Brandon Lloyd

[JoeRedskin]

Originally Posted by dgack

I think most people believe Lloyd could be a decent receiver. The question is how much we're paying to get him. I am in no rush to buy the next Peerless Price.

As to the "don't pay too much" part - I agree. But remember, unlike Price, we are not bringing Lloyd here to be the "go to" option. Also, Price did not have a solid option opposite him. Those factors just won't be true here. It is Moss who will demand double coverage not Lloyd. Over the course of last season, teams learned: Single cover Moss and get burned - one of the reasons our offense slowed down during the second half of the season is b/c teams were blanketing Moss (in the Seattle game they often had 3 guys on him).

Originally Posted by dgack

Again, when you're throwing all game long in desperation mode, why wouldn't you get a lot more chances to catch footballs? Santana was "the other option" on a run first team, for cripes' sake.

SF had one of the crappiest offenses in the league. If not THE crappiest.
Moss may have been the "other option on a run first team" but at least it was an offense that could score and sustain drives. If SF's offense goes 3 and out and the other teams takes its sweet time driving the ball, I don't care if your "throwing all game long in desperation" - you're still only going to get limited chances. Certainly, Moss and Lloyd were close enough in "targeted passes" to indicate that they were roughly equivalent in terms of their respective roles in their respective offenses.

Also, as for the target/reception ratio, which are the lower percentage passes? - The long "desparation" passes. What - by your own terms, was SF throwing to Lloyd? Long desparation passes.

The "targeted receiver" stat is probably a much better reflection as to how much a player was intergrated into the attack than the target/reception ratio is as an indicator of how good a reciever the player is. There are any number of reasons why LLoyds reception ratio may be low; quite a few of them out of his control. Given SF's overall team (offensive and defensive) flaws (did Smith throw a TD pass last year? I don't think so), however, I would suggest that, although Moss may have done better than Lloyd in SF, I wouldn't bet on it.

Put Lloyd in a decent offense, with a solid option opposite him and I bet he explodes.

Bottom line: If Gibbs thinks Lloyd is worth a 2 and 5 or 3 and 4, I see no reason to doubt him.