Alex Barron has no time for your Wei Ji.I’ve often heard — incorrectly, as it turns out — that “crisis” and “opportunity” are the same word in Chinese. They are related words, though, as “ji” translates roughly as a turning point. It seems to be particularly appropriate to bring this up tonight, as Denver’s wei ji could very well be St. Louis’ zhuan ji. And yes, having relied on the internet to translate for me, I probably just called my own mother a prostitute.
Wei Ji — Crisis in Denver
The big news of the day — Kevin Payne trade notwithstanding, and we have a post coming up about that featuring perspectives from Bears Hibernation — was the announcement that the Broncos’ punishing left tackle Ryan Clady had torn his patellar tendon while horsing around on the basketball court. While the official estimate for recovery time is 3 months, Bill Barnwell at Football Outsiders isn’t so sure.
Something’s amiss here. We have a wide variety of players listed with torn patellar tendons in our injury database. I can’t find a single player that managed to either recover from a torn patella in the middle of a season in three months time, or a player that suffered a torn patella in the offseason and then recovered to start the season. Not one.
— Football Outsiders: “Ryan Clady tears patellar tendon playing basketball“
In fact, it’s much more reasonable to believe that Denver will be without Clady’s services for most of the season. Which means that after spending the past week trying to spin up Denver’s befuddling draft, someone needs to hide the sharp objects and take the belt away from our man Bryan.
bpdouglass @RamsHerd Seems like things are looking up… and it rises up and kicks you right in balls.
Zhuan Ji — opportunity in St Louis?
While the phone lines between Denver and St Louis have not been used much lately, might I suggest our man Billy Devaney call up his old friend from his Falcons days, GM Brian Zander of the Broncos? Might I go so far to suggest that we offer a fine deal on a slightly used Alex Barron? We lost the owners’ manual a few years back, sometimes the engine coughs and sputters, and sometimes he takes a funny turn, but the good news is that he just goes and goes.
bpdouglass @RamsHerd I was going to tweet you with a similar “response”… wouldn’t shock me at all.
bpdouglass @RamsHerd Some good OTs rumored to be “available”… so we will see. Doubt #Denver makes a big splash though. Money, money, money. #Broncos
More good news for you then, governor, as Alex is signing his tender, allowing us to shop him, and he’s available dirt cheap. He’s only got a one-year deal for $2.62 mil, and the Rams aren’t asking all that much in return. In fact, could set you back only a third-rounder for a former #19 overall choice.
What’s more, we did just draft a pretty well-regarded kid named Saffold that could step in right away.
I know it hurts losing a guy like Clady, but sometimes these things happen for a reason, right?
