Drafting for the future - awesome!

Originally posted by blm7754:

Originally posted by krizay:
Easy to say we drafted for the future in this draft. Cause we didn't get any impact player and got a lot of role players. Which would be ok if we were a playoff team that had competent starters.

Good point. I dont expect we will be much (if any) better this year, because we dont have a solid group of starters. But I still like the draft strategy because in the long term, it is better to find two guys that could be pro bowlers in 3 years than guys that can be average starters now but never much more. How can we ever expect to get better without taking some risks?

We're still a young team and don't forget improvement from within to guys that are already here. Davis+Iupati have a year under their belts so the O-line should improve. Aldon should help the pass rush this year too(to what extent we'll see), Dixon will look to get leaner, meaner, and faster to improve as support for gore. Crabtree will hopefully finally have that year we've been waiting for.

If we can get 8-8, just a few seasons ago, with singletary coaching us, I see no reason to get risky and potentially knock us back even further. We've got a solid core of talent. Maybe squeak into the playoffs this year, then slowly get better and better as the young talent turn into allstar pro bowlers.(ideally)

We have to build for the future---the cupboard isn't as bare as in 2004--but some of the stars---like a Gore/ Clements/Spikes--may not be around when we hit the good times again---this is what happens when a team has bad drafts and builds up too slowly--or can't get that QB.

We are building towards the 2013 season---that has also been harbaugh's past pattern--year 3 is the year it all begins.

If this draft can add to P Willis and Vernon/Crabtree--2013 could be the year. For 2011 I want to see the coaching staff prove their worth---they will.

I don't think the team had any choice but to draft for the future. What seems to be missing in a lot of doom and gloom, "disappointing", "projects" reviews of the draft is a realization of the extreme effect of the triple-whammy of the old coaching staff, the new coaching staff and the CBA situation.

I would suggest that the key point in drafting is knowing the team you already have. I don't think that many would dispute that, aside from maybe a few players, the past two coaching staffs have really not appeared to make much of an effort, or at least have not succeeded, in identifying or utilizing what appear to be the strengths of the actual players we had. They seemed to be focused on imposing their pre-fixed schemes on the players, regardless of the results.

Because of that, watching film of the past seasons, as I think Fangio said a while back, can only take you so far, and even that is a reach. So given you don't really know what you have, I think what do you do in a draft, you look for projects to fit the obvious holes until you have an opportunity to actually see what the foundation is. I think it's fairly obvious from the coaching comments made after the draft, that pretty well all of the players chosen were personally viewed and annointed by position coaches, on whom it appears a lot more reliance was taken than in past drafts. Harbaugh appears to have a lot of faith in their extensive experience and expertise and I have hope that this will bear fruit.

I think that, hopefully after a full season of play, next year's draft will better illustrate the more-immediate player improvements that the coaches feel need to be made. And I would suggest that it is quite probable that some of those changes may be quite unexpected and involve removing some perennial webzone favorites. As I recall, that was the way it seemed to a lot of us fans a lot of years in the Walsh era, so maybe that's not such a bad thing. There are times you just gotta' have faith in the coaches and I for one have a lot more faith now than I've had in a really long time.

Apologies for the long post. I just think that a lot of the younger posters want immediate results and mock draft favorites because they've never really had a chance to know what good coaching can do to a team.

Originally posted by ColdFan:
I don't think the team had any choice but to draft for the future. What seems to be missing in a lot of doom and gloom, "disappointing", "projects" reviews of the draft is a realization of the extreme effect of the triple-whammy of the old coaching staff, the new coaching staff and the CBA situation.

I would suggest that the key point in drafting is knowing the team you already have. I don't think that many would dispute that, aside from maybe a few players, the past two coaching staffs have really not appeared to make much of an effort, or at least have not succeeded, in identifying or utilizing what appear to be the strengths of the actual players we had. They seemed to be focused on imposing their pre-fixed schemes on the players, regardless of the results.

Because of that, watching film of the past seasons, as I think Fangio said a while back, can only take you so far, and even that is a reach. So given you don't really know what you have, I think what do you do in a draft, you look for projects to fit the obvious holes until you have an opportunity to actually see what the foundation is. I think it's fairly obvious from the coaching comments made after the draft, that pretty well all of the players chosen were personally viewed and annointed by position coaches, on whom it appears a lot more reliance was taken than in past drafts. Harbaugh appears to have a lot of faith in their extensive experience and expertise and I have hope that this will bear fruit.

I think that, hopefully after a full season of play, next year's draft will better illustrate the more-immediate player improvements that the coaches feel need to be made. And I would suggest that it is quite probable that some of those changes may be quite unexpected and involve removing some perennial webzone favorites. As I recall, that was the way it seemed to a lot of us fans a lot of years in the Walsh era, so maybe that's not such a bad thing. There are times you just gotta' have faith in the coaches and I for one have a lot more faith now than I've had in a really long time.

Apologies for the long post. I just think that a lot of the younger posters want immediate results and mock draft favorites because they've never really had a chance to know what good coaching can do to a team.

I couldn't agree with you more and great post! Looking back on Nolan/Singletary, it seems that they neither delegated authority and responsibility well nor they did see themselves as teachers, rather 'leaders'. JH and staff do not appear to be this way so I'll take take it on faith that we shall see improvement. Frankly, almost anything from the coaching staff has to be better than the last six years.

And it's interesting, that it is called a coaching staff...

We've been hearing this "for the future" line for several years now. Drafting project after project, trying to make players change positions...this year is nothing new and no different. Why draft a real FB when you can draft a DE (or is he a LB??) and convert him to a position he's NEVER played before?

Maybe they should consider changing the team name to the "Fortynextyears"?