Could/Should OBJ be available for trade this week?
 

This is all about money going forward.

Theney is on the books for at least 3 more years, and isn't coming off the books cheep in year 4.

In another year or two, we are going to have to look at re signing both Humphrey and Smith to extentions/new contracts, and I assume neither of those 2 are going to come cheap, and it looks as if both need to be keepers.

OBJ is not going to be cheap either. Probably $20 million, give or take a bit going forward.

That's a lot of money invested in the O-line in the very near future.

If Trevor Penning is still on the board in the late teens, and the Chiefs could move up and grab him, and then say trade OBJ to a team like the Jets for an early 2nd and early 4th (which is a late 1st round value) would you consider it?

That would put our cap space this year at about $34 million before rookies are paid. So high $20 millions to play with during and after the draft to fill in spots that we were unable to fill in during the draft. And an additional $20 million for the next 2 or 3 years just like we recouped from moving Hill.

Say 29 and 50 to Philly for Pick 15. (Thats 318 trade points for 29 and 50, vs 315 for pick 15)

Get picks 35 and 111 from the Jets for OBJ. (Thats 201 trade points which is valued right inbetween picks 29 and 30 in the 1st round).

So essentially move OBJ and pick 50 for massive cap space going forward.

Picks left:

30
35
62
94
103
111
121
135

Still 8 picks and Penning for OBJ and cap space.

I'd categorize this as a pretty terrible idea. The one way which you can **** up this superbowl window is by playing a kid at left tackle and getting Mahomes killed. Even the top end tackle talent this draft that will go top 5/10 is not as good as the 1st rounders from the last couple of drafts, so you're taking a massive risk assuming Penning can start week 1.

Left tackle is just not the spot to go cheap. You can give OBJ a 4-5 year deal now, and if you factor in that the first year of a new deal is normally cheap cap wise, the money between an OBJ deal and deals for Humphrey and Smith won't even overlap. Thuney's deal will be off the books by then too.

Orlando Brown Jr. IS OUR LT!

Thats it, get used to it. He is not getting traded, they love him and he loves the Chiefs.

No

Is “trade brown jr” the new “move Albert to lg”?

Pretty much. It’s a stupid ****ing idea.

Veach said yesterday they are going to try to get a long term deal done after the draft.

The holdup is OBJ deciding if he wants to hire an agent or not.

I think he’d like to make a reasonable deal and not paying agent fees could help that.

How so? On all of those.

We are in year 2 of Humphery and Smith. Thuney is on the books for 4 more years. All are expensive.

They have an out in Thuney’s contract before the 2024 season.

I listened to the PC.

I just think this could mean losing Humphrey or Smith... or both in a couple of years.

Maybe not, but we will see. Mahomes has crazy numbers coming up.

Thuney is 22 million a year after this year for the next 3.

Low this year on OBJ, and you are at 20 million probably starting next year. Or more depending on how low you go this year.

Humphrey and Smith have this year cheap, and next year cheap. Then what?

Sure. For 13 million.

Humphrey and Smith aren't even extension eligible until after 2023. An extension also doesn't have to kick in until 2024 and 2025, so you can make it to where there's not much overlap between the expensive years of Thuney and the new contracts for Humphrey/Smith.

Also, the salary cap is likely to continue to increase quite a bit. I wouldn't be surprised if the cap is $250-270 million by 2025. Viewing salaries for someone like Thuney through the lens of the current salary cap means his salary is large, but that may not be the case by 2025. Also, Thuney can be released in 2025 with $16 million in cap savings and only $6 million in dead money, which I imagine might be a high possibility of occurring. He'll be around 32 at that point and they'll probably go with a rookie or cheaper veteran at LG.

Yeah if his contract stays how it is currently. He could easily restructure, get an extension or something else. Offensive linemen play into their 30s at a high level all the time.

Smith and Humphrey are under contract through 2024, any new deal would start in 2025. in 2025, Thuney can be cut with a 6.6m cap hit.

Your whole plan doesn't make any sense, lets say you take Penning now and he's not a bust. Penning would only be cheap until 2025, his 5th year option in 2026 would be expensive and then he would need a new contract in 2027. If you keep Smith and Humphrey, the first year of their new contract, with the low cap hit would be 2025, and then they would get expensive in 2026 THE EXACT SAME TIME AS PENNING.

Meanwhile, if you give OBJ a 4 year deal including this year, his last expensive year is in 2025, meshing his last, probably expensive cap hit year with the "cheap" cap hit years on the first year of Humphrey and Smith's new deals.

You're trying to solve a problem that doesn't exist, and doing it badly.

Centers and guards are easier to find than LTs

So if you lose those two, find more

No.

Just - no.

What are we even doing here?

Asking a question about the only movable piece that could give us cap space to really fill out our roster with the extra cap space.

And watch the first two 3rd down plays of the 4th quarter vs the Bengals. Those two plays were huge in this game. It's not like this guy is irreplacable.

<iframe width="853" height="480" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/LJEDhaPfw_Q" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Well...

A couple of nuggets to digest here.

One, Penning is reportedly getting strong interest from Seattle so he may not even be available at 15.

But, if he is there... I think he'd remind Andy Reid an awful lot of a former FA he signed in Jon Runyan, so there's that.

Then there is the curious issue of the Jets. Obviously, they have Mekhi Becton and I don't think there'd be much discussion if he hadn't been injured last year. He looked just fine at LT in 2020 as a rookie. George Fant played really solid in relief of him last year, so there has been chatter that maybe they'd start Fant at LT and move Becton to RT. I don't see it happening though. So, then what about OBJ going there? At that point, the Jets would have to be thinking that they'd be moving Becton to RT and OBJ is a longer-term solution at LT than Fant can be (he's in his 30s). Are the Jets actually improving their situation? I don't know that they are.

Would I do it if I knew all things could and would go down as you have outlined? Yes, I would. I think Penning would be much better at LT than OBJ in this offense. By doing the deal, you're really not substantially affecting your draft, and if you can get that OBJ trade down before pick 20/21 you have the potential to still have Karlaftis there and move 30 and 62 for him and a 5th. 35 is probably a spot you could grab Pickens.

All told though, its probably a bit far-fetched to think this would all happen. I'm not saying it won't or can't but I'm not so sure the NYJ would be your trade partner for OBJ. If SEA doesn't take a tackle at 9, I think you could send OBJ to them for 40, 109, and 152.

No

But I know Brett Veach in his media meeting said the Chiefs still have plenty of time to do a new contract with Orlando Brown Jr, but stranger things have happened than two sides not being able to agree to a new contract.

Chiefs could be looking at improvements to OL in the draft.

Maybe OBJ plays on the Franchise Tag this year and Chiefs try to prepare a successor for 2023.

One BIG nugget you left out, Orlando is not signed. He has not signed his tag and therefor can NOT be traded.

I dont believe they are even considering trading him but also IT ISNT POSSIBLE right now.

If we could move up to #6, with your proposed thib trade and take Charles cross instead, I’d trade obj all day. I’d view cross as an upgrade over obj with how much we pass and how important protecting mahomes is. And I love the value of 40, 109 and 152. Watch cross move.

https://youtu.be/QZM5MnBe6MM

I'm knocking on wood right now, but you know a severely underrated part of OBJ's game and why I'm okay with giving him a starting OT extension? He ****ing stays healthy. He missed zero games as a RT/LT in Baltimore (once they finally made him the starter at RT) and only missed the regular season Cincy game here with us.

I can't say the same thing for any of these rookies coming in. Yeah, it's probably safe to assume they'll be fine, but Eric Fisher was also fine and he would miss a handful of games here and there. And he was considered one of the healthier tackles from 2013-2020.

OBJ works fine, and I'd rather not **** around with something that works. Not when we have Mahomes.

Also, we were bitching about Fisher and his play all the way through 2016, even after the team determined he was good enough to get a nice extension. Sometimes it takes multiple seasons to be a great OT. We're bitching about OBJ and how he's apparently not good enough now... how long do you think it's going to take for a ****ing rookie to come in and not be a pile of shit? A season? Two seasons? More? There's also the bust potential.

It's just not worth the cap space. I'd rather have 12 draft picks and OBJ than cap space, fewer picks, and the potential to get worse at protecting Mahomes, particularly in the short term.

Unless I missed it, OBJ has not signed his franchise tender (likely due to not having an agent). Until he does sign it, the Chiefs can't trade him. Unless I'm mistaken, he's sort of not even on the team right now. As it currently stands, the Chiefs technically do not have a starting left tackle heading into next week's draft.

If he wants a long-term deal and trading him is what gets him that, he'll sign the tag. Much ado about nothing there.

Honestly, him not signing the tag yet is a hell of a reason to draft a tackle, IMO. I get the point SNR is trying to make about bird-in-the-hand, but this thread also shows how accepting everyone is of subpar play at the position. I'm not about to pretend that going to the Popularity Bowl is somehow indicative of him playing well. Reid and Mahomes did a lot to mask the deficiencies and thank baby Jesus those young guys in the middle played like seasoned All-Pros.

I thought teams could? How did we trade Dee Ford while on the tag?

Draft another tackle? Sure. I'm game. Absolutely.

Trade away your current best OT and trade up to draft a rookie in his place while still needing more depth and/or competition? That's the problem I have. We may as well be pissing away the season.

What Crow says above, if a new deal is agreed as part of the trade the player then signs the tag and the new deal.

I could be mistaken, but I am pretty sure him not signing the tag yet is just because of representation issues with him not having an agent.

I wasn't a huge fan of the OBJ trade, but I am way less down on his play last year than you are. To me he was average to marginally above average, in his first year in a new system that was very different to what he was asked to do in Baltimore, so I think there is still some potential left to be realized, even though he will never be a "top" tackle.

I'm only railing against the premise of this thread, that it would be good to get "cheap" at left tackle, with a non-sensical trade. Prioritizing cheapness over protecting Mahomes is a terrible philosophy, the proposed Jets trade makes very little sense as you noted and trading OBJ to someone so we can have their pick and take a tackle makes very little sense in any situation, because why wouldn't the team trading back just take the tackle on the board if he's so much better than OBJ?

The Chiefs have too many needs at premium positions this year. It looks like cap situation wise OBJ can play on the tag, so if you want an upgrade, taking a 2nd or 3rd round tackle and developing him to start next year is the better option if you're really down on OBJ. I hate the idea of throwing a rookie out there, especially with this tackle class.

Yeah, I definitely could see the difficulty in letting him go this year.

I think a guy that can play RT or LT like Penning is the type of guy that makes the most sense because you could start him at RT this year and move him over to LT next year. Even then, I don't think Penning is going to drop very far and I also am not overly excited about drafting a guy with the intent of him playing LT only to have him play the opposite side for a year.

I'm also still not sure how I feel about going up for a tackle over a DE either. That's more of a problem for me than getting rid of OBJ.

I think the best thing is to fix the defensive issue and depth problems at WR and at some point grab a developmental tackle like a Braxton Jones, even if you reach a bit for that guy.

Yep, 100% agree on this being the better way to handle it.

That goes without saying.

However, by not signing the franchise offer, he could also holdout without penalty since he wouldn't be contractually obligated to play or participate in any team activities.

It's not a common occurrence (for obvious reasons) but an occurrence nonetheless. Difficult to imagine this possibility, no matter how remote, hasn't been accounted for by the Chiefs as they prep for the draft and beyond.

Nah.

/thread

Trading obj gets interesting if LT cross falls. I’d do it! If cross falls to 15ish, pull the trigger and go get him if you can get adequate value for obj.