S197 wrote:
It depends on how you look at it. You could say he rebuilt a defense that was 2nd to worst in the league to #3 over a span of 3 years. I think special teams, with the exception of Walsh, has been rather good over the last couple years. That's 2/3rds of your team that is "rebuilt." Patterson is a big loss but getting a kicker who can make PATs mitigates kickoff returns given the new rules.
As for the offense, I think they're average O-line play away from making this a good football team. This team has beat good teams. Won on the road. Won the North title. They went from terrible to beating Green Bay IN Lambeau to take the division over the course of two years. I don't consider this a rebuilding year at all, I think last year was extraordinary, and outside of what can only be described as a ridiculous amount of injuries, the trajectory is still upwards.
Rebuilding? Not in my book. But that's just me.
Excellent post. Well said. I'm not sure why this is considered a "rebuilding year". We have to "rebuild" the tackle spots, guard, RB and some depth along the team. When has that ever been considered having to "rebuild"? A team never stops building. We're addressing holes. Not rebuilding. There is a gigantic difference between the two. Rebuilding is when you're getting rid of most of your roster/finding guys to replace others on MOST of your roster. We are not even close to doing that this year. In turn, that's not rebuilding.
For example, Seattle needs basically an entire OL, could use better WRs, haven't found a RB since Lynch (Lacy is a big question mark), are on the verge of getting weaker at CB and are weak at the DT spot. Does that mean they are rebuilding?? No they have holes to fill. And quite frankly, we've done a better job filling our holes so far this offseason than Seattle has. On probably a worse line than ours, they signed only Luke Joekel, who isn't very good at all. Signed Lacy who is a mystery and signed a safety that is simply depth. We filled both tackle spots, signed a solid RB and will probably draft another, added a much better backup QB and provided depth along the DL. I don't hear anyone saying a team like Seattle is rebuilding. So why are fans saying we are "rebuilding"? We aren't. We have to fill holes. Just like every single team in the NFL does every year. And we have to fill much less than a lot of teams out there (aka, the teams that are rebuilding).
I swear the words "rebuilding" and "bust" are by far the most overused/out of context words used on here and outside of here by a long shot. When you look at what they ACTUALLY mean and how fans use them, it really leaves me scratching my head.