had a bigger role when healthy if we hadn't drafted Bateman.