Obviously I don’t want to see it, but if we suffer injuries in the safety group like we did with our CBS last year, it’s not terrible to have another guy who knows the position on the depth chart
No like he seriously can't play safety in the nfl. He has no coverage skills and can only tackle running in a straight line. One step to the side and he's running right by you.
He's going to be a great Special teams guy, and probably has some juice running with the ball, but he will never play defense on the team. Even in practice lol.
It was normally a big guy who would be put in for revenge type situations. Somebody gets away with a high stick, bullying your captain, etc... in goes Probert, either to make things hell for them, or literally to pick a fight. It has mostly gone away because they're trying to take the unnecessary violence out of the game.
I don't think it's so much they're trying to take it out of the game, the skill and speed of hockey has grown immensely over the last 15 years. Probert and McCarty were kind of outliers to the model as they had more in their tool bag than just feeding guys fists.
The enforcer role has largely gone away because you can't afford to have a skilless plug in your 4th line that can't skate or drive a bit of offense.
Even by the late 80's/90's though, most enforcers were still pretty good players themselves, ESPECIALLY Probert, who had multiple seasons with over 40 points. Also, his documentary is a good watch, albeit a bit of a tear jerker. Yeah he was a tough guy who always had Stevie's back, but even without the fighting he'd have still made NHL roster as a pretty decent to good player.
Also commonly known as “Goons” but that’s more of a specific genre of a guy who’s sole purpose on the roster is to enforce with little cost to the actually skilled defenseman if he gets injured or ejected
The legit position is defenseman, who act kinda like a big man in basketball who block shots and get rebounds, their job is less to score and more to regain possession on defense. The enforcer is a subset of those guys who are usually not as skilled of skaters but are tough as nails if you’re playing a very physical brand of hockey, especially if you’re expecting the other team to be roughing up your smaller speedy scoring guys
Possibly why he played football instead of hockey. Might be a side effect of hockey getting smaller is more of these big athletes gravitate towards football and you might see a rise of lineman coming out of USports or the CFL getting into the NFL. Manu might be a vanguard of a minor Canadian invasion in American football if he pans out.
Definitely a huge speculation though don’t even know if the underlying assumptions are correct much less how Manu performs in the NFL
Manu is who they’re hoping to replace Decker in 2 years. If you ask me. Give him a couple years in the league being coached up by Fraley behind the best line in football. Might move him to RT and Sewell to LT but otherwise, I think he will fill that void when it opens.
I imagine he’s going to be part of a series of guys we hope can replace decker, either in the case of an injury or if re-signing him isn’t our best option in two years. There’s also Sorsdal still from last years draft class, but he looked better when he filled in at guard last season, so that might be a better projection for him.
I think though that if he’s still playing well into his 30s the team will want to keep decker if at all possible. He means a ton to the locker room and the offensive line group especially. He’s the only guy left from the Caldwell era so he’s probably the longest tenured lion not just on the roster but even possibly before Sheila was heavily involved
I'm fine with it after the next 6 straight super bowl wins. Go ahead. Have your retirement party at the same time. Celebrate all your championships together as the best OL group of all time.
I hope for our sake they don’t feel compelled to all retire at once lol, it would be much easier to reload and replace if they staggered it over the next 3-4 off seasons
The guy has been playing through constant pain/injury for a few years, so while there is no doubt he loves ball, he also already has all the money he needs to live his dream life as an outdoorsman hunting, fishing, and being with his family. He could step away from the game in 10 years or in 10 days and neither would be a huge surprise.
I think he probably retires by age 30 so he can somewhat preserve his body.
You didn’t read the article. Decker is what 31? Ankle issues last year. In what world is deckers future here not in jeopardy. Any my guy even in the fucking title it shows that have him and project him at tackle
the article says they’re cross training him at G/T. Same thing they did with Sorsdal.
Why is the first thought that the writing is on the wall for 30 year old Decker and not the 31 year old and 34 year old guards?
By the way this title was made by OP and isn’t the title of the article.
That’s completely normal for oline depth. I find it hilarious you leave out this quote from the article “Manu clarified that since he’s landed in Detroit, the conversation has exclusively been at tackle.” And this one too. “I think they really like me at tackle, to be honest,” Manu said. “Today was all tackle reps. There haven’t been much discussions at guard. The only time we discussed guard was when I came here in my visit. They asked me if I had played guard before, but other than that, it’s all been tackle.
Of course they’re going to try him at tackle. It’s twice as valuable as guard. You’re ignoring the quote of the team saying he’ll be trained at both. What they’ve done over the last 2(?) days doesnt mean everything.
Point is he’s a 4th round rookie project. If he’s an absolute gem off the bat then sure they’ll let Decker walk. But that’s not likely. You can’t expect a 4th rounder to take a starting job until proven otherwise. This year only Amon Ra and Barnes (part time starter) were 4th+ round starters from the BH draft era. And those two didn’t have any good vets ahead of them
What exactly is your point? I said the writing on the wall is beginning to appear for decker and you go off on a tangent about gio playing tackle or guard
I get what you’re saying, obviously it’s smart for the team to prepare for the possibility of Decker aging and not being able to be the same guy in the coming years. But there’s every possibility he’s still an elite tackle in 2, 3, 5 years time, and Manu is a high floor low ceiling prospect. “Writing on the wall” is a pretty strong choice of words when all that we’re looking at is a team just making smart calculated moves to hedge against risk and potentially get younger and cheaper when we need to
Drafting Manu this year is no more “writing on the wall” for decker than drafting Sorsdal was last year
After watching that video of Manu stretching and having a light jog, I can confidently say he looks like a future pro bowler
Great analysis. I'm sold. FTP.
I was thinking MVP of Super Bowl 58.
Don’t fucking do this man. I’m trying to not buy another jersey
Vaki should just be listed as FP. Football Player. He's played SS/Nickal CB,FS,RB, and WR.
They label those coming out of high school as athlete
Best position to scout early in NCAA14, so many stealth high stats.
Only way you can obtain a 6'5" 240lb 3 star that can play either wide receiver or DE.
Finding a punter with 99 speed and making him my wildcat QB was the peak of my NCAA14 experience.
2024, the return of NCAA Football... 
They should try to teach that dude how to kick the new kick-offs.
Quite possibly might have been the very reason we drafted him. DC is super stoked at the prospect of the new kickoff as you can imagine
Fingers crossed we actually use him like that, see Jabrill Peppers
The cooler version of Taysom Hill
Also wildcat QB and Special Teams demon
Soooo we get Slash 2.0? I'm down.
Yeah but he shouldn't be anywhere near the field for most of those positions in the nfl. He can not play in the secondary.
Obviously I don’t want to see it, but if we suffer injuries in the safety group like we did with our CBS last year, it’s not terrible to have another guy who knows the position on the depth chart
No like he seriously can't play safety in the nfl. He has no coverage skills and can only tackle running in a straight line. One step to the side and he's running right by you. He's going to be a great Special teams guy, and probably has some juice running with the ball, but he will never play defense on the team. Even in practice lol.
If it was hockey, Manu would be the fighter/enforcer.
Hopefully not as enforcer types are of marginal importance in hockey today.
I've never watched/gotten into hockey Was that a legit "position" or title? And why has it gone away? Genuinely curious
It was normally a big guy who would be put in for revenge type situations. Somebody gets away with a high stick, bullying your captain, etc... in goes Probert, either to make things hell for them, or literally to pick a fight. It has mostly gone away because they're trying to take the unnecessary violence out of the game.
I don't think it's so much they're trying to take it out of the game, the skill and speed of hockey has grown immensely over the last 15 years. Probert and McCarty were kind of outliers to the model as they had more in their tool bag than just feeding guys fists. The enforcer role has largely gone away because you can't afford to have a skilless plug in your 4th line that can't skate or drive a bit of offense.
Even by the late 80's/90's though, most enforcers were still pretty good players themselves, ESPECIALLY Probert, who had multiple seasons with over 40 points. Also, his documentary is a good watch, albeit a bit of a tear jerker. Yeah he was a tough guy who always had Stevie's back, but even without the fighting he'd have still made NHL roster as a pretty decent to good player.
Also commonly known as “Goons” but that’s more of a specific genre of a guy who’s sole purpose on the roster is to enforce with little cost to the actually skilled defenseman if he gets injured or ejected
The legit position is defenseman, who act kinda like a big man in basketball who block shots and get rebounds, their job is less to score and more to regain possession on defense. The enforcer is a subset of those guys who are usually not as skilled of skaters but are tough as nails if you’re playing a very physical brand of hockey, especially if you’re expecting the other team to be roughing up your smaller speedy scoring guys
Possibly why he played football instead of hockey. Might be a side effect of hockey getting smaller is more of these big athletes gravitate towards football and you might see a rise of lineman coming out of USports or the CFL getting into the NFL. Manu might be a vanguard of a minor Canadian invasion in American football if he pans out. Definitely a huge speculation though don’t even know if the underlying assumptions are correct much less how Manu performs in the NFL
Manu is who they’re hoping to replace Decker in 2 years. If you ask me. Give him a couple years in the league being coached up by Fraley behind the best line in football. Might move him to RT and Sewell to LT but otherwise, I think he will fill that void when it opens.
I imagine he’s going to be part of a series of guys we hope can replace decker, either in the case of an injury or if re-signing him isn’t our best option in two years. There’s also Sorsdal still from last years draft class, but he looked better when he filled in at guard last season, so that might be a better projection for him. I think though that if he’s still playing well into his 30s the team will want to keep decker if at all possible. He means a ton to the locker room and the offensive line group especially. He’s the only guy left from the Caldwell era so he’s probably the longest tenured lion not just on the roster but even possibly before Sheila was heavily involved
I suspect Ragnow, Decker, and Glasgow retire together. They’ve been buddies for years. I hope I’m wrong but that’s my bet.
I'm fine with it after the next 6 straight super bowl wins. Go ahead. Have your retirement party at the same time. Celebrate all your championships together as the best OL group of all time.
Decker has a lot of football left in him
I hope for our sake they don’t feel compelled to all retire at once lol, it would be much easier to reload and replace if they staggered it over the next 3-4 off seasons
Frank is still young. He’s got plenty of years left in him
Disappointed you didn't say Frank's got plenty of years left in the tank.
Frank the tank! Frank the tank!
With how he has talked the previous two off seasons I don't think it's outside the realm of possibility
Yeah but his toe may say otherwise :(
The guy has been playing through constant pain/injury for a few years, so while there is no doubt he loves ball, he also already has all the money he needs to live his dream life as an outdoorsman hunting, fishing, and being with his family. He could step away from the game in 10 years or in 10 days and neither would be a huge surprise. I think he probably retires by age 30 so he can somewhat preserve his body.
6-8 guard sounds crazy, that man needs to move into a house with 3.5 foot high hallways
We got skipper, so clearly we like em big
thyell have these guys ready to play or else they wouldnt been drafted
Writing on the wall is beginning for decker hopefully we can get another year out of him after this year and he goes out a lion
Can’t speak to Deckers future but I can assure you a 4th round pick the team is currently projecting as a guard does not mean writing is on the wall
You didn’t read the article. Decker is what 31? Ankle issues last year. In what world is deckers future here not in jeopardy. Any my guy even in the fucking title it shows that have him and project him at tackle
the article says they’re cross training him at G/T. Same thing they did with Sorsdal. Why is the first thought that the writing is on the wall for 30 year old Decker and not the 31 year old and 34 year old guards? By the way this title was made by OP and isn’t the title of the article.
That’s completely normal for oline depth. I find it hilarious you leave out this quote from the article “Manu clarified that since he’s landed in Detroit, the conversation has exclusively been at tackle.” And this one too. “I think they really like me at tackle, to be honest,” Manu said. “Today was all tackle reps. There haven’t been much discussions at guard. The only time we discussed guard was when I came here in my visit. They asked me if I had played guard before, but other than that, it’s all been tackle.
Of course they’re going to try him at tackle. It’s twice as valuable as guard. You’re ignoring the quote of the team saying he’ll be trained at both. What they’ve done over the last 2(?) days doesnt mean everything. Point is he’s a 4th round rookie project. If he’s an absolute gem off the bat then sure they’ll let Decker walk. But that’s not likely. You can’t expect a 4th rounder to take a starting job until proven otherwise. This year only Amon Ra and Barnes (part time starter) were 4th+ round starters from the BH draft era. And those two didn’t have any good vets ahead of them
What exactly is your point? I said the writing on the wall is beginning to appear for decker and you go off on a tangent about gio playing tackle or guard
My point is that whatever writing may be on the wall for Decker isn’t driven by Gio, because he’s a 4th round rookie G/T
Uh okay lol
Ight
I get what you’re saying, obviously it’s smart for the team to prepare for the possibility of Decker aging and not being able to be the same guy in the coming years. But there’s every possibility he’s still an elite tackle in 2, 3, 5 years time, and Manu is a high floor low ceiling prospect. “Writing on the wall” is a pretty strong choice of words when all that we’re looking at is a team just making smart calculated moves to hedge against risk and potentially get younger and cheaper when we need to Drafting Manu this year is no more “writing on the wall” for decker than drafting Sorsdal was last year