Front office with Pioli and without

[PromisedLand]

I would like to start a thread for discussing whether the past year withouth Scott Pioli was better or worse, as far as personnel moves, than the previous 8 years with him. Many times people give SP credit for the team's HR "genius", forgetting that BB was always the top man and that no personnel moves were made without him. Still, if we look at the one year since he left vs the other years we can get some inkling of whether his influence was as positive as the conventional wisdom suggests, or not.

I haven't researched this, but I know some of you here know all this stuff by heart, but off the top of my head I would say the 09 draft was better than 08, and probably better than most of the 05-08 drafts. As far as non-draft moves, post-Pioli we have some free agents that didn't work out (Greg Lewis, Joey Galloway) but we have some of those when he was here too - Donald Hayes, Adalius, etc., and some poor draft high round draft picks such as Bethel Johnson and Chad Jackson.

So, please discuss.

 

[pats1]

I would like to start a thread for discussing whether the past year withouth Scott Pioli was better or worse, as far as personnel moves, than the previous 8 years with him. Many times people give SP credit for the team's HR "genius", forgetting that BB was always the top man and that no personnel moves were made without him. Still, if we look at the one year since he left vs the other years we can get some inkling of whether his influence was as positive as the conventional wisdom suggests, or not.

I haven't researched this, but I know some of you here know all this stuff by heart, but off the top of my head I would say the 09 draft was better than 08, and probably better than most of the 05-08 drafts. As far as non-draft moves, post-Pioli we have some free agents that didn't work out (Greg Lewis, Joey Galloway) but we have some of those when he was here too - Donald Hayes, Adalius, etc., and some poor draft high round draft picks such as Bethel Johnson and Chad Jackson.

So, please discuss.

Right, I think many would say the 2009 draft was one of the best in the Belichick era. It was just free agency and the trades that really **** the bed.

 

[BradyFTW!]

The draft was great, but Pioli was part of this draft, as far as the scouting process, draft board, etc. It'll be interesting to see how this next draft goes without him. As far as personnel moves, this past offseason was by far the worst of the Belichick era. We went into the season without a #3 WR, without a #1 CB, without anyone who could rush the passer, without a starting ILB opposite Mayo, and without a replacement for Seymour (which makes it even dumber that we had to replace Seymour at all). When's the last time the Pats went into a season with so many holes?

Just a terrible job by the FO all around.

 

[SoonerPatriot]

The draft was great, but Pioli was part of this draft, as far as the scouting process, draft board, etc. It'll be interesting to see how this next draft goes without him. As far as personnel moves, this past offseason was by far the worst of the Belichick era. We went into the season without a #3 WR, without a #1 CB, without anyone who could rush the passer, without a starting ILB opposite Mayo, and without a replacement for Seymour (which makes it even dumber that we had to replace Seymour at all). When's the last time the Pats went into a season with so many holes?

Just a terrible job by the FO all around.

I think Bodden was pretty solid. Is he a top 20 CB? No, but he'd be a solid No. 2. McGowan played well early but faded in the second half, or just before it.

Outside of that.....

Fred Taylor was a flop.

Shawn Springs was a flop.

Chris Baker was a flop.

Joey Galloway was a huge flop.

 

[Garbanza]

About the same. The drafts picks - with Pioli - HAVE SUCKED AND IS THE DEMISE OF THIS TEAM. Seriously - name one draft pick who is amazing (besides Mankins and Wilfork who weren't all all that 2day).

 

[pats1]

I think Bodden was pretty solid. Is he a top 20 CB? No, but he'd be a solid No. 2. McGowan played well early but faded in the second half, or just before it.

Outside of that.....

Fred Taylor was a flop.

Shawn Springs was a flop.

Chris Baker was a flop.

Joey Galloway was a huge flop.

Alex Smith, Michael Matthews, Derrick Burgess, Greg Lewis...

 

[Deus Irae]

The draft was great, but Pioli was part of this draft, as far as the scouting process, draft board, etc. It'll be interesting to see how this next draft goes without him. As far as personnel moves, this past offseason was by far the worst of the Belichick era. We went into the season without a #3 WR, without a #1 CB, without anyone who could rush the passer, without a starting ILB opposite Mayo, and without a replacement for Seymour (which makes it even dumber that we had to replace Seymour at all). When's the last time the Pats went into a season with so many holes?

Just a terrible job by the FO all around.

I suspect that a lot of people will be coming late to this party and pretending that they were saying this stuff all along.

You can't really blame them, though. The homers' "BB knows best and is above questioning" crap was completely destroyed by the game today, and by the season in general.

 

[BradyFTW!]

I think Bodden was pretty solid. Is he a top 20 CB? No, but he'd be a solid No. 2. McGowan played well early but faded in the second half, or just before it.

Outside of that.....

Fred Taylor was a flop.

Shawn Springs was a flop.

Chris Baker was a flop.

Joey Galloway was a huge flop.

I agree that Bodden is a solid #2 CB, but that still left us without a #1. If we had at least kept Hobbs, we would have had two #2s, but we didn't even have that.

 

[Rob0729]

I think Bodden was pretty solid. Is he a top 20 CB? No, but he'd be a solid No. 2. McGowan played well early but faded in the second half, or just before it.

Outside of that.....

Fred Taylor was a flop.

Shawn Springs was a flop.

Chris Baker was a flop.

Joey Galloway was a huge flop.

Taylor was injured for most of the year. So was Springs. Was that bad scouting?

 

[BradyFTW!]

I suspect that a lot of people will be coming late to this party and pretending that they were saying this stuff all along.

You can't really blame them, though. The homers' "BB knows best and is above questioning" crap was completely destroyed by the game today, and by the season in general.

Agreed, and the worst part is if you look at those holes, most of them were actually created this offseason, and not out of necessary.

Down a starting CB: should have just kept Hobbs
Down a #3 WR: Probably should have re-signed Gaffney
Replacing Richard Seymour: How about we just don't trade him in the first place?
Down a starting ILB: couldn't have been replaced with anyone already on our roster, but this was a well-known hole from the get-go. We hitched our wagon to Paris Lenon, and it didn't work out.
Down a pass-rusher: I'm a little disappointed that we didn't at least try to draft a pass-rusher (even at the time, I thought Sintim would have been better for us than either Chung or Brace). That said, I liked the Burgess trade at the time, and I still don't have it, so there is that.

 

[BradyFTW!]

Taylor was injured for most of the year. So was Springs. Was that bad scouting?

They're both historically injury-prone players in their mid-30s. The downside of signing guys like that is that they tend to get hurt.

 

[PromisedLand]

The draft was great, but Pioli was part of this draft, as far as the scouting process, draft board, etc. ...

I did a little research:

Tom Dimitroff was hired by the Falcons on 1/13/2008.
Scott Pioli was hired by the Chiefs on 1/13/2009.

So while SP may have been part of the scouting process, I doubt he had much to do with settng the draft board in 09. Likewise, SP can't really blame TD for the 08 draft.

 

[upstater1]

I agree that Bodden is a solid #2 CB, but that still left us without a #1. If we had at least kept Hobbs, we would have had two #2s, but we didn't even have that.

I would take Springs and Butler out there over Hobbs any day of the week.

Then again, KR was a weakness, so I'm not sure I wouldn't want Hobbs.

 

[Rob0729]

The draft was great, but Pioli was part of this draft, as far as the scouting process, draft board, etc. It'll be interesting to see how this next draft goes without him. As far as personnel moves, this past offseason was by far the worst of the Belichick era. We went into the season without a #3 WR, without a #1 CB, without anyone who could rush the passer, without a starting ILB opposite Mayo, and without a replacement for Seymour (which makes it even dumber that we had to replace Seymour at all). When's the last time the Pats went into a season with so many holes?

Just a terrible job by the FO all around.

Worst of the Belichick era? Do you remember 2005 (Tim Dwight, Duanne Starks, Chad Brown and Montey Beisel)? Or 2006 (Johnothan Sullivan Tebucky Jones, Doug Gabriel, absolutely no depth or starters at WR)? I think that this was not the worst of the Belichick era.

 

[Rob0729]

They're both historically injury-prone players in their mid-30s. The downside of signing guys like that is that they tend to get hurt.

Taylor was injury prone early in his career, not so much later years. You cannot control injuries. Plenty of players in their mid-30s play injury free while plenty of players in their early 20s get injred. The NFL is a crap shoot with injuries.