A lot of virtual ink was spilled on the deficiencies of the Green Bay Packers at wide receiver and tight end positions in 2019. Much virtual ink was spent talking about how Green Bay needed to improve its production at those places in 2020. Free agency it came and went and Green Bay just added pseudo-TE Devin Funchess. With a pool that already has a lot of big and not very fast types, Funchess adds a level of redundancy that they probably could have done without. But, at least, he is almost certainly better than Gerónimo Allison.
The low season is not over! Hopefully we have a season, but if we do, there are bound to be implications of our current crisis that will extend beyond 2020. NFL teams are unsure how the salary cap will be applied in the coming years, but the best guesswork currently the limit is going to flatten and growth will be borrowed from future years to avoid a limit catastrophe. If the limit fell 25%, a good part of the league would be over the limit immediately with little exit. Neither the NFL nor the NFLPA wants this, so the pain is more likely to spread during the 2020s.
To help create more butt space for years to come, to increase butt space laps, to open butt space for this year, or to move from a player who has oversized requirements, we can see more cuts. butt casualties at training camp. year than most. That can provide an opportunity for teams seeking to get players for very little, either by claiming exemptions, acquiring them in an exchange for very little compensation, or obtaining them as free agents on the street. For Packers who get a light body in proven bodies, there are a few options that may be on the table in August.
Albert Wilson
Wilson has had a difficult two years in Miami after a promising start to his career in Kansas City. In a very strong 2017, Wilson had a DVOA of 21.4%, good for eighth in the NFL. He also held a solid 26th in yards per goal. According to Next Gen Stats, he was also the NFL leader in average yards separation per play at 4.1 yards.
Wilson followed that solid season with a 3-year, $ 24 million contract from Miami. In its first year, it posted another solid DVOA with 10.8%. He improved his yards on target to 11.2 from 8.9, and had he qualified he would have been tied for third in the NFL. Unfortunately, he didn’t have enough goals to qualify because he suffered a pretty serious injury. In late October, Wilson was diagnosed with a small fracture and a labrum tear in his right hip that ended his season.
Hoping for a year of recovery in 2019, Wilson certainly did not deliver. Her DVOA was abysmal at -23.7%. His yards per target ranked 134th in just 5.7. He was never a player for a living on the field, his specific passing yards remained low, but his average separation fell from his peak in Kansas City from 4.1 to 3.5 yards.
By cutting Wilson, Miami could create just under $ 3 million in capitalization space and go from someone who became a disappointing player. For Green Bay, acquiring Wilson would be a gamble for a player to recover almost two years after his hip injury. There is no doubt that the cost to Wilson would be quite low, and he would play the role of slot player that Green Bay doesn’t really have in his current group, but the injury may have ruined the player.
Kenny Stills
Bill O’Brien is something. He took a receiving body that had Deandre Hopkins, Will Fuller, and Kenny Stills and made it one with Brandin Cooks, Will Fuller, Randall Cobb, and Kenny Stills. It made it more expensive and worse. Awesome.
There is no guarantee that Houston will leave Stills, but this offseason’s actions speak volumes. Houston signed Cobb in free agency with a sizable contract, traded for Brandin Cooks, and has Will Fuller in a fully guaranteed deal for this season. That probably leaves Stills as the strange man with no cap hit if he gets cut / swapped. Houston could create $ 7 million in capitalization space.
That fact is surprising when you discover that Kenny Stills is good. It’s not even fake, but it’s actually good. In 2019, Stills ranked fifth in the NFL on DVOA with 24.7%. In 2018, he was ranked 22nd at 12.6% In fact, the only year in his career that he was not at least above average was 2015. He also has a first place. Kenny Stills is good.
I think the perception of Stills must be distorted when playing with some bad quarterbacks in Miami. While dealing with Ryan Tannehill and Jay Cutler’s corpse, Stills was more of a solid to good WR in terms of his raw stats. When he had a legitimately above-average quarterback game in New Orleans and Houston, Stills has been excellent. His yard-by-target in 2013, 2014, and 2019 were 12.8, 11.2, and 10.2, respectively. All of those numbers would have been in the top 10 last year.
While Stills’ efficiency is fantastic, its volume has never come close to incredibly high numbers. He only has three seasons with more than 80 goals, but he doesn’t have any seasons with less than 50. The compensation for lower volumes has been the vertical threat. Stills has also spent much of his career as a field stretcher. In 2019, that role was largely left to speedmate Will Fuller, but in 2018, Stills was fourth in the NFL at the target’s average depth of 16.4 yards. It ranks 14th in 2017 and 10th in 2016. Green Bay desperately needs a reliable target on the field, and Stills fits that bill perfectly.
I honestly don’t know why Houston did what they did this offseason, but essentially getting Stills out of the receiving body is a strange choice. If I’m an NFL general manager, I regularly send O’Brien commercial offers to try to escape his wide productive receiver.
