The NFL has recently stated that the NFL will not play preseason games, but teams have to sacrifice something. Players. The rosters will now be cut from 90 to 80. Some promising players will likely not be able to show off what they have because of this. This is sad because look at how many guys have came into the league and made noise like this. A big one is Adam Thielen. Anyway, here are some surprising ones that could happen. Disclaimer: You might know some of these guys too well because wellll.... teams aren't going to cut people like Khalil Mack. (I worked really hard and literally looked at every NFL roster for 1 and a half hours and handpicked these people so please share this as much as possible).
9. Graham Gano
You may be wondering why I wouldn't cut Joey Slye, and even I wondered who should be cut. Here's my reasoning: their schedule has some pretty daunting defenses. Most of the teams they face don't have a bad defense at all. That would be bad for the offense led by Bridgewater. Yes, they do have McCaffrey, but that's not enough. They need to push the ball and complete passes. It could take some time to get the chemistry with Bridgewater and his WRs though. And Graham Gano is a little worse than Joey Slye at long field goals. And, Gano is coming off of a season where he had an injury. So he might have lost a little bit of power.
8. Dante Pettis
This WR was the 4th reciver taken in the 2018 Draft (2nd round 44th overall). Let me repeat that. 4TH. Almost every WR taken after him was better than him except the ones taken in the 5th round or later (with the exception of Auden Tate who was drafted in the 7th round). He was able to rely on his athleticism in college and get around DBs better in the PAC 12. The NFL is much much different and he was doing too much to get around them and couldn't do that much. But, the 49ers drafted him in the second round only 2 years ago, so they might just trade him for a low draft pick instead.
7. Derrius Guice
Now you might say that he's still ta talented back and they should not cut him. But, he hasn't been healthy to provide in any of the important games. He played in week 1, and returned all the way in week 11. But he got injured again in week 14. He did produce a decent amount when he was healthy though. But, he is also a player that is only in his 2nd year and they could maybe wait one more year, but they might not even get to use him. So, the Washington _______ should try to trade him for a 5th or 6th round pick in my opinion. But, if they don't get anything, they should just move on and get to 80 soon.
6. Byron Pringle
This guy is a pretty good player and he flashes really good speed when he catches the ball and runs. But, the Chiefs in my opinion really don't need speed. They already have Hill, and Mecole Hardman. And for a possession WR, Sammy Watkins is good, but they have Kelce too. So to put it simply, they should get closer to 80 by cutting him. It's not that he's a bad player, but just that he isn't really needed in the offense. He could find a new home elsewhere, but not in KC.
5. Zay Jones
The Raiders overhauled their WR position this offseason. They added a speedster in Ruggs, they drafted Bryan Edwards in the 3rd round (and they didn't do that to sit him), they drafted Lynn Bowden Jr. too (who is a do it all guy literally. He can play every position on the offense except O-line and TE. Who knows, maybe he can play TE too.), They already had Hunter Renfrow the slot guy, and they have other good depth guys such as Nelson Agholor. Tyrell Williams is going to be the 3rd WR. And if you made the argument that he is still a good WR, he didn't have a game over 35 yards in the season. That could maybe partially the fault of the WRs not being good last year, but Williams had 651 receiving yards last year. So, that probably wasn't the problem.
4. Jojo Natson
He is one of those guys that come into the league as a UDFA and prove themselves worthy of getting a roster spot. But, I think that he really isn't needed on the Browns. They already have really really good WRs, and even their backups look decent. But, he wasn't brought in to be the main receiver. Natson was brought to be a good returner, yet the Browns seem set there too. He is listed as the 3rd string starter on the offense and returning game. You might be wondering why I put him here as surprsing. But, do the Brows really want to put one of their star receivers (Jarvis Landry) back to return punts instead of a guy that's not going to be used as much? It is something to think about.
3. Rex Burkhead
This one even for me is really surprising, but necessary. They could have cut Bolden or any of the other ones, but they cut him. Here's why: he's often only used in certain situations, only as a change of pace back, or if one of the starters gets hurt, he goes in. But, the Pats have other RBs for that and they could save 1 million dollars by cutting him. You could make a case for him that he is needed in the Belichick offense, but we all know the Coach Belichick is going to take a punter from some FCS school and turn them into a good speed back. Jokes aside though, he could take one of his players and turn the, into a good speed back like he turned his linebacker Elandon Roberts into a fullback. That leaves Burkhead going out the door.
2. Malcolm Butler
It's funny that the picture above was only 5 years ago when he was making the game saving grab. Now he could be on the chopping block. The only reason he wouldn't be at the risk of being cut is his cap hit. He has 8 million in dead cap space. He does provide 5 million dollars of cap savings though. But, contract aside, he hasn't done that that much to be getting 13 million per year. He was only active in games 1-9 and was injured after that. We don't know how her will respond to the injury when he comes back. He did have decent stats when healthy, but he wasn't there to go against Patty Mahomes in the AFC championship and the Titans struggled. Who knows, he could have made an interception against Mahomes.
1. Lane Taylor
This one is not the biggest surprise, but he could get released even though he could be a quality backup. He was graded by PFF at a measly 59.2. His heir, Elgton Jenkins, was graded 10 points higher at 69.2. Also, Taylor only played 2 games in 2019 which is a concern about his durability. Especially since he is already 30 years old. Elgton Jenkins brings youth (24), and he has better talent. Even if we look at the advanced stats, Taylor had a bigger blown block percentage in the 2 games he played than Jenkins even though Jenkins played 16 games (the Packers played in 2 playoff games) to his 2. And pass protection was pretty good with only .02 blown blocks from Jenkins while Taylor didn't blow any in only 61 snaps.
Huge thanks to Sports Info Solutions for providing the advanced stats FOR FREE (cough cough PFF cough cough)
Please share this with your friends that like football or sports. I literally looked at every NFL roster for 1 hour and 30 min picking everyone. Thanks a lot for reading and see you in the next one.
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