Production replacement - team

Now that I have gone through each position specific replacements for last year I want to try to tie it all together. In theory plugging in a new player and expecting a certain production should work. For example, looking at AJ Green and anyone who replaces you would assume a drop off in production. Looking at Dent and Ogletree at MLB and it might be easy to assume that with Ogletree's raw talent he should be more productive than Dent was. Looking at Murray and saying he has a year as a starter under his belt and you would expect him to be better this year.

That as we all know is not how sports work. Sometimes a team is greater than the sum of the parts and sometimes a team is less than the sum of its parts. Quarterbacks and receivers sometimes are just in tune with each other. Sometimes one safeties weakness (say coverage) is covered by the others strength and vice versa (run support). This year’s defense should be much better than last years as the parts that were lost are not as good as the parts that were gained. They have the advantage of being in the second year under Grantham and his switch to a 3-4. Plus when in doubt having 700 lbs to fill the gap at nose tackle that was filled by 300 will always tip the scales in favor of optimism. I believe the defense alone will be responsible for turning a 6-7 into at least 8-5 and possibly 9-4.

As for the offense Murray at quarterback and now experienced should give great cause for hope. Great young talent is coming in to help but it is just that, young. Outside of Murray, Charles and T. King there is little in the way of proven commodities on offense. How well the line and the unproven players play will determine how good the offense will be. If the line play is solid, Crowell is even just a bit better than Ealey was and someone steps up in the passing game the offense should be better than last years. That is a lot of ifs but all that falls into place and this team will be a 10 win team and possibly headed to Atlanta in early December.

update on receivers - Forgot to mention I think that Michael Bennett could provide good production at the WR spot as well.