New Eagle safety Rashad Baker.
On ESPN.com’s NFL Nation blog Matt Mosley typically covers the NFC East, and aside from being a bit too obsessed with MeO and the Cowpukes he has done a pretty decent job.
Today though he posted an offseason report card for the teams of the NFC East and let’s just say it makes no sense whatsoever. First of all, we are all of 12 days into free agency so I think it’s pretty ridiculous to already start handing out grades to teams when big moves could easily still be coming over the next few months. Even ignoring that fact, his grades leave a lot to be desired.
The team that has had the best offseason in the division, according to Mosley, is the Giants (A-). My question to you: who did the Giants sign that will have THAT big an impact? They overpaid for Chris Canty (a DE with 10 career sacks in 4 unspectacular seasons in Dallas.) Michael Boley, C.C. Brown, and Rocky Bernard are average role players at best. Did they do a horrible job shoring up their roster? Not at all, but an A-, really?
Next on the report card are the Redskins (B). Here’s what Mosley says about the moves they made (dramatically over-paying for Haynesworth and Hall)…
My fear with Haynesworth is that he had the best two years of his career when the Titans (and the rest of the league) were dangling that lucrative carrot in front of him. How will Haynesworth perform with a full bank account?
Well, we’re about to find out. But honestly, signing DeAngelo Hall to a long-term contract is the bigger risk. He was a divisive force in the Falcons’ locker room and he obviously didn’t make it with the Raiders. He performed well on a $500,000 deal in half a season — and the Redskins guaranteed him $22.5 million. The Redskins have been down this road before — and it never works.
That makes a lot of sense, so why did they get a B for making two moves they very realistically could end up regretting?!? It sounds to me like the Skins have had to worst offseason in the division up to this point, which really isn’t saying a lot given we haven’t even hit the draft yet.
Next up is the Cowgirls (B-). Again I’m a bit surprised by the high grade…cutting T.O. may have been good for the locker-room but now that offense is missing a big time target and Roy Williams won’t be able to pick up the slack alone. They also have yet to find a true replacement for the safety version of Roy Williams too. Igor Olshansky was a decent depth move for the defense and Keith Brooking is solid (and at age 33 clearly on the decline.) The real kicker though was the trade that sent a productive starting DB (Anthony Henry) for what’s left of Jon Kitna. This deal still makes NO sense to me…Romo will start, so the Cowgirls just gave up a good, physical corner for a slightly better version of Vinny Testaverde. B- is extremely generous considering the Cowgirls are noticeably worse now than they were on February 28th.
Finally rounding out the report card are the Eagles (C-). Here’s what Mosley had to say:
This may seem harsh to some of you, but is there anything that excites you about what the Eagles have accomplished so far? Stacy Andrews can replace Jon Runyan at right tackle, but this still leaves a gaping hole on the left side.
Andrews was a great pickup, and the Eagles will probably address LT either in house or in the draft You might have found out which had you waited another month and a half or so before coming up with this BS “report card.”
Sean Jones is a serviceable replacement for Brian Dawkins, but the one-year deal tells you that the organization doesn’t have a ton of faith in the guy. Former Raiders safety Rashad Baker is more of a special-teams guy.
No argument with this, but the Jones deal was a worthwhile risk for the Birds to take. Baker was brought on mainly to replace Sean Considine on special teams, which I am perfectly ok with.
But if the Eagles are biding their time to make a run at Cardinals wide receiver Anquan Boldin, all can be forgiven. They probably would have to part with one of their first-round picks and possibly a third-rounder. Does that seem like the type of thing Reid and Joe Banner would do? Right now, Donovan McNabb’s scratching his head like the rest of us.
Allow me to paraphrase Mosley here: ‘If the Eagles get Boldin and make a few other moves all of this will be irrelevant and I am a moron.’
Bravo Matt! I think we’ve pretty clearly established that dishing out grades in mid-March (even if you try to explain it away as a ‘two-week free agency report card’) is utterly pointless. It’s the equivalent of giving a kid a C in a class a quarter of the way through the school year. Even if I could get over how stupid the whole thing is, the grades he gave out were completely wrong for just about every team. If you asked me how I’d rate each team’s two week offseason so far this is how it would look…
**Giants: B- …Added solid depth to their D, but still need to find a suitable replacement for Plax.
**Eagles: C …Andrews and Jones were good additions, but the team still needs a left tackle, backup runningback, and preferably a talented wideout. Expect them to address most of these concerns in the draft where they have a whopping 12 picks.
**Cowboys: D+ …Olshansky and Brooking are decent pickups, but they’ll need to find a receiver to replace T.O., a safety to replace Roy Williams, and let’s face it: the Kitna trade was atrocious.
**Redskins: D+ …Even if Haynesworth plays as well as he did the past two years in Tennessee (not a given) his huge contract will severely limit what the Skins can do to improve the team in the future, and one man does not make an enitre defense. Losing Jason Taylor won’t help, and they really over-paid Deangelo Hall (who has caused trouble in both Atlanta and Oakland prior to this.)
** – None of this shit matters right now because IT HAS ONLY BEEN TWO WEEKS SINCE FREE AGENCY STARTED!!
So there you go…a much more accurate take on how each NFC East team has fared up to this point. Still, can we at least wait till right after the draft before we start condemning a team’s entire offseason?
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