I'm not bothered about re-signing Omenihu, I think Young is a better rusher even if he's hot and cold. Tbh if we're rebuilding the DL I'd be interested in what a guy like Milton Williams will cost. I'd bet a guy like Derek Barnett costs a LOT less than Omenihu and probably gives you 80% of what he does. There's options.

I'd love to have him back but that seems like a lot.

McDuffie will demand a very large contract. They still need to sign several WRs, DT, and one of Bolton/Reid. They can free up money if Thuney leaves but will need to pay someone to replace him and Smith (who is probably gone).

I suspect I'm alone but I'd honestly have no interest in paying Karlaftis this.

Kind of been banging my head against the way trying to convince people of those physical limitations. He's...sound, reliable. But his best attribute has always been his motor. That's valuable, but not half as valuable as winning quickly, and he doesn't. He's benefitted from Jones and last year's sticky coverage affording him time.

Unless there's a big uptick in his pass rushing I'd let him see out his contract and move on.

Just depends on my options.

I mean at a point we do have to consider life beyond Jones and how that is going to look much MUCH different than what we have now. Moreover, Karlaftis looked at his absolute best this season against Pittsburgh when we DIDN'T have Jones out there.

I mean I don't think I'm letting him walk for a 3rd round comp pick or anything if we just don't have a better option to build a pass rush around. If we signed Young and he broke out, that's one thing.

But if you keep it steady as she goes, drafting and developing, and guys like FAU and Danna are the leftovers if Karlaftis walks and Jones ages out....well at that point you kinda HAVE to keep Karlaftis.

80% of what Omenihu gave us isn't far removed from Danna.

That's the thing, Omenihu is kinda the very least we can reasonably get from our #2 rusher.

I really don't think we can afford to pinch pennies and cut corners at that spot. We NEED that #2 rusher to be a guy who draws attention. Derek Barnett ain't gonna do that, IMO.

Ultimately the best approach to trying to get by on the cheap at RDE would, unfortunately, probably be baking on FAU to make a leap in year 3.

But I'm not super interested in another $7-10 million DL who's just...eh.

Give me the $14 million guy who's good or the $1 million young player who might be.

That mediocrity in the middle doesn't interest me any more than it did when we gave Danna his deal. Those just don't tend to work out well.

Well, yes. But I'm going on the fact he's just 23 right now, and should, SHOULD be lot's of room for improvement. And yes, we do have a lot of other pieces we need to decide what to do with.

He's pretty maxed out and there really wasn't much of a '3rd year leap' from him.

It's pretty rare for a guy to really move forward much from where Karlaftis is, especially when he's as physically mature as he's like to ever be.

The bend will just never get there. He can refine his hand-fighting and if that REALLY explodes forward, you have Hendrickson on your hands and kick yourself for losing him for the next half-decade.

But again, that doesn't happen often.

Eh - my answer's easy. You likely sign Bolton this off-season and you ABSOLUTELY get a McDuffie extension done the moment it's allowed by league rules.

Then you see what's left.

If you can still build a viable defense around GK and his contract - that's cool. But I think you may be better served signing Chase Young, getting a year with both of them and then moving GK for a 2nd rounder after you activate his 5th year option.

Whatever we do, it centers around McDuffie. It's not dissimilar to Mahomes in that regard -- the answer to the rest of the offense was "Get Mahomes done, spend what you have left"

That's how I'm approaching this defense as well. McDuffie is the only 'must sign' on it.

If Karlaftis had two more sacks and 15 less pressures people would be happy with him because they are enamored with sacks. He is exactly the kind of player you try and extend. He fits in the scheme, he’s productive, he’s reliable, no off field or ego issues, gives 100% all four downs.

Spend the money on the kid so you aren’t spinning your wheels with players like FAU, Kpass, Kaindoh and Speaks

Wasn't it Frank Clark that said "They don't pay me for pressures?"

The studies on pressures are interesting in that they are REALLY volatile. Some pressures just mean precisely dick. Almost all sacks, OTOH, mean a fair amount.

I'd trade 5 pressures for a sack 100 times out of 100. So honestly, I'm not sure your thesis there carries a ton of weight.

Many of those pressures just don't mean anything. Almost all of the sacks mean a lot.

It's also possible that the 'scheme' may not be the scheme for much longer.

If Spags takes a HC job, we may be working with a different scheme really quick.

My honest sense is if we NEED Karlaftis here, something has gone wrong or he's become a different player. Agreed re his Steelers game, that was pretty encouraging, so who knows. But really my conclusion is we should be prioritising the DL more and planning for both Jones and Karlaftis going, the former ageing out, the latter pricing himself out.

The DL has been so underwhelming I'm happy to blow it up outside of Jones. I can't believe we can't find better in FA than Omenihu and than Karlaftis in the draft in the next couple of years. Or improve via DT

Yeah that might be fair, I think Barnett is probably better than Danna and honestly not a million miles behind Omenihu, but I take the point. He was so cheap you could possibly wave goodbye to Omenihu and, say, Reid, and have Young and Barnett on the DL. I actually don't mind that outcome at all if it means quicker and more regular pressure from the DL.

Omenihu and McDuffie both need big contracts. Omenihu should get a nice chunk that will end up a huge bargain.

The moment Omenihu got back, the defense kicked it up a notch and the pass rush woke up and started being terrorizing QBs again.

Those 2 need to be here the next 5 years.

You guys are being ridiculous in your assessment of Karlaftis. He's in the top 30 in sacks every year. He's not a top 10 gamebreaker off the edge but he's sure as ****ing a good DE.