Ballard Cap Philosophy
 

Since this issue seems to arise in many of the threads here, I thought I'd create at new thread to discuss it in light of Ballard's newest statement on the subject earlier this week:

This is one thing that I’ve been very consistent about since I walked in the door. I knew we needed to build a core base of young talent here. And it’s easier to train your own. We want to be able to train our own players. Does that mean we’re against free agency? No. It does not, and I think we have some examples on our team with Margus Hunt, Al Woods, (Denico) Autry, Ryan Grant, (Matt) Slauson. We’ve gone out. Is it the A-level guys that the media and everybody writes about? No, but these are good football players that we signed and we thought we got at good value for our team. And you want to continue doing that. I think sometimes just spending money to spend money, that’s not always the smart thing to do. And when you do build your team up with your own guys, and they get to their second contracts and you begin to reward them, that’s when I think you’ll start to see some of that cap space disappear. Is there a time that we could go into free agency and we see a piece that we think fits and it fits culturally, fits from not only from a scheme perspective, but also from a character perspective? When you bring a guy into your locker room and you make him a highly-paid player, there’s a lot more that comes with that than just playing on the field. That means that guy needs to do everything right because he’s looked upon differently than the rest of the locker room.

Sounds to me like he's planning to push some of that cap room forward another season or two. Please provide your thoughts as I put on my flak jacket.

I think we'll see more B- and C-level signings, but I'm not completely writing off a premium player in UFA. Ballard was part of a front office that did this when they weren't getting enough pass rush from their front 4.

http://www.espn.com/chicago/nfl/news/story?id=4969071

I really like this guy. Honesty, consistency. I may not completely agree with his approach, but at least he has coherent reasons behind it.

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I think its been clear this was the approach, he is just verbalizing it.

And while I agree to some extent its the best approach long term, you are going to need to sign some free agents, in this day and age, to win a title.

Trying to do it all through the draft is very hard. Polian almost did it. That SB winning team was almost all Colts drafted players. But then to find put them over the top, they had to get booger McFarland. Not a FA, a trade, but still, you have to bring in some guys in the NFL to fill in gaps. And Adam Vinatieri, free agent, probably the biggest one ever for the Colts. You just don't always have the opportunity their in the draft for every position you need.

Exactly. Both Booger and AV came in and acted like pros.