How come you guys are always complaining when Graves doesn't get someone?

[52brandon]

It's really simple to see what the Cardinals problems have been.

1. They let their experienced players leave because they want too much $ or are unhappy with the team.
2. They replace them with equal or lesser talent who don't have experience with the Cardinals and over pay them.

That's why they only had 3 winning seasons since the advent of free agency in 1989. And it is why the one period that they didn't do the above and held on to their own guys they won 2 Division titles and went to the Super Bowl.

a lot of the time. But on occasion, they replace our big name guys with better guys like Smith with CC, Dansby with Wash. They've improved in that field, but not enough

 

[Ed Burmila]

Not when you look at what they are paid. They have all played beyond their pay scale and that is the object of FA. Anybody can overpay for a top notch talent and it happens on a yearly basis. Look at Washington.

Look at the Bills and Mario Williams. They've signed him, used up their cap and now have to hope he isn't going to be a colossal bust or end up injured. It's a chance they are willing to take due to the possible up-side, but they will be ridiculed if it don't work out. That's the problem with FA. There are no guarantees.

So Rod Graves is good at signing cheap players who are terrible. This is an asset?

 

[Duckjake]

a lot of the time. But on occasion, they replace our big name guys with better guys like Smith with CC, Dansby with Wash. They've improved in that field, but not enough

I agree, though I don't think DWash is better than Dansby, but the problem is what you see in the posts defending Kolb and Bradley, they need time to learn the new system. That is what hurts you when you let a 5 year player go and replace him with a draft pick or free agent.

It was patently obvious in 2010 where so many experienced players left. Though the Cards appear to have done a good job of rebuilding, especially on Defense, we had to endure a horrendous period of only 3 wins and 15 losses while the new guys acclimated themselves to Arizona's style of play.

 

[Buckybird]

a lot of the time. But on occasion, they replace our big name guys with better guys like Smith with CC, Dansby with Wash. They've improved in that field, but not enough

I wonder how good we could be if we actually stacked talent upon talent. The cap doesn't allow us to keep all, but too many times the franchise lets it's best talent get away & tries to replace it with a cheaper draft choice or a failed FA whose cost is only slightly lower.

Over the years the Cards have been like a minor league training ground for many NFL teams.

Johnny Roland
MacArther Lane
John Gilliam
Dave Butz
Simeon Rice
Garrison Hearst
Thomas Jones
KVB
Karlos Dansby
Ahmad Rashad
Lionel Washington
OJ Anderson
Ken Harvey
Jay Novacek
Steve Beurlein
Anquan Boldin
Leonard Davis
Jamir Miller
Ricky Proehl
Tim McDonald
Leonard Smith
etc, etc, etc

I dare you to find a franchise outside of maybe the Houston Astros that has let more talent walk away in it's prime than the Cardinals!!!

 

[MrYeahBut]

I wonder how good we could be if we actually stacked talent upon talent. The cap doesn't allow us to keep all, but too many times the franchise lets it's best talent get away & tries to replace it with a cheaper draft choice or a failed FA whose cost is only slightly lower.

Over the years the Cards have been like a minor league training ground for many NFL teams.

Johnny Roland
MacArther Lane
John Gilliam
Dave Butz
Simeon Rice
Garrison Hearst
Thomas Jones
KVB
Karlos Dansby
Ahmad Rashad
Lionel Washington
OJ Anderson
Ken Harvey
Jay Novacek
Steve Beurlein
Anquan Boldin
Leonard Davis
Jamir Miller
Ricky Proehl
Tim McDonald
Leonard Smith
etc, etc, etc

I dare you to find a franchise outside of maybe the Houston Astros that has let more talent walk away in it's prime than the Cardinals!!!

Beurlein??? I will admit to Q and Tim McDonald bumming me out completely though. McDonald going to the 9ers was doubly bad for me. Not sure exactly why I felt so strongly about him, but I just did.


.

 

[JeffGollin]

I was thinking along the same lines and even started typing it, glad I didn't because this is a way better of a post then I would have come up with. WELL SAID.

 

[juza76]

why cardinals dont give any numbers when they make a new contract with players ..hw long we have to wait to know the detalis of levi brown contract

 

[Buckybird]

Beurlein??? I will admit to Q and Tim McDonald bumming me out completely though. McDonald going to the 9ers was doubly bad for me. Not sure exactly why I felt so strongly about him, but I just did.


.

Look at what Beurlein did prior to "Cruddy Ball" & after in Carolina...not bad.

 

[Duckjake]

Look at what Beurlein did prior to "Cruddy Ball" & after in Carolina...not bad.

StevieB threw for 4400 yards and 36 TDs in 1999 for Carolina.

 

[Cardiac]

The Bidwills with contracts like Larry's and Levi's were just doing what was standard in the NFL to prevent Rookie's holding out. They didn't do anything wrong in writing the contracts. What they did wrong was not address them the next to last year of the contract which is also part of what they were originally designed to do.

In fact the Bidwills were bashed constantly on Cardinal message boards for NOT writing contracts like those.

On the other hand the Cards have had problems with their star players for decades. Don't know exactly why but it is true.

I implore you to pm Buckybird since he won't back me up on this in a thread. He found an article or information that the way 1st rd draft picks were constructed was at Bill Sr's insistance and that there was a better way so that we didn't always lose players a year early. Some old school mentatlity that made zero sense to me so I simply can't remember what it was.

These were not the way many teams were writing contracts at that time.
So while you are correct that fans (including myself) bashed Bidwill for using smoke signals instead of cell phones he still only moved up to the telegraph.

While we are on the subject it was Graves who convinced Sr. to give assurances that unsigned rookies could attend minicamps and if they suffered an injury it wouldn't impact their initial contract. IIRC we were the last team to sign off on these type of waivers.

 

[Cardiac]

So Rod Graves is good at signing cheap players who are terrible. This is an asset?

Paris Lenon is not terrible. In fact he has played rather well and most fans have come around to this realization.

The main point however is that almost without exception teams who spend like crazy in FA don't have a successful outcome.

The FO has decided to try and model themselves after successful franchises and again almost without exception they don't go after big ticket FA's.

So if the Cards want to become Pittsburg west or become more lke the Ravens and Packers then they have to start modeling those organizations behaviors. That means finding decent talent at a good rate in FA and drafting well. The FO is still making some mistakes but if they stay true to the plan the number of mistakes will become fewer and the negative impact on the team will diminish exponentialy.

I forget who pointed out the fact that RG does not make all of these decisions in a vacuum. This takes us back to why everyone bashes Graves when it is the entire FO that should get the credit or blame. I would post far less on this topic (there's incentive for many of you) if everyone would replace the word Graves with FO when complaining about the Draft, FA or how long it takes to negotiate a deal.

 

[Duckjake]

Paris Lenon is not terrible. In fact he has played rather well and most fans have come around to this realization.

Terrible? I won't go that far but far from playing rather well. The Cards were still getting gouged on the ground even at the end of the season. Something Lenon, if he had been playing rather well, would have helped stop.

I still think that he's exactly what K9 wrote when the Cards originally brought him onboard. "they've just signed some other team's Ron McKinnon".

 

[Cardiac]

Terrible? I won't go that far but far from playing rather well. The Cards were still getting gouged on the ground even at the end of the season. Something Lenon, if he had been playing rather well, would have helped stop.

I still think that he's exactly what K9 wrote when the Cards originally brought him onboard. "they've just signed some other team's Ron McKinnon".

You and I agree that the run D needs to improve. I don't know that Lenon was the root cause of this problem or not. What I do know is that his teammates voted him as captain so I reasonable line of thinking would be that he is playing rather well.

 

[Duckjake]

You and I agree that the run D needs to improve. I don't know that Lenon was the root cause of this problem or not. What I do know is that his teammates voted him as captain so I reasonable line of thinking would be that he is playing rather well.

That just means he's a likable guy. I think McKinnon was a Captain as well. But I guess you could say Lenon played rather well for a 34 year old LB with 9 years of NFL wear and tear. But that's not good enough for me.

 

[Gaddabout]

Why does anyone complain about anything on the Internet?

Because it's there.

Next question!

 

[JeffGollin]

You and I agree that the run D needs to improve. I don't know that Lenon was the root cause of this problem or not. What I do know is that his teammates voted him as captain so I reasonable line of thinking would be that he is playing rather well.

I believe Lenon's biggest strength is his pass coverage and being in the right position on the field. In the classic 34, the DL's occupy the blockers so tha the other 8 guys can execute their assignments - which on run plays often calls for flying to the ball. Everyone on every play has his role with DWash best at flying around and pursuing from sideline to sideline. Lenon is OK vs. the run, but don't expect anything resembling a Butkus-type run-stuffer from any of our ILBs in Horton's defense.

I think we got what we wanted from Lenon (maybe more when you consider his leadership) -- but he's not the second coming of Brian Urlacher.

 

[Cbus cardsfan]

It's really simple to see what the Cardinals problems have been.

1. They let their experienced players leave because they want too much $ or are unhappy with the team.
2. They replace them with equal or lesser talent who don't have experience with the Cardinals and over pay them.

That's why they only had 3 winning seasons since the advent of free agency in 1989. And it is why the one period that they didn't do the above and held on to their own guys they won 2 Division titles and went to the Super Bowl.

That explains it perfectly.

 

[Cbus cardsfan]

So Rod Graves is good at signing cheap players who are terrible. This is an asset?

But they are going to blossom once they get to the Cards .

Why not bring in guys who are proven good football players, or at least keep your own. I like that they brough back Brown and Doucet but, if there were any kind of significnat market for them, I seriously doubt they would be back.

 

[Cardiac]

But they are going to blossom once they get to the Cards .

Why not bring in guys who are proven good football players, or at least keep your own. I like that they brough back Brown and Doucet but, if there were any kind of significnat market for them, I seriously doubt they would be back.

You know what, you may be right that there wasn't a big market for them. Or.................. it might just be a sign that the culture has changed and the Cards are getting "home town discounts".

At the very least we can't give credit to Graves for anything positive.

 

[Ed Burmila]

Paris Lenon is one of the examples of something Graves has done right. So was Richard Marshall (until they let him walk).

This offseason, I have no idea what the plan is, if there is a plan at all. We're just sitting around thumbing our crack, not even signing the kind of mediocre bottom-of-the-pile stuff that we usually target in free agency. It's bad enough when you're setting up visits with losers like Bush and Schillens and Gay. It's even worse when you can't or won't bother to sign them.

 

[40yearfan]

Paris Lenon is one of the examples of something Graves has done right. So was Richard Marshall (until they let him walk).

This offseason, I have no idea what the plan is, if there is a plan at all. We're just sitting around thumbing our crack, not even signing the kind of mediocre bottom-of-the-pile stuff that we usually target in free agency. It's bad enough when you're setting up visits with losers like Bush and Schillens and Gay. It's even worse when you can't or won't bother to sign them.

If they are such big losers, why would you sign them?

 

[Crazy Canuck]

Paris Lenon is one of the examples of something Graves has done right. So was Richard Marshall (until they let him walk).

This offseason, I have no idea what the plan is, if there is a plan at all. We're just sitting around thumbing our crack, not even signing the kind of mediocre bottom-of-the-pile stuff that we usually target in free agency. It's bad enough when you're setting up visits with losers like Bush and Schillens and Gay. It's even worse when you can't or won't bother to sign them.

Marshall got $5M+ on a three year deal as a starting cormer on the open market. Understandable that the Cards wouldn't pay that for someone they see as a nickle corner / FS. The Plan starts with the fact that, unlike last offseason, they have some 57/58 players under contract and are looking for pieces to compliment a team that ended 7-2. There are still things to be done in FA and the draft that you may approve of, and perhaps will have the outline of plan in your mind.

 

[Cbus cardsfan]

You know what, you may be right that there wasn't a big market for them. Or.................. it might just be a sign that the culture has changed and the Cards are getting "home town discounts".

At the very least we can't give credit to Graves for anything positive.

I don't think there was much of a market when you see what they signed for.

I give credit to Graves all the time, when I think it's deserved.

 

[Duckjake]

If they are such big losers, why would you sign them?

That is rather odd isn't it? The guys you brought in for visits suck. So why did you let them leave without signing?

People are having to reach to find holes in our team. We don't need to sign any free agents because now that Peyton is gone most of the ones available aren't as good as the guys we already have on our team.

 

[Cardiac]

I don't think there was much of a market when you see what they signed for.

I give credit to Graves all the time, when I think it's deserved.

Well none of us truly know what the market was, we aren't privy to this info.

And yes you do give credit to Graves at times, my bad. I just want to change the "Graves sucks" posts to the "FO sucks" posts.