[sportscurmudgeon]

Chief:

The problem is that the Skins should not overpay anyone - not a current member of the team nor a FA who played for someone else last year.

However, we know that the Skins have this tendency to overpay based on past evidence. So, if they are in the situation where they are about to overpay someone and there are two possible players who will be the recipient of the overpayment, here's the rule I would use:

If you must overpay someone, OVERPAY THE BETTER PLAYER. I don't care who he played for last year, get the best player even if you are going to pay more for him than he's worth.

And Dockery isn't the best lineman on the team at the moment. He improved a lot last year and with that improvement, he moved just above the level of "average" as an OL. If any team gives him a monster contract, they are taking a HUGE risk and will be saddled with that contract for a while - - because no one will trade for Dockery if he comes with a monster contract strapped to his back.

Oh, by the way, Steinbach is a significantly better guard than Dockery.