from off the net

===

ramBRO

I caught a radio interview with ESPN’s KC Joyner wherein he discussed the Bradford trade. For those who don’t know, KC Joyner is the self-proclaimed “Football Scientist” who ranks player performance on metrics outside of typical stats. In other words, he applies “analytics” to football in the same way that Billy Bean might do so for baseball.

Although as a Rams fan I was interested in what Nick Foles would bring to our team, the radio hosts spent the entire segment having Joyner focus on what Chip Kelly saw in Sam Bradford. This is what he said:

1) Sam Bradford is a smart and “safe” QB who takes care of the football.

2) Bradford is also accurate with his deep ball.

Those were the primary benefits that Joyner listed. But he delved a little further. He indicated that people have a misconception of Chip Kelly’s offense thinking that it’s an up tempo passing attack. In reality, it’s an up tempo rushing attack that looks to take advantage of a tired/disorganized defense with passes – preferably vertical ones (hence the Bradford interest). Joyner said that Kelly’s offense is only effective with a strong rushing attack and that his WR’s need to be physical in order to block downfield (thus, no use for a Desean Jackson/Jeremy Maclin-types). Foles became careless with the ball last season and Kelly doesn’t believe that he’ll have that problem with Bradford.

The radio hosts inquired why the Eagles would trade away LeSean McCoy if they were looking to have a strong rushing attack and Joyner said that: A) they got a good defensive player in return (defense is the primary concern for the team); B ) RB’s are a dime a dozen (didn’t discuss losing out on Frank Gore); and, C) more cap space to go after his type of guys.

Again, there was little talk of the compensation for Bradford or his injury history. This was all about what the numbers told Joyner on why Kelly might like Bradford so much. And truth be told, it sounded as though Joyner liked the pick-up.

Sam Bradford: Trade to Philly has been in the works for weeks

by Michael David Smith

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2015/03/11/sam-bradford-trade-to-philly-has-been-in-the-works-for-weeks/

New Eagles quarterback Sam Bradford revealed today that he has known for weeks he was being shopped by the Rams, even as the Rams claimed that wasn’t the case.

“This has been in the works for a while so it didn’t catch me totally by surprise when it happened yesterday,” Bradford said.

When reports first surfaced that the Rams could trade Bradford, St. Louis coach Jeff Fisher said the reports were inaccurate. But Bradford revealed that he has known for nearly a month that the Eagles and coach Chip Kelly might trade for him.

Bradford said he’s happy to be in Philadelphia because he’s a fan of Kelly’s innovative offensive system.

“I think any quarterback in the league would love to play for Chip, in his offense,” Bradford said. “It’s extremely quarterback-friendly. The tape that I’ve watched, it just looks like a lot of fun to play in. I think it’s similar to what I did in college at Oklahoma. I’m extremely excited.”

Bradford also said he has “a great relationship” with Eagles offensive coordinator Pat Shurmur, who previously coached him in St. Louis. Bradford is happy — and not surprised — to be in Philadelphia.

Agamemnon wrote:

A lot of players are going to be free agents in 2016. Hayes, Sims, all the QBs, Barron, and the 2012 draft class.

Good point.

Bernie: Getting to know Nick Foles

By Bernie Miklasz

http://www.stltoday.com/sports/columns/bernie-miklasz/bernie-getting-to-know-nick-foles/article_1902aabb-1c64-5cb1-93f8-57376ec7bc2f.html

Here’s a scouting report on the Rams’ new quarterback acquired from Philadelphia on Tuesday in exchange for QB Sam Bradford…

1. Foles was born on Jan. 20, 1989 in Austin, Tex. and is a graduate of Westlake High School in Austin. Notable Westlake alums include New Orleans QB Drew Brees, Baltimore place kicker Justin Tucker, Tampa Bay tight end Kyle Adams, actress Angela Bettis, MLB reliever Huston Street, and retired MLB third baseman Kelly Gruber.

2. Foles, who is listed at 6-5 or 6-6 — depending on the source — was a star basketball player in high school. A three-year starter and two-time team MVP who was recruited by Texas, Baylor and Georgetown (among others.)

3. Foles’ parents, Larry and Melissa Foles, have done very well in the restaurant business. Larry Foles was co-founder of Eddie V’s Prime Seafood in Austin, a successful upscale establishment that now has 13 locations. Six are in Texas but other Eddie V’s can be found in Chicago, San Diego, La Jolla, Calif., Orlando, Tampa, Scottsdale AZ, and Northern Virginia. According to media reports Foles and partners sold the restaurants to a corporation that owns other chains including Red Lobster, Olive Garden and The Capital Grille. Reported sale price: $59 million.

4. Foles is married to Tori Moore, a former volleyball player at Arizona. (They met there as students.) She is the sister of former NFL tight end Evan Moore.

5. Foles is a devout Christian and a genuinely humble person. When asked how he handles the highs and lows of playing a demanding QB position Foles said: “I’m a Christian. It’s my faith in Christ. I’m into scripture every day. I have great players around me. And great parents that have raised me. And people that have surrounded me throughout my career who helped shape who I am. That’s who I go out there and play for every single day. I don’t play for myself. I play for my teammates and play for the people that helped me get to where I am. I know they’re watching me every week, and I want to play for them. It’s just in my heart and that’s who I am.

“I’m very fortunate to be playing, and I know that any given day could be the last. And I’ll be thankful for the time I have had to play this game. But I’m going to give my all every single day. So why would I let my confidence (fluctuations) and frustrations affect me when I know it’s only a short time where I can play this game. And it’s not worth getting all distraught and mad and going too high or too low. I just want to be me. That’s it. Simple as that.”

6. Foles isn’t a live-wire personality on or off the field. If you want a fist-pumping QB that shrieks at teammates and opponents, then this isn’t your guy. Fans that disliked Sam Bradford’s low-key personality will be getting the same in Foles. In Philadelphia, “Friday Night Lights” author Buzz Bissinger stirred things up by writing that Foles “has an aura of softness about him.” Bissinger recommended that Foles “man up to be the man.”

Here was Foles’ response at the time: “I don’t agree with it just because I think a quarterback and leader and anything it’s not necessarily what you do with the limelight or anything. Obviously, handling yourself in an appropriate matter is very important for you and your teammates, but I’ve always believed that you need to be who you are.

“If you’re a guy who loves to go out and be at everything and do that and you can be a great player and great leader as well, that’s awesome because that’s naturally what you’re great at, that’s naturally what you want to do. See, if I were to go and do all that stuff, that’s sort of out of my norm.

“I’ve always been a laid-back Texas boy. I love my family. I love being with my family. That’s what I stick to. I love the game of football. I love getting better. My teammates know me because I show them who I am in the locker room and then I don’t change when I go on the field.”

Foles had declined a one-on-one interview request with Bissinger before Bissinger wrote the piece.

7. According to the Eagles’ media guide, Foles lists “Where the Red Fern Grows” as his favorite book. Favorite film? The cartoon version of “Scooby-Doo.” In an interview with ESPN, Foles said his favorite Disney movie is “Lion King.” His favorite meal? Fried catfish. (He’ll be able to find plenty of that in the St. Louis area.) Foles also has, at least in the past, been a devotee of Bikram yoga.

8. Coming out of high school in 2007, Foles initially committed to Arizona State. But he had a change of heart and signed with Michigan State. After a season in East Lansing, Foles transferred to Arizona, got a chance to start during the 2009 season, and was the Wildcats’ full-time starter in 2010 and 2011. He was a communications major at Arizona.

9. Here’s a scouting report from the respected quarterback analyst Greg Cosell, who described Foles as a limited talent in a 2014 interview:

“I think if you look at Foles the player, what you likely see is this: He’s got a good arm but not a gun; he’s not a power thrower, not a drive thrower. He’s a little more of a finesse thrower than a drive thrower,” Cosell said “He does not have quick feet. There is no quick-twitch to his movement. There’s no explosive lower-body movement to him. When you look at Foles, I think what you see is a quarterback that needs the system to work for him and provide defined reads and good throws with the route concepts, just the whole system. He needs the system to work for him… I don’t think he’s really any different (from 2013.) Because he’s not a quick-twitch guy, when he doesn’t feel comfortable making a throw he’ll start to look a little awkward because he’s not quick twitch, he moves around.”

10. Foles is a workaholic. At Arizona, coaches had to tell him to ease off on lifting weights. He’s consumed by video scouting of opponents and has been known to have teammates over for film study.

11. Daniel Jeremiah, formerly a scout with the Eagles, had this to say (in part) in his official scouting report filed to the team before the 2012 draft: “Mentally, excellent smarts, knows what everybody is doing on the field, understands fronts and coverages. … outstanding worker, sets a tone in the weight room … great character … He’s all about football. Always at the facility. He was there when I was visiting with the (Arizona) QB coach. He wanted to see one particular play that bothered him from practice, so he showed up, came right into the room with his ice bag on his arm. Has the wide receivers over all the time to watch tape and eat at his apartment. Pays for their food … Foles is a clear leader of the team.”

12. Foles’ 2013 season was, in many respects, one of the finest by a QB in NFL history. Some highlights: Pro Bowl selection, Pro Bowl Offensive MVP, league passer-rating leader (119.2), two-time selection as NFC Offensive Player of the Week, had the 60th “perfect game” (as in passer rating) in NFL history, was ranked at No. 70 in the NFL Network’s list of Top 100 players in the league at the end of the 2013 season. Also: Foles tied an NFL record with seven TD passes in a game, had the best single season TD-interception ratio (27:2) in NFL history, and posted the best-ever passer rating (152.8) for a calendar month (Nov. 2013.)

13. Foles wasn’t nearly as effective in 2014, throwing 13 touchdowns and 11 interceptions with a passer rating of 81.4 before his season ended after eight games because of a broken collarbone. Cosell suggested that NFL defenses made some changes in how they played against Foles in 2014 after getting a chance to study the 2013 version of Foles and the Eagles offense.

“Because all of this was new to defensive coordinators, we all agree that it looked last year like there were a ton of open receivers, which doesn’t happen that much in the NFL,” Cosell said. “And he needs the system to work for him.”

14. Here’s an excerpt of Bissinger’s 2014 profile of Foles in Philadelphia magazine:

“The truth was, Nick Foles was something of a nerd (in high school), a guy who hung around with a small posse of mostly non-football nerds — eggheads, kids who would go on to careers in finance and private equity and engineering. A hot Saturday night was getting together at his house to play video games like Call of Duty, or hanging out at Zilker Park on the shores of Lady Bird Lake. ‘Dude, come on, you’re the quarterback, go out and have some fun,’ high-school teammate Matt Nader pleaded with him, fruitlessly.

“He was the kid you wanted dating your daughter, because he would have her home at 9:30 after you said 10. He was socially awkward, with a naive and goofy sense of humor. He dressed as if he had never seen clothes before. His hair was oddly styled in an ersatz pageboy, curling below his ears like a drainage ditch and covering his forehead in uneven wisps, thin grime on a windshield. His face was a cup of Napoleon Dynamite and a tablespoon of golly-gee-willikers and a teaspoon of Gomer Pyle.”

15. Eagles coach Chip Kelly had no problem trading Foles the quarterback. But Kelly was a big fan of Foles the person. “I wish there were more people like Nick Foles in our lives,” Kelly told the Philadelphia media last November.

It’s not really THAT much. It’s a fair amount but not that much. You figure about 6 M for the draft picks, about 3-4 M for the season including the practice squad. That leaves say about 18-19 M, and they still haven’t resigned Britt or Barksdale. I don’t even think it counts Kendricks (which is just under 5 M a year).

Peter King

http://mmqb.si.com/2015/03/11/jameis-winston-roger-goodell-nfl-trades-free-agency-retirement/

The Rams-Eagles trade will take a long time to figure out. The deal no one saw coming was Sam Bradford and a fifth-round pick in 2015 for Nick Foles, a fourth-round pick in 2015 and a second-round pick in 2016. The Rams had multiple trade options for Bradford, who has had two straight seasons ended with ACL tears to his left knee, but by Monday they were focused on Philadelphia because the Eagles had something that no other involved team would offer—a potential starting quarterback in Foles.

“Chip came hard after Bradford,” an NFL insider said. “That’s why this happened.”

What I was told reliably Tuesday night: Philadelphia coach/power-czar Chip Kelly loves Bradford, feels Bradford’s the right guy to run his fast-paced offense, and this from an insider on the trade of the day: “Chip came hard after Bradford. That’s why this happened.” I know many of you think this is some sort of precursor to Kelly stockpiling weaponry to chase Marcus Mariota in the first round of the draft, but I don’t think so. There aren’t a lot of GMs in the league who would think Bradford is clearly better than Foles. So to trade up for Mariota, from where the Eagles sit at 20, would take first-round picks this year and next year, the second-round pick this year, Bradford, and probably more. That assumes the Titans or Jets actually want the risky Bradford and would sacrifice dealing down to number 20 this year in the process. I don’t see it. It’s far more likely that, as my source says, Kelly is smitten with Bradford, who ran a fast-paced offense at Oklahoma his final season even though he is more suited to a classic NFL scheme.

Two other points to be made here: I can tell you with certainty that this was not a trade made to punish Bradford for not re-doing his contract. Bradford was owed $13 million this year, and the Rams certainly wanted him to take a major pay cut to stay, after he gave them precious little in the past two seasons. I also can tell you that, even if Bradford had agreed to slash his salary before the weekend, the Rams still would have made this trade. They like this trade. They like Foles’ potential, they like the fact that they picked up a 2016 second-rounder, and through no fault of his own they’d lost faith in Bradford. No matter what they said, they just had no faith that Bradford could stay upright for 16 games.

As for Kelly, he now is under heavy, heavy pressure. No one truly buys that Bradford is a franchise quarterback. He may be, but he certainly isn’t now. He’s missed 39 of 80 possible NFL starts due to injury, he’s a 58.6 percent passer, and his passer rating is a feeble 79.3. He’s been hurt in fluky ways, but life for an NFL player starts with showing up, and Bradford hasn’t been good at that. If he either doesn’t play well or goes down by Columbus Day with another injury, it’s going to be very tough for Kelly to take the broadsides that will come his way in a tough NFL city.

Herzog wrote:

To me calling Wells and Long bad signings is pure hindsight.

I’m gonna disagree with this. They were both coming off injuries (if memory serves correctly)

I love Kendricks though. I think he COULD be a great recieving threat, but he’s just too damn good in other areas and they have Cook. I actually hate Cook. I wish they’d have more plays for Kendricks, the dude can catch the football.

Long was coming off of ARM injuries and the question was whether he could still play at a high level after those surgeries. If people had concerns it was the arms. No one anticipated other injuries. No one saw 2 freak knee problems coming. In fact neither knee was from contact. They were just the dreaded hyperextensions.

Wells had a SCOPE which he called routine. A scope is not reconstructive knee surgery. He then got ill in Africa, and starting with that there were a series of bizarre injuries and accidents. But other than having a scope, Wells was an injury-free all-pro center and a good signing.

Long did not play well initially as a pass-blocking LOT, but once they switched to a play-action offense, he turned out to be a top run blocking tackle and a pretty good play-action pass-blocking tackle.

Until 2014, Wells played well when he was on the field. But the injuries kept mounting up, and they were bizarre. Last summer he got a rare infection from a tick bite and ended up hospitalized. He lost 40 pounds. He then had to sit out most of the summer to get back in playing shape, and when he finally did play, he then injured both his elbow and his back.

None of that was anticipated. They just caught the Rams OL injury bug.

Agamemnon wrote:

Bradford/Foles Trade, Howard Balzer
Tuesday, March 10, 2015

IMO Balzer is one of the best on all this.

Good listen.