I was wondering about this last night. How far ahead do teams sometimes discuss potential draft spot changes? I don't think there are any rules to prevent this. For instance, a week or so before the draft, Team A discusses with Team B that they will potentially be willing to trade out of their late 1st rd spot to Team B for a 2nd and a 3rd IF it looks a certain way near that point (i.e. the players they want are off the board already). That seems like an awful lot of maneuvering to do at the last minute without having done the math ahead of time. From someone who isn't that knowledgeable about the draft, I'm just curious. I feel like I read somewhere we did that with the Sanchez move.
I'm not sure how far in advance it happens, but know it does happen. I remember many stories over the years where teams had agreements in place at least a week or more prior to the draft where if a certain player wasn't still available at that point in the draft, a trade would be made. They make the most sense, because GMs have time to think about the value, fair compensation, etc. without the pressure of being on the clock and needing to get a card up to the podium. Draft day trades do of course happen, but I think often times, the groundwork has been laid days or weeks before. I'm sure the GMs call other GMs not in their own division multiple times over the days and weeks preceding the draft to ascertain whether they are willing to trade up/down, so they have a pool of teams they know they can possibly deal with and have some of the details already sketched out.
Yeah, like klecko said it's all about building groundwork, so if certain things fall certain ways there's immediately an outlet to pursue. I'm sure that the random nature of the draft can create many spur of the moment deals, but I'm guessing most of the 32 GMs go into the draft knowing who wants to move where.
It would be really funny if all the team owners had a listserve and the posted on it like a forum. Title: Anyone looking to trade up? I fucking Hate this spot Msg: I am trying to trade down... maybe into the top 2nd round and cop an extra 3rd and 4th round pick. Maybe just a 3rd? I really dont give a fuck anymore I just dont want to be pick 27. Let me know if any of you are interested A. Blank P.S. Goodell is a fucking dick
When I used to post on draft specific sites we had GM mocks with trades and that's exactly how a thread would look. I always thought it would be awesome if there was that type of MB somewhere that only GMs were apart of.
