Kristjan Sokoli moving to guard

[grizbob]

Cable scouted Sweezy as defensive player, then got him in the 7th round and converted him into a stalwart starter. That's an effective move-up of two or three rounds to get that value. Now he's doing it with Nowak and Sokoli. These guys could potientially be great in the ZBS, and we're getting them with low picks. COACH CABLE'S A FUGGIN GENIUS, YA'LL.

EGGS ACT LEE :roll:

 

[BlueOne]

How does Cable escape significant blame for our O-line troubles? It has consistently been the teams weak point since he has been here and it's not like we haven't invested capital in it.

Maybe I'm just not that aware of the rest of the league, but do most teams invest more in the O-line than the Seahawks? My first thought is no.

I'll start with the salary paid perspective:

Seattle ranks 31st in salary paid to it's offensive line in the NFL. The bottom 6 are:

32: Det 12.5m
31: Sea 14.3m
30: Buf 17.1m
29: KC 17.8m
28: TB: 19.2m
27: Chi: 19.9m

Those are the only teams that pay under 20m on their OL position group. Obviously Seattle is WAY under the norm, and if they replace Okung, they'll be 32nd next year at roughly HALF the combined salary of the 31st team in OL pay.

Obviously we haven't used UFA at all to spike the position group, except to sign street free agents (Gallery, Giacomini, Winston etc.)

That leaves the draft. Since 2011 I'll limit to the top 4 rounds. I'll just include the top 6, since they should be rookie laden.

Buf: 1st (0), 2nd (2), 3rd (1), 4th (1)
Chi: 1st (2), 2nd (0), 3rd (1), 4th (0)
Det: 1st (2), 2nd (0), 3rd (2), 4th (0)
KC: 1st (1), 2nd (3), 3rd (1), 4th (0)
Sea: 1st (1), 2nd (1), 3rd (1), 4th (2)
TB: 1st (0), 2nd (1), 3rd (0), 4th (0)

Really TB stands out here. We selected 5 total picks in the Cable era. Tying for most. Buffalo has spent roughly the same capital if one were to use 'the chart' Detroit and Chicago spent WAY more in capital than Seattle despite having one fewer selection in this range.

TB has entirely neglected it's OL although that's partially due to the fact they used UFA to add talent and are just this year getting out from under some mega deal whiffs.

Honestly, if we use either actual cash, or weighted draft position by use of the chart -- Seattle has barely invested in the line at all relative to the league. And whatever investments we've made by draft have basically been allowed to walk out the door. Even going forward, it's pretty easy to see that Seattle will be in the bottom 3 of salary committed to the position group for the next couple years at least. Since it's very possible both Okung and Sweezy are each allowed to depart for cap reasons.

I'd also point out the obvious, that the 2011 draft skews our outward understanding of Seattle having invested in the OL. But what is most often forgotten, is in that offseason, Seattle was horribly depleted in the OL group. Not even having enough camp bodies to fill our 9 man final roster. We were obliged to dip heavy into the OL pool out of sheer necessity -- without the ability to bolster the unit with UFA journeymen since we were in a cap cutting rebuild.

On the other hand, we don't know the immediate scenarios by which all other teams selected their OL early either. Ultimately, Seattle definitely hasn't invested in OL by way of Salary. And of those least invested teams -- Seattle is fairly significantly behind all but two of them in terms of draft investment. Those other two generally are annual locks for top 5 overall picks.

Seattle is currently competing for championships, while doing so with an investment level in the OL that is amongst the dregs and mediocre of the league. The reality is, Seattle is financing all of these big second deals to impact players elsewhere on the team on the backs of Cable's labors. And that reliance on turning draft day turds into gold is going to steepen over the next two years. His work is absolutely essential to the current model for our roster.

I can easily see Seattle getting down into the 9m to 12m range for the entire OL group in terms of salary for 2016.

First of all, thank you for such a detailed response. A lot of good info in there. That said,

Shouldn't it be 2 2nd rounders for Seattle and 2 firsts? Britt and Unger. I mean we're judging how the O-line has played in the last couple years, it doesn't matter that Unger won't be on the team moving forward and while Carp was a bust who we didn't resign, he played for us most of the years under Cable and if he was a bust part of that has to be on Cable. And also, Unger's cap hit the last couple years was like 5-6 million so there's a bit more money. Though I don't think money is a good way to judge because our O-line has been full of picks, not FAs.

Moreover on FAs, the one big name we signed was Gallery for something like 15 Mil over three years. And we specifically signed him due to Cable, "ESPN’s Adam Schefter reports that veteran offensive lineman Robert Gallery has agreed to terms and will sign a three-year contract with the Seahawks, giving the team a much clearer picture of what their offensive line will look like."

The reason he's not with the team is again, not that we didn't invest in a FA, but because we invested poorly.

 

[Scottemojo]

How does Cable escape significant blame for our O-line troubles? It has consistently been the teams weak point since he has been here and it's not like we haven't invested capital in it.

Maybe I'm just not that aware of the rest of the league, but do most teams invest more in the O-line than the Seahawks? My first thought is no.

I'll start with the salary paid perspective:

Seattle ranks 31st in salary paid to it's offensive line in the NFL. The bottom 6 are:

32: Det 12.5m
31: Sea 14.3m
30: Buf 17.1m
29: KC 17.8m
28: TB: 19.2m
27: Chi: 19.9m

Those are the only teams that pay under 20m on their OL position group. Obviously Seattle is WAY under the norm, and if they replace Okung, they'll be 32nd next year at roughly HALF the combined salary of the 31st team in OL pay.

Obviously we haven't used UFA at all to spike the position group, except to sign street free agents (Gallery, Giacomini, Winston etc.)

That leaves the draft. Since 2011 I'll limit to the top 4 rounds. I'll just include the top 6, since they should be rookie laden.

Buf: 1st (0), 2nd (2), 3rd (1), 4th (1)
Chi: 1st (2), 2nd (0), 3rd (1), 4th (0)
Det: 1st (2), 2nd (0), 3rd (2), 4th (0)
KC: 1st (1), 2nd (3), 3rd (1), 4th (0)
Sea: 1st (1), 2nd (1), 3rd (1), 4th (2)
TB: 1st (0), 2nd (1), 3rd (0), 4th (0)

Really TB stands out here. We selected 5 total picks in the Cable era. Tying for most. Buffalo has spent roughly the same capital if one were to use 'the chart' Detroit and Chicago spent WAY more in capital than Seattle despite having one fewer selection in this range.

TB has entirely neglected it's OL although that's partially due to the fact they used UFA to add talent and are just this year getting out from under some mega deal whiffs.

Honestly, if we use either actual cash, or weighted draft position by use of the chart -- Seattle has barely invested in the line at all relative to the league. And whatever investments we've made by draft have basically been allowed to walk out the door. Even going forward, it's pretty easy to see that Seattle will be in the bottom 3 of salary committed to the position group for the next couple years at least. Since it's very possible both Okung and Sweezy are each allowed to depart for cap reasons.

I'd also point out the obvious, that the 2011 draft skews our outward understanding of Seattle having invested in the OL. But what is most often forgotten, is in that offseason, Seattle was horribly depleted in the OL group. Not even having enough camp bodies to fill our 9 man final roster. We were obliged to dip heavy into the OL pool out of sheer necessity -- without the ability to bolster the unit with UFA journeymen since we were in a cap cutting rebuild.

On the other hand, we don't know the immediate scenarios by which all other teams selected their OL early either. Ultimately, Seattle definitely hasn't invested in OL by way of Salary. And of those least invested teams -- Seattle is fairly significantly behind all but two of them in terms of draft investment. Those other two generally are annual locks for top 5 overall picks.

Seattle is currently competing for championships, while doing so with an investment level in the OL that is amongst the dregs and mediocre of the league. The reality is, Seattle is financing all of these big second deals to impact players elsewhere on the team on the backs of Cable's labors. And that reliance on turning draft day turds into gold is going to steepen over the next two years. His work is absolutely essential to the current model for our roster.

I can easily see Seattle getting down into the 9m to 12m range for the entire OL group in terms of salary for 2016.

First of all, thank you for such a detailed response. A lot of good info in there. That said,

Shouldn't it be 2 2nd rounders for Seattle and 2 firsts? Britt and Unger. I mean we're judging how the O-line has played in the last couple years, it doesn't matter that Unger won't be on the team moving forward and while Carp was a bust who we didn't resign, he played for us most of the years under Cable and if he was a bust part of that has to be on Cable. And also, Unger's cap hit the last couple years was like 5-6 million so there's a bit more money. Though I don't think money is a good way to judge because our O-line has been full of picks, not FAs.

Moreover on FAs, the one big name we signed was Gallery for something like 15 Mil over three years. And we specifically signed him due to Cable, "ESPN’s Adam Schefter reports that veteran offensive lineman Robert Gallery has agreed to terms and will sign a three-year contract with the Seahawks, giving the team a much clearer picture of what their offensive line will look like."

The reason he's not with the team is again, not that we didn't invest in a FA, but because we invested poorly.

The reason Gallery is not with the team is that he retired after Seattle cut him. He isn't with any team.

 

[Attyla the Hawk]

First of all, thank you for such a detailed response. A lot of good info in there. That said,

Shouldn't it be 2 2nd rounders for Seattle and 2 firsts? Britt and Unger. I mean we're judging how the O-line has played in the last couple years, it doesn't matter that Unger won't be on the team moving forward and while Carp was a bust who we didn't resign, he played for us most of the years under Cable and if he was a bust part of that has to be on Cable. And also, Unger's cap hit the last couple years was like 5-6 million so there's a bit more money. Though I don't think money is a good way to judge because our O-line has been full of picks, not FAs.

Moreover on FAs, the one big name we signed was Gallery for something like 15 Mil over three years. And we specifically signed him due to Cable, "ESPN’s Adam Schefter reports that veteran offensive lineman Robert Gallery has agreed to terms and will sign a three-year contract with the Seahawks, giving the team a much clearer picture of what their offensive line will look like."

The reason he's not with the team is again, not that we didn't invest in a FA, but because we invested poorly.

I didn't include Unger because this conversation was framed how Cable has done. Unger was acquired before Cable and even Carroll arrived.

This response seems to be more of a referendum on Carpenter. To be honest though, Carpenter outperformed guys picked in his range pretty well. Many of whom were flat out cut resulting in no lingering value at all for the teams that drafted them.

Was Carpenter a bust? Honestly, I'm not sure I'm willing to go that far. The odds of getting a player not worth signing to a second contract in the latter half of the first round is substantial. We could look at the guys taken from 25 to 35 over time to examine that. I'll look at draft classes where extentions/resigns would show actual open market value.

2012:

Kevin Zeitler. Extended to half Carpenter's contract. Bust

2011:

Carpenter. Not resigned. Bust
Gabe Carimi: Cut Bust
Derek Sherrod: 1 start. Cut. Bust

2010:

Roger Saffold. Resigned to a Carpenter level contract. Bust?

2009:

Eric Wood. Resigned to a Carpenter level contract. Bust?

2008:

Duane Brown. 3x pro bowler and 1x all pro. Not a bust

2007:

Joe Staley Not a bust
Ben Grubbs Not a bust
Arron Sears Total bust

If we presume that a player who can command 4-5m a year on the open market is a bust for a first round pick, then 7 of the ten picks taken qualify as Carpenter level busts.

That's a ridiculously bad rate of return for OL taken in this range. There are as many quality players in this sample size, as there are players who even played out their rookie deals at all.

I'm a reasonable guy. But I'm not seeing how there even should be an expectation of success based on the track record here. I'd suggest that maybe collectively many fans fall into the '1st round' trap. This implies that a player taken anywhere in the first round is generally equivalent across picks 1 through 32. Which is horribly incorrect -- and something Seattle understands all too well, opting to trade out of the late first every opportunity they can.

It's also worth mentioning, that Seattle tried mightily to trade out of the Carpenter pick too. But simply couldn't get anyone to accept a deal. There was virtually no value at any position worth moving up for to make the deal work.

 

[scutterhawk]

Something tells me the Hawks won't be able to get this guy stashed on the practice squad. I expect him to be one of the 9-10 linemen we keep.

If Soloki makes the PS, imo, there's no way that another team is going to sign him to their 53-man roster.

He's a major project... only we do such things.

I don't agree, as anyone that would follow the Seahawks way of doing things, would automatically recognize that this guy is a SPARQ freak, and would immediately steal him away from us.

 

[netskier]

Our former coaches would grab him in a millisecond.

 

[Attyla the Hawk]

Something tells me the Hawks won't be able to get this guy stashed on the practice squad. I expect him to be one of the 9-10 linemen we keep.

I think he's a perfect candidate for the PS. Any team taking him would have to believe he can contribute. He isn't going to play in 2015. Ideal to get him on the PS and work on his craft.

I think we could have gotten away with this in 2010/11/12.

But the last 2 years has seen a marked shift. Not even accounting for the Jags/Falcons with ex hawks coaching staffs -- we've seen that there are 4 SPARQ teams that kind of circle jerk each other's castoff players. If we cut Sokoli, I'd put money that he gets picked up by KC on waivers. They won't be the only team to put in a claim, but will have the lowest record amongst KC/GB/Phi who each would probably claim him.

We also don't know how Atlanta will operate yet. Bradley and Caldwell in JAX haven't gone after our dev projects in their 2 years. Nor has Dmitroff in Atlanta. But the situation has changed dramatically in Atlanta. They are rebuilding -- and their OL is pretty crappy. So the change in circumstance, as well as the new Seahawk influence with Quinn could mean there is another team vulturing our castoffs.

I think it's pretty likely that about the only players we could expect to stash on PS are going to be WRs and LBs.