This group is one of the more interesting off-season stories to follow in my opinion. I suspect we'll be unable to retain Wilson as some team out there will be infatuated with his cover skills and will offer him a sizeable contract.
Count me in as someone that does believe Barr's full value is not encapsulated by PFF grades. But his contract is difficult to swallow. I don't see how they don't re-work his contract as I simply cannot see Zimmer letting him go. Given the lack of depth at the position, I don't think they can let Barr go. Which leads me to the last off-season LB story...
...which is can the Vikings have success in drafting or acquiring depth for this position? It's been a feast-or-famine position for the Vikings when it comes to the draft. Obviously they've had a couple of home runs at the position, and while it's not a position they've drafted very often, most have been in and our of the league with the exception of Ben Gedeon and Gerald Hodges (interesting story as to why he was traded to the 49'ers).
Bottom line, the Vikings either need to either find a quality depth LB in the draft or find one in FA, especially with Wilson likely gone.
I believe that Barr needs to be restructured and kept around. First of all he likes zimmer which probably is hard to do, more importantly regardless of data driven value numbers he knows the defense, he is solid but again his number has to go down. I absolutely think he would be open to a restructured deal to stay in a place that he is obviously very comfortable with.
Question for Friday. Reilly Reiff would have gotten a bonus based on him playing most snaps. But the Vikings kept him out of the last game against Detroit. Did the Vikings find a way to pay him the bonus?
Rieff had to sit out because of COVID protocols.. haven't heard whether they found a way to pay him that bonus or not. They usually don't make those things public. They definitely should
Hang on a minute, sir. We have a clear before/after picture with Kendricks, but what is the evidence of Barr's impact? By expected points, the D gave up -14 in the win against GB (sans Barr) and -28 in the loss (with Barr). If one prefers yards allowed it's 522 with vs 400 without. So to the limited extent there are actual data, they reject the premise. Of course, it's possible that with Barr for 16 games the D is much better, but it's also possible/more likely that with an actual NFL d-line the D is much better without Barr and Wilson looks like a star.
It's nice (and all too common) to say that something can't be measured, but that also means we don't know if it actually exists. Given the individuals involved, you're right that the most likely outcome is a restructure--in which case the details matter a lot--but that doesn't make it the correct decision.
Barr is very good at what he does, but what he does simply isn't that valuable.
I agree the cap hit vs. performance do not match up but using the GB game doesnt really add up. Barr played nearly 100% of snaps on defenses that ranked in the top 5 for four years. I also believe Zimmer (and you can see it on tape) when he talks about the things that go beyond box score stats. He's a very good player and on a different level than Wilson but it's about how much they can afford to spend for the difference.
One should be hesitant to conclude anything about 2 games. But, it's what we have and they don't show a with/without case for Barr (whereas, eg, the two Bears games do for being with/without Kendricks).
The main point is we disagree about your conclusion that the defence suffered materially this year because of Barr's absence. He has been a very good player, albeit with the benefit of excellent defensive lines in front of him. It's possible Wilson would have looked nearly/just as good with, e.g., Griffen/Richardson/Joseph/Hunter in front of him.
Again, Barr is very good at what he does. He makes the defence better, not worse. However, this is a cap league and he's wildly overpaid for what he does/doesn't produce. At least one axe is going to swing this offseason. It seems nuts to keep Barr (or Rudolph), whose respective production can be replaced at a fraction of their current cost, vs Reiff whose production can't.
It's easy to show that they suffered without him in the fact that Barr has always been a solid to good run defender and Wilson was literally at the bottom. But how much that's worth, I think we agree that it's probably not as much as they think
He has, but in a materially different context. Surely we agree having a good-to-great DL sets the table for LBs to shine--perhaps especially so for Wilson whose biggest weakness is getting off blockers in the run game. I'm not saying you're dead wrong and Barr brings nothing, but without seeing him play 16 games with a DL this terrible, it's a giant ? how much of the success can be attributed to him. Maybe he's that good he would have shined anyway, but maybe he looks like JAG.
Anyway, the value issue is the most important, and unfortunately it will likely get screwed up, again. Being a Vikings fan is rarely dull, but often unpleasant.
That's the thing about defense, all the parts play together off each other. Barr wouldnt have had it easy but he weighs 30 more pounds than Wilson, so he's going to do a better job of shredding blocks rather than getting driven back 10 yards. His IQ and ability to recognize route combinations and things like that is valuable too over Wilson (I did a piece on this last year, I believe). So Zimmer's not wrong about his talent, it's just that $15M is too much for that job
The challenge is we don't have enough information to determine how much better Barr is than Wilson. It might be a wide gulf, it might be much closer than it appears, given whom they've each been on the field with (including the games Wilson played without the benefit of Kendricks beside him). It would be nice to know this, because even if another team decides Wilson is the second coming of Lee Woodall, that still won't attract the kind of offer Barr received with visions of LT or Kevin Greene dancing in Florham Park.
But, roster decisions are rarely made with complete information. C'est la vie.
This group is one of the more interesting off-season stories to follow in my opinion. I suspect we'll be unable to retain Wilson as some team out there will be infatuated with his cover skills and will offer him a sizeable contract.
Count me in as someone that does believe Barr's full value is not encapsulated by PFF grades. But his contract is difficult to swallow. I don't see how they don't re-work his contract as I simply cannot see Zimmer letting him go. Given the lack of depth at the position, I don't think they can let Barr go. Which leads me to the last off-season LB story...
...which is can the Vikings have success in drafting or acquiring depth for this position? It's been a feast-or-famine position for the Vikings when it comes to the draft. Obviously they've had a couple of home runs at the position, and while it's not a position they've drafted very often, most have been in and our of the league with the exception of Ben Gedeon and Gerald Hodges (interesting story as to why he was traded to the 49'ers).
Bottom line, the Vikings either need to either find a quality depth LB in the draft or find one in FA, especially with Wilson likely gone.
Ok, I’ll bite... Why was Hodges traded?
I feel better about the Vikings LB situation if we pretend Kendricks has Barr’s cap hit and vice versa, lol
I believe that Barr needs to be restructured and kept around. First of all he likes zimmer which probably is hard to do, more importantly regardless of data driven value numbers he knows the defense, he is solid but again his number has to go down. I absolutely think he would be open to a restructured deal to stay in a place that he is obviously very comfortable with.
Question for Friday. Reilly Reiff would have gotten a bonus based on him playing most snaps. But the Vikings kept him out of the last game against Detroit. Did the Vikings find a way to pay him the bonus?
Rieff had to sit out because of COVID protocols.. haven't heard whether they found a way to pay him that bonus or not. They usually don't make those things public. They definitely should
Hang on a minute, sir. We have a clear before/after picture with Kendricks, but what is the evidence of Barr's impact? By expected points, the D gave up -14 in the win against GB (sans Barr) and -28 in the loss (with Barr). If one prefers yards allowed it's 522 with vs 400 without. So to the limited extent there are actual data, they reject the premise. Of course, it's possible that with Barr for 16 games the D is much better, but it's also possible/more likely that with an actual NFL d-line the D is much better without Barr and Wilson looks like a star.
It's nice (and all too common) to say that something can't be measured, but that also means we don't know if it actually exists. Given the individuals involved, you're right that the most likely outcome is a restructure--in which case the details matter a lot--but that doesn't make it the correct decision.
Barr is very good at what he does, but what he does simply isn't that valuable.
I agree the cap hit vs. performance do not match up but using the GB game doesnt really add up. Barr played nearly 100% of snaps on defenses that ranked in the top 5 for four years. I also believe Zimmer (and you can see it on tape) when he talks about the things that go beyond box score stats. He's a very good player and on a different level than Wilson but it's about how much they can afford to spend for the difference.
One should be hesitant to conclude anything about 2 games. But, it's what we have and they don't show a with/without case for Barr (whereas, eg, the two Bears games do for being with/without Kendricks).
The main point is we disagree about your conclusion that the defence suffered materially this year because of Barr's absence. He has been a very good player, albeit with the benefit of excellent defensive lines in front of him. It's possible Wilson would have looked nearly/just as good with, e.g., Griffen/Richardson/Joseph/Hunter in front of him.
Again, Barr is very good at what he does. He makes the defence better, not worse. However, this is a cap league and he's wildly overpaid for what he does/doesn't produce. At least one axe is going to swing this offseason. It seems nuts to keep Barr (or Rudolph), whose respective production can be replaced at a fraction of their current cost, vs Reiff whose production can't.
It's easy to show that they suffered without him in the fact that Barr has always been a solid to good run defender and Wilson was literally at the bottom. But how much that's worth, I think we agree that it's probably not as much as they think
He has, but in a materially different context. Surely we agree having a good-to-great DL sets the table for LBs to shine--perhaps especially so for Wilson whose biggest weakness is getting off blockers in the run game. I'm not saying you're dead wrong and Barr brings nothing, but without seeing him play 16 games with a DL this terrible, it's a giant ? how much of the success can be attributed to him. Maybe he's that good he would have shined anyway, but maybe he looks like JAG.
Anyway, the value issue is the most important, and unfortunately it will likely get screwed up, again. Being a Vikings fan is rarely dull, but often unpleasant.
That's the thing about defense, all the parts play together off each other. Barr wouldnt have had it easy but he weighs 30 more pounds than Wilson, so he's going to do a better job of shredding blocks rather than getting driven back 10 yards. His IQ and ability to recognize route combinations and things like that is valuable too over Wilson (I did a piece on this last year, I believe). So Zimmer's not wrong about his talent, it's just that $15M is too much for that job
The challenge is we don't have enough information to determine how much better Barr is than Wilson. It might be a wide gulf, it might be much closer than it appears, given whom they've each been on the field with (including the games Wilson played without the benefit of Kendricks beside him). It would be nice to know this, because even if another team decides Wilson is the second coming of Lee Woodall, that still won't attract the kind of offer Barr received with visions of LT or Kevin Greene dancing in Florham Park.
But, roster decisions are rarely made with complete information. C'est la vie.