Quote:
Originally Posted by Chaka
But there’s a real difference between squandering your available resources (Grigson) and preserving your resources to make better use of them later (Ballard). It seems to me that the predominate criticism of Ballard boils down to his lack of spending on free agents, rather than spending unwisely. I’m convinced that will be remedied later – it has to be, under the salary cap rules.
In the meantime, I think Ballard is focused on implementing his vision and figuring out what players can best help him do that. When players don’t fit, he won’t hesitate to get rid of them in favor of other players who he thinks will better help him realize this vision. You can say that’s arrogant or inflexible, but you can also say its strong and clear leadership.
All of the controversial guys cut/traded were victims of scheme change – they no longer fit the type of defense that the Colts intend to play. Many here seem to be in favor of the theoretical concept of large scale changes (not hard not to be when the Colts were as bad as they were last year) but now don’t seem to like what that means – they want Ballard to half-ass it, implementing a “soft” rebuild by keeping a number of veteran guys who don’t fit and won’t play a role in the team once the rebuild is complete. Ballard instead insists upon full-assing it (sorry - is that an actual term?), and everyone gripes.
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Grigson’s failure wasn’t in his method of rebuilding, it was in his execution. His rebuild using veteran free agents paid off enough to get this team to an AFC title game - even while not hitting any home runs in free agency. And while completely turning over the roster and changing schemes as well. Let’s not pretend Grigson in anyway kept the status quo. His problem was that there were never any young players developing to effectively fill long term roles on the team. That wasn’t because he was to kind hearted with aging vets and they stunted young players growth, it’s because he utterly sucked at drafting. And Pagano utterly sucked at player development. The idea that you can’t develop players if there is a veteran if front of them is complete BS as evidenced by most other teams in the league - save maybe the Browns. On good teams players earn their spots, they aren’t handed them for strictly being young.
It’s funny that when I point out that Ballard’s “plan” seems to be a 4 yr rebuild in the prime of his franchise QBs career no one ever says that’s it the best thing for the franchise and Luck just has to wait. No, they argue that it’s not going to be 4 years. It’s two. And last year doesn’t count. But look at that opening day roster and tell me that it’s one good draft away from seriously competing. Can you? I seriously doubt it. It sure is long on hope though. You get to see young guys running around making mistakes “growing”. The perfect thing to placate a fan base while you waste another year of your most important commodities career.