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With the huge news on the likely departure of Carl Nicks, do you break the bank on him? I'm aware that the Falcons need a right guard, but to me a left tackle is much more valuable. It wouldn't be a bad move to get Nicks, but ti will certainly cost a fortune. It would also be nice to stick it to the Saints, but for me they should avoid getting Nicks with bigger needs around.

No. If the Falcons are going to guarantee $20+ million to any one player, it should be Brent Grimes, not Carl Nicks.

Ben Grubbs is also a free agent Plan B. Although honestly, if I was the Falcons I would go after Shawn Andrews over both of them.

Honestly I have always believed that if you have a strong group of interior lineman then you can get by without A1 talent at the tackle position especially if you have a QB with good pocket mobility. In NO Strief and Bushrod are not blue chip OTs but because the inside of their line is so stout he is able to escape a lot sacks because he has room to step up in the pocket (until he ran into SF). So would I break the bank, probably not but after Grimetime the number one priority is to sure up the inside of the offensive line. So the addition of Grubbs would be welcomed if Nicks places himself out of the Falcons price range, but it would seem that he want a crack at the team that deemed him expendable twice a year. My offseason priorities are as follows:

1A. Resigning Grimes & Abe (If you cant reach a deal with Grimes Slap him with the franchise tag until you figure it out)
1B. Offensive line (RG & LT)
2. Restructuring of some the contracts on the roster (We will see if the "Falcon Filter" is true are these guys the consumate team players like TD preaches or are they the same selfish athletes that are all over the league and have yet to get in trouble)
3. A seam stretching TE
4. Resigning Thomas Decoud

If we cannot get Abe back or if we can I think we should contact the colts about Dwight Freeney I mean if they blow up that team and start over they owe it to him to send him to a contender . If that falls through Robert Mathis is a FA and he has said he would like to finish his career with the Falcons since he is from Atlanta.

I don't think that resigning Abe is a mission critical thing at this point in time. He's like 35 years old. He goes missing for extended periods of time. He can make an impact when he wants to, but I just don't see him as someone that we should be throwing a lot of money at. If he's willing to come back for LESS money, then great. But I really don't think he's worth top money at this point.

I would like to see Grimes come back, but I often wonder if we give a crap about him at all. We didn't work out his contract at the end of last year... We didn't seem to do anything about renewing it during the year. Now we read in the papers that we're prepared to move on without him. Again, I think we're dumb as crap if we just let him walk, we should at least franchise him and trade him.

Offensive line is a no-brainer. But I am not convinced that all we need to do is RG and LT. I'm tempted to move Clabo to RG and go after a RT and LT. Even doing that, I think we need to bring in another guard to challenge Clabo and Blalock. I doubt that we'll be able to effectively address the line this off-season.

Restructuring is tricky. It would be curious to see if they make any moves on that front. At this point, Robinson, Turner, and Mughelli are the only ones that really make any sense to me.

I doubt that we're going to get a seam stretching TE this year... Actually, I think that we might already have one on the roster, but he hasn't seen the field yet... Kerry Meier. He might be a bit undersized.

Resigning Decoud would be like #20 on my list. Going after a FA safety would be higher on my priority list. Decoud is not good.

Wouldn't hurt my feelings a bit. Give me Blalock, Hawley and Nicks and I promise you'll see us pick up 3rd and shorts, 4th and 1's. Add a LT at some point and I'll shut up about the O-line and that's something I haven't done in 15 years...

Why haven't we heard anything about Mike Johnson? I mean we draft him in the world 3rd round and he still hasn't even sniffed the field. This guy is supposed to be really versatile and is certainly bigger than Hawley. I don't like Reynolds or Hawley unless they are backups. I say we should move Johnson in at C and sign a roadgrader to play RG. Svetek might be able to handle things at LT until we draft a proper replacement.

Because he got hurt and prior to that couldn't beat out Reynolds. Remember Hawley stepped up and played better than those counted on to play guard. Guard isn't his future as a Falcon, it's at center...

I would really like to see what Johnson has at RG, but man its hard to wait and see what he has and a player like Nicks could be hitting the market. Johnson was really good at Alabama especially in the run game. The only thing is he is not a good pass protector, back when we drafted him and I looked up all of his scouting reports the one constant was the "lack of lateral movement." The only problem I have with this situation is that if we sign Nicks what do we do with Johnson we will have three spots on the O-Line tied up with big money contracts RG,RT, and LG that leaves the C and LT positions for him to compete at and with Hawley being the "future at center" that only leaves LT and he is not built for that. I would hate to have drafted him in the 3rd round and not let him have a chance of making it to the starting line up but Nicks is the sure thing. All in all I think I would pursue Nicks just for the simple fact that he is a Saint and I need Ryan to stay clean back there when he went down in that DET game this year I almost went into a deep depression.

I understand Johnson got hurt, but he wasn't hurt all season. I don't know the extent of his injury, but I doubt it was bad enough to keep him down all year. The he should been given a chance to help. I expect a third round pick to begin a chance and not go sign someone when we haven't even seen what he can do. I say sign a LT and maybe draft 1 or 2 guys on to OL and see what happens.

that strikes me as very very odd, too. you think we would have tagged him by now....

I disagree. After Grimes, Abe should be the 2nd priority re-signing on the team's list ahead of Lofton and others. Abe is the only pass rusher on this team that at any point during the last 8 weeks of the season decided to show up on a regular basis. I too wouldn't break the bank for him (I'm envisioning something that doesn't pay him more than $10M over the next 2 yrs), but if we lose him and don't adequately replace him with some stud in the draft (doubtful w/o 1st round pick), or sign Robert Mathis, or Ray Edwards suddenly becomes an even better player than he was in Minnesota, the Falcons pass rush is going to be TERRIBLE next year! If you thought 2009 and 2010 were bad, if you thought '06 was bad where Kerney & Abe were hurt for most of the year, and we had to rely on the likes of Chauncey Davis, Paul Carrington, and Josh Mallard to provide much of our rush, then 2012 might put all of those years to shame.

And if you couple that with the team not re-signing Grimes, and having coverage that makes the '09 season look great. Robinson is a better fit in Nolan's scheme than he was in BVG, but that doesn't mean he's going to be good. And Franks/Owens have a lot to prove at the other spot. Like I said in another thread, they should enter this summer as the No. 4 and 5 corners, not the No. 2 and 3 guys.

So unless the Falcons pass on keeping those guys, and go out in FA and spend some serious money on other guys, this is setting up for a disastrous year on defense.


Who are you going to sign that is better? DaShon Goldson? Brodney Pool? Jim Leonhard? Reggie Nelson? LaRon Landry? Goldson has 6 picks and that makes everyone think he's the next Ed Reed, and he definitely has it going for him that he was drafted by Mike Nolan. But up until this season, he definitely wasn't better than DeCoud. Singletary was high on his potential, but he never quite lived up to it under him. And that makes me think it's either the Vic Fangio scheme or the contract year boost.

Could he wind up being better? Sure. But are you going to pay him to find out? $10 million guaranteed and $5M/yr.? Or would you prefer to sign DeCoud back for like $3M/yr. and like $3-5M guaranteed?

I think both Pool and Leonhard are better. But Pool is an underwhelming run defender, and Leonhard hasn't made it through the past two seasons healthy. And Landry is a good player but he's always struggled when asked to play FS.

I was just saying that DeCoud isn't a, "priority," to me. Before I decide to even re-sign him, I'd check out who else is available and determine if we consider Safety to be a critical position. From my experience with the NFL, the middle of your defense is the most important part. DTs are your anchor, ILBs/MLB and Safeties are your playmakers. If you can pay a bit more money to bring in someone better than you have at those spots, then you should do it.

Another great post Pudge, you can't simply let your best pass rusher by far and your best coverage guy by far go at the same time and not expect a disaster. Hopefully we can get Abe for 3yrs 18 million or less. Grimes 4 years 40 million or less. While I'd love to have Nicks the team only has so much money and we paid top dollar for the road grating stud that is Justin Blaylock last year

I get that. I'm just contending with the notion that I know many here and elsewhere in the fan base have that DeCoud is infinitely expendable. It's not a strong safety draft class, many of the good juniors failed to come out, and this is a week FA class if you ask me. When your top FS are Pool, Leonhard, Goldson, DeCoud, and Michael Griffin, there are no clear-cut upgrades IMO, at least in the sense that there are definitely guys out there that are worth premium dollars like an Eric Weddle or Nick Collins type would be.

I just wonder who are you really waiting for? If you were to sign DeCoud to a similar deal that we paid Erik Coleman back in '08 before free agency started, what player is going to be a significantly better player for a significantly lower price? Whose going to be a significantly better player that's worth paying significant more than that?

I personally don't see that player out there. And for me, with that in my mind, I'd just rather maintain some continuity with DeCoud if that can be had at a modest price. Now I know that may not be the most popular opinion on the matter, because I know the most popular opinions around DeCoud center on the believe that he is an atrocious safety. Which I don't think he is.

Yeah, I don't think that he's horrible... I just don't think that he's good. I think he's not good... Average/Below average. Again, not among our biggest priorities. I can agree with your comments on continuity.

I get that. I think there are probably 3 priorities for the Falcons on their own FAs: 1-Grimes, 2-Abe, 3-Lofton. Grimes you have to keep, Abe you want to keep unless he wants some big contract, and Lofton is worth keeping assuming he doesn't want to be one of the more highly paid LBs out there as well.

After that, you have a glut of players that I think you want back, but aren't going to exactly shed tears if they get the opportunity to test the market. Those players would include DeCoud, Douglas, Snelling, Kelvin Hayden, Mike Cox, Mike Peterson, James Sanders, Eric Weems, and Kroy Biermann.

For me personally, I would probably place DeCoud at the forefront of that group as guys I would prioritize worth coming back simply because I think the quality of the FA/draft class at safety is so weak and the nature of the FS position makes it so that I think continuity there is important.

IMO, Hayden and/or Weems are probably the only other guys I might put above them, simply based off Hayden becomes a higher priority if you lose one of your starters at CB, and Weems because I don't see any obvious return men that are impending FAs that are obviously better.

I'd put a higher priority on Douglas, but replacing Douglas probably wouldn't be that difficult. That said, I fully expect Douglas to go elsewhere and do as well as Laurent Robinson is doing if we don't keep him.

I don't put that much emphasis on Douglas mainly because he's not a great fit in a vertical offense. If the Falcons really want to maximize the vertical potential of their offense, they will target a No. 3 receiver in a similar mold as Laurent Robinson that can play inside/outside. Andre Caldwell, Mark Clayton, Earl Bennett are capable slot receivers that are probably better fits. The Falcons could try and get Mike Sims-Walker, and then move Jones to the slot. Or even a reclamation project such as Devin Thomas, Anthony Gonzalez. Or you could go after Chaz Schilens, Devin Aromashodu, or Bryant Johnson as guys that tend to be "purer" vertical options.

In a vertical offense that has maximized it's potential, Douglas should only be a No. 4 receiver.

Obviously, the Falcons won't do this because they have no real long-term vision for this offense/team, but while I'm a Douglas fan, I'd let someone else overpay him to be a 30-40 catch receiver.