Laloosh":33iqit5t said:
Hey guys, one thing that stuck out to me in York's presser on Tomsula's firing were his comments about free agency.
My question is, do you think they dive into the free agent pool this off-season? If so, what positions do you think they'll really be looking to upgrade?
(not giving you shit btw, genuinely curious)
For sure. Long post to follow, but hopefully the detail makes it worth your while. :th2thumbs:
As for if the 9ers dive into FA, I think Baalke's comments from a few days after Yorks are a little more instructive than Yorks. Baalke's response when asked about York having noted how much room they had to spend in FA:
“Well, the one thing that I’m convinced of is you can’t buy championships. You earn championships and there’s a process to it. You build through the draft. You supplement your roster with free agency. You take care of your own guys because that creates ownership on their part. So, to say we’re going to go out and because we have X number of dollars to spend, how are we going to spend that? Are you going to spend that on two players or are you going to spend that on 12 players? I don’t know. I don’t have that answer right now nor would I from a competitive standpoint share that. But, there’s different ways to use that money. We just have to make sure we use it correctly.”
This is basically more developed answer that's a variation on what he said when asked this same question last year (quoted below):
“Just because you have money doesn’t mean you’re going to spend it foolishly,” Baalke said. “You have to address needs and we’re into free agency now. Very seldom, at least in my tenure, have we delved into the early stages of free agency. We did it this year with Torrey (Smith). Right now, we’re still in that process. As you see every day, somebody else is getting cut. There’s a trickle-down effect. It’s always a fluid situation.”
The thing about York is he's a child and reads all the criticism about himself (which he basically owned up to in that press conference). So, York is going to talk about how willing to spend he is (and over-promising on that) because it hurts his feelings that people say he is cheap, whereas Baalke is the adult in the relationship and actually has an internal compass.
As for if they'll be big players this year, my two answers are A) I don't think so (although perhaps a bit bigger than in years past), and B) I really hope not.
On "A": Regardless of if 9ers fans like it or not, Baalke signed a contract extension last year and is relatively safe in his job right now. Baalke and Paraag (who still is in charge of contracts and salary cap) also, wisely IMO, are well known for setting an internal value on players and not getting into (IMO almost always irrational) bidding wars over them. I think the 49ers will dip their toes in for the top FAs, be more serious contenders for the 1B/2A FAs, and do what they've always done and take low-risk flyers at the back-end of the market on guys who slipped through cracks. For all his sins, I think Baalke is smart enough to realize that it's a fool's errand to try to turn a bad team into a good team through being the "winner" of free agency.
On "B": If Baalke breaks from the way he does things and goes after multiple 1A and 1B free agents it either means he's worried about his job security and trying to make a splash, or he's been beaten down by the last two years and is changing his approach. This is really a doomsday scenario for me as a fan, as it's generally a really bad strategy, and it can also take years to undue these types of mistakes.
On What Positions They'll Be Looking to Upgrade:
The 49ers, in order of importance IMO, need: 1) QB , 2) Pass Rushing OLB, 3) OG, 4) 3-4 DE or NT (depending on Williams) 5 ILB, 6) TE, 7) WR and 8) backup HB
I'd expect them to target #2 (pass rushing OLB) and #4 (3-4 DE) with names you've heard of at the 1B/2A area of the market, and use the draft and back of the market for everything else.
Under Baalke the 9ers in most years have brought in at most one FA you've heard of for a bottom-half of the Top 10 contract with some outs in it (e.g. Whitner, Bethea, Torrey Smith). I'd definitely expect them to do that this year.
Two names to watch for them (one that you know very, very well).
Bruce Irvin: I always rolled my eyes when people said the Seahawks reached for Irvin, because if they hadn't taken him the 9ers would have. Unless he's dead set on going to the Falcons, the 9ers will be players for him. What they can offer that Quinn can't is that they're going to want to use him as a pass rusher than primarily as a jack-of-all-trades. They desperately need someone on the opposite side from Lynch, and I would guess Irvin is their #1 target. They won't get in a bidding war for him with the Falcons, but IMO his agent is going to be the first call they make.
Derek Wolfe: Despite being one of the best 3-4 DEs in the NFL this year, Wolfe is a little under the radar because 1) he missed all of last year due to injuring his spinal cord against the Hawks in preseason last year, and 2) served a 4 game suspension for PEDs at the start of this year (in relation to his recovery; people have tended to believe him that it really was a mistake).
These are both TOTALLY the type of guys that Baalke would give top 6-10 money to, which will cause everyone to say they overpaid a bit, and then a week later the details come out and it's pretty clear the 9ers built in outs for themselves after two years of the contract.
As for the other positions, I think they'll target all of them except for QB and backup HB in FA, but closer toward the back of the market, and with redundancies too. Baalke really despises drafting for need, and always drafts for 2-3 years out (why the 2012 draft and the picks he did miss on in 2013 didn't really hurt until this year -- save for QB those misses are basically the list of things the 9ers now need). I'd look for the 9ers to be a little bit more active in FA (i.e. maybe even 2 1B/2A players coming in, and a cavalry of back-of-the-market guys on one and two year prove-it deals), but definitely not to lose in FA by "winning it."
I really, really hope that 9ers fans who want the team to be big players for guys like Sheldon Richardson and Alex Mack will end up being resentful, disappointed, and insisting the team is "cheap." If those fans are happy I think the 9ers will have really blown this offseason, and this draft and FA session is probably the most important one in Baake's tenure.
