Pandion Haliaetus":fil7zn9g said:
Also, if the Seahawks had re-signed Tate, it would be fair assessment to say that he would be the 3rd best WR on this team after Harvin and Baldwin.
In conclusion, I have little doubt that Harvin, Baldwin, Kearse, and Lockette not only can rise to the occasion in replacing Tate but they can also cover Rice's production as well.
Bottom line is as long as health permits, the Seahawks passing game should be upgraded despite the losses of Tate and Rice as Harvin gets fully intergrated.
It's not a fair assessment at all that Tate would the 3rd best (or most valuable) WR, especially considering he was our punt returner. Even without returning punts I think a fair assessment would be that they were tied for #1 receiver last season. Tate was also virtually tied for #1 receiver in 2012 with a "true #1" Sidney Rice, they had almost the same exact yards per catch, and if Tate had as many targets as Sidney Rice he would of statistically been slightly better if my memory serves me. Even without averaging the target totals Tate was only about 64 total yards behind Sidney Rice in 2012 if I remember exactly.
So a fair assessment would be that as receivers Tate and Baldwin would be #2a and #2b, they are too closely matched to FAIRLY conclude one is better than another. If you factor in punt returning, overall athletic skill, and their max potential I think the edge goes quite easily to Tate. If there's one area you can knock Tate it's his mental focus and discipline, if he improves that to anywhere close to what Baldwin has I think it'd be pretty obvious who's better.
But anyways I think a fair assessment is that they are pretty much tied as receivers, although some may think Tate has more potential and adds additional value with his punt returns especially, some would just focus on Baldwin in the playoffs recently instead of their past 2 seasons as a whole.
I wouldn't question anyone who thinks they are very closely skilled or valuable to our team, but if anyone thinks Baldwin is far superior to Tate when there's nothing to back that up I have to doubt their opinion. Maybe a slight edge for personal preference, but this OP has been a Tate hater for quite some time if I remember correctly.
And your bottom line is "if health permits"?! Ok, well what if Harvin gets injured again since that Hip will never quite be the same... He looked fine vs. the Vikings but it knocked him out multiple more months. Those hip injuries do not have a history of fully healing, I just think he's gonna be a risky guy to stay healthy for the rest of his career. Plus he has a ton of migraine issues in the past and he seems to get concussions every time he takes a real hit.
So if Harvin DOES get injured which is VERY likely in my opinion, then you just WASTED A WHOLE LOT OF TIME arguing a mute point. Doesn't matter how good he is if he's injured, only time will tell.
As a Seahawks fan I want Harvin to stay healthy so we have a chance to repeat Superbowl. But from a logical standpoint I'm kind of expecting him to get injured and it will make a lot of people including our front office look VERY stupid when they undervalued Tate and let him walk.
At first I thought front loading the Michael Bennett contract to 10 million this year was brilliant to make room for next year, but I was assuming we would keep Tate too and we would be in a great situation. Now that we lost Tate and you just look at our current cap space situation paying Bennett so much this year is looking like a pretty dang stupid move to me. We really have very limited options now and if we don't get Jared Allen losing Chris Clemons is gonna look pretty stupid too since he got signed for 4.5 mill a year.