Year of the Free Agents

[rainmaker]

One of the key advantages that BB has over most other front offices is that he has the complete trust of his owner and his job is secure for many years allowing him to make decisions that are unorthodox.

- This year most teams are taking care of their needs through the draft and BB doesn't see the talent this year so is trading out of it. Most teams can't do this because they need to win now and can't risk not getting their rosters filled given the uncertainty of free agency and salary caps. I posted before the draft that this would indeed happen.

- BB will be large in free agency and getting a good number of better free agents. He is drafting cheaper alternatives through the draft to his current free agents (check out the Pats free agents - Light and the CB's - they are likely gone if they don't sign very cheaply). The value of free cap space just went up because the owners are proposing the salary cap to go down by $14MM. Some teams will need to cut in order to make this happen and others have filled their needs with a weak draft class. BB will sign our future pass rusher and guard through free agency and get real immediate help to win this year at a bargain price because there will be very few teams able to make offers to the free agents we target. Welcome Mathias Kiwanuka and Davin Joseph to the Pats.

 

[PatriotsInGA]

BB has never been large in free agency. He believes in the draft. If he picks up players, it's usually either:

A. Trade via draft

or

B. Waiver wire


And if you consider Marcus Stroud as the big free agent signing, you're insane.

 

[rainmaker]

Agree that BB has never been big on free agents - because they cost way too much. However, the key to his success is being ahead of the curve and anticipating the rule changes. With the lower salary cap, free agents are screwed and BB will take advantage before the other front offices catch up. He WILL sign more free agents - not just Stroud.

 

[eom]

I know it's become popular to say he traded out of this year's draft, but he came away with 5 players in the first 2 days --- how many did everybody else get?

 

[RobertWeathers]

BB has never been large in free agency. He believes in the draft. If he picks up players, it's usually either:

A. Trade via draft

or

B. Waiver wire


And if you consider Marcus Stroud as the big free agent signing, you're insane.

2001- Compton, Izzo, Patton, Phifer, Pleasant, A. Smith, Vrable= SB
2003- Ty Poole, Colvin, Harrison = SB
2007- Brady, Morris, AD, Stallworth= SB appearance

3 out of 4 years following a big FA offseason has produced a SB appearance or title. I would agree that he does not believe in breaking the bank, but he will if he thinks the player will help the team- see Colvin and Thomas and in 2008, Moss.

My point- Without jeopardizing the future of the franchise, BB will build a competitive team however way makes the most sense.

 

[Patriot_in_NY]

Agree... plus we're already pretty young on defense. Getting younger might have been counter productive. I'd love to bring in someone like Mathias Kiwanuka. A pass-russer with a little more maturity to compliment what should be a very young and healthy defense (from which we will really be able to access our "areas of need").

 

[The Scrizz]

BB has never been large in free agency. He believes in the draft. If he picks up players, it's usually either:

A. Trade via draft

or

B. Waiver wire


And if you consider Marcus Stroud as the big free agent signing, you're insane.

Adalius says hi. Didn't work out but was one of the consensus best FA that year.

 

[Observer]

One of the key advantages that BB has over most other front offices is that he has the complete trust of his owner and his job is secure for many years allowing him to make decisions that are unorthodox.

- This year most teams are taking care of their needs through the draft and BB doesn't see the talent this year so is trading out of it. Most teams can't do this because they need to win now and can't risk not getting their rosters filled given the uncertainty of free agency and salary caps. I posted before the draft that this would indeed happen.

- BB will be large in free agency and getting a good number of better free agents. He is drafting cheaper alternatives through the draft to his current free agents (check out the Pats free agents - Light and the CB's - they are likely gone if they don't sign very cheaply). The value of free cap space just went up because the owners are proposing the salary cap to go down by $14MM. Some teams will need to cut in order to make this happen and others have filled their needs with a weak draft class. BB will sign our future pass rusher and guard through free agency and get real immediate help to win this year at a bargain price because there will be very few teams able to make offers to the free agents we target. Welcome Mathias Kiwanuka and Davin Joseph to the Pats.

He did not trade out of the draft. He picked more players than most.

 

[Jared]

I agree that the defense is very young, and frankly could use 1 or 2 starting quality free agents. They don't need to be super stars, just quality starters.

 

[patriot lifer]

I know it's become popular to say he traded out of this year's draft, but he came away with 5 players in the first 2 days --- how many did everybody else get?

I think the point is that they probably didn't feel like there was that much talent in this year's draft. Let's remember that last year featured an especially deep class because more college players elected to enter early rather than enter during uncertain times. This had two effects: a) it increased the value and depth of the 2010 draft class and b) it weakened this draft class. It's something we were expecting this year, and it likely led them to not value as many players. Where in 2010, at any given pick, they may have had multiple players on their board worthy of the selection, but in this year's draft there were much fewer players worthy of any given selection. At 17, for example, they thought Solder was significantly more valuable than Jordan. At 17 last year, there could have been players at multiple positions worthy of that pick, in which case you take the most needy position. Who knows, they may consider this draft class to be on the order of the 2007 one. At least in that year they were able to trade out by acquiring Wes Welker and Randy Moss. I believe that their first pick after the first round was a fourth rounder (Kareem Brown). All this would explain things like why they would take another DB at 33. They didn't have any good trades and other players were not worthy of that pick. They would have been reaches per their draft boards.

Plus, let's not forget that other teams were trying to trade out too which made it harder to get good value on trades. 'Ole Shanny tried copying BB's strategy a little, and Mayock even said before the draft that after pick 25, teams would start to trade down and out because the value significantly drops off. And we know that BB took less value for one of the trades (according to Reiss who consulted the value charts). I think it was the one after the trade with the Saints.

 

[Froob]

Give up the pats 2nd next year and grab Kiwanuka(maybe get a 4th or 5th back?). Will there be anybody in the 2nd round who would be much better than Kiwanuka? If he's not insanely expensive they should get him. On the one condition he NEVER EVER mentions super bowl 42 as long as he's a pat

 

[DW Toys]

2001- Compton, Izzo, Patton, Phifer, Pleasant, A. Smith, Vrable= SB
2003- Ty Poole, Colvin, Harrison = SB
2007- Brady, Morris, AD, Stallworth= SB appearance

3 out of 4 years following a big FA offseason has produced a SB appearance or title. I would agree that he does not believe in breaking the bank, but he will if he thinks the player will help the team- see Colvin and Thomas and in 2008, Moss.

My point- Without jeopardizing the future of the franchise, BB will build a competitive team however way makes the most sense.

I agree, I have no idea what these other posters are talking about???
DW Toys

 

[SoonerPatriot]

Prediction: They make exactly zero FA moves, assuming there is a FA period at all.

BB likes what they have now, particularly on the defensive side of the ball and specifically at the OLB/DE spots.

 

[rainmaker]

I think the point is that they probably didn't feel like there was that much talent in this year's draft. Let's remember that last year featured an especially deep class because more college players elected to enter early rather than enter during uncertain times. This had two effects: a) it increased the value and depth of the 2010 draft class and b) it weakened this draft class. It's something we were expecting this year, and it likely led them to not value as many players. Where in 2010, at any given pick, they may have had multiple players on their board worthy of the selection, but in this year's draft there were much fewer players worthy of any given selection. At 17, for example, they thought Solder was significantly more valuable than Jordan. At 17 last year, there could have been players at multiple positions worthy of that pick, in which case you take the most needy position. Who knows, they may consider this draft class to be on the order of the 2007 one. At least in that year they were able to trade out by acquiring Wes Welker and Randy Moss. I believe that their first pick after the first round was a fourth rounder (Kareem Brown). All this would explain things like why they would take another DB at 33. They didn't have any good trades and other players were not worthy of that pick. They would have been reaches per their draft boards.

Plus, let's not forget that other teams were trying to trade out too which made it harder to get good value on trades. 'Ole Shanny tried copying BB's strategy a little, and Mayock even said before the draft that after pick 25, teams would start to trade down and out because the value significantly drops off. And we know that BB took less value for one of the trades (according to Reiss who consulted the value charts). I think it was the one after the trade with the Saints.

Exactly. A couple years from now, we won't be looking back at this draft seeing that we drafted a ton of quality players. It's going to be like 2007, we didn't get many impact players and most teams didn't either because it was a weak draft. We took the BPA with Solder and Dowling. After getting our target in Solder, Pats were looking to get out of the draft and picked when they couldn't get decent trade value. When they picked, they picked players with serious question marks that dragged down their value and hoped that they could hit the lottery with guys like Mallet and Cannon. They will hit the free agent market hard and let the weaker teams fill their roster with mediocre players that this year's free agent class would beat out easily at what will be a more reasonable price due to the lower salary cap.