Week 3 NFL thread

Here is a good balanced assesment of the trade from both teams perspectives.

http://www.grantland.com/blog/the-triangle/post/_/id/75160/the-browns-hit-reset-again-with-an-unprecedented-trade

 

I'm not.

 

The trade is fine if you believe the Browns will use the extra draft picks prudently, which is still a greater leap of faith than I'm willing to take. I always thought the Bears trading for Cutler was a smart deal because it prevented the Bears from making two more boneheaded first round picks.

I can see why it feels like the prudent move. And perhaps it will be. I'm just not convinced Lombardi will be any better at evaluating players than the previous 10 years of knuckleheads.

 

That's funny, and probably true about Cutler...

As far as the Browns are concerned, this is the kind of move that bad franchises make when there's turnover every couple years. Two years ago, they give up a lot to move up one spot to take Richardson, who was supposed to be a once or twice in a decade level running back. Whether he can become that guy remains to be seen, but I don't think anyone looks at Richardson says, "What were the Browns thinking drafting him?" They might have thought they gave up too much, but I don't think we've seen anything to indicate that he's the next Blair Thomas or Ronnie Brown or (list your RB bust pick here...)

This also overshadows that Weeden will almost certainly be gone by next season as well...

New regime and new ideas. Richardson isn't a great fit in Turner's offense and now their most valuable player at a skilled position is being wasted. Let's get something for him and move up in the draft... OK, great... Now is anyone supremely confident that the coach of the Browns in 3-4 years isn't going to say, "I didn't draft Teddy Bridgewater."

 

Getting a first round pick is being wasted? What would his value have been after this year if he continued to struggle?

What the morons did before Lombardi should have no bearing on the moves he makes going forward. He may very well fuck this up but replacing Richardson will be the least of their worries.

I will never understand the logic of picking a 28 year old in the first round. You mean a man in his physical prime dominated teenagers? No shit, he damn well should have.

 

Exactly.

Let's look at the top 20 rushers of the 2012 season and where they were selected in the draft.

First round: 7 (Overall selections 7, 12, 31, 9, 24, 23, 12)
Second round: 4
Third round: 5
Sixth round: 1
Seventh round: 1
Undrafted: 2


Now let's compare that to the top 20 passers by yardage -- we can do it by rating, too if you want to play that game but I'll bet the results are similar.

First round: 14 (Overall 1, 3, 1, 1, 24, 17, 1, 1, 1, 18, 1, 4, 22, 8)
Second round: 2
Third round: 1
Sixth round: 1
seventh round: 1
Undrafted: 1


Let's review shall we? That's seven of the top 20 rushers in the first round, including two top-10 and four top-15 selections, and 13 from later rounds (plus three late first-rounders, as in 20 or later). Compared to 14 of the top 20 passers in the first round, including 10 top-10 picks, and six from later rounds (plus two late firsts).

So what have we learned? Your chances of hitting on a top runner in later rounds are way better than your chances of getting a top passer.

 

I may be in the minority in thinking it was good for both sides. The move has it's positives and negatives for both teams.


Colts

Positives:

The Colts now have potential in the backfield they haven't seen since Edgerrin James. Richardson has the potential to take a lot of pressure off of Luck and the passing game and already is easily the most talented player at RB they've had since Addai. This move helps them finish games a little bit better and is good reason to get the ball out of Andrew's hands a little more, which should help with some of the turnovers that come from trying to force the pass game. It's also some semblance of a running threat, which theoretically makes it easier to throw. How much easier will it actually be? We'll have to find out. Luck is someone who had a strong backfield and running game throughout his entire college career, so this should also make him a little bit more comfortable in conducting a successful offensive attack. The playaction just became less of an exercise in futility in Indy.

Negatives:

What in the world puts the Colts in position to trade a first round pick for an RB? Not only are there probably better trade options that would have more of an impact on a team with playoff hopes, that 1st round pick should hold more value for a team that still has a sizable amount of draft needs. Sure they have some pieces on offense, but outside of Andrew Luck improvement and a continuously lackluster AFC, the playoffs are no guarantee and hardly very likely. This seems like a desperation move for a team that seems a bit impatient in their progression. Very risky and ill-advised. How many Quality RBs have been found beyond the first round in the last 5 years? How many starting RBs around the league were originally 1st round picks? Less than half, actually. The Browns Oline was only able to block well enough for a Sub 4YPC average, can an equally unimpressive oline for the Colts really do much better?


Browns

Positives:

Few team get a way out of a bad 1st round pick. The Browns arguably got a mulligan here. They now have 7 picks in the first 4 rounds, including 2 picks in the first round. They now have the ammo to take multiple talented players in the top end of this year's draft. Trent reportedly did not fit what they were trying to do and they can get an early start on going in another direction. They knew the playoffs weren't in the cards for them this season and they can now develop other players at the position. QB is also a huge need for them. Getting worse plus obtaining trade chips is a good way to make a move towards a Franchise player at Quarterback. They have more than enough cap space to cover the dead money of this deal. No need to try to make due with the assets of a previous regime, right?

Negatives:

You don't trade top 3 picks after one season. For financial (reasons not as critical as in the previous CBA) and logic reasons, there's no purpose in giving up significant money invested into a talented player so soon. I'm not a fan of hitting the reset button on a 1 year rebuild, that proceeded a past rebuild, by starting another rebuild. Do these people give a crap about their impressively loyal (a loyalty that won't last forever) fan base, at all? When you select a player in the top 10 of a draft, let alone the top 3, the plan is to makes things work around them...not the other way around. I'm not seeing these great surroundings that his presence is somehow befuddling, it's not like Richardson was the monkey wrench in the plans. He was more like the lonely Cog in a low-function machine. The browns offense has been in the bottom half of the league A LOT in the past decade. They've lost games A LOT in the past decade. I know it was a different GM last year, but if a top 3 pick didn't work out for you after a year, what the hell are you going to do with a mid to late round pick? Trade it for a 2nd round pick when it doesn't take the league by storm? #Profit. The closest thing to face that franchise has had in a millennium (okay, okay that's unfair, a billion years), is now gone. Hopefully they're terrible enough to replace that face this April. Hopefully he's not on the hot seat by week 3 of preseason.

 

The timing of the trade is what I find curious. It's not unusual to see teams who are in new regimes and are struggling to trade their better players for what they can, say, after the first six weeks of the season, but doing it two weeks into the season is unusual, especially when you are trying to give fans some flicker of hope for at least a respectable season.

We all knew going into the season that teams like the Raiders and the Jaguars had no chance at the playoffs but, while they don't really have a player that would net them a first-round pick, they aren't trading one of their better players two games into the season. Six games in, I could see one or the other doing so, but they at least seem to be operating under the belief that they might win a few games here and there.

The Browns, on the other hand, just signaled to the fanbase that the mindset is "just wait till next year." Not exactly what I would be doing at this point of the season.

And I suspect the Browns might have found additional players for Richardson and still been able to get a good deal for him -- maybe not a first-round pick, but two second rounders (one in 2014, one in 2015) would have been possible and that's still a good deal for the Browns. And I'm sure the Colts would have been right there in the mix.

I don't think Richardson is a back you can build a franchise around but he can be a key part of it, given that he's a good pass catcher. I don't know enough about how he is as a pass protector (something most teams want from a RB these days) but I would imagine he's good in that role, too, given that it seems he's utilized frequently on passing downs.

In other words, Richardson may not have been worth a top 3 pick, but he's definitely got the skill set teams are looking for in running backs these days.

 

Three fumbles in a season is good, but not THAT good, and whether or not they are lost is often a function of luck rather than anything the ball carrier did right.

 

The assumption Richardson isn't worth the high draft pick he was reminds me of nothing so much as what people said about O.J. Simpson after his rookie year.

 

The timing was right. The Colts were eager (if not desperate) to get a strong runner after their top back went down for the season and were willing to overpay. The Browns didn't like Richardson in the first place and figured this was more than they could get for him in four or five weeks (because they weren't convinced his production was going to get any better). I don't think they could have gotten more than that for him if they'd waited, either. If that's the case, then why wait?

I agree with Gehrig that the trade was good for both teams, at least on paper. The Colts believe they're ready for advance in the playoffs, so when they lost their semblance of a running game to injury they felt they needed to make a move, and this should be an upgrade. The Browns got more value for the player than they felt he was worth (and again, I agree with them on that).

We'll see how it will all plays out.

 

Really? You believe Trent Richardson is as good as O.J. Simpson?

Let's talk in five years.