Originally posted by pasodoc9er:
What you all say is all true, but just looking at your posts, can you really believe we are having this conversation as opposed to last yr when the conversation...?
It's pretty remarkable actually. That was my silver lining to last year...the ONLY silver lining...that most of the young kids got some real NFL snaps and as a result, knew how to prepare better for this year. Dial played well and got himself a new contract. Tiller played great the final 8 games at both RG and LG on the fly and Brown got his due late and clearly has built off that success. Even Purcell got quite a few snaps as well last year (thankfully). All 4 of those guys have a legit shot at not only being starters or rotational players that get a ton of snaps or are "starter worthy." Then, consider where Baalke found them...Dial in the 5th, Purcell and Tiller as UDFA's and Brown in the 7th round as an extra pick for the Pinion trade-back. Dial and Purcell will probably be base-down starters and rotate along the DL and Garnett & Davis are going to have a heck of time beating Tiller & Brown. That's what you want. The OL and DL isn't 100% secure yet but it certainly has made great progress compared to last year. And that's what you want during a rebuild...arrow up.