PSA: Apparently, the Pats also won the March SB

BTTA · Mar 21, 2015

Just lovin' it: http://www.footballoutsiders.com/stat-analysis/2015/free-agency-cost-benefit-analysis

voluntarysaftey · Mar 21, 2015

Not signing Revis or anyone else big was the right thing to do.
Letting Wilfork go was probably the right thing.

Unfortunately, not signing McCourty earlier for cheaper and not having a Revis backup plan -- to allow them to keep Browner -- who was on a team-friendly contract was probably the wrong thing.

Vareen could've probably also been signed last year for much cheaper, but at this time last year we didn't know exactly what type of player he would become

shmessy · Mar 21, 2015

Interesting stuff, two things:

1) The marking system completely leaves out RB's and QB's, so it must be said that this system is exceptionally incomplete.

2) The Revis' and Suhs get all the flash and attention, but it really is the "death by a thousand cuts" that sink the March SB teams and raise the smart patient teams to Jan/Feb victories, great example at the end of the piece:

"...But adding the value from the compensatory picks makes the Super Bowl winners also the winners of free agency by a nose over the Cardinals. Smart teams such as Baltimore have consistently played the compensatory game well, in part by developing players other teams want to sign. And Bill Belichick seemingly set this offseason up to grab compensatory picks.

Consider the 2016 compensatory selection they will receive for losing Akeem Ayers. That pick completes this magic trick of a trade with Tennessee:

Titans get: 2015 sixth-round pick
Patriots get: 2016 sixth-round pick, 2015 seventh-round pick, Akeem Ayers for most of 2015

The smart teams can literally create something out of nothing sometimes. The New England Patriots have won free agency in part with moves like this that happened long before March 10. "

shmessy · Mar 21, 2015

voluntarysaftey said:
Not signing Revis or anyone else big was the right thing to do.
Letting Wilfork go was probably the right thing.

Unfortunately, not signing McCourty earlier for cheaper and not having a Revis backup plan -- to allow them to keep Browner -- who was on a team-friendly contract was probably the wrong thing.

Vareen could've probably also been signed last year for much cheaper, but at this time last year we didn't know exactly what type of player he would become

I fully agree.

I'm Ok with not killing the cap to resign Revis, but not having an adequate backup plan and letting Browner go IS a huge mistake. The FO screwed up there.

convertedpatsfan · Mar 21, 2015

shmessy said:
Interesting stuff, two things:

1) The marking system completely leaves out RB's and QB's, so it must be said that this system is exceptionally incomplete.

2) The Revis' and Suhs get all the flash and attention, but it really is the "death by a thousand cuts" that sink the March SB teams and raise the smart patient teams to Jan/Feb victories, great example at the end of the piece:

"...But adding the value from the compensatory picks makes the Super Bowl winners also the winners of free agency by a nose over the Cardinals. Smart teams such as Baltimore have consistently played the compensatory game well, in part by developing players other teams want to sign. And Bill Belichick seemingly set this offseason up to grab compensatory picks.

Consider the 2016 compensatory selection they will receive for losing Akeem Ayers. That pick completes this magic trick of a trade with Tennessee:

Titans get: 2015 sixth-round pick

Patriots get: 2016 sixth-round pick, 2015 seventh-round pick, Akeem Ayers for most of 2015

The smart teams can literally create something out of nothing sometimes. The New England Patriots have won free agency in part with moves like this that happened long before March 10. "

And while the compensatory picks will fill the gap between the end of the 6th and the beginning of the 7th rounds, the Patriots win puts their pick at the end of the 6th and the Titans terrible season puts it near the top of the 7th so it's not even that big of a gap.

Ayers is also a good reference point to remind people that player acquisition and roster building extends far beyond just the first few days of free agency. Ayers, Blount, Branch and Casillas all played useful roles in our Super Bowl season, and all were picked up after the season had started.

BTTA · Mar 21, 2015

shmessy said:
not having an adequate backup plan and letting Browner go IS a huge mistake. The FO screwed up there.

We don't know what the back up plan thinking was/is. One thing we do know as probable, is that it stretches over 5 months, not 5 weeks.

luuked · Mar 21, 2015

voluntarysaftey said:
Unfortunately, not signing McCourty earlier for cheaper and not having a Revis backup plan -- to allow them to keep Browner -- who was on a team-friendly contract was probably the wrong thing.

You assume that DMac was willing to extend the contract earlier. He and his agent were aware that this would be a soft safety FA and draft class which would push his value up. You need two to dance.

The Revis backup plan is to move to a different defensive scheme. You need a truly great CB to let him take over one side on his own and play like we did last year. This made Browner expendable, and since his contract called for a bonus to be paid soon after the league year started, there was not enough leverage to trade him.

voluntarysaftey said:
Vareen could've probably also been signed last year for much cheaper, but at this time last year we didn't know exactly what type of player he would become

Nope, the Pats approached him last offseason and he and his great agent priced themselves out of the Patriots range. As a sidenote he ended up getting less in FA than he wanted for the extension last year. Look for the details yourself Reiss reported them at some point this offseason.

Galeb · Mar 21, 2015

shmessy said:
I fully agree.

I'm Ok with not killing the cap to resign Revis, but not having an adequate backup plan and letting Browner go IS a huge mistake. The FO screwed up there.

It sounds like a change of scheme was a backup plan, and letting Browner go was part of that. Good corners who excel at man coverage are expensive. If you can't field multiple corners who excel at man coverage, then you have to primarily play zone.

luuked · Mar 21, 2015

shmessy said:
I'm Ok with not killing the cap to resign Revis, but not having an adequate backup plan and letting Browner go IS a huge mistake. The FO screwed up there.

Whatever model they use to generate some value metric for every player told them that for the anticipated role without a true shutdown CB1 Browner would be overpaid. Now you can criticize the model to be wrong but bear in mind the success over more than a decade with how we deal with players.

sambam94 · Mar 21, 2015

mia. jits, buff all in bottom 9

shmessy · Mar 21, 2015

Galeb said:
It sounds like a change of scheme was a backup plan, and letting Browner go was part of that. Good corners who excel at man coverage are expensive. If you can't field multiple corners who excel at man coverage, then you have to primarily play zone.

Yes, but we've seen that movie between 2009-2012.

shmessy · Mar 21, 2015

luuked said:
Whatever model they use to generate some value metric for every player told them that for the anticipated role without a true shutdown CB1 Browner would be overpaid. Now you can criticize the model to be wrong but bear in mind the success over more than a decade with how we deal with players.

Let's face it. This is a model that leaves out RB's and QB's to make a judgement on "who won or lost FA".

It's pretty much an incomplete model to begin with.

luuked · Mar 21, 2015

shmessy said:
Let's face it. This is a model that leaves out RB's and QB's to make a judgement on "who won or lost FA".

It's pretty much an incomplete model to begin with.

Sorry I should have been more clear. I meant that BB & Co. have a model internally to assign values to playersm not any of those internet services.

patfanken · Mar 21, 2015

shmessy said:
I fully agree.

I'm Ok with not killing the cap to resign Revis, but not having an adequate backup plan and letting Browner go IS a huge mistake. The FO screwed up there.

Here's the problem with condemning the Pats for a lack of a "backup plan". Who was out there that the Pats could have gotten that would have constituted a reasonable back up plan. I mean if you could have grabbed any other CB in FA could you have made it work. I don't think so.

Unfortunately for the Pats, I think losing Revis happened in a year WITHOUT reasonable options to replace him. There were some decent CB's out there but most of them were relatively overpaid as well. The more I think on it, Fletcher and Chickwa were probably as good a value as we could have expected. Both are 6' physical CB's. One is coming off injuries. One is coming off a bad year. We could have done worse. If we just hit on one of them, it will go a long way to solving the perceived problem

Galeb · Mar 21, 2015

shmessy said:
Yes, but we've seen that movie between 2009-2012.

Yup, and the Pats were an injured Gronk away from winning the Lombardi.

TomPatriot · Mar 21, 2015

Galeb said:
Yup, and the Pats were an injured Gronk away from winning the Lombardi.

How could you challenge the culture of woe and despair? Don't you know it's over? Now that Revis and Browner are gone, the sacrosanct secondary is spent and only Jonathan Wilhite's ghost is left, with help over the top from Sergio Brown. Come'on now!

glm · Mar 21, 2015

shmessy said:
Yes, but we've seen that movie between 2009-2012.

The front seven wasn't as good then as it is now so that's irrelevant.

1960Pats · Mar 21, 2015

The Pats are winners in every month of the year.

Deus Irae · Mar 21, 2015

Denial: Not a river in Egypt

primetime · Mar 21, 2015

shmessy said:
Let's face it. This is a model that leaves out RB's and QB's to make a judgement on "who won or lost FA".

It's pretty much an incomplete model to begin with.

To be fair, there wasn't much QB movement this year. In fact, there rarely is, and if you're paying big for a QB in free agency when it's not a singular circumstance (see Favre or Manning) then something bad has occurred. I guess there have been a few others - Brees comes to mind.

PSA: Apparently, the Pats also won the March SB

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