Early W/L offseason predictions (any team)...

[GTripp0012]

Originally Posted by That Guy

but, our schedule only has two sure losses (well, nothing's 100%, but seattle and pittsburg have very good rosters right now) and the rest seem pretty winnable. I'm not concerned with STL, NO, ARI, SF, DET, or BAL. CLE or CIN could go either way, but i do think we can win those at least 6/10 times.

Well, we have Pittsburgh at home this year, and though it would be foolish to take Campbell over Big Ben at this point, Pittsburgh's roster is lacking in the exact same places ours is: They are elderly on defense, and have little of a running game to back up their passing game. The difference, of course, being that we have an established running back, and they have a one two punch of fantasy back Willie Parker, and rookie will-be-stud-two-years-from-now Mendenhall. I'm taking the Skins in that game, at least right now.

Seattle of course, is always a tough road game, but that team isn't impressive to me. Sure, they jettisoned Alexander, but a combination of Julius Jones and TJ Duckett doesn't strike all that much fear into anyone in the running game, and we know that Hasselbeck had his career year in 2005 -- three years ago. I don't want to say that we have the advantage at QB, but Campbell IS improving, and Hasselbeck is hanging around the above average tier for the next few years, so we might have the advantage at QB in that game. Seattle's defense is much younger than ours, but they are definately in transition at a few positions, such as DE or Safety, and that might give us the advantage around the middle of the season.

The non-conference opponents we really have to be careful about: St. Louis, Arizona, Cincinnati, and to an extent, New Orleans. New Orleans has a crappy roster right now on paper, but I can't sleep on Drew Brees. Cincinnati is just a top offensive team from top to bottom, and they have two young corners and two young linebackers, so I can't count their defense out either. Still, I already know I'm picking the Skins over the Saints in the home opener, especially with 10 days to gameplan for it.

Anyway, the toughest part of the schedule is right at the beginning -- the first 5 games, so we will know right off the bat how good this team is going to be.