Realms Beyond Fantasy Football 2013-14 - Time to beat the Brit

[Sir Bruce]

What the hell are the Browns thinking?

The Browns have new management and ownership and they're thinking that whatever was paid for Richardson is a sunk cost, that nothing in this league matters until you have a QB and that an extra pick next year makes their being able to make something happen to get a QB more likely.

Richardson's a nice player but RB is the most fungible position in the league. Guys like Arian Foster and Fred Jackson have had huge seasons as undrafted free agents and there are many others. The headlines are bad, but for a team like Cleveland who isn't doing anything with their QB situation, gathering assets is the right move.

I completely agree. As a Colts fan I'm slightly positive on the trade because we really really needed a serviceable RB but I'd be thrilled if I were a Browns fan. Well, thrilled may be the wrong word since I would still be a Cleveland sports fan, but happier than usual. Turning a decent RB into a first-round draft pick while rebuilding is a no-brainer imo.

[sunrise089]

Basically they're tanking like an NBA squad, and it's about as good from a watchability standpoint.

Tanking isn't too common in the NFL since 1) because players don't have to be as tall the talent pool is deeper, hence the #1 overall pick is less valuable on the margin, and 2) the NFL is the least deterministic major sports league, so middling talent can have a successful season or even win a Super Bowl due to randomness. Those same reasons btw make tanking a less advisable strategy, something lost on the Browns' management.

IMHO this is pure gamesmanship from the new GM+coach regime. If they don't do this and the team is bad in 2013 and 2014 they probably get fired. Now they buy themselves an extra year. Shanahan did the same thing in DC with his McNabb -> Grossman -> RGIII moves. "My McNabb trade isn't looking too good? Oh, well I never really meant for him to be the answer. It's actually the great replacement-level QBs we have on hand. Err...it's actually we need to trade up for the QB of the future." Then, because it's the NFL, randomness struck and the Redskins made the playoffs. Suddenly Shanahan gets bonus years since he "turned around the franchise."

It's true that RB is the least important every-down position in football, and that the sunk cost fallacy exists. But by benching Wheedon and trading Richardson the Browns are only marginally improving their chance to be good in the future (perhaps moving up a few spots at the top of the draft plus getting a middle first round pick) at the cost of being so bad in 2013 they won't be able to hope for good luck giving them an over-achieving season. I don't think the haul is worth it, especially since they're going to have to spend one of their first rounders plus say a third rounder replacing the two guys they benched/traded, and said RB replacement probably won't be as good.

tl;dr - Most NFL coaches and GM's can't bring enough skill to their role to have a meaningful influence on team performance. Therefore they take steps to ensure their job security for an extra year or two. Cleveland is just taking this to the extreme and their owner fell for it.

nothing in this league matters until you have a QB

Since 2000:

*Trent Dilfer
*2001 version of Tom Brady
*Brad Johnson
*2007 version of Eli Manning
*Joe Flacco

I'm very skeptical there are many teams with QBs with a ceiling lower than that group.

[wetbandit]

tl;dr - Most NFL coaches and GM's can't bring enough skill to their role to have a meaningful influence on team performance. Therefore they take steps to ensure their job security for an extra year or two. Cleveland is just taking this to the extreme and their owner fell for it.

I realize I'm quoting the tl;dr section, but I think it's a bit unfair to characterize this as a job security move. The tenure of Mike Lombardi and Rob Chudzinski will be closely tied to the success of this move. Their job security would also depend upon the success of their 2014 draft, regardless of this trade, and their performance in successive seasons. Adding another draft pick in 2014 doesn't extend ML and RC's evaluation period. If the trade is deemed a success, it will be because they drafted and developed their picks well. I don't see a moral hazard here in the same way that an at-risk GM with a young team trades away a promising prospect for an older veteran. It would seem to me that trading the team's top jersey seller (I'm assuming here, man it would be cool if it was Joe Thomas) increases the scrutiny placed upon them.

I would agree that only elite head coaches and GMs contribute to team performance in a way that is demonstrably significant.

That said, this seems like a worthwhile risk to me. The trade captures what the Browns perceive as a fair or over-value return for Richardson. The value of a non-elite starting RB is low, if you subscribe to the positions held by the NFL analytics community and for the reasons stated earlier in the thread. I don't imagine that the Browns are giving up that much by trading a skilled player usable in their 2013 campaign. Even with Richardson, for all the randomness inherent in football, it's still doubtful that the Browns would qualify for the playoffs, let alone make a Superbowl run.

The worst thing for Cleveland is the affect on attendance and the resulting blackout mania, which, given the strength of the team, may actually be a blessing.

[Kuro]

What I don't understand is why people think the Browns are so bad this needs to happen.

Maybe it is just me, but it seems like when they had Richardson, all they needed as a QB and a WR. (Which is funny because, IMO, drafting Weeden was the worst thing they could do QB-wise: I would have kept Colt or waited a bit and drafted a later guy...imagine if they got Russell Wilson!) And maybe some O-Line? I'm not up-to-date enough on their O-Line, I should go study it...

People call RB fungible, but I don't really see it. Most RBs seem to stay good for about 4-5 years: Ray Rice, Adrian Peterson, MJD, Marshawn Lynch, Jamaal Charles, Steven Jackson, Arian Foster...yeah, you get RBs who are a flash in the pan, but you also get a lot of RBs who do really good one year and then never that good again. I dunno. It seems to me that once you have your stud RB, you shouldn't let him go until the end of his peak.

All the same, I might be biased, as I am someone who feels that the "QB is all that matters now"/"Passing games are what we should focus on to the exclusiveness of the running game!" aren't the best strategies. Not a lot of NFL teams have suceeded and won a Super Bowl without a running game (The Green Bay Packers of 2011 are the only ones that come to mind. You might think the 2009 Saints count, but they don't: 6th in Rushing Yards, 4th in TDs, 6th in Yards/Attempt, etc).

Anyway, I'm off to play my PB11 turn, eat, then I'll come here and give my weekly predictions.

[wetbandit]

And just because I like to read what I type: My above argument assumes that Lombardi already convinced Cleveland ownership that 2013 was a lost cause or rebuild as it was.

I really just wanted to share this article (Forbes) and this dubious speculation:

Richardson’s fully-guaranteed four-year deal is worth $20.5 million over the four years, with a $13.3 signing bonus. He also has no offset language, which means he’ll receive the whole $20.5 million even if he signs with another team before the four years are up. According to Rotoworld, Richardson was due $1.3 million this year, $2.3 million in 2014 and $3.2 million in 2015, and becomes a free agent in 2016.

Which begs the question: Was the trade the result of the legal mess majority owner Jimmy Haslam’s truck stop company, Pilot Flying J , is entangled in? Some estimates the law suits Pilot Flying J faces could be quite expensive, and despite Haslam vowing he will not lose control of the team, plans have already been put in place for his 82 year old father to run the Browns should his son not be able to as a result of his company’s legal problems. Earlier this summer Haslam sold his ownership of a minor league baseball team.

[scooter]

This trade is not that great, but drafting any RB in the top 3 of a recent draft was a far worse move than this trade.

[Kuro]

This trade is not that great, but drafting any RB in the top 3 of a recent draft was a far worse move than this trade.

I disagree intensely.

[scooter]

This trade is not that great, but drafting any RB in the top 3 of a recent draft was a far worse move than this trade.

I disagree intensely.

Well then you're intensely wrong . (I'm kidding, mostly.) You draft a QB in the top 5. If he ends up being a pro bowl caliber QB (no I will not use the E word and don't any of you dare ), you get him performing at that level for well over 10-15 years. If he ends up being a prob bowl caliber RB, you get that level of performance for 5-6 years. RBs don't perform at a high level in their 30s unless they are "miraculously" recovering from ACL injuries in record speed like Adrian Peterson.

Come on, other than the Ravens, name me a team that's recently won a Super Bowl because of their amazing RB? And never mind the fact that the Ravens won it mainly because Flacco turned in one of the greatest string of playoff games from the QB position in NFL history. The reason all the best RBs seem to end up on consistently mediocre teams is because in a salary cap league, the value you get from spending big on a top RB isn't nearly as good as spending big on other positions, and the recent results support out that hypothesis. There's also been a half dozen rule changes over the last 10 years that have gradually shifted the balance of the game towards passing anyway. Therefore, investing heavily in an attempt to get at top-tier RB is a poor decision because it's far less likely to pay off.

[Sir Bruce]

This trade is not that great, but drafting any RB in the top 3 of a recent draft was a far worse move than this trade.

Agree completely. I can't find the study right now but various sabermetricians have consistently found that the value-draft position relationship is the flattest for RBs compared to all other positions. This is very slightly compensated by an increased likelihood of getting a complete gamechanger like AP but in general high-drafted running backs are almost always a terrible idea compared to drafting a player at basically any other position with that spot.

[Cyneheard]

This trade is not that great, but drafting any RB in the top 3 of a recent draft was a far worse move than this trade.

Essentially. The Colts are paying fair value for a strong RB. RG III doesn't have to be the best QB ever to pay his original drafting value. Trent Richardson did.