karmarooster said:
Jercules said:
karmarooster said:
This argument has gotten way off track. The average NFL fan has no clue that some guy from Cleveland led the league in receiving yards while only playing 14 games. Unless you're name is "Manning" or "Brady," there's no preferential treatment coming from the 'league office' in case of a DUI, another weed test, weapon's charge, club brawl, whatever. Another strike likely means a multiple game to year long suspension.
A more relevant topic... where do people put Gordon among his WR peers? Where's the cutoff for other WRs you'd take straight up for him?
Personally, I rank him at about dead even with Julio as the 'Blackmon-cloud' hanging over Gordon is roughly equivalent to Julio's injury cloud. Their risks are balanced out by both having supreme top-5 NFL WR talent, but I simply place more value on AJG, Calvin, Dez, and Thomas given that they have roughly as much talent as Julio/Gordon, but come with less risk. All have demonstrated elite ability, and picking among them is based more on flavor rather than talent.
Jeffery is another toss up, but I feel like the argument in his favor over Gordon is based mostly on having less risk; Gordon could be slightly more talented. Continuing, the next tier of Cobb/Brown/Cruz/Marshall/Harvin is probably a half-step down in talent, and each carries their own risk in the form of injury or age or uncertainty. I think Gordon is squarely above this tier even discounting for the potential suspension.
Your first paragraph is a typical, naïve, two-seconds-of-thought assessment of things that I no longer have the energy to debunk (please see above).
Gordon was on par with D. Thomas and Megatron last year as the most productive receiver in the league.
Arguments about his inflated targets and substance abuse issues are both massively overblown, and he's probably in line for a few more TDs next year as the Cleveland offense can't conceivably get worse. With steadier QBing and a running game, he should be in line for a smaller slice of a much bigger pie. He's definitely undervalued.
Ok, let's assume that the substance abuse issues are overblown, either because he's just simply not going to get high anymore/or get busted, or some conspiracy theory about "Goodale" and the shield protecting Gordon despite a positive test because he's some kind of superstar...
Cleveland last year with Chud and Norv Turner (both pluses on the offensive side) put up 4040 yards passing with Campbell/Weeden/Gordon, and 26 passing TDs.
Meanwhile, Andy Dalton's 2013 Bengals (who most people would classify as a "good" offense) threw for 4100 yards (albeit 33 TDs).
It can't get any worse, right?
Buffalo, where the new Browns coach was DC, shows you how much worse it can get: 3100 passing yards and 16 TDs. Jaguars? 3400 and 14 TDs. Raiders? 3500 and 15 TDs.
Assuming that the Browns -- of all teams -- have no where to go but
up the year
after they fire two offensive minds and bring in whatever random DC from the bills... meanwhile still not having figured out the QB... with no running back to speak of (yet), and WRs outside of Gordon featuring two guys who either shouldn't be in the league or won't be for long in Bess and Little. Aside from Gordon and Cameron practically the whole offense is lacking. Even restocking competently and drafting like the Packers or the Colts (um, still talking about the Browns here)... there are a lot of spots to fill. And assuming they do, is Gordon going to continue to account for 39% of the passing offense and, while doing it,
up his TDs, too?
I'm going to pump the breaks here. There are reasons besides the Blackmon-cloud to consider him overvalued if placed in the top 5.
You make a good point about not necessarily assuming things can't get worse, but taking everything into account, I'd still say things are bound to improve.
Despite having less passing TDs, both Buffalo and Oakland had higher scoring offenses than Cleveland in 2013. The Browns had 308 points total, 32 more than the second worst team in football (Houston, with 276; Jacksonville had 247, which to me screams outlier, but perhaps not to you). The point is, they were awful, the kind of awful that leads me to question the offensive pedigree of someone like Chud whereas you, curiously, seem to think his firing will detract from next year's product.
In fact, for Chud to get fired so fast, with the team willing to eat millions on the contracts of him and his staff, suggests to me he was brutally incompetent, in which case his dismissal is a positive for the fantasy prospects of Cleveland players.
Mocking them for being "the Browns here" is pointless; it's all about today's collection of executives, coaches, and players. People once mocked Seattle, New Orleans, and New England in a similar fashion.
Greg Little and Davone Bess are not as terrible as you make them out to be.
They gave up a ton of sacks--3rd worst in football--and I'm not even going to attempt to ascertain how much of that was on the O-Line vs. the play-calling vs. the revolving door at QB. I'm given to understand Joe Thomas is still a great LT.
But we can expect more continuity at QB, a huge plus even if the player isn't terribly good, and whoever gets the OC gig, we can expect him to design an offense for Josh Gordon and not Trent Richardson. We can also expect a running game that exists (my personal feeling is they want a back more in the mold of Forte or Charles; a pass-catcher).
Plus, there's Gordon himself, who is young and has room to improve. We're typically wary of players who score well in fantasy but do it with inflated TDs: Gordon had 9 TDs, a remarkably low total for the best per-game scorer at WR in 2013 fantasy.
Sure, things could get worse, but the QB point alone suggests to me things are much more likely to get better. Gordon was top 5 last year; he ought to do it again, and if you can scare his owner into dealing him with some myth about an inevitable suspension, I say go for it.
I've been just fine.
wned:
