The John Lynch / Kyle Shanahan Player Profile

49oz2superbowl · 2017-04-28T11:34:07-07:00

In addition to all the excitement around our new draft picks (what a first round!) one thing I was equally excited about was to learn more about the Lynch/Shanahan player profile. I know everyone always generically uses the BPA term and says all the same things (high character and impactful players) but until they make their first picks it's impossible to guess what they actually value. For example with Baalke he was obsessed with the physical body measurables (ex. arm length, hand size) of players and seemed to always value that over production and only tended to take value risks on injured players (understatement). This was incredibly frustrating as we always seemed to reach on non-productive players who had perceived upside and only value came in the form of a player that was seriously injured and couldn't contribute for a couple years (if at all).This obviously lead to a roster full of non-productive and injured players with nothing but perceived "upside". Now look at the Lynch/Shannahan mold (based on first 2 picks and will update as sample size grows). 1- Passion for football over true "character"- obviously at where we got Foster you could say it was too good a value to pass up but considering we were thinking of going Foster MUCH earlier in the first this tells me Lynch is fine with character blemishes so long as they are passionate about football and don't get in the way of playing football. This could be even more telling throughout the draft when it comes to potential players like Mixon and Cook, who may fall due to character but are both obsessed with football. This is a refreshing approach as he seems to know the art of weighing character risk in the NFL having played in a locker room with questionable characters but elite talent and football character (ex. Sapp, Brooks, etc.) 2- Production Over Body Measurables- Both players picked have been far more productive than most of any player picked in the entire Baalke regime. Thomas lead his team in tackles, sacks and TFL. Foster was the most productive LB in college football. They both had questions on size (Thomas not ideal height/arm length and Foster needs to bulk up) but in a way these were anti-Baalke as we valued production over body measurables. 3- Elite Athletic Profile- While the body measurables aren't elite on either Thomas or Foster they have phenomenal athletic profiles both in terms of their "spider charts" and their background. While a small sample size, it's interesting to note that both of our picks were unanimous 5 star HS recruits. Only a handful of first round picks in each draft are 5 star prospects and we drafted 2. This could be sheer coincidence but I think overall it speaks to their athletic profile as the high school recruiting/star system is overly athletic profile obsessed. Will be interesting to adjust the above as we fill out our draft. It's a small sample size thus far, but I'm loving what I'm seeing so far

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Apr 28, 2017 at 11:38 AM

saniner
Veteran
Posts: 7,724

Thomas and Foster are both violent with how they play as well. John Lynch played the same way, so I see him trying to mold this team to be the same.

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