Interesting View on Roman Harper (1 Viewer)

ELLIASJWILLIAMS

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New Orleans Saints Off-season Dream Scenario - Canal Street Chronicles

Discussions about Roman Harper, current Saints strong safety, have been mighty quiet. Going into this year's free agency period, he seemed to be one of the players that was either going to take a pay cut or be outright released. Nothing has happened so far, but it makes me wonder if he is being used as trade bait behind the scenes.

If we sign Nnamdi there will be moves that will need to be made. Greer/Roman/Thomas/Ivory may or may not be saints next year. OR they may all be....but i still feel like there is a move to be made.

I hear the sense of urgency in SP's voice when he says we need to do everything we can to help our defense.

I think they know we need at least 2 more picks in this draft...and they've got to come from somewhere.




This is not to start a Debate about Roman or if he should stay or any of that nonsense...just simply stating that I think there is a big move brewing. Just don't know who!!
 
New Orleans Saints Off-season Dream Scenario - Canal Street Chronicles



If we sign Nnamdi there will be moves that will need to be made. Greer/Roman/Thomas/Ivory may or may not be saints next year. OR they may all be....but i still feel like there is a move to be made.

I hear the sense of urgency in SP's voice when he says we need to do everything we can to help our defense.

I think they know we need at least 2 more picks in this draft...and they've got to come from somewhere.




This is not to start a Debate about Roman or if he should stay or any of that nonsense...just simply stating that I think there is a big move brewing. Just don't know who!!

It's hard to take the writer seriously when he has such a basic misunderstanding of the cap situation and Harper.

"This could then clear out a whopping $7.1 million worth of cap room for the team"

Nor do I think Harper has much value. No one wants him for his $5.25 million dollar base. Even Dashon Goldsons base salary in 2013 is $4.5.

No, things are quiet about Harper because he's expensive to cut, untradeable, and we have little leverage to force a pay cut. So it's quiet because I don't think there's really much to say abut him. Well see if he rebounds in 2013 and if he doesn't, cut him next offseason. That's my read on the situation at least.
 
It's hard to take the writer seriously when he has such a basic misunderstanding of the cap situation and Harper.

"This could then clear out a whopping $7.1 million worth of cap room for the team"

Nor do I think Harper has much value. No one wants him for his $5.25 million dollar base. Even Dashon Goldsons base salary in 2013 is $4.5.

No, things are quiet about Harper because he's expensive to cut, untradeable, and we have little leverage to force a pay cut. So it's quiet because I don't think there's really much to say abut him. Well see if he rebounds in 2013 and if he doesn't, cut him next offseason. That's my read on the situation at least.


For those points exactly is why i think he stays and we draft a S in the later rounds. However, there is 1 thought process that keeps the hope alive something might happen with our safety duo. You don't have the two worst safeties in the league(according to PFF) and not make SOME changes. Id go as far as to say that they have been underwhelming their 2 years together. With that being said i think its more likely our Safety Tandem remains for another year.

Not to mention losing harper would create a large hole @ SS. With the safety market thinning anything we picked up now would be a downgrade. It would almost dictate that we have to go safety early which i think or FO likes to have as many options as possible.

That doesn't omit anyone else though. I'm not sure if greer could play the slot but he has excellent agility and route recognition...something thats needed considered routes can go either way in the slot but if we Sign Nnamdi we will have a nice amount of money Tied up in our Top 3 corners...somethings gotta give.
 
For those points exactly is why i think he stays and we draft a S in the later rounds. However, there is 1 thought process that keeps the hope alive something might happen with our safety duo. You don't have the two worst safeties in the league(according to PFF) and not make SOME changes. Id go as far as to say that they have been underwhelming their 2 years together. With that being said i think its more likely our Safety Tandem remains for another year.

That doesn't omit anyone else though. I'm not sure if greer could play the slot but he has excellent agility and route recognition...something thats needed considered routes can go either way in the slot.

We've got Jenkins, Harper, Isa Abdul Quddus, Rafael Bush, and Corey White probably at S. That's five, adding one means subtracting one.

I agree changes would be possible, but I think they like the three young guys. If you add a safety it needs to be someone who will replace Harper or Jenkins. Given the lack of interest in free agent safeties shown thus far, unless we draft someone in the first round at this point it seems likely that what you see is what you will get.

I only hope that Ryan and McGriffs fresh eyes on the situation give our hunger players a fair shake at starting over Jenkins and Harper, if its called for.
 
i think corey white is our future SS and IAQ FS, IAQ is great in coverage, has good instincts, is a playmaker and has great speed, white is good in man coverage, a good tackler and also has great speed. Next year i dont expect to see roman harper on the team, jenkins could also be gone unless he excels in RR's scheme.
 
No team in their right mind would give anything close to a 3rd for Harper - especially with that salary. At the end of the day, we are at the mercy of Harper and it was a bad contract we gave to him. Hopefully we'll learn from this moving forward.

Also, we have to have some of the worst reporting in the NFL when it comes to our local guys. Not one X's and O's guy exists down here. I literally have learned nothing about football from our media guys. TP should look into hiring a former scout or a someone similar to their team.
 
We've got Jenkins, Harper, Isa Abdul Quddus, Rafael Bush, and Corey White probably at S. That's five, adding one means subtracting one.

I agree changes would be possible, but I think they like the three young guys. If you add a safety it needs to be someone who will replace Harper or Jenkins. Given the lack of interest in free agent safeties shown thus far, unless we draft someone in the first round at this point it seems likely that what you see is what you will get.

I only hope that Ryan and McGriffs fresh eyes on the situation give our hunger players a fair shake at starting over Jenkins and Harper, if its called for.


I'd like to see what IAQ can do as a centerfielder in this D. I just don't think MJ is a natural@ that and would be better used as a Rover@ SS. where he can drop in the slot@ times in the Base and cover a TE.

Wishful thinking...i am by no means really unhappy with harper...just think hes payed Alot.

Harper could play in the base and Nickel but i figured a 4 1 6 package would be a nice way to get IAQ on the field in a Sub. Moving Harper to that 2nd LB spot and brining Quddus in @ SS would be nice.

I trust Harper in man to man........as long as he has help over the top. I've always said he isn't horrible in coverage..just doesn't have ball skills.



Itll be interesting to see how he fits and if we go back to a package heavy defense.
 
No team in their right mind would give anything close to a 3rd for Harper - especially with that salary. At the end of the day, we are at the mercy of Harper and it was a bad contract we gave to him. Hopefully we'll learn from this moving forward.

Also, we have to have some of the worst reporting in the NFL when it comes to our local guys. No one X and O guy exists down here.

Just a small word on "bad contracts", I mean, they happen.

We made Harper play on his RFA tender in 2010, a restricted free agency that shouldn't have happened but did because of quirks in the uncapped year. So when he became a FA in 2011 he demanded, justifiably, market value. Well he was coming off two straight pro bowls and Eric Weddle, an admittly superior player, got 5 yrs / $40 million. Dashawn Landry, an inferior player, got 5 yrs / $28 million. We slotted Harper in right between.

It was a fair market price for a desirable 2-time pro bowl safety. Of course, then Vernon Davis ate him up, he got walked down by a quarterback, and why Sags even bothered playing him if he was going to put him in deep zone is beyond me, so yeah it looks bad now. But at the time it was a pretty reasonable deal.
 
I'd like to see what IAQ can do as a centerfielder in this D. I just don't think MJ is a natural@ that and would be better used as a Rover@ SS. where he can drop in the slot@ times in the Base and cover a TE.

Wishful thinking...i am by no means really unhappy with harper...just think hes payed Alot.

Harper could play in the base and Nickel but i figured a 4 1 6 package would be a nice way to get IAQ on the field in a Sub. Moving Harper to that 2nd LB spot and brining Quddus in @ SS would be nice.

I trust Harper in man to man........as long as he has help over the top. I've always said he isn't horrible in coverage..just doesn't have ball skills.



Itll be interesting to see how he fits and if we go back to a package heavy defense.

Well in 2011 we played 3-3-5 with Harper in the box like 40% of the snaps. Essentially it was a 3-4 defense with Harper as the fourth linebacker, and that's when he had 7.5 sacks, 100+ tackles, and 3 FF. So we know there are some lineups he can be effective in.

The trouble he had was, well for one he has stone hands, but beyond that he can't matchup with elite tight ends. You'd think, playing him in the box like that in a nickel situation, well sure, we'll just cover Their tight end with our SS. But Harper is marginal athletically and not that big really. So he matches up really bad against faster tight ends.

I hope that'll be less of an issue going forward, as we're more athletic at the LB position now than we've really ever been. Martez Wilson (hopefully) and David Hawthorne in particular should matchup well with most tight ends, so you can assign Harper the running back (which fits well with his delayed blitz skillet anyways, since he can read the RB in coverage or protection and make the call on blitzing or not based on that).

But if its going to be third and long and we're not blitzing (and hopefully Ryan doesn't blitz as much on 3rd and longs as GW did in 2011 :covri:) he'll probably need to go off the field. I just don't see why anyone would be optimistic about him being lined up deep, not when we have promising young players with uh better range behind him.
 

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