And now for something completely different. No stats, just opinions. Who played as good as they are going to last season? Jake and Wake were close but, Long was hurt, and Wake said he is still learning how to play OLB. Fasano was rock solid but, had few chances in the passing game. Langford may have also been close but, I believe he can do more. Fields may have been the closest but STs put a damper on a number of plays. For many different reasons, I can't think of any other player who was close to having his best year. This is a good thing in looking ahead to 2011.
Yeremiah bell, last year might not have been his best year but i can only see him getting worse not better
In my opinion Bess had his best year last year as long as he's on the dolphins. In other systems he could excel but I don't see him topping last year.
Good choices, aside from the "Which" and Henne Hunters. LOL Soliai had a surprisingly VG year but, he was up and down in the first half. Second half was consistently at a Pro Bowl level. He also gets bonus points for a "sack dance" WHICH was a highlight of the year. I thought Bess was a bit better in 09 but, I may well be wrong. He was very close to the same. Fasano needs to be thrown to more. He does not have the speed but, can come up with the yards. Based n Dabol, last year, expect to see him shine. I think "old man Bell" has a few more rings in his play. I don't expect him to miss all thse tackles again. The main point of this thread, aside from checking everyone's spelling knowledge, was to show that no one did what they could. There were new coaches on D and STs, missing new coaches on O, new players, youth, injuries, etc, etc. Big Jake was close, and not because of his talent level. He is a young vet, knows the system and opposing players, can correct the mistakes of others, and does not have to think. I'm looking forward to a number of break out seasons this coming year. It's gonna be some fun.
Aqua4, I thought we would win 10 games last year, and we did have the talent to do that. However, a running team WHICH cannot run is going nowhere. This year, I'm at 11 or 12. We were not wrong, our timing was just a bit off.
Hey Aqua long time no talk... hope everything is fine... just wanted to add a few of my cents on the bolded... How were the Packers doing when they had all their injuries on Defense??? Not too good if I remember, I mean they lost to Henne and the Phins... not trying to be sarcastic... Got to remember your statement, "teams improve their footbal teams by getting better with the players that are on the roster"... Don't know about KC nor the Falcon's injuries last year, did they suffer any to their starting OL or their starting DL, LB corp or thier skilled players or back ups that would have played a lot of snaps??? Like I stated, I don't know about those teams above... but we do know that the Phins, before the start of the season lost a lot of valuable talent that were forecasted starters and players that were brought in to play specific downs and distances... Miam had like 5-8 starters and backs ups that were out after the 2nd game of the season, and as the season wore on, they added backups to the backups on the OL and WR positions... think about it... Does that fit your statement, when you have lost 8-12 players that were forecasted starters and backups, not playing??? How can the team get better??? The Packers did not look good when they had a lot full of starters out, and as soon as they got some health back...boom...boom... you think we could have beat them again with a healthy Mathews and some others??? of course not... Was KC and Atlanta lucky that their starting core were pretty much intact throughout the year??? I don't know this is an actual question... Now you put on the team that was forecasted to be starters and the beginning of TC, before the injury bug hit the team, and they had a chance of beating the Pack at full strenght... could have won a few more games to... We just don't stop to think about the team that Sporano and Irish had in mind before the first snap of TC took place... before the Will Allens, the Gardners, the Odricks, the Edds and others, felt something wrong with one part of their extremities... Did I meantioned that the OL that was patched up in the last quarter of the year had a Pro-bowler at LT that was hampered by injuries, a LG that was averaged at best, but supported by 2nd and 3rd string Center, and was helping the center as much as possible, which did hurt his game. Jerry out after a few games with a bug that kept from from starting for a handful of games, and Sporano put him in even though he was not really ready to go... Sporano kept shuffling in players to help slow down the DL... So will it be a big surprise if the Phins win 10 or more games this year if all or most of their main core guys stay healthy??? Yes I do agree with your statement... just add a single word I've always said that the best way to improve your football team is by getting better with the "CORE" players already on your roster.
This is pretty much right on. To expound a little about the OL, Sparano gets a lot of criticism for tinkering to much with that unit, but entering training camp he was counting on another year from Jake Grove and Justin Smiley. Losing both of those veterans to injury really hurt, forcing Sparano to really scramble to build a unit that, in the final analysis, did not perform well.
I got you.. Injuries happen to all teams, except that at times teams performance is affected more often when many of their core players are hurt, and it is noticed in the Win-Loss column... Bottom line is as you say, you have to have the most talented/skilled core players together on the field a lot to have that time to gel...
