The problem with “fuck the rich” is that it asks the public to assume the rich are less “worthy” than the poor.

The problem with “fuck the rich” is that it’s not a real thing. That’s just your own ears inventing that. And it has nothing to do with who is “worthy.” That’s the cartoon version.

It has to do with economic policies. For example, the actual real social and economic effects of structural inequality. If we’re not discussing policies, IMO, then nothing real is happening.

Actually every poll I saw before the last election that asked who would win in a Bernie/Trump matchup favored Bernie.

Adam Schein, from best of past nine draft classes

http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap3000001034443/article/russell-wilson-jj-watt-among-best-of-past-nine-draft-classes

…

2014: Aaron Donald, DT, Los Angeles Rams

Drafted: Round 1, No. 13 overall.

With all due respect to pass-rushing great Khalil Mack (now with the Bears, picked fifth overall by the Raiders), receiver Mike Evans (picked seventh overall by the Buccaneers), receiver Odell BeckhamJr. (now with the Browns, taken 12th overall by the Giants) and guard Zack Martin (picked 16th overall by the Cowboys), this one was easy. When it’s all said and done, the league might have to name the Defensive Player of the Year award after Donald, who’s won it the past two years (in addition to being the Defensive Rookie of the Year in 2014). Donald is an unstoppable, tone-setting, game-changing force in the middle of the defensive line for the Rams. He posted 20.5 sacks last season, more in one year than any other interior defender in NFL history. The four-time All-Pro is special, mesmerizing and a joy to watch.

2015: Todd Gurley, RB, Los Angeles Rams

Drafted: Round 1, No. 10 overall.

This class is tricky — and relatively weak. We are still waiting for quarterbacks Jameis Winston (taken first overall by the Buccaneers) and Marcus Mariota (picked second overall by the Titans) to truly arrive as starters in the NFL. You can make the case that running back David Johnson (taken in Round 3 by the Cardinals) will get back in this conversation; two years removed from a 2,118-scrimmage yard campaign in 2016, Johnson missed all but one game in 2017 with a wrist injury and struggled to make an impact in 2018, but now he’s healthy and working with a new coach in Kliff Kingsbury. You could also argue that receiver Amari Cooper (picked fourth overall by the Raiders) will shine moving forward in Dallas, considering the numbers he put up (725 yards and six scores in nine games) after being traded to the Cowboys last October. And I love Chargers running back Melvin Gordon (Round 1, No. 15 overall).

But no player, not even Johnson, has been able to stay at the highest point reached by Gurley. A knee issue seemed to limit him last season, but when Gurley is healthy, he plays like an MVP. In the four seasons since he entered the NFL, no one has more rushing yards (4,547), scrimmage yards (6,430), total touchdowns (56) or touches (1,229) than Gurley.

"Johnson's name came to mind right away when I first started working on this piece."@iamjohnthethird makes @Gil_Brandt's "DBs ready to break out" list. 🙌

— Los Angeles Rams (@RamsNFL) June 28, 2019

==

from: http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap3000001034666/article/jaire-alexander-among-defensive-backs-ready-to-break-out-in-19

…

2) John Johnson, S, Los Angeles Rams
Drafted: Round 3, No. 91 overall, in 2017.

Johnson’s name came to mind right away when I first started working on this piece. He really blossomed in 2018, logging 119 tackles and four interceptions — and that total doesn’t include the pick he recorded against Drew Brees in overtime of the NFC title game to set up the winning kick. I’m expecting Johnson to advance again in 2019 and join the ranks of elite NFL safeties. One of the reasons to feel good about him is the Rams’ addition of veteran safety Eric Weddle, who can serve as an important mentor. Johnson also appears to have an exceptional ability to find the ball — he’s one of those guys who seems to know where the ball is going before it’s thrown. This is an exceptional player who will get even better.

What we know about Kliff Kingsbury’s mysterious offense in Arizona

https://www.espn.com/blog/arizona-cardinals/post/_/id/31811/what-we-know-about-kliff-kingsburys-mysterious-offense-in-arizona

TEMPE, Ariz. — There are state secrets, and then there is first-year coach Kliff Kingsbury’s offense with the Arizona Cardinals.

Yes, they’ll have an offense — that much has been confirmed. Beyond that we’ve heard only whispers. What will it look like? Will it be a true Air Raid or an adapted one? Could he roll out a traditional, pro-style offense?

Unclear. One thing we know is that it doesn’t have a name yet.

“It’s an offense,” rookie quarterback Kyler Murray said when asked for a name. “An explosive offense.”

So there’s that.

After a voluntary veteran minicamp, three weeks of organized team activities and a mandatory minicamp, little is officially known about Kingsbury’s offense. In fact, Kingsbury said he has been tight-lipped about it because even he doesn’t know exactly what it’ll look like, and he might not until after the team gets through parts of training camp.

“I have a feeling how it’s going to go, but we’re going to do what we’re good at,” Kingsbury said.

Still, over the past two months, enough hints have been dropped that we can piece together an idea of the offense Kingsbury is developing. With a little bit of decoding and a few rounds of interviews through the locker room, here’s what we know about the Cardinals’ offense as we approach July:

It will utilize the shotgun. Earlier this offseason, center A.Q. Shipleysaid on The Pat McAfee Show that Arizona will be in shotgun “99%” of the time. While that is yet to be seen, what’s almost certain is that the Cardinals will likely play out of the shotgun a lot.

“Probably more shotgun’s our home, which is good because I did that in college, and we had a running quarterback,” running back David Johnson said.

The Cardinals also have a running quarterback in Murray. Also, Kingsbury said he likes what he has seen from the Kansas City Chiefs, who lost in the AFC Championship Game with second-year quarterback Patrick Mahomes, who, coincidentally, is a Kingsbury disciple. They went shotgun “80%-plus,” Kingsbury said.

It will be fast-paced. Johnson said the plan is go up-tempo — so much so that he said the offense will have to “get used to no-huddle.”

“We’re going to get the ball down the field as fast as we can,” Johnson said. “We’re trying to get a lot of plays in the game.”

Just how many plays is Johnson talking? About 90 to 95 per game, he said. That has never been done before, according to ESPN Stats & Information. No team has averaged 80 offensive plays per game. In fact, it’s rare for a team to run 90 plays in a game at all. There have been only 66 instances in which a team has reached that mark in a game, including overtime games, in the Super Bowl Era.

Even if it’s fewer than 90 on average, it’s sure to be a lot of plays, and thinking critically in an offense that fast will be the hardest part about playing in Kingsbury’s offense.

“You want to have that fine line of not thinking too much, but we want to have enough in that we can still be attacking,” Kingsbury said. “Kind of given the illusion of complexity out there. And so, I think when we start going fast, sometimes it freezes guys up, but once they get accustomed to it, they can pick it up.”

Kingsbury said the Cardinals aren’t going to play as fast as they can every play. The intention, he said, is to find a pace that’ll be comfortable for Murray, one that gives him a chance to see and evaluate the defense.

“I want him to be able to work in a good rhythm,” Kingsbury said.

It will spread the field. The Cardinals probably won’t spread the field the way Kingsbury did at Texas Tech. Kingsbury said some of his concepts from college won’t work in the NFL, but “you’re still spreading the field.”

The biggest adjustment for Kingsbury in developing his offense will be the hashmarks. In the NFL, they’re 18 feet, 6 inches apart. In college, they’re 40 feet apart, allowing for an entirely different type of spread offense to be employed. Kingsbury said he has used OTAs and minicamp — and plans to use training camp — to try new concepts with the shorter hashmarks.

However, Kingsbury said “a lot” of his spread concepts carry over. His is a plan that has his players excited.

Said Murray: “That’s what this offense does: puts people in space, makes defenders make decisions. I think it’ll be very dangerous.”

Said Johnson: “I think it’s going to be really helpful because only having to worry about one guy tackling you compared to three, four guys loading the box.”

It will be balanced. Even though Kingsbury is trying to keep his scheme a secret, there’s one misnomer floating around, he said.

People think “it’s going to be wide-open every single snap, throw it every play,” Kingsbury said. “That’s not what it’s going to be.”

That’s not what it has ever been, actually. In his six seasons at Texas Tech, Kingsbury’s running backs averaged more than 20 carries per game four times. The other two seasons, they averaged 19.2 and 19.6 carries per game. In Kingsbury’s last two seasons in Lubbock, his running backs peaked, averaging 26.7 carries per game in 2017 and 24.3 carries in 2018.

Kingsbury has been adamant that his offense will be fluid on a game-by-game, play-by-play basis.

“We just try to do things that we think the defense will struggle with,” Kingsbury said. “If it’s run it every play, we’ll run it every play. If we got to throw it a bunch, we’ll do that as well. Basically, take what they give you.”

Guard J.R. Sweezy broke it down in simpler terms: “It is the NFL. Everybody knows you got to be balanced.”

David Johnson will be a focal point. Johnson believes he’ll be used “similar” to how he was under former coach Bruce Arians in 2016, when Johnson had 2,118 all-purpose yards.

“I think I’ll be utilized as a running back and a receiver,” Johnson said.

The ratio of Johnson’s snaps at running back and receiver is yet clear, but he believes it’ll come down to the defenses more than anything else.

Kingsbury said Johnson “could have a pretty extensive role in this offense.” That could mean asking him to carry the ball 35 times or catch 10 passes, Kingsbury said. But balance will be necessary to keep Johnson fresh.

Final analysis? Cardinals outside linebacker Chandler Jones is among the players most qualified to opine on the team’s new offense. After all, he has already experienced the stresses that this still-developing offense can present.

“You just have to be sound in order to defend this offense,” Jones said. “Everyone has to do their job, and if you don’t, they’ll definitely catch you.”

We’ll know more in training camp, but it’s unlikely that Arizona will run any of its scheme during the preseason. We might not know what this offense will look like until the season opener against the Detroit Lions on Sept. 8.

No matter what it looks like, though, there’s one thing we know for certain.

“It’s going to be fun to watch,” Sweezy said. “It’s going to be real fun to watch.”

Mackeyser wrote:

Between medical issues and my damned “outta sight, outta mind” functioning, I’m just terrible at communicating, it seems.

Hi Mack. You’re always welcome. You know that. No apologies necessary. BUT I do worry. Medical issues? You okay?

Phillips expects Micah Kiser to step into larger defensive role

https://www.therams.com/news/phillips-expects-micah-kiser-to-step-into-larger-defensive-role

When the Rams selected linebacker Micah Kiser in the fifth round of the 2018 NFL Draft, they picked up a player who could come in and immediately contribute on special teams.

A Virginia product, Kiser led the ACC in tackles for three straight seasons before entering the league, becoming only the second player to ever do so. He translated that prowess to football’s third phase at the highest level, as he was on the field for 63 percent of Los Angeles’ special teams snaps as a rookie — finishing No. 4 in the category.

But now, according to defensive coordinator Wade Phillips, Kiser has a good chance to play in the Rams’ base 3-4 scheme as the second inside linebacker. Cory Littleton is still slated to be the club’s ‘Mike’ linebacker and defensive signal-caller. But Kiser could help fill the void left by the departed Mark Barron.

“I think for where he is in his career and where we need him, it’ll be in those first and second-down plays for sure,” Phillips said of Kiser’s role during the offseason program. “Cory is such a good coverage guy and then we’ve got a lot of safeties that can come in and help us on third downs, so I think his main role certainly right now will be first and second down as a base defensive player.”

And part of the reason why Phillips feels Kiser can be successful in that role is how he excelled on special teams — much like Littleton did for his first two years before transitioning to a full-time linebacker.

“Micah showed a lot of things last year, he came in, you always have high hopes I think, and he basically only got to play special teams. He was one of our best special teamers — you know Cory Littleton also went that path too, and turned out to be really good backer, and I think Micah is going in the same direction,” Phillips said. “When they show things, they show the ability to get to the football on special teams and they carry it over to defense and he moves well, he’s a smart player, and he’s had a really good spring. He’s fit in really well.”

Cameron DaSilva@camdasilva
NFL announced Rams OL Aaron Neary has been suspended 4 games for violating the substance abuse policy

==

Aaron Neary, a Rams practice squad lineman, will be suspended for the first four games of this NFL season: https://t.co/z1WItnHAPa

— Ryan Kartje (@Ryan_Kartje) June 28, 2019

The greatest game in NFL history?@Chiefs vs @RamsNFL was a downright CLASSIC! 👏#FlashbackFriday pic.twitter.com/45wtKL55fq

— NFL UK (@NFLUK) June 28, 2019

A Leap of Faith

link: http://www.sj39.com/leap-of-faith/

I’m only a few years removed from my NFL playing career, but I’m still around the game a lot in my work with NFL Legends. I can say with some certainty that the landscape has changed quite a bit.

The modern pro football player is a different type of player, and a different type of person than when I came into the league some 15 years ago. These guys have been famous or at least noteworthy for playing football for most of their lives. They’ve been superstars at every level. They’ve had Instagram and Twitter followers since they were in middle school.

On top of that, the game is faster than it’s ever been. The modern NFL athlete is built differently than I was, and certainly than those that came before me. Linemen on both sides of the ball are more athletic. Linebackers are smaller again. Running backs are shiftier. Athletes in the receiving corps and the secondary are doing things we’ve never seen.

The game has changed. It’s a different era of athlete.

So the old way of micromanaging, of telling guys what to do and how to do it, that’s kind of a thing of the past. It’s giving way to guys who are thinking the game and being innovative.

The Rams were one of the first organizations in the league to take notice of that.

So I want to give their front office some credit for the direction they took the franchise in two years ago, when they took the leap and brought in an unknown commodity to run the team.

Nobody knew how hiring Sean McVay was going to turn out.

Here’s a guy who is not that much older than the players he’s being hired to coach. That was something that was unheard of. And it wouldn’t have worked just anywhere, with any guy.

As a player, you only have so many years in the NFL. For those guys to buy into someone that was damn near their age, to come together and play hard and coach hard for each other, that’s something.

To me, what sets McVay apart is how he communicates with his players. He knows how to communicate with guys at their level, and gets them to buy in. Along with that, he takes care of them. That’s so important because when you ask people to buy into something, you’re asking them to trust you. He has earned a lot of trust from those guys. He’s figured out how to get them to buy in.

I think his closeness in age to them has actually been very beneficial for him, and for those players. He is able to understand these guys on a different level, to talk to them and bond with them through video games and other things. I know he does a ton of walkthroughs in the ballroom, to make guys understand their roles and put them in a position where when they get on the football field, they don’t need to think. They just react.

And they’re all in-sync when they get on the field. They do a lot of pre-snap motion that allows Jared Goff a good idea of what he’s dealing with. You force a defense to show their cards in how their formation shifts with a man or zone look. Then once he gets that, he knows right away what side of the field the ball is likely going to go to, because there are a lot of combinations being played. If they want to play a soft zone, that’s where Todd Gurley and the running game come in, and make them pay for protecting against the pass.

The timing of everything they do is impressive. That lets you know they’re a close-knit bunch, that they’re coached up right in their technique and that they’ve each accepted what they have to do on each play. They’re not panicking and reverting back to bad habits. They’re all executing their job the right way.

It’s why they are where they are and why—regardless of the outcome on Sunday—the future is bright for the Rams.

.@EricDickerson running wild! 🙌#LARams | #TBT pic.twitter.com/CDxAsqdcLW

— Los Angeles Rams (@RamsNFL) June 27, 2019

Gil Brandt lists John Johnson as breakout candidate in 2019 https://t.co/HnfrBxVm5s

— Rams Wire (@TheRamsWire) June 27, 2019

The time Steve McNair went 71 yards to seal the win. (Nov. 8, 1998) @Titans pic.twitter.com/ivDK1MACwk

— NFL Throwback (@nflthrowback) June 26, 2019

D’Marco Farr@DMarcoFarr1
Scariest QB I ever played against and that includes Elway, Favre, Marino, Kelly and Young! I’ll never forget the size of his neck. It made his helmet look too small for his head. And dude was ILB big. First time ever being cussed out by ENTIRE secondary for losing contain.