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Micheal Turner's 'security blanket' hasn't played a snap, and just signed a contract to do sports talk on the new 92.9 the game. ( does this city need 3 sports talkers?) The Rams released him in August.

I guess TD got that one right. Between Grimes and Ovie, I'd have to give a tip-o-the hat. Coming off injuries, TD didn't pay up. Tremendous foresight. Grimes is pine riding and Ovie is off to radioland!

...and Bosher is Punter of the Month. Always liked Ovie and am sorry his injury curtailed his career. At one point he was the highest paid FB in NFL history. I guess he was intended as a spread type FB for Petrino's system? Dimitrof has really done an exceptional job all around.

Grimes pine riding? Huh? I don't think that means what you think it means.

Yeah, TD really got it right when the Falcons have one of the worst running games in the league.

Of course TD got it right because when he cut Ovie during the first week of May, he knew that Ovie had already made the decision to work in radio this season. I guess TD knew what Ovie was going to do before Ovie really knew because Ovie obviously tried to give football one more shot by signing with the Rams, and working out for the Dolphins.

And they wasted a 5th round pick on a fullback that is going to be a ST player going forward, and that's...about...it.

The thing that "people" said TD got wrong was not cutting Ovie, it was cutting him when he did. The Falcons waited 8 weeks to reap the salary cap savings of cutting Ovie for no reason. It had zero positive benefits to the team, made even moreso when we use hindsight to judge these decisions due to Ewing's injury. And had they cut him sooner, maybe they could have taken the savings and plugged many of the numerous weaknesses that this team has at MLB, DT, WR, TE, FB, etc.

You're really reaching here...

If we really want to play this game, last October the Falcons worked out Mike Cox and Lousaka Polite to replace an injured Ovie. They ultimately chose Cox for whatever reason. Fast forward 10 months, and they bring Polite into the fold after TD's 1st choice for replacing Ovie doesn't work out (Ewing gets hurt). And then Polite proceeds to beat out Cox fairly easily with only 2-3 weeks of work, after Cox gets 10 months with the team.

So now Ovie Replacement Option B is now gone.

Then with Polite being Option C, he is mediocre during all the times when he's actually healthy enough to play.

And he's been outperformed by a converted center (Joe Hawley) and running back Jason Snelling.

Thus far, Options A, B, and C as replacements for Ovie have yet to work out. And in the big picture, their plans of re-establishing the physical nature of our offense, which clearly our off-season was devoted to with signing Manuwai, drafting Konz, and Holmes, and Ewing, has yet to work out because our running game is in fact much worse than it was last year. Which is odd considering Sam Baker and Garrett Reynolds are both improved, something TD did get right...

So why is that? It has nothing to do with TD's "exceptional" planning as far as the fullback goes, it has to do with the fact that he was unaware or ignored that one Michael Turner is/was well past his prime. And as some "people" have been saying over the past 10 months, he would no longer be able/capable of helping this team win football games on a week-to-week basis. You can thank Cyril for championing that cause.

Must've hit a nerve on the ol Pudgster~!

So let me get this straight.

The Falcons 'waited' 8 weeks to save some 'cap room', but I see it more like during those 8 weeks, they got a 'looksy' at Ovie ( and Grimes, later ) and decided to do the prudent thing. Sign Grimes for the one year, see if he can do it again or doesnt have the 'tude( answer, NO) . Release Ovie, draft a 5th rounder ( because this position is going away ), if HE can't do it: get Joe Hawley or Snailing or WHOEVER to do the job. But Ovie couldn't beat out a 5th round pick, a FB and Hawley Otherwise, we would have brought him back.

Or, sign him too early and watch him, injure ourselves on our dime. The fact that no other team in the league even sniffed him other then the Rams is telling. Nice guy. I bet he will be a better radio guy then Finneran. But I'll give TD props.

...Meanwhile a player taken 16 slots after Mr. Ewing is on pace to have over 1400 yards and 13 TDs this year, while Turner is on pace for a pedestrian 224 carries, 952 yards, and 8 TDs.

yeah, but can he speak well and help build innercity greenspaces? Yeah, didn't think so

TD comes through again! Viva La Dimitroff :dance:

What is telling about it, is as you said, it's a dying position. Which I think is the primary reason why Ovie hasn't signed, and the perception (fair or unfair) that he's damaged goods.

Look around the league, and your average starting FB only plays about 15-20 snaps per game. Several teams don't even use a fullback, just favoring 4-WRs and 2-TE sets almost exclusively (DET, IND, NE). In fact the Falcons are on the lower end of the spectrum in terms of FB usage this year.

And the majority of the current ones in the league are former UDFAs: Marcel Reese, Hynoski, Kuhn, Jovorskie Lane, Bruce Miller, Darrel Young, Jed Collins, Brit MIller, Chris Pressley, etc. And what has increasingly become the new trend is that teams are converting players from other positions. James Casey and Marcel Reese are former college WRs. Kuhn, Lane, Greg Jones, Charles Clay, Snelling, Mike Tolbert, Lex Hilliard, Matt Asiate, Nate Eachus, etc. were all RBs in college. Corey McIntyre, Erik Lorig, Bruce Miller, Will Tukuafu are college DEs. Side note: Interestingly enough all either played for Jim Harbaugh in college (Lorig) or currently play for him now (Miller & Tukuafu). Collins, Evan Rodriguez & Rhett Ellison were TEs in college. Michael Robinson was a friggin' college QB. Owen Marecic was a college FB, but pulled double duty and also played MLB. Basically there are literally a handful of guys currently in the NFL that were primarily fullbacks in college and remain fullbacks today.

What's my point? Is that teams have basically figured they can plug and play with fullbacks (as the Falcons have done with Hawley & Snelling).

Yet in the midst of all of this, the Falcons drafted one of these "traditional" fullbacks and he's currently languishing on IR, and will have to overcome a much more significant knee injury next year than Ovie had to this year. Yeah, TD really got that right.

Now I'd bet the real reason why the Rams cut Ovie and chose Brit Miller at FB is (1) because Miller has been one of their more productive ST players over the years, (2) was paid roughly the same amount of money as Ovie was due to make for them, (3) and in the zero sum game that was their roster decision and they felt that as a 26-year old coming off an ACL tear was a much smarter investment than a 32-year old coming off an MCL tear. And (4) given that Miller is currently graded as the 10th best blocking FB on Pro Football Focus (compared to say Polite who is 40th out of 43 FBs), it seems like good ol' Les Snead comes out glowing.

Now, my stance has never been against the outright cutting of Ovie. The Falcons saved $3 million against this year's cap by cutting him. And was Ovie's value to this roster worth losing that $3 million savings? No.

My stance was always against the timing of cutting Ovie. Reaping that $3 million in savings on May 8 is practically worthless. Because 95% of the FAs that will do anything in the upcoming season already signed deals weeks/months before.

And that $3 million, had it been reaped on March 13 when free agency began, could have been put towards adding any number of significant components that would have helped this team to a much greater degree than Bradie Ewing, Mike Cox, or Lousaka Polite have in the time since.

With their decision to draft Bradie Ewing, it was clear that they had made the decision long before draft day (and subsequently May 8) that they were going to cut Ovie. We have to presume that in order to do the pre-draft work on Ewing, they had to make that decision by late March or early April at the very latest if not in February/early March when draft boards really get finalized for most teams.

So let's assume that after watching Ewing work out on his March 8 pro day, within the next week they had really made the decision that they wanted him, which also coincides with the beginning of free agency. Let's assume that TD is good at his job and that the decision to draft Ewing wasn't some willy nilly decision made the morning of the draft, but instead was one of several moves planned out weeks/months in advanced...

So with that assumption, why did the Falcons then decide to wait another 2 months to cut Ovie? Why did Mr. Dimitroff decide to sit on the $3 million in cap savings for 2 months?

Someone please explain to me what that was the smart(est) move? How did that benefit the team?

So TD got it right with how he's handled this entire fullback situation this year? You can praise TD for many things, but this is not one of them. It's by no means a clusterfudge, but the Falcons have yet to come up smelling like roses in regards to the fullback position.

In fact, I'd bet money that next year you'll see the Falcons move more towards the popular 2-TE based offense than one that uses a traditional FB like Ewing or Ovie.

TD>Pudge

[quote="Pudge]
So with that assumption, why did the Falcons then decide to wait another 2 months to cut Ovie? Why did Mr. Dimitroff decide to sit on the $3 million in cap savings for 2 months?

Someone please explain to me what that was the smart(est) move? How did that benefit the team?

.[/quote]


sure thing. They could not 'tell' in those two months how well Ovie was 'healed up'. They decided to wait, since it wasn't as much a priority to fill the FB slot.

After they got a good look under the hood, they saw this motor was broken. And then ALL 31 other teams did the same: and came to the same conclusion. Which is why were not paying 3 million for a pine rider.

Next year who grades out to be a better football player? Ewing or Ovie? Im betting Ewing.

Thomas got this one right! Give the man his soy based cheese!

I wholeheartedly agree with that. I don't think I'm smarter/better than TD. I hope TD in such a high regard that I'm in fact disappointed by what he's done the last few years.

I think TD did as good a job as humanly possible his first 18 months on the job, starting from his hire of Mike Smith to where he extended Roddy's deal. Really the only bad move/decision he made during that time period was drafting Peria Jerry in the 1st round. Jerry was a 2nd round talent, and the Falcons would have been better off using the #24 pick on Moore, and the #55 pick on Jerry. Had that been the case, he would have continued his perfect streak.

But right after the Gonzo trade and the Roddy extension, the bad moves started piling up to the point that now 3 years later, the scale is balanced. And the problem is that he makes a lot of good little moves, but all of his big moves are bad ones.

And the point of contention is that people believe that TD continues to do an 'exceptional' job because of the product currently on the field. And I don't think that is the case really at all. Because the reason why the product on the field is so good is mainly because of moves he made during his first 18 months on the job: 1-hiring Mike Smith, 2-signing Turner, 3-drafting Ryan, 4-extending Babs & Roddy, 5-inheriting Abe, 6-drafting Moore, 7-keeping Grimes, 8-trading for Gonzo, etc.

Not to say everything he's done since then has been terrible moves, but for every good move there is a bad one that cancels it out.

All what TD did built up to 2010. And to turn around this team so quickly from where it was to turn it into what it was in 2010. But look where it is now? This 2012 team coudl beat the 2010 team, certainly. In a Best of 7 series, I think it's going to 7, and I would probably give the 2012 team the edge just because Ryan is better than he was then. But other than Ryan (through natural progression) and Julio at WR, where is this team better than it was in 2010? Not at RB, TE, OL, pass rush, run defense, LB. They're better in the secondary.

And most people would just brush that off and say, "Oh well, Rome wasn't built in a day." But what people keep forgetting is that the reason why two-thirds of this roster has regressed is because of decisions he made. He's traded too many picks and missed on the majority of FA signings.

You can find posts on this board from me back following 2010 of me saying that I think this team was 2 good off-seasons away from really being special. And what happened? 2 bad off-seasons. And he killed all of the built up goodwill he had with me. And it's not like it was because somebody got hurt which is why a move turned out bad, it's because he made the classic mistakes that unexceptional GMs make all of the time, by overpaying for average talent (see Dunta & Ray Edwards). And why was he forced to overpay those guys? Because he had either neglected or missed on too many CBs/DEs in the draft. And he overpaid for Julio Jones, giving away 3 or 4 quality players, when he didn't need to do that. We didn't need to give up that to get a better No. 2 WR than Michael Jenkins. Hell, a 2nd or 3rd round pick would have sufficed.

And even if you believe he got this whole fullback/Ovie situation right (which he didn't), it doesn't compare to the BIG THINGS he's got wrong.

You're right TD > Pudge. But I shouldn't be finding this much ammo to shoot holes into record so easily.

And the problem is that TD is put into this pantheon of Great GMs for stuff he did 2 years ago. As I've said for months now, he doesn't compare to the other elite GMs, because if you were to measure him against those guys, it wouldn't even be close. But for the majority of this fan base, all that has to happen is that he has to outperform Rich McKay and Ken Herock, and they will happily swallow the BS that he serves them.

And finally if/when that rotten smell in the state of Denmark comes wafting up, they won't blame Thomas Dimitroff, they'll blame Matt Ryan.

Are there five GMs better than TD?

Yes. But not more than 10 or so. But if you're looking only at his last 2 years, then he's not top 10.

Name them, please. I'm not saying I disagree. Just interested to see who is better and look at their record. It gets a bit harder to do his job when your team is winning and the top picks are no longer yours. We (Pudge) can nit pick all we want but the fact remains that the team is in better shape than it has ever been. Forest and trees sometimes.

5 consecutive winning seasons after a 40 year run, 3 playoff apperances, this team is now 'on the radar'

This after the flaming trainwreck of VickTrino.

you have to look at the whole picture.

give props

I think we are doing some knit picking here myself. Big picture TD has been great. No one bats a 1000. I think it's a bit early to judge what he's done the last two years. As for better GM's the only guy I'd rather have is the guy from the Giant's whose name is escaping me at the moment.

TD has made one fantastic decision, and several smaller good decisions. He's also made several bad decisions. We are only talking about how great TD is because of Matt Ryan. Without Matt Ryan, TD would get FAR more criticism than he does currently. Without Matt Ryan, I figure we would have lost at least 3 more games every year since he's been here. That's 12 additional losses over the past 4 years. We would not have had back to back winning seasons, and we would have made the playoffs once.

Speculation on your part, Robert. Do you mean if TD had been an idiot like me and drafted Dorsey instead? There is no telling what we would have done and MR is only one piece to his puzzle. Disregarding Mike Smith's impact--something Pudge also does--is a mistake. I'vebeen wrong plenty of times from the Peanut Gallery. I thought the JJ deal was a mistake also but I find it hard to argue with macro results. Every year as a team the falcons seem to break another record...back to back sinning seasons, back to back playoff appearances, undefeated through six games, winning more games in a four year time span than virtually any team in the league. Pretty heady stuff for the Liuttle Engine That Couldn't. And, FWIW, I don't think McKay did ahorrible job in the role other than the coaching hires and the extenuating circumstances he dealt with give him a partial pass.

5 better GMs:

Bill Belichick (if that counts), Rick Smith (Texans), Ted Thompson (Packers), Jerry Reese (Giants), Ozzie Newsome (Ravens).

If you were to put him 6th, I wouldn't argue against that.

Is it nitpicking? Absolutely. As I've said numerous times over the past 6-8 months, if winning 10 games every year and losing in the 1st or 2nd round of the playoffs is fine in your book, then TD is excellent. The analogy I use is the glass is 75% full. And if you can take that glass of water and gulp that down and have your thirst sated, then so be it. I don't fault anybody for that because as you've all said, in the big picture you have a relevant and good Falcon team, and there hasn't been a better 5-year period of being a fan of this team.

But if there is part of you that wonders why the remaining 25% of the glass isn't getting filled, then I think you have to start to point some of the fingers at TD. All of them? No. But while many people want to heap all/most of the blame at the feet of Matt Ryan and his subpar arm strength or testicular fortitude, I think the bigger issue here is how the team is run organizationally.

I think TD has run this team in recent years at a subpar level. If "par" is determined by what the other top GMs are doing.

We aren't mining the later rounds and undrafted pool for talent quite on par with what I think other teams under good GMs are doing.

I think most fans are content because they don't spend as much time thinking about the little things this team does (or does not do) to make themselves better. The fact that they retained Brett Romberg for 2 months as a completely unnecessary 3rd center on last year's roster flies completely under most people's radars. But for over-analytical, undersexed nerds like me, stuff like that sticks in my craw. Why couldn't that have been used for a player like Leonard Davis?

It's sweating the small stuff that is going to be what fills the remainder of the glass. It's not giving up half a draft for a complementary receiver that is going to put you over the top. It's those small seemingly inconsequential detaials that when added up together make a lot larger difference.

I consider myself to be a well-informed fan, certainly smarter than your average guy on the street. And a lot of what I've learned over the years I've pilfered from Thomas Dimitroff, by seeing the things he did early here in Atlanta. But in recent years, IMO he's gone away from those things that caused him to have that initial success and really blow me away with how much I didn't know 3-4 years ago.

I think it's the same thing that Rich McKay did. He abandoned the long-term plan for the sake of winning now. And that never works. You don't build championship teams in just 3-4 years. It's an extremely rare occurrence. It consistently takes 7-10 years.

The difference is that with McKay, the bottom fell out for him because he hitched his wagons to Michael Vick and Jim Mora. TD has hitched his to Matt Ryan and Mike Smith, and so if/when the bottom falls out, you're still probably going to be an 8-8 or 9-7 team.

I think he's missed a bunch of opportunities these last few years and I think the price to be paid is this team maintains the status quo. And again, I know I'm in the minority of people that aren't content with the status quo. But I do know that if the Falcons again disappoint this January, then I'm going to have to make it easier on myself and find a way to get right with the status quo. I'll have to accept that the Falcons are just the NFC's version of the San Diego Chargers.

Blank gets a pass on impatience?

Pudge named five, and I think there are five others that all can compete for that 6 spot.

TD did a really good job year 1, obviously. But from there, the OL has been a consistent issue and all the OL picks have been misses. Shouldn't Hawley or Johnson have been quality starters? I had us taking Jimmy Graham or Emmanuel Sanders in the 3rd and Geno Atkins in the 5th that year. Instead we took two OL who don't play. That happens each year, not just occasionally. TD starts really reaching in the third round (Owens, Dent, etc.) and simply doesn't hit enough home runs in the 1st round to do that.

The Ravens consistently hit doubles or homeruns in the first, and that enables them to get the steady guys in the midrounds. On the other hand, you have other FO's who seem to be great at finding late round talent. That's a viable method as long as you still hit doubles in the 1st.

Basically, if you keep taking low ceiling, high floor guys in the draft, and limiting your number of picks, you're going to be a very solid team that doesn't beat itself often, but can't play against the best of the best. That's what we are. I like TD, I just wish he wouldn't get cutesy. There are always a lot of good players in the 3rd, and he consistently takes a 5th round graded guy. If you're smart enough to know a guy is a good value, be smart enough to know where to take him.

If Baker and Jerry were dominant forces (Ravens model) Dimitroff would look close to the top. Otherwise, if he were taking your Graham's, Sanders, Atkins etc. in the 3rd to 5th, he'd be tops. Otherwise, he needs to stick to a very solid plan of hoarding picks and choosing linemen in the early rounds and focusing on quantity of weapons (2TEs, 3WRs, 2RBs all viable). I have trouble discerning if he has a definite plan.

For instance, this year, I, as an idiot fan, wanted to dump Turner and Mughelli early and use that money to get a FA RB along with FA talent on the OL. That would have freed up the entire draft for skill positions (2nd TE anyone?, 3rd WR anyone?, RB who can run and catch anyone? fast OLB?) I fail to see how we wouldn't be a much better team (at the same cost) had we done that. It's things like that that give me pause. We could have taken a proven RG and RB in FA, shifted to a passing offense, and since we addressed the OL in FA, get the weapons for that offense in the draft. Sometimes it just seems like they don't have a plan, and they compound the problem by falling in love with 6th rounders in the 3rd round. Luckily, their great 1st year, combined with Smitty/Ryan have given the FO some latitude to make a few mistakes. I'd just like them to use that latitude to build a team laden with deep talent, instead of the Mike Johsnon's, Akeem Dent's, Chris Owens of the world.

Of course he does. He's a businessman, not a personnel guy. I'm not saying that TD shouldn't try to win ASAP but there is a right way and a wrong way. And I don't pretend to have the answers as to what constitutes the right way but I also shouldn't find it so easy to shoot holes into TD's methods. I go back to 2010 and it looks like everything that TD did the three previous years constituted some genius plan. That was Phase One. Hire Smith, sign Turner to carry the offense initially until Ryan is ready, get Tony to give Ryan a No. 2 target, and build up the defense in the 2009 & 2010 drafts/offseasons. F-ing brilliant.

Phase Two was then supposed to kick in following 2010. I figured it would be start to center the offense around Ryan, replace the aging components of Phase One (e.g. Turner, Gonzo, Abe, etc.), continue to build up the defense, etc. I don't know exactly. These seemed like good general strategies but I trust the Vegan Jesus would come up with something brilliant as he did before. But what happens? They basically continue Phase One. Trade away key draft picks for a complementary receiver with the intention that they remain a Turner-centric offense and they stand pat on an average defense.

I hope it works, but I doubt it. In Michael Holley's book you basically learn that TD admits to abandoning the "The Process" after 2010 essentially because he figured that he had already built Rome in 3 years. Well if he did he'll be the first.

OK, Sergio Kindle, a second round LBer from last season just got cut by the Ravens. Aside from the JJ deal--which was fairly radical--and P. Jerry I think his picks have been pretty much "norm." Pudge, you preached against the Turner acquisition for quite a bit if memory serves. The proof will be in the pudding, I guess, over the next few years if the "lost" draft of 2011 bites us. We have always seemed to spend tons of pick son OL--even before TD--with limited success....or else where they succeeded elsewhere somewhat. I get the feeling if we don't win a SB you can say, "See?" and if we do but don't win two you can say, "See?"

When your owner--the guy who signs your check--calls and attends a presser after the season to halfway spank you publicly for losing in the playoffs that says, "I'm not getting any younger, Thomas. I want to win now." Blank is notorious for this kind of thing. Remember the full page ad of apology in the AJC after we got whipped on MNF? Who does that? You don't think that impacts draft day?

Tis true we do not get as many street FAs as some teams...like NO. We have had a few busts but everyone does. Easy to forget Brian Brohm when your QB is Rodgers and you have won a SB. I get your point but I think you overstate it.

Name a 3rd or 4th round pick from last year's draft that would have had the immediate impact that Julio Jones had. Name one that would demand double coverage on a consistent basis...I think the Julio Jones trade was necessary. Sure, TD may have missed on a Victor Cruz or two, but look what it did for Ryan's numbers in a sub-par offensive scheme.

Not many teams can say they have the offensive weapons we have. And the defense seemed to get better with a flick of the wrist once Brian "Cover 2" Van Gorder moved on.

Could TD have done a better job? I think so. I'd agree that we have far too many lower-tier players on this roster. But i don't think he gets as much credit as he deserves sometimes. I mean, look at the Sam Baker decision. And he didn't give up on DeCoud either when he was pretty soft in BVGs scheme for a while. Who knows what Peria Jerry wouldve been if not for the injury. And the jury is still out on Peters, imo. Given the circumstances, what other options did he have beyond Ray Edwards and Dunta Robinson? And Spoon was a great first round choice apparently. I mean, cut the guy some slack.

I don't think he's done a flawless job, but i think this team has greatly underachieved. For the past four years we've had enough talent to win multiple playoff games, the coaching just wasn't there.