Trading Seymour turned out to be a good move since his best years were behind him. But the first half of his career he was a top 3 DT and a big part of our first 3 titles in the 2000s
Trading Seymour without any type of acceptable replacement who could act as 75% of the player at DE was (in my opinion) a huge mistake, and we paid dearly for that for awhile, but we also received a first round draft pick for a player who was basically at the end of his career and wasn’t likely to be re-signed due to contract demands, so I don’t have as much issue with that as some do.
Collins was a freelancer who wasn’t going to be retained. That one was easy.
The 4th and 2 call wasn’t as bad as it looked due to our defense being so gassed, and Faulk may actually have picked it up with a more reasonable spot anyway, so it’s hard to nitpick that one for me.
Moss basically ran his mouth and forced his way out of town, plus Brady was locking in on him and throwing picks, anyway. Spreading the ball out more paid off to the tune of a 14-2 record that year, and we began to utilize the 2 TE sets. We also took MIN for a high round draft pick (3rd) and got three years of Moss + a better pick than we gave up (4th). I don’t know why that’s even on the list.
Trading Mankins saw early season challenges that resulted in a SB victory at the end of the year, so that’s another controversial move that seemed to pay off in the end.
The only one that pisses me off was allowing JG to walk, but it’s also a possibility that they may have signed him to a 3-4 year high priced deal (that never would’ve realistically happened) only to watch him continue to ride the bench for most of it, getting very little value, if any, in return. I can’t realky blame that on Belichick, but moreso bad timing.
