I had some interest in Dawkins this offseason, but I had concerns about adding an old safety to a defense that lacked speed in '08. As for Sharper, I knew the Patriots wouldn't have any interest. The main reason Sharper was shown the door in Minnesota was his tendency to freelance. That tendency leads to big plays...both ways. The Minnesota staff wanted Sharper to play assignment football and simply got fed up with him not following the gameplan. Obviously, this would be a huge red flag in the Patriots Defense.
In hindsight, I'd love to have either guy on the team this year. For a few weeks, McGowan/Merriweather looked like a great young tandem. Now McGowan is benched and Merriweather has made a number of notable mental errors. I still like Merriweather a lot, but maybe playing with a veteran safety would have been best for him this year.
You make some good points.
Whether with FA or the draft, whenever a player does well somewhere else (Dawkins and Sharper at safety, Clay Matthews at LB, for example) there is a tendency on this board to post one of these kind of threads, with many posters suggesting (1) that BB should have been clairvoyant about the unexpected success the player in question has had and gone after him, and (2) that the player's success on another team in a different system would have translated into equivalent success with the Pats. Obviously, both of these assumptions are flawed.
Last free agency no one wanted Sharper for a reason. He was a 33 year old FA safety coming off of a solid but uninspiring season with Minnesota in which he had had 1 interception, his career low since becoming a starter. He didn't sign with NO until March 18, so he was not exactly a highly sought after guy, and the Saints didn't go after him terribly aggresively. As you say, he had a reputation for free lancing and giving up the big play, which BB abhors, and which led Minnesota to decide not to more aggresively pursue re-signing him. Obviously, Greg Williams' defense was perfectly suited to take advantage of his skills. The Pats' defense would not have been so perfect.
Brian Dawkins was coming off of a pro bowl season in 2008, but was 35. Most people were shocked when Denver threw a 5 year $17M contract with incentives up to $27M at him. The cost of our entire secondary was less than that contract. And 2009 was
not an uncapped year. Even if you subtract the voidable years, $4.5M/year for a 35 year old player was very aggressive. Obviously, in retrospect it was worth it, especially to a team like Denver which needed leadership. We don't know that the Pats didn't want Dawkins. James Sanders wasn't re-signed until March 1, the day on which Dawkins signed with Denver, so for all we know the Pats went after Dawkins and were simply outbid by the Broncos.
The big demand for the Pats defense last offseason was to get younger and faster. Signing 33-35 year old FA's was just not something that people were clamoring for last FA. Not that BB would have cared, but those signings would have been met with a lot of skepticism.
Finally, last FA I don't think anyone anticipated quite the void in defensive leadership that we have experienced. The Vrabel trade was quite unexpected, and came on February 27. Dawkins signed 2 days later with Denver, on March 1. I think many here expected Tedy Bruschi to be with the team this season mainly to provide veteran leadership and continuity. I don't think people expected his skills to have eroded to the point where he really couldn't get on the field. The Junior Seau experiment of bringing in a veteran leader who hasn't been able to work his way into the lineup much hasn't been a huge success so far this season.
Going back through the threads on this forum, I have been unable to find a single thread posted around either signing bemoaning the Pats' lack of interest in picking up either Dawkins or Sharper.
Great players having great years, yes. But Hindsight is always 20/20, and it's not clear that either would be having nearly as much success if the Pats had picked them up.
