Guest Post: Leg two of the JetsFix readers' 53-man roster relay

After JetsFix founder and MockDraftable head honcho Marcus Armstrong shared his premature 53-man roster projection in a guest post last week, we've decided to evolve this feature into a fan-sourced relay type of thing. This week, Brendan is sharing his own current prediction and we'll take a look at how much this has changed since Marcus selected his 53 prior to the first preseason game:

Without further ado, here's his forecast. Note that players colored in green are considered to be locks to make the roster, yellow means they're a solid bet but need to keep playing well and red are the long-shots he thinks will make it.

Now let's review how different this is to what Marcus had in the first leg:

Locks

Marcus had 36 players he viewed as locks to make the roster, while Brendan has 39. So which three players have earned themselves "lock" status this week? Or is it more than three with some players losing that status?

  • Eli McGuire has lost his status as a roster lock, as Brendan views him as a candidate to go onto injured reserve and return later on during the season. This presumably depends on how his rehab is going;
  • On the offensive line, Brendan considers Dakota Dozier and Brent Qvale to be locks now, whereas Marcus only felt the starters could be considered as locks this time last week;
  • Brendan is calling Chris Herndon a lock, after Marcus controversially refused to. Ironically, if anything, Herndon is less of a lock than he was a week ago, having been out injured;
  • Brendan has Mike Pennel as a lock, which probably makes sense as Pennel has been starting for the injured Steve McLendon all week;
  • Brendan also has Josh Martin as a lock, which was another controversial omission from Marcus last week given his importance on special teams; and
  • Brendan isn't prepared to call Derrick Jones a lock yet, as Marcus had prior to the first game.

Cuts

Now let's look at the other end of the roster and see which players were included in Marcus' depth chart but not Brendan's and vice versa:

  • Dropping out of the 53 this week: Cairo Santos, Ben Ijalana, Lorenzo Mauldin, Darryl Roberts, Kevin Pierre-Louis, Elijah McGuire; and
  • Stepping up into the 53 this week: Taylor Bertolet, Travis Swanson, Dylan Donahue, Neal Sterling, Dakota Dozier, Brent Qvale.

Santos, Ijalana, McGuire, Mauldin and Pierre-Louis are all for injury reasons with Ijalana now definitely not going to be on the 53 as he's on injured reserve, so it's really only Roberts who got bumped down after last week for a non-injury reason and that's largely because Brendan kept an extra tight end.

Of the six players stepping up this week, Marcus was going to have Donahue on his practice squad (and Sterling, until he found out he wasn't eligible) but didn't have Qvale or Dozier despite the fact Brendan now views them as locks.

Where they agree

Finally, to recap some of the less obvious areas where Marcus and Brendan's forecasts agree:

  • Neither has a spot earmarked for a punt return specialist yet;
  • They both have sleepers Frankie Luvu, Brandon Copeland, Neville Hewitt, Kevin Minter and Tre McBride making the team; and
  • Neither has any room for Jonotthan Harrison, despite the fact he'll probably start tonight.

Brendan will be around in the comments section later if you wish to debate any aspect of his list...

JETSFIXERS: Let us know if you'd like to be the one to take the baton for next week's 53-man roster projection.

Brendan, who is the author of the now legendary Lamarticle has been a loyal JetsFix reader for several years; an impressive feat given that the site has only existed for just under 18 months.