I'd forgotten that the Falcons were on a good streak of winning seasons at that time. I could have used another team as a better example. My point remains the same though. If you are a legit contender then moving up to get a difference maker makes sense. If you need more than a few pieces and need to build a team then I'd collect as many assets as possible.
I don't know, I would still sort of disagree. Just look at right now - the two teams with the best record in the NFL right now are the Patriots and Cardinals, and fans of each team could craft up a 6 - 12 item list of must-haves and want-to-haves. If that's what the best teams look like, imagine what the Jags and Raiders look like?
My view on this topic is a slightly modified version of Mayoclinic' and Patchick's view. The essential question is evaluating whether the team is better with:
(1) the traded-up player and no one else,
(2) the current position with extra picks at the normal draft positions,
(3) players acquired from trading down,
(4) players and future picks acquired from a trade-out.
And this evaluation needs to take into account things like salary cap impact as well as just talent.
Generally for option 1, you're going to see modest trade-ups that mirror what Mayoclinic mentioned -- like the trade-ups for Chandler Jones and Donte Hightower. You'll rarely see a Julio Jones type trade. But that said, I wouldn't rule it out completely because there *are* scenarios where that might be the best option. That would be a case where:
- The draft's top 10 is historically good, where all 10 players would be picked in the top 3 in any other year
- The players in the rest of the 1st round are historically bad and would be 2nd rounders in other years
- The players in subsequent rounds are also historically bad and would be drafted one round later in typical years
- All of the other teams in the NFL recognize the previous two points, so no one wants to trade into this draft by trading future picks
- Next year's first round is anticipated to be very weak
- The team is not projected to have salary cap concerns over the next two years
In that case, a Julio Jones type trade in option 1 above could potentially have better value than the other 3 options. But the key points are that - it has nothing to do with being a legit contender looking for one player to push them over the top, but rather it has to do with the quality of help you can provide your team -- and that this type of scenario is very rarely seen, so such a move should be rarely seen.