A random thought on mediocrity

[FlyingGreg]

Serious question here....when do we stop using the "we are young" crutch? It's legit... but I hear it from Pete every week to explain lapses and errors -- and I wonder when it's going to expire.

Is it a "crutch" when it's absolutely true? Did you know that the Seahawks have twice as many players with 3 or fewer years in the league than they do players with 6+ years?

Sure, part of the "youth" argument is that young players make mistakes. But part of it - and this is especially true of a team that's going through a rebuild - is cohesiveness. Because of the youth of the team, they haven't built those strong bonds that you see on more veteran teams.

Look at defenses like the Ravens and Steelers, for example. They've cycled through young players pretty effectively across many years, but it's because they were able first to establish that veteran core and then acclimate new players into that core while allowing older players to retire or move on to other teams. If you draft well, that process is self-sustaining. But we're not at that point... we're still developing that core on both sides of the ball. That's why you still get Rice and Wilson thinking that a raised hand means different things. That's why you get miscommunications in zone coverage that lets a Lions WR get so open past Sherman.

The biggest fix for that is time and experience playing together, imo.

I said it's legit -- I believe it. My question was...when does it stop being true? Most of our youth is coming up on at least two full seasons under their belt. I guess what I want to know is when we expect the youthful errors and lapses to be conquered? I have no idea.

To me, it can be dangerous to default to that to explain every problem we are having. I think I'm a little alarmed that Pete seems to always bring it up. After all, the youth movement is his trump card. But I'd almost prefer he just says, "we told you it's a 4-year plan and anything we accomplish in year 3 is icing on the cake".

 

[themunn]

I said it's legit -- I believe it. My question was...when does it stop being true? Most of our youth is coming up on at least two full seasons under their belt. I guess what I want to know is when we expect the youthful errors and lapses to be conquered? I have no idea.

To me, it can be dangerous to default to that to explain every problem we are having. I think I'm a little alarmed that Pete seems to always bring it up. After all, the youth movement is his trump card. But I'd almost prefer he just says, "we told you it's a 4-year plan and anything we accomplish in year 3 is icing on the cake".

Youth stops being an excuse when you have more players with 5+ years experience than <5 years experience IMO.
Right now, on offense we have:

Okung 3
Carpenter 2
Unger 4
McQuistan 7
Giacomini 5
Lynch 6
Robinson 7
Miller 6
Wilson 1
Rice 6
Tate 3
Baldwin 2
Turbin 1
McCoy 3
Moffit 2

So our first 11 is bordering on experienced, but our depth is still very young (and in all likelihood, next year, McQuistan and Giacomini are expendeble, and we're looking at a very young team, but with a lot of experience, because they've all come in and contributed as rookies)

Our defense is a strange one:

Bryant 5
Mebane 6
Branch 6
Clemons 10
KJ 2
Wagner 1
Hill 8
Sherman 2
Browner 8
Jones 5
ET 3
Chancellor 3
Scruggs 1
Irvin 1
Trufant 10

We have a lot of really experienced players in there, but of them, Hill and Trufant's age is actually beginning to reduce their effectiveness instead of increase their experience, Browner is only in his 2nd NFL season and Bryant had just 9 games experience until PC took over as a situational player, he's still "young" in terms of experience (he has only 3 more games experience than Ndamukong Suh, for example)

 

[MontanaHawk05]

Serious question here....when do we stop using the "we are young" crutch? It's legit... but I hear it from Pete every week to explain lapses and errors -- and I wonder when it's going to expire.

Is it a "crutch" when it's absolutely true? Did you know that the Seahawks have twice as many players with 3 or fewer years in the league than they do players with 6+ years?

Sure, part of the "youth" argument is that young players make mistakes. But part of it - and this is especially true of a team that's going through a rebuild - is cohesiveness. Because of the youth of the team, they haven't built those strong bonds that you see on more veteran teams.

Look at defenses like the Ravens and Steelers, for example. They've cycled through young players pretty effectively across many years, but it's because they were able first to establish that veteran core and then acclimate new players into that core while allowing older players to retire or move on to other teams. If you draft well, that process is self-sustaining. But we're not at that point... we're still developing that core on both sides of the ball. That's why you still get Rice and Wilson thinking that a raised hand means different things. That's why you get miscommunications in zone coverage that lets a Lions WR get so open past Sherman.

The biggest fix for that is time and experience playing together, imo.

I said it's legit -- I believe it. My question was...when does it stop being true? Most of our youth is coming up on at least two full seasons under their belt. I guess what I want to know is when we expect the youthful errors and lapses to be conquered? I have no idea.

To me, it can be dangerous to default to that to explain every problem we are having. I think I'm a little alarmed that Pete seems to always bring it up. After all, the youth movement is his trump card. But I'd almost prefer he just says, "we told you it's a 4-year plan and anything we accomplish in year 3 is icing on the cake".

Which makes more sense: to assume that an extremely young team will improve, or to assume it won't?

It's also worth pointing out that Miami's final ten points on Sunday were scored at the expense of our two OLDEST defensive players. The question of "when do we improve?" is valid, but hey, when one of the weak link's replacements is already on the roster and has a short but strong record of play, it's easier for me to be optimistic.