(01-02-2018 07:52 PM)MemOwl Wrote:  I'm reluctant to lay special teams failure at Rick Smith's feet, but maybe I shouldn't be.
On the positive side, I think there are studies that show we have high persistence of our draft picks on the roster, and he has hit on a number of superior UDFA's.
On the negative side, we don't have a Matthew Slater, a guy who only plays ST's and plays them superbly. Brian Peters only plays ST, but he isn't superb.
So while I believe Smith's talent acquisition is far better than the talk radio consensus, it may be that his roster construction is flawed. But Kubiak and O'Brien, I believe, have had a lot of say in the final 53.
Recall on Hard Knocks for the 2015 season, they cut Charles James and kept someone else because he was taller. Then they brought James back and he was superb on kick coverage (but then got cut anyway late in the season when injuries forced him to play CB and he couldn't cover his own shadow against Aaron Rogers).
We made the playoffs anyway but KC returned the opening kickoff for a TD on way to a historic arse whipping.

That's kind of the quandary. Your starters are your starters. For the rest of the roster do you want guys who can play special teams, guys who are ready to step in with little falloff in case of an injury to a starter, or guys with great future potential? Cowboys under Schramm/Landry used to go for future potential, Redskins under George Allen went for special teams players, and when they met Redskins seemed almost always to win the special teams phase, and with it the game. Of course, the Schramm/Landry era lasted a lot longer than the Allen era, so maybe their approach was better in the long run.