Boo Khaki

Harbaugh and Hortiz have confirmed Slater is the locked-in LT, and the plan all along was to draft Alt to play RT. To be honest, that just makes me all the angrier. Drafting a fucking RT at #5 with the needs and obvious holes on this roster. It isn't really the same position, because most players strongly favour one side of their body just like every other human being. It doesn't matter how hard you train and hit the weight room to even muscle mass out, your brain still instinctively favours one side. All your movements are mirror-image, but you'll still favour putting your weight on your favoured foot, pushing with your favoured arm and so on. Footballers have to work their entire careers are developing their weaker foot and forcing their brain to stop instinctively shying away from using it. It's akin to taking a right-handed boxer and expecting him to suddenly box Southpaw. If Alt is naturally Right-handed, then switching should actually be ok for him, but moving from one side of the OL to the other isn't a case of struggling with assignments and so on, it's adapting to the fact that you suddenly have to reverse absolutely everything you were doing previously, and mould your brain to get to grips with that. If they really, really wanted a RT then they should have traded down, and I'm having a hard time believing there wasn't a suitable deal on offer because anything would be a bonus over what we have, which is a pair of Left Tackles, a veteran Right Tackle we already had under contract, and no extra picks. The only way I can see this pick really paying off is if they have already decided they aren't paying Slater and Alt is his replacement, but even then that is premature, and on ability there is absolutely no reason whatsoever to forego offering Slater a second contract. If we go WR at #37 and pick up Tyler Boyd after May or something, then it makes passing on Nabers and Odunze a bit easier to swallow, but still, I fundamentally disagree with the entire plan of taking a player at #5 and then moving him out of the position he played his entire college career, especially when it isn't a desperation situation. The WR room absolutely is, because Palmer is really just an NFL standard #3 WR, and god knows if QJ will even be on the field by October. If he sucks as badly as he did as a rookie then Harbaugh will not persist with him, although to his credit there were little signs in the games Stick started that he was beginning to get some things together. I think Herbert genuinely was reluctant to throw at him because of the clunkers in GB and NE, although there were other less obvious instances of QJ destroying Herbert's faith before that, the INT on the comeback v's Dallas when he was actually in a better position than the DB to make a play on the ball springs to mind. Stick wasn't as picky, but that was also a bit forced by KA13 missing December, so Stick didn't have a lot of choice but to chuck it at QJ. I hated the QJ pick at the time, because he looked every bit like a typical TCU/Texas player, all physicals, raw, and questionable mental aptitude. I didn't see anything from him prior to December to think I was wrong, but he is still young and sometimes WR's do take until their 3rd or even 4th year to really get it together.

I have no issues with the calibre of player taken, I just question the wisdom of taking a career LT when you already have an upper echelon LT on the roster about to play out his 4th year. Slater did play a lot of RT at Northwestern, so if you are going to switch one of them then Slater would make sense, however, I question the wisdom of uprooting a set, convincing starter to accommodate a Rookie at a testing and vital position, and there is also the fact that Slater will be looking for an extension right about now, so if you do switch him he's still going to want premium Left Tackle money anyway, and if you try to lowball it the only option remaining is the Franchise route and a guaranteed pissed off player. They are also paying Pipkins $9m per to play RT, and he graded out as middle-of-the-pack last year and is not the liability a lot of Chargers fans make out. The Chargers OL horrors were all OC/OG-related last season, and as much as I get the thinking behind "book-ends, road-graders" etc etc, so far they appear to be banking on improved coaching and development of existing players to overcome that massive problem, while they've spent #5 on an area that wasn't a problem and created a massive headache for themselves in the process. I'll wait to see what they do today and tomorrow, because while I could live with JPJ at #37, that would make it 3x 1st round picks + potentially a 2nd rounder on the Chargers OL while Herbert has the square root of f**k-all to throw at. I'm gearing up for another disappointment when Harbaugh insists on taking Blake fucking Corum about 80 picks too early. Presumably they plan to "protect" Herbert by running off-tackle about 60 times per game.

The most baffling thing about it isn't the fact it's a massive reach on a guy who should probably have gone about 50 picks later at the earliest, but the fact they play in a garbage Division that is up for grabs right now, and could easily have taken a grip on it with an extra contributor right now, but instead they've chosen a guy who they are presumably going to sit for 1.5-2 years, giving N.O., Tampa, and even Carolina added time to sort their shit out and get better. Just mind-numbingly stupid when they could have taken Odunze or had their pick of every single Defensive prospect.

I think you can genuinely make the case for all three of them potentially failing, but if you put a gun to my head and forced me to say who I think might bomb completely, I'd actually say Williams. Again, it's not on talent, I'm just not comfortable with some of his behaviour and the stuff that came out of the circus surrounding him in the past year. Emotional maturity is the concern for me, and since Chicago is one of the worst NFL QB graveyards, my concern is that if things don't start well and then stay hot, then I think there's the potential for him and his entourage to become an off-field clusterfuck and destroy the relationship with the team. It might take a few years, and it probably won't be entirely down to play on the field. They've given him every single chance to succeed in terms of putting capable players around him, doing it the correct way instead of the idiocy down in Carolina, so if he doesn't pan out I think it'll be entirely down to the player himself. Maye is really rough around the edges, but the reason I think he'll be ok is that he actually makes the difficult throws, which is a sign that he can be worked on and developed, and the occasional sloppiness tidied up. His footwork lets him down and he doesn't set properly, but unless he's a moron that's usually corrected pretty easily by NFL coaching. The problem with a lot of QB's coming out of college these days is that they are hyped because they are dual-threats, and people ignore the fact they can't complete simple 5 yard outs, see the middle of the field, and stand in the pocket rather than bolting. There are a lot of fundamentally garbage QB's being drafted high who can't do simple things well, and if they don't have than nailed by 21,22,23 then they never will. Maye needs a lot of polish, but I have no concerns about a talent deficiency. I think in 2-3 years he could easily be a top 5 NFL QB. Daniels is harder to read IMO. I think he's potentially boom or bust and he does look a bit on the skinny side for me for a player who likes to take off a lot, but maybe getting his bell rung a few times will calm that down a bit.

Think I'm gonna go put the kettle on and see if I can come up with any explanation for drafting a RT at #5 who isn't a RT.

Bowers to be the latest big, slow slot-receiver that everyone falls in love with because he's notionally a TE.

LOL. Maybe the solution to 20 years of shite QB's in Denver is to stop with the desperation hail-mary QB picks.

Vikes swap #10 and #11 with the Jets. Must be to keep McCarthy away from Denver and LV. Good luck trying to beat Mahomes and Herbert with Bo fecking Nix under C

That's a laugher. Probably the 4th or 5th best QB in the draft, but he's not a 1st round talent and taking him a #8 is hilarious.

God all fucking mighty that's a horror pick.

The decades long tradition of going to a commercial break as soon as the Chargers are on the clock continues...

Won't be long before $30m is the going rate for a #1 WR

Think I preferred it when it was just Goodell in his spare bedroom. Any chance of a Covid pandemic next year?

Clock starts at 1am UK time. No doubt the Bears will still take nearly 15 minutes to hand the card in.

A lot of parallels with this season. Made hard work of promotion the season before, recruited well in the off-season, surprised a few folk in the first season back up. I just hope it doesn't fizzle out like Hartley and 2023-24 is not the highpoint of Docherty's time as manager.