What cracks me up is that people bitch about "29 year old Alex Smith", when Brendan Albert will turn 29 in November, but he's "young".

Hypocritical bitches.

LMAO

Ya ROFL. I've never called him young. He's getting to that age and with his back spasms. It can be fishy.

What? Albert is homegrown, near top-shelf talent that belongs to us.

Alex Smith is just an average QB who isn't improving.

There's a huge difference.

You CAN win a SB with Branden Albert as your LT.

You most likely cannot with Alex Smith.

Give me a ****ing break.

You're being intellectually dishonest.

Incorrect.

You don't need a top shelf LT to win a SB.

9 times out of 10, you need a top shelf QB to do so.

Alex Smith has never even thrown for 3200 yards in this league.

He's not winning a SB. Ever.

It's not hypocritical at all; it's a realization of the players' relative skill sets.

To win a SB with Alex Smith, he needs to improve. At 29, this isn't likely to happen.

A team can absolutely win a SB with Albert playing at his current level.

Why can't Alex Smith improve? He improved from 2010 to 2011 and improved again in 2012.

How is it that you can declare that he's hit his ceiling?

A lot of ascending QBs at age 29? Or players in general? Nope.

He should be in the prime of his career right now, and he might be able to sustain his current level of talent for another 3-4 years.

Alex Smith was improving. No question about that.

2 of the worse coaches in the NFL ****ed Alex Smith start in the NFL.

As it becomes clearer and clearer that they had no intentions of negotiating with him or keeping him you are right.

but you're arguing about apples vs. oranges. Neither have anything to do with each other.

Alex Smith's signing is a statement that Reid and Dorsey don't think there's a franchise QB in the draft-certainly not Geno Smith at the top of it. That is ONE situation.

Albert wants top money to play LT. He's probably not worth that, especially coming off a season where he missed a lot of time to a back injury. (when the big boys start having back problems, they don't often just go away.) So letting him go for a #2 is better than having a malcontent around for a season and then letting him walk for nothing.

These were not either/or situations. They were just real world judgements about the best path given the circumstances. There's not really a better answer. If you think Geno Smith is a franchise QB-then how come we can't get anyone to jump up to #1 to get him? How come the Raiders, Bills, and Cardinals all signed lesser vets just like us? Come on.

I wanted Geno to be the guy too, but it just looks like nobody in charge of any of these teams thinks he is.

He's 28, the same age as Joe Flacco. Has Flacco hit his ceiling?

I think the past two seasons are indicative of the fact that he is entering his prime. If he can sustain his current level of play for the next 3-4 years, the Chiefs should win plenty of games and give them the time they need to identify and groom the QBOTF.

In his "best" year, he averaged something stupid like 175 YPG.

"That's because the 49ers relied upon their defense and running game."

Exactly.

He'll be 29 in May, I believe.

If Flacco's ceiling is a shit ton of playoff wins, I'd take it. And, yes, I don't believe he's an ascending player at this point.