What Players Show in Preseason

Just some thoughts here, by no means am I trying to call anyone out or sound like I am giving commandments from the mount. I always sound teachy and arrogant on the internet to myself, so I just want to start of by saying I am really trying not to be. A lot of this will be obvious to many.

Preseason is very important in player evaluation, but I don't think it is everything. Players can flash and show abilities many may not have expected and be lauded for them. If a player does not show an expected trait though they can quickly fall in the "bust" category(there are always exceptions and off-field stuff and attitude are examples of these exceptions). If a high draft pick is a "bust" in his first preseason and kept many say it is because they don't want to look bad, but I think this overlooks an important part of a front office's duties.

A player is evaluated in college as well as preseason, and the difficult call is if your evaluation in college was correct or not. Some guys just take longer than others to produce. GM's have to trust their scouts and instincts and high draft picks are picked early for a reason, most have a special trait that deserves patience. If the player hasn't shown an ability to produce in 3-4 years, then by all means move on to another player. A team cannot all of their young guys in the reality of roster building in the NFL, so they prioritize with an eye on talent. These talented players are usually drafted higher.

If Pope is cut I don't think it will be a death sentence to our UDFA recruitment. He has shown a ton of ability and I hope the Seahawks keep him, but there is an argument that Collins deserves patience due to what he showed in college. Prosise has had a bad preseason, but his talent deserves patience because he could bring a much more diverse and absent skill set to the team than Pope and Collins. Seattle's choice to keep whoever will not kill our commitment to competition, just put in into perspective. Pete Carroll and John Schneider have the leeway to wait and see if a player can bloom with their deep 53 man roster.

Odhiambo and Fant are another example of this with both having an upside that few can match. I like what Fant has shown in his first few football games. Along with his athletic profile I think he is a rare commodity that is worth keeping. The Seahawks kept Sokoli all year in what amounted to nothing, but I don't blame them because his potential made the risk of wasting a roster spot worth it, at least in my opinion. Keeping a player with potential like Byron Maxwell can help your team in the future.

That became a lot of text, thanks for reading and I hope you I was able to get my idea across. Any questions or observations would be appreciated!

I am going to agree to disagree.

The reason Seattle gets first pick usually at the UDFA or gets taken when multiple teams are looking to bring the same guy on, is that Seattle has a reputation where you can earn your slot. Draft picks do not get an advantage, everyone competes and the winner is the one that produces.

You sell that story you have to live up to it.

If they cut Pope to keep a non-producing duo of backs, they gut that. And no amount of spin will fix it because the agents will see right through it. Or cut Lambert when we desperately need help in the secondary, this will be the kind of thing.

Preseason is not everything but what you produce in training camp with no contact rules and limited contact expectations, and lack of live fire on multiple other levels isn't sh*t.

Now, I've noticed lately that the Seahawks have gotten to the point where they stopped just trying to find undervalued weaknesses or taking paths that nobody has taken because of inertia or laziness and started instead to start to believe they really have some secret magic. Because of this, they have started to do some stupid things.

Kind of like signing your all everything QB to a huge contract and then making him take the ball behind a OL made up of secondhand gum wrappers.

Not always, but just really bad risks that have little potential payoff for strange reasons. Its like the FO version of the bubble screen, very little chance of success, little payoff if you succeed, huge risk of failure and really unpleasant results if/when you do fail.

It is one thing to not be afraid of failure, and another thing to dance around it and slap it in the face.

Vin.couver had a great rant on it, when he pointed out that making non-sensical decisions is no longer a weird thing for the Seahawks. They are starting to outsmart themselves and think their judgement matters more than the data - and it is burning them repeatedly.

This is how you take DL guys repeatedly and try to turn them into starting OL. When it doesn't work out you can puzzle till your puzzler is sore, but it might have been you just needed not to make a DT your center.

Trying to justify potentially bad decisions ahead of time by pointing out there is stuff we don't see is pointless. What should matter is production, and when you are weighting things that are not production above production eventually it catches up to you.

It will absolutely affect our ability to get FAs if guys do well in preseason and don't earn a slot because the FO won't want to look like they burned a draft pick. Especially when those draft picks turn out to be average or worse.

Wow you guys write lots of words to make your points really good jobs!!! I think all players are same when coaches look they only want players to help big time for team no one cared where you came from as long as you can HIT and make people sorry for ever playing YOUR sport! GO SEAHAWKS ALWAYS BEST COMPETE!!!

It's a fair point that college tape and evaluations remain a factor. That's why I often bring up Golden Tate, he was terrible in his first two preseasons before putting things together midway through year two. He had the benefit of being a 2nd round pick. Had Tate been a 5th round pick, he probably would have been cut by the end of his 2nd preseason, if not sooner.

That's why I think Procise is probably safe, and Collins might be safe.

However, it's also important to know that very often players look different in the NFL than they do in college, just like how highly recruited High School players can look different when going up to the next level. That's why most of the elite coaches tend to acquire players more for fit than for pure talent. And when you go to a new team, whether it's at the next level up or not, there will always be a question of how you fit.

How do you know if a player is a fit for your team? Really, you can't know until you buy it and try it... and there is no refund policy.

If a player doesn't look like a fit, it's probably unwise to hold onto him for years hoping he'll suddenly change his football DNA to fit your team. There's a world of difference between a guy who just needs some polishing up, and a guy who needs to be in a totally different system to utilize his strengths.

Some good points Crayola Man. I believe them to be valid as Pete and John have always said they place a lot of value on college tape. I believe it was Schneider that said when someone "unknown" flashes in preseason, it forces them to go back and evaluate the tape even further and expand their research.

I don't think Pete evaluates a players position on the team so much during preseason games, as he does during training camp. I think that they use the preseason games to give them specific match ups against certain positions and situations (i.e. a WR over the middle or as a blocker), and to put them in positions that they didn't see in college to further evaluate how they respond to unfamiliar, or uncomfortable situations.

I'm sure it's true that Pete and John give higher draft picks more leeway, not because of the value of the draft pick itself, but because they trust their evaluation process. They believe that player is worth that much, and like Crayola mentioned, will give them more time if they struggle to try and determine why they are struggling, and see if they missed something in the early evaluation process that they can learn from. There's more to be learned here than just "is he roster worthy or not."

Much more concise and clear explanation than I was capable of Ivotuk, thank you very much!

Twisted Husky I also wish Seattle had a better Oline, but other than drafting better, I don't see how Seattle could make that a possibility. The Seahawks seem to have elected to spend their cap space elsewhere and I cannot blame them. I would much rather have KJ Wright than J.R. Sweezy or James Carpenter. Every team has to make concessions whether it be the Cowboys and their defense or Pittsburgh and their DBs. A lot of NFL teams seem to sacrifice Oline play, it just seems the Seahawks get more exposed because of Russell Wilson's scrambling and extensive amount of time he holds the football. My opinion wasn't really about what a player shows in practice, but what the GM or evaluator saw from them in college that they are hoping transitions to the NFL. I think Seattle has always made dangerous risks (Whitehurst, Harvin, Irvin), but when it doesn't work out they have been very good in my opinion of failing quickly and moving on. With 6 UDFA making our roster I think Seattle will still be able to recruit UDFAs in future years just fine.

Kearly I think fit is very important, but for Seattle I struggle to think of players that are square pegs being put in a circular hole. Some certainly need to be transitioned to the new system though or bulk up to survive the punishing work of playing in the NFL. Some just cannot cut it mentally and with these players I would just move on unless they are playing simple positions. I have a really hard time evaluating the "fit" of a player because I think Seattle are always going to be subtly shifting our scheme to the talent available to us. I think the transition from Red Bryant and Chris Clemons, to the more ideal ( I assume) pairing of Cliff Avril and Michael Bennett shows Seattle just trying to get their best 11 on the field. Seattle does have prototypes of players as shown by their draft picks at CB and RB (probably others too but those are the most obvious to myself) though.

Another idea that I think Seattle adheres to is drafting athletes and teaching them intangibles rather than the reverse. Tim Ruskell did the opposite of this and I find Ruskell much less effective. Cable has stated that he would rather start with a raw athlete that doesn't have to learn new techniques and forget ones he believes are incorrect that some offensive linemen have learned in college and can fall back on in times of disarray, the Army says that you sink to your training, you do not rise to the occasion. Once you get to the later rounds of the draft and UDFA most guys are gonna be pretty raw so you need to be patient as you teach them to play football as a Seahawk. Those who have good intangibles available late are gonna be believed to have limited ceilings usually due to physical limitations, so the decision becomes trusting in your coaching staff and selecting a raw athlete or wanting the immediate impact of a more polished player. These are pretty broad strokes I am making that have examples showing them incorrect, but I believe for the most part in a macro sense they are true.

Thanks for the posts and interest!