All true. I hadn't read about it being a career threatening. However, when he is on the field he is one of the best wideouts in the game. My point was that if the Jets feel that Watkins can be an elite, game changing, All Pro and perhaps most important, consistent and healthy, wideout than consider making that move if they feel that it would be a good value for the team.
Yeah no thanks. I'd rather be stockpiling picks and adding youth and depth than trading it away. Nothing is guaranteed in the draft anyway, you could get a WR in the 3rd round who ends up being a bigger contributor...it's less likely, IMO, but the point stands.
It most certainly is. The top teams NEVER do it. It doesn't represent good value and is purely a product of falling in love with a player and thinking that he is the only one that could possibly help your team. That's never true or a wise way to handle the draft.
The important thing to remember about the draft is that there's always talent out there even in the late rounds. If you can't see it clearly and find it now and then the answer isn't to trade up, it's to replace the people who aren't good enough to see it clearly and find it.
Jets have much more urgent need than trading picks away. That is, their coaching staff sucks big hairy goat balls. Most of them anyway. And they are here to stay. This year's WR class is very deep I heard - whoever Jets pick will turn into Stephen Hill 2.0. [Lal, will you fuck off for Chrissake?]
And why do you think that happened? Julio essentially has to play FIVE men's role. Him sucking = 5 people sucking, and him getting injured = 5 men getting injured. If Falcons didn't trade up for him, maybe they could get a starter on defensive side of the ball, AND get some protection AND another WR or whatever, no? Make no mistake about this stupidity. This is what it cost for the Falcons: Falcons got: #6 in 2011. Browns got: #26, #59 & #124 in 2011 [all good picks up to 4th round] AND 1st & 4th round pick in 2012. Yes. That trade WAS beyond colossally stupid. That's like 3 starter quality players & 2 depth players for one. Are you telling me this stupidity had NOTHING to do with them crumbling last year? Just what the hell are ya smoking? Trade up is almost always a stupid move waiting to detonate.
Whatever. You're clueless and have no idea of how to put together a roster. Thank God Idzik is smarter than you.
Jets have too many needs. We could easily grab a starter with our second or thirds. To trade up for Watkins we'd have probably have to get rid of 2 of those picks. Not worth it IMO
That's exactly what I'm saying. The Falcons were 1-4 before Julio got hurt because they didn't have enough overall talent on the team to win in the NFL. They gave up 2 1sts, a 2nd and 2 4ths to move up and take Jones. Then they watched several other people age out after the fact and were left with a thin roster topped by a few stars. Then Jones got hurt and they were in the nightmare scenario of having a last-place talent base even though they had a good NFL QB. They'd have been much better off if they actually used the 5 picks instead of turning them into one player. The NFL is a war of attrition from year to year. People get hurt. They get old. They do stupid things that prevent them from playing football as well as they used too or in some cases from playing at all. The Falcons were trying to get lucky with the Jones move. For a couple of years they did. Then their luck ran out and they became a bad team overnight. If they'd won it all nobody would care. However now what you're looking at is a bad Falcon team. If Jones comes back and plays at his previous level then the Falcons will likely be just a mediocre team. They still have aging vet problems, with 8 starters over 30 going into next season. If he can't play it's a nightmare for them because then they have 9 starters over 30. What makes their outlook grim is that the Jones trade up deprived them of a couple of young guys hitting their prime right now and a couple of 4th round picks that could have been starters as well. Even if they only got a couple of extra starters out of the deal overall it would have been a boost in the war of attrition that every franchise faces. You have to find talent at your picks. That's how you stay ahead in the NFL. Forfeiting picks to cherry-pick guys just doesn't work. That's admitting that your scouting department is not up to the task of identifying quality players throughout the draft. That's why the Jets are where they are right now.
I find it somewhat amazing that there are still a number of Jets fans that think trading up is a good idea. We recently saw first hand exactly what trading up does to your roster. And people want to repeat that mistake? So soon? Our roster was so run down after years of trader Mike (Tannenbaum) that Mike Westhoff couldn't even produce a quality special teams unit and it made him want to retire. Our offense was put together with duct tape and scraps off the scrap heap the last two years. The average NFL career is 3 years. With concussions being such a sensitive issue now players often miss games that they would have played in the past. Also, many more serious knee injuries are happening since they are trigger happy on flags and fines for hits to the head. All that means you need to have more depth than ever. Add in the fact that no draft pick is ever guaranteed to live up to what they did in college and it makes almost no sense to ever trade up IMO.
Remember the draft we had three picks? Sanchez Greene Slauson I think we should trade down, if the value is there.
It's difficult to respond to you when you respond to several people in one post. Here's the thing. In order to stop the trend at trading up at every given opportunity you have to actually stop trading up. IMO trading up should be a rare event for any franchise - probably something that teams looking to add a final piece to an already championship quality roster. Even if it's 6 years the point remains IMO. I would like to see a link about this if you have it. I understand your argument. I don't think it's insane, I just have a much more conservative opinion on spending draft picks.
You're not looking at the trade as it was. You're kind of waving by it to suit your argument. This was the trade: The Falcons gave up #27, #59 and #124 in 2011 and #27 and #118 in 2012. In return they got the 6 in 2011, which turned into Julio Jones. Ok, so what the Falcon gave up was 3 people you are supposed to turn into starters in the 2011 #27, #59 and the 2012 #27. They gave up 2 people in the 2011 #124 and 2012 #118 that good teams often turn into starters. Now as to your point about the Falcons being 1-4 before Jones went down. What does that tell you about the talent base on that team at the start of 2013 2 years after making that blockbuster deal in which they sacrificed quality depth along the roster for one player? The Falcons probably wouldn't have won many more games in 2013 with Jones on the roster. The talent level of their players didn't support a lot of wins. Several key contributors including Tony Gonzalez and Roddy White were aging out of the picture. The acquisition of an aging RB in Stephen Jackson wasn't going to help the talent base long-term either. It just wasn't a wise trade, when the Falcons made it or two years later when the crows came home to rest. Having Jones get injured with a serious injury to his foot just spotlighted what was already true: the Falcons mortgaged their future for a short window at a championship and then failed to win in that window. Imagine what the Falcons look like right now if they had kept all those picks and taken DT Muhammad Wilkerson out of Temple on the #27 in 2011? Add in the other players they could potentially have gotten with the 4 picks packaged for Jones and they maybe still have a window wide open. Jones was having a superstar, almost Calvin Johnson-like season when he went down. The Falcons sucked anyway, as the Lions have for so many years with CJ blowing the roof off the joint.
It's just that you're not listening to reason. Your mind is slammed shut. It's seldom that 98% of Jets fans ever agree on anything, and all of us except 1-2 of you think it's a horrible idea to trade up. That ought to tell you something right there. We have given you many excellent reasons why it shouldn't be done, pointed out how it hurt the Jets and other teams giving you concrete examples, and you just summarily dismiss them. You're wrong about top teams doing it. They don't. They may do it once over a 10 year period, but they don't do it regularly. The Jets fans that support trading up always bring up Revis. The draft he was taken in wasn't a very good one and had little depth. The Jets had a huge need for a CB. I could almost have accepted trading up for Revis if that was the only trade up Tanny ever made AND he had also traded down not only in that draft but in the next 2-3 draft to compensate. He didn't. The thing is, they got lucky that Revis turned out to be as good as he was, but there was still a cost. In giving up the other picks to move up for Revis, the Jets lost out on potential starters or solid backups that could still be helping the team, and possibly could have made the difference in 2009 and 2010 that would have put the Jets over the top and into the SB.
I might have to dub you nyjunc 2.0. That's exactly how it feels like - it makes me feel like talking to a wall. 1. Not every team is '98 Broncos. Teams DO need high draft picks to assemble the roster. High picks are regarded highly for a reason; they have less chance to bust than the low ones. First three rounds are very important for this very reason - you MUST get a starter out of that group. If you can't do that on a consistent basis, you not only have a problem with scouting department, you also have a problem with coaching staff. Again, not every 1st and 2nd round picks turn out as busts as you claim. They may NOT become the pro-bowler that Julio Jones is, but that doesn't mean they HAVE TO. As long as they become a starter and contribute in a meaningful way, that's more than good enough. 2. And that's exactly what Falcons traded away: 1st round picks x2 & 2nd round pick x1. That is where that 'three starter' argument comes from. [AND 2x 4th, which should be a valuable depth.] 3. So... if most picks become backups and 3rd stringers, where does the starters come from? That highly touted 1st round pick that you traded up for? Are you fucking nuts? 4. Last, but not the least: these kids are given 1st round grade based upon the assessment - whether he has lower chance to bust and higher chance to become a successful starter. So does it make sense to merge chunks of high draft picks for ONE kid? Logically that's dumb fuck thing to do. In the very least, the scouting report could be wrong too. [We all know scouting isn't even an exact science either - or we won't find 6th round superstars like Terrell Davis or Tom Brady.] Contrary to your hopes and whatnot, we human beings do this thing called aging. We get old as years pass by. Of course that happens to football players too. As they get older, they get slower, and more prone to injury. You always want to assemble deep roster simply because of that. And there is no such thing as a 'too deep a roster' in NFL. Maybe for the first two years after the trade, the team was still young enough to compete. Injury bug didn't hit them hard. That does NOT mean you can neglect your talent base like they have. Seriously, why do you think Geno had nobody to throw to? As bad as Tannenbaum was, he never traded multiple 1s away in a SINGLE trade. [And he was a fucking moron too.] Your stupidity never ceases to amaze me. Contrary to your conception, NFL players need this thing called EXPERIENCE. Not many rookie players barge into the NFL scene and perform like superstars that they were in college bowl. Even the almighty Revis had ho-hum rookie season. This means - by year 3, these picks [5 players] 1. would have gained valuable experience and 2. were primed to contribute in a meaningful way. That also means Falcons deprived themselves of 3 good starter service and 2 good rotational player service for ONE. If that doesn't come to bite them in the ass in short term like that, I would be more than shocked. That trade was a fucking DISASTER.
Jets1Zero - When do you think young players make their biggest impact on a roster? Year 3 is the most typical response. Well, this was year 3 for the 2011 class, the one which they gave up all those picks for Julio, as well as year 2 for the 2012 class which they forfeited their #1 pick. The way to stay ahead in the NFL is to generate young, cheap talent. You do that through the draft mostly. Giving away draft picks is giving away a chance to be successful over the long haul, unless you get really lucky elsewhere. Julio was one reason for success for the 2011-12 teams. That's a big reason Atlanta made the move: it felt the reward of being so much better in 2011 and 2012 was worth it when not having draft picks would finally catch up to them. The weak drafts the Jets had from 2008-10 caught up to them in 2011-13, wouldn't we all agree? Now, if the Jets were one player away from the Super Bowl, like Atlanta thought they were, giving up a ton to trade up could be worth it. However, this Jets team is definitely not one player away.
It isn't just by belief. I and others have given you examples and facts. You just choose to ignore or disagree with them. No, the majority isn't always right, but on something like this, it should at least make you step back and re-examine your position, and it didn't. I made several attempts, but after seeing your responses to each of us, I got frustrated and it seemed to me that trying to convince you was a waste of my time and energy. I have around 15 years experience posting on Jets sites, and seldom do I see anyone's mind changing. Most of the time pride and ego gets in the way and people stay entrenched in their own thinking/opinions. Your responses came across to me as dismissive. If they weren't intended that way, ok. Yes in one draft the Pats traded up twice, but that was after how many years of trading down, or trading picks for picks the next year? Also, you miss one glaring difference between the Pats and the Jets. The Pats are the perennial champs of our division. They are already a very good team. The Jets aren't. It's one thing if one is only a player or two away from making it back to the SB, and quite another when one has little depth, and one's starting lineups are chock full of holes. As it is, the Jets don't have enough picks this year. It's going to take at least one more draft to even get them close to where they need to be thanks to all the trading up Tanny did. As for the other "top" teams, again, they are "top" teams. The Jets aren't. Huge difference. You don't get to be a top team by having no depth and having lots of holes because you trade up. Yes, I've seen your other posts where you're not in favor of it on a regular basis. The thing is that the Jets are still trying to recover from all the trading up that Tanny did. It's too soon, they have too many holes and too little depth, and they're not even close to being a "top" team. The thing that you're obviously not hearing is that the reason a team trades up is because they have "fallen in love" with a player, be it his production, personality, measurables or some combination. In trading up, they take the attitude that they HAVE to have that player, that there's not another player in the draft at that position that can possibly be as good. It's also taking the attitude that they pretty much think the rest of their team is set and can't be improved upon, or that that one player will be so great that he'll make up for the 2, 3 or however many players they lost out on by trading away those picks. It puts a lot of pressure on that player to not only succeed in becoming a quality starter, but to become a "great" player because he's very likely taking the place of at least 2 if not 3 or more players. If he busts or gets seriously injured, it really hurts the team, even doing it just once every 10 years or so. I mentioned Revis, because the Jets' need for a WR is as dire this year as it was for a CB the year they traded up to take Revis. It's the exact same principle. Listen, I am more willing to trade up than many fans are. I think if one doesn't have a franchise QB, one has to do what one can to get one, even if that means giving up multiple picks to get the guy you want. There's one caveat, however. You darned well better not miss. If you do, your team is screwed for the next 5 years. The only other time I would be in favor of trading up, and then only giving up one additional pick, would be if you haven't traded up in a decade and your team is a perennial SB contender but you can't quite get over the hump because you have one position that you just haven't been able to upgrade and it keeps biting you in the ass. Then if you think there's a guy that plays that position that will be a real difference maker, you might strongly consider it. Even then it's risky. Even though you don't think the player that you'd get with that 2nd or 3rd round pick would be a real difference maker, he could be. You could also wind up getting a player in the 4th round or lower at that position of need who is a stud and gets you over the top, and then you traded up for nothing. I'm sorry if I insulted you. I usually just say "we'll have to agree to disagree on this one" and that's what I'm saying this time too. Peace.
The Jets don't need a WR, they need a couple of WR's and a couple of TE's and it wouldn't hurt to add a RB in the mid to late rounds also. They also need at least one guard and probably should take a tackle as well. That's 6 or 7 players on the offensive side of the ball to begin to fix what is wrong there. Then they need an OLB and an ILB and a safety and a CB as well. Maybe 2 safeties. The Jets dry spell in the draft from 2007 to 2010 is really coming back to haunt them now. They need a bunch of talented players and they need to find 4 or 5 starters in the draft this year, maybe more. Trading up is like revisiting the ghosts of bad Jets drafts of the recent past. It's going to leave them with not enough picks to get what they need. Something like half the picks they make are going to disappoint. In that light avoiding putting several picks into one disappointment is a paramount concern for the Jets this year and moving forward. When they get that loaded roster that is just one or two players short then maybe they can start looking at a tactical trade up. They can also start hoping they don't screw it up at that point.
I'm still on record as saying that Kelvin Benjamin (Who most mocks have going in the 20s) will BEAST the combine and be selected by the Jets at 18.
