3 NFL draft scenarios

[Rain Man]

Originally Posted by 'Hamas' Jenkins

1) Then you don't because
2) It isn't

What about giving up 12 1sts and 16 2nds for RGIII?

If you say no, then we've established that there is some limit on what people would trade up for to get a 1st round QB. The question is merely where the limit is.

And my take is that rather than pay 2 1sts and 2 2nds, let's see who's available with our 1st as it stands. Looking at the ten years from 1997 through 2006 (throwing out the last five years since we don't know career arcs yet), here are the quarterbacks drafted in the first 9 picks:

Group 1

Vince Young
Alex Smith
Eli Manning
Phillip Rivers
Carson Palmer
Byron Leftwich
David Carr
Joey Harrington
Michael Vick
Tim Couch
Donovan McNabb
Akili Smith
Peyton Manning
Ryan Leaf


Here are the quarterbacks drafted in picks 10 through 19:

Group 2

Matt Leinert
Jay Cutler
Ben Roethlisberger
Kyle Boller
Chad Pennington
Daunte Culpepper
Cade McNown

Here are quarterbacks taken in picks 20 through 31 in that period:

Group 3

Jim Druckenmiller
Patrick Ramsey
Rex Grossman
J.P. Losman
Aaron Rodgers
Jason Campbell

Here are quarterbacks taken in the 2nd round in that period:

Group 4

Jake Plummer
Charlie Batch
Shaun King
Drew Brees
Quincy Carter
Marques Tuiasasopo
Tarvaris Jackson

So would I rather have one pull on the slot machine from Group 1, or would I rather have one pull in Group 2, one in Group 3, and 2 in Group 4? We could probably do the math, but offhand it seems to me like I'd rather have more pulls on the slot machine, because I see some pretty good quarterbacks in that group and I have more tries to get them.

I don't know if there's a salary cap deal, but I think mathematically you'd be better off drafting QB after QB with all those picks until one of them works out. Not to mention the fact that if your first or second guy works out then you can redirect the later picks since they're not all happening this year.

So the bottom line is that turning down a trade of 2 1sts and 2 2nds isn't a statement that I don't want a franchise QB. It's a statement that there may be a better option for getting one. In this case it would be flooding your roster with QBs using those picks and hoping that one of them is the next Brees or Rodgers or Roethlisberger.