With FA about to start and the draft after that, I thought I would look back at our previous trades and see how they turnout in retrospect.
There's a lot of "coulda woulda shoulda" on this board, and I think most believe our history of trading picks is a bad one.
When you break each move down individually, it paints a slightly different picture when you look at what we traded away and what we could have had if we'd stood pat.
Our trades around the draft over the last 4 years, what other teams got from us, and what we may have used those picks for:
2004:
1. PORTIS TRADE
We gave the Broncos Champ Bailey and our 2nd Round pick (41 overall) for Clinton Portis.
The Broncos used the pick for Tatum Bell. Julius Jones, Bob Sanders, Michael Boulware and Antwan Odom were still on the board.
2004:
2. BRUNELL TRADE
We gave Jacksonville our 3rd Round pick (72 overall) for Mark Brunell.
The pick ended up with Green Bay, who took DT Donnell Washington. He was a total bust. Max Starks and Bernard Berrian were on the board there.
2004:
3. COOLEY TRADE
We gave New Orleans our 2004 5th Round Pick (139) and our 2005 2nd Round Pick (40) for their 2004 3rd Round Pick (81) and we used that for Cooley. We had to trade back into the 3rd due to the Brunell deal.
The Saints used our 5th rounder for DT Rodney Leisle. Jake Scott and Erik Coleman were on the board. They used our 2nd rounder in 2005 for safety Josh Bullocks. Lofa Tatupu, Corey Wesbster, Matt Roth and Nick Collins were on the board.
2005:
4. CAMPBELL TRADE
We gave Denver our 2005 3rd Rounder (76), plus our 2006 1st Rounder(22) and 2006 4th Rounder(110) for the 17th overall pick -- Jason Campbell.
Denver used the 2005 3rd rounder for cb Karl Paymah. Kirk Morrison, Ellis Hobbs and Chris Henry were on the board.
The 2006 1st rounder ended up in San Fran, who chose lb Manny Lawson. Santonio Holmes, John McCargo, Joseph Addai, Mathias Kiwanuka and Demeco Ryans were on the board.
The 2006 4th rounder was wr Brandon Marshall. Barry Cofield and Elvis Dumervil were on the board.
2005
5. THRASH TRADE
We gave the eagles our 2005 5th Round Pick(146) for James Thrash. The Eagles used the pick to draft Trent Cole.
2006:
6. MCINTOSH TRADE
We gave the Jets our 2006 2nd round(53), 2006 6th round(189) and 2007 2nd round(37) for their 2006 2nd round(35) and 2006 6th round(173).
We drafted Rocky McIntosh and Reed Doughty with our picks.
The picks we traded amounted to:
TE Anthony Fasano (to Dallas -- Devin Hester and Maurice Jones-Drew were on the board)
CB Drew Coleman (Bruce Gradkowski and Antoine Bethea were on the board)
S Eric Weddle (to SD -- Tony Ugoh and Steve Smith were on the board)
2006:
7. BRANDON LLOYD TRADE
We gave San Francisco our 2006 3rd rounder(86) and 2007 4th rounder(104) for Brandon Lloyd.
SF drafted WR Brandon Williams and DE Jay Moore.
2006:
8. TJ DUCKETT TRADE
We gave away our 2007 3rd rounder (70) and 2008 4th rounder for TJ Duckett. The broncos selected OT Ryan Harris from Notre Dame. Lorenzo Booker, Jacoby Jones, James Jones and Jay Alford were on the board.
This year's 4th rounder has yet to be used obviously, and we don't have our 2009 4th rounder due to the Pete Kendall Trade.
EVALUATIONS:
1. Fine by me. Champ wanted out, and I love CP. Tatum Bell hasn't done much.
2. Bad. We could have waited for Brunell to be cut, or just signed some other veteran QB. Then we could have just used this pick for Cooley.
3. Good, even though we should not have been forced to trade back into the draft here. I'd take Cooley over Josh Bullocks, Lofa Tatupu or anyone else we could have used with those picks.
4. Good. Even with 100% success rate, if we'd have not made this deal, we could have ended up with Ellis Hobbs, Joseph Addai and Brandon Marshall. That's damn good, but not if you believe JC is a franchise qb as I do.
5. Even. Love Thrash, but Trent Cole is a super 5th round pick. I'm not sure we'd have targeted him here though.
6. Bad. Like Rocky, just worried about his health and i think WLB is a position you don't need a superstar. Imagine not making the deal and ending up with Devin Hester and Tony Ugoh instead.
7. Awful. The picks haven't amounted to much, but we paid Brandon Lloyd $400,000 per catch. Id rather have two 2nd-year players learning from our coaches.
8. Really bad. It was a panic move, and the Broncos ended up with a good young tackle due to our panic.
There ya go. Some good, some bad, some a wash.
I think in the end though, more picks is better than fewer. Drafting is such a crapshoot, the only way to guarantee success is just to draft lots of guys, because some of the will work out for you, and they wont cost much while they're doing it.



Reply With Quote
So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish
