I’m sure there are academics out there who would say I’m besmirching Aristotle’s good name by using one of his defining works in a fantasy football article. To those tweed-laden, bespectacled folks, I say, “hey, it was you who introduced me to the idea, is not applying it to every aspect of my life an…
Trust the process. Sports franchises have been captivated by these three simple words that originated out of the then hapless, yet hopeful, Philadelphia 76ers organization in 2015. The Sixers’ mantra is somewhat of a euphemism for tanking – which can be defined as the stripping down of a franchise’s present assets to acquire future assets…
Quarterback dominos began to fall this week, as the Cleveland Browns became active participants in the trade market. John Dorsey made a flurry of moves late last week, including trading for wide receiver Jarvis Landry as well as quarterback Tyrod Taylor. In this installment of Check With Me I’ll dive into that trade, look at…
Equanimeous St. Brown perplexes me. The Notre Dame wideout exhibits an impressive stature with excellent height at 6’4” and a lanky frame that could stand to add weight to the 205 pounds he currently carries. Based off size alone he’s an intriguing prospect for NFL teams and evaluators. However, after turning to his production you…
Part 1: The Day One Selections There comes a time in every person’s life when they have to push all their chips to the center of the table. When they have to just go all in, and lay everything bare for the world to see. Perhaps that comes when a person proposes marriage, and asks…
In the Building Blocks series, writers from Inside the Pylon will discuss the current roster of those teams on the outside looking in of playoff contention in 2017. In a roundtable format, the writers will talk about what players currently look like keepers for the long term, with the potential for being key contributors to…
The 2017 NFL trade deadline was surprisingly full of excitement this season. There were many high impact trades affecting teams both trying to win now and those preparing for the long term. However, I want to mainly focus on the quarterback movement, or almost quarterback movement in the case of A.J. McCarron, and how we…
Dan Hatman’s latest piece on Carson Wentz and self scouting has me thinking a lot about quarterback’s environments and how they affect their developmental curves. The Cleveland Browns are 0-8. After multiple benchings in favor of Kevin Hogan and Cody Kessler, Coach Hue Jackson has named his rookie quarterback, DeShone Kizer, the starter – again.…
The Inside the Pylon team often enjoys debating and discussing team-building philosophy and other football topics in our Slack board. From time to time, we publish these chats, lightly edited for readability. What follows is a recent discussion on how teams try to find a quarterback and how the Chicago Bears and Cleveland Browns have…
Like DeShone Kizer. Don’t like DeShone Kizer. I don’t care. At this point, after what has transpired this season in Cleveland, it doesn’t matter. And in reality, it shouldn’t have mattered in the first place. What was the goal of this season? To win or develop young talent? Let me explain. The Cleveland Browns were…
Not every loss is created equal and not every team benefits from the same amount of luck from year to year. A bounce of the ball here and a bounce of the ball there tend to even out in the end, but – during the course of a season – these little things add up,…
Anyone that tells you they know anything about anything at this point prior to the college football season… well… they don’t. We can take estimated guesses and some of them will turn out to be correct, but to accurately play out the entire season is a fool’s errand. People love to believe there is some…
The Miami Dolphins were in a tough situation last week. Franchise quarterback Ryan Tannehill partially tore his ACL, and recently decided to undergo surgery, ending his 2017 season. Despite having a capable backup like Matt Moore, the Dolphins decided to fill the need left by Tannehill’s injury externally, signing Jay Cutler out of retirement and…
The days and weeks leading up to the 2017 NFL Draft is a time where we can hypothesize about several different scenarios and hope our favorite team does not swing and miss early, while at the same time hoping that our team finds the hidden gems in the third day of the draft. After a…
Draft expert Mike Mayock of NFL Network held his annual draft press conference on Friday, and as usual it included some excellent insight and information. Here are a few tidbits followed by the full transcript and a link to the audio segment, in case you would like to listen. On Alabama LB Reuben Foster Q:…
With no inside knowledge to the Browns’ plans, my hypothesis was that last season, the first for the current front office and coaching staff, was about establishing a foundation – a group of players with high football IQ and character, with mostly successful college careers, who may not ever be high-ceiling starters but would definitely…