Speculation: Patriots set to make big trades

[Froob]

Mallett for Suh? Maybe Pats would take Stafford if he's willingly to take a paycut. I know he's making tons of money but a chance to learn behind Tom Brady? I bet he'd take that. All they need to take after that is sign Sanders, Tebow, and Seward and they may as well hand us the trophy.

 

[PATSYLICIOUS]

Well, put the pipe down. HAHAHAHA Mallet, Bolden, and 1st round pick for FITZ?

 

[borg]

Ian Rapoport Ian RapoportVerified account ‏@RapSheet

Patriots won't trade him unless it's for a 1st or maybe 2nd. Not there yet. RT @RB8780 @RapSheet No Ryan Mallet now!!!!!!!!

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[ivanvamp]

What part of "pipedream" don't you understand? If I were Belichick i would throw some offers out and see what happens, no-one ever thought they would get Dillon for a 2nd or Moss for a 4th. I doubt like hell they can swing it but there is no harm in trying.

If the Patriots are going to consider making a trade for a WR, let's come up with some good, but more realistic, options for them. I'd *LOVE* to get Fitz, but for all the reasons given already, there's almost no possible way for Arizona to swing that, so that isn't going to happen. So let's think differently.

Here are some possible trade targets that I think the Pats could consider:

Emmanuel Sanders, Pit (offer sheet, would cost a 3rd round pick)

Mike Williams, TB - big (6'2", 212 lbs), very good hands, 63 rec, 996 yds, 9 td last year; also had a similar year in 2010 (65 rec, 964 yds, 11 td). Excellent target, gets downfield, wins the jump balls. Just 25 years old. He's due $1.4 million in 2013 but becomes a free agent after then. The Bucs and his agent have been trying to work out a contract extension for a while, with no success yet; negotiations have actually been put on hold for a bit, and they hope May is when it'll all be resolved. But his skill set would be tremendous for this team.

Malcom Floyd, SD - big (6'5", 225 lbs), explosive, 56 rec, 814 yds, 5 td last year. He's 31, so SD might be willing to move him based on his age. But his contract is favorable to the Pats: 2013: $1.5 million (+ $2.75 million option bonus), 2014: $2.75 million, 2015: $3 million, becomes a free agent in 2016. Ideal big, fast outside WR, and for a reasonable salary.

Steve Smith, Car - not big (5'9", 185 lbs), but electric and explosive. Not a kid (he'll be 34 in May). His contract - 2013: $3.75 million, 2014: $4 million (+ $3 million option bonus), 2015: $7 million, 2016: $9 million (Option Year). Don't think there'd be any way he'd see that 2016 salary. But Carolina needs help all over, and I don't know that Smith is the right guy for them moving forward. He's still got enough left in the tank, though, to be an asset for New England (73 rec, 1174 yds, 5 td, 16.1 ypc) during this last phase of Brady's career. Might not cost a lot to acquire him in a trade.

Sidney Rice, Sea - great size (6'4", 202 lbs), fits that big, outside WR profile we've talked a lot about. Productive - 50 rec, 748 yds, 7 td, 15.0 ypc), will be 27 at the start of next season. Contract: 2013-2014: $8.5 million, 2015: $9 million. Pretty steep, actually. Wonder if Seattle would want to get out from under that. They added Harvin and already have Golden Tate, and Rice is getting paid like a #1 even though they don't use him that way. Not sure NE would want that contract - a deal might require a renegotiation of the contract. And Seattle is already in the upper echelon of teams, so not sure they'd want to move a valuable piece like this. But perhaps there's a deal to be made there. I like him a lot as a player.

 

[Kay Mad]

Re: "Clear right now Pats willing to trade"

Suh for four first rounders!

Any team that did that trade would splash and burn

 

[VJCPatriot]

Glad to see medical marijuana working well. You'll be real hungry soon.

And I'm glad to see that the posters in this forum don't GM this team or they'd give away our valuable players for cents on the dollars. I'll stand by my statement that it's not worth giving up our backup QB for a 6th/7th round pick plus a future 3rd or even a mere 3rd straight up.

When Alex "I'm buried on the bench cos I'm a game manager" Smith garners two 2nd round picks, that tells you the market right there for QBs this season. I'm also interested to see what Matt Flynn goes for. He was only a 7th round pick, he's older than Mallett, and he's barely seen any more playing time, not to mention he got a fairly fat contract from Seattle only to be buried on their bench when Russell Wilson emerged.

As for what 'big trade' the Pats are cooking up. Well that is very vague and just speculative so far. If anything happens it looks like it would be a draft day deal and the real news probably won't break till the day before if not the day of the trade.

 

[supafly]

When Alex "I'm buried on the bench cos I'm a game manager" Smith garners two 2nd round picks, that tells you the market right there for QBs this season.

I don't mean this to be offensive, but I find this comment to be insane.

Take a look at Smith's record in the past couple/few seasons, his completion percentage, and his ability to beat top tiered teams. He's also the #1 overall pick from his year's draft class.

What in the hell has Ryan Mallett done to warrant anything in that same range?

 

[supafly]

Re: "Clear right now Pats willing to trade"

Any team that did that trade would splash and burn

Good one

And besides that the team that would trade him (Detroit) would also crash and burn due to having close to 30 million in dead money, after paying him a recent bonus of 10 million dollars last week.

Anyone who honestly still considers N.Suh as a reasonable trade idea either isn't aware of this fact, or just doesn't take it into consideration. If DET was really considering a trade for him, it'd have happened prior to his roster bonus being due for 10 million dollars.

 

[Sparetire]

I don't mean this to be offensive, but I find this comment to be insane.

Take a look at Smith's record in the past couple/few seasons, his completion percentage, and his ability to beat top tiered teams. He's also the #1 overall pick from his year's draft class.

What in the hell has Ryan Mallett done to warrant anything in that same range?

If i was the chiefs, i'd rather have mallett. alex smith sucks and we all know that, mallett on the other hand might be a solid QB or a total bust just like alex smith, but he has the potential to be a good QB while alex smith will still suck, the chiefs gave 2rnds for him just cause under jim all his flaws were just "hidden".

to sum up: i'd rather start mallett and hope for win than start smith and know im screwd.

 

[VJCPatriot]

Are you serious? Alex Smith is Trent Dilfer 2.0 without the ring. And even Tim Tebow could lead that stacked 49ers team into the playoffs. Say it with me now - Game Manager. There's a reason he got benched. Alex Smith doesn't have the dynamic ability to take his team to the next level and his GM/head coach both know that.

Luckily the factors that you just mentioned helped convinced some sucker team (ie KC) to overpay. It's a sellers market as far as QBs are concerned.

And let's not forget the FINANCIAL factors:

Alex Smith - Earning 8.5m per season
Flynn - Earning 5.25m per season
Mallet - Earning 509k per season

I don't mean this to be offensive, but I find this comment to be insane.

Take a look at Smith's record in the past couple/few seasons, his completion percentage, and his ability to beat top tiered teams. He's also the #1 overall pick from his year's draft class.

What in the hell has Ryan Mallett done to warrant anything in that same range?

 

[supafly]

Are you serious? Alex Smith is Trent Dilfer 2.0 without the ring. And even Tim Tebow could lead that stacked 49ers team into the playoffs. Say it with me now - Game Manager. There's a reason he got benched. Alex Smith doesn't have the dynamic ability to take his team to the next level and his GM/head coach both know that.

Luckily the factors that you just mentioned helped convinced some sucker team (ie KC) to overpay. It's a sellers market as far as QBs are concerned.

And let's not forget the FINANCIAL factors:

Alex Smith - Earning 8.5m per season
Flynn - Earning 5.25m per season
Mallet - Earning 509k per season

The Raiders made Matt Flynn restructure, so that point is totally invalid. He's not earning 5 million dollars this season. He is going to make backup QB money and be in the mix to be a starter, which is what all of the NFL teams who have shown interest in him see his progress at. Flynn threw for 500+ yds in one of his actual starting performances, and almost shocked the world by beating the NE Patriots on Monday Night Football in another appearance. Those are facts that allow GM's to view his tape and assess his skills. Ryan Mallet doesn't have any tape, unless you're going to show the backup performance against the Jets this year when he came in and quickly threw a horrible INT. He is nothing more than a gamble at this point, and there are plenty of gambles already in this year's NFL draft, along with much better options for teams looking for starters at the moment.

If Mallett had so much interest from everyone, then why did a bunch of bums like David Garrard, Bruce Gradkowski, and Josh Johnson get scooped up instead?

We'll have to disagree about A.Smith. Obviously he had a ton of potential to be the #1 overall pick in the NFL draft, and it wasn't until 2011 where the SF 49'ers really took a step forward as a team, so I'm not sure about your comment about them "being loaded," because it didn't even happen until the 2011 season.

In Smith's past 26 games he has an .800 winning percentage, and made strides in much better decision making as far as throwing very few INT's etc. He only threw 5 in all of the 2011 season. In his past 26 games, he has a 30/10 TD to INT ratio. How in the world does that make him "suck?"

He also had a 70.2 completion percentage in his 10 games this year. I don't know how you are going to spin the fact that he completed 70.2 percent of his passes, but I'm sure you'll try.

Do I believe that Smith is a top tiered QB? Hell no. But I also believe that you're greatly selling him short with the production and better decision making that he's made in the past 2 seasons. You can make a case for justification for KC giving up a 2nd round pick for Smith. They overpaid by about a round, but at least he was highly hyped and showed good progress and leadership ability. What the hell has Mallett shown, besides the ability to hold a clipboard. You aren't taking into account that 32 teams passed on Mallett multiple times, and that he hasn't done a damn thing to prove them wrong. What's changed?

And Smith didn't "get benched." That's ridiculous. Smith became injured with a concussion and missed a couple/few games. In the meantime Kaepernick proved himself as an NFL ready QB who would scramble and add a different option to their offense with his feet..and even then, Harbaugh wavered back and forth on what the right decision was.

The bottom line is that Smith was viewed as the top pick in his draft class, led his team to the NFC Championship game, and is a proven NFL QB. Ryan Mallett hasn't proven anything and is a figment of patsfans.com imagination, much like Brian Hoyer was. There's no way that Mallett is going to command a 1st or 2nd round pick from any of the other 31 NFL GM's out there. We'd be very, very lucky to get a 4th at this point in time. That could change if Mallett actually you know...plays the game and shows something.

 

[ctpatsfan77]

Ryan Mallet doesn't have any tape, unless you're going to show the backup performance against the Jets this year when he came in and quickly threw a horrible INT.

That was against the Texans, and apparently it was so horrible it got Visanthe Shiancoe cut.

Seriously, maybe he shouldn't have thrown it, but he put that pass exactly where it needed to be in the middle of three defenders; Shiancoe just bobbled it.

 

[supafly]

That was against the Texans, and apparently it was so horrible it got Visanthe Shiancoe cut.

Seriously, maybe he shouldn't have thrown it, but he put that pass exactly where it needed to be in the middle of three defenders; Shiancoe just bobbled it.

Fair enough point, but there certainly hasn't been anything to make the other 31 GM's feel much comfortable about giving up a high 1st or 2nd rd pick. He hasn't proven anything to this point to make everyone who initially passed on him feel any differently. The fact that he tried to put it in between 3 defenders may/may not come into play regarding his decision making--which is a huge key in assessing a QB's skillset. I don't see any GM looking at that film and jumping up for joy, but that's just my thought.

The comparisons to Alex Smith are silly in my opinion, and even Matt Flynn showed some serious promise in 2 of the games that he started--although everyone's entitled to their own thoughts.