No GM is perfect, and a new GM is going to learn on the job.
I've done this before, but between Rivera and Bruce before him, the team had so few building blocks. McLaurin and Cosmi come to mind. There's probably somebody else along the way I've missed.
Yeah, Daniels was great in 2024, but the 2024 plan was absolutely stunningly great. They brought in a bunch of FAs on one year deals and then drafted guys who could replace them. Wherever there was a veteran, they drafted a successor.
And in 2024, it worked beautifully.
However, 2025 was a massive miss for basically 2 reasons:
1. The entire team got hurt from QB on down. They lost all of their DEs and WRs and best RB (Ekler) by like week 4, and then Ertz got hurt, and then Amos, then on and on and on. The team they were fielding was not the team they thought they would field. And that matters. We were lining up practice squad players because the starters and primary backups both got hurt. This is the #1 reason why the season went off the rails.
2. The 2024 draft picks ALL took a step back or at a bare minimum didn't progress.
Daniels - historical rookie season to injury plagued second season, and when he played, he didn't look as good.
Johnny Newton - Maybe not a step back, but not a step forward. And for a high second round pick, that was disappointing
Mikey Sainristil - Very promising rookie year, at best uneven second season.
Ben Sinnott - Again, maybe not a step backwards, but not a step forward either
Brandon Coleman - Went from starting LT to getting benched at guard. Youch.
Luke McCaffrey - Didn't really develop and then got hurt.
Jordan Magee - Barely played
Dominique Hampton - didn't make the team in 2025
Javontae Jean-Baptiste - Did ok then got hurt.
So the really great plan from 2024 went bust because the guys they selected to be the core of the new roster either didn't develop or took a step back, or (I guess) just got hurt.
Now, how much of that was scheme/fit/coaching? You could definitely argue Whitt had no idea what he was doing, and that effected Newton and Sainristil directly, and Kliff's offense didn't use TEs, and that impacted Sinnott.
Well, now they have a new DC and new OC, and that might change, but we'll have to wait to see it.
Yeah, there were other questionable decisions at specific roster spots. The decision to re-sign Noah Brown was a disaster. They should have looked for an upgrade there. Deebo was a good trade. Tunsil was a very good trade. Lattimore, clearly, was a disaster of a trade though I still appreciate the swing. It just didn't work out. They needed to do more in FA last year than they did. Their biggest pickups were Tunsil (which was great) and Deebo (which was ok.) They weren't as aggressive as they needed to be.
But it looks like they had a good 2025 draft. We'll see how they develop.
This season is going to rest on 3 things from a roster perspective:
1. Health (that's basically true for every NFL team)
2. The development of the 2024 class. In year 3, they need to get serious production from players approaching their prime.
3. How the spending spree this off-season off-sets the lack of spending last off season. Did they get enough pieces.
I still think it's way too early to think Peters is a bad GM. What he did building a competitive team in 2024 was nothing short of a miracle. And nobody should forget that. It did happen. In his first year as a GM. Now, you can't ride that forever. But it should buy you enough good will to survive a terrible, injury ravaged second season with most of your reputation intact.