In hindsight, Brady was/is the greatest NFL player of all time, and if NFL teams were magically given the knowledge of this somehow, he would certainly be the No. 1 player drafted overall in the 2000 Draft, not someone taken in the sixth round.
Suppose one were the GM of the Browns (the team that had the No. 1 pick that year.) All other NFL teams want to trade to get Cleveland’s spot so that they can take Brady. How many draft picks would they have to offer in a trade to make it worth it?
Would it require something like 10 first-round picks?
Does the hypothetical include knowing what we know about the other players involved in these drafts too, or just Tom Brady? One massive aspect of the NFL is how to deal with the uncertainity of player evaluation/development.
And are you drafting Tom Brady as we know he is, or Tom Brady in 2000, where he may not develop into as great a player without the events/coaching/opportunities he had with the Patriots?
Good point. If you have universal insight, then I’m sure there were two players available in that draft who collectively would be worth much more than Brady alone.
Another factor is that a team only has one first round draft pick to trade. After that, they’re trading away picks in the second and subsequent rounds.
So Cleveland had the 1st, 32nd, 63rd, etc. pick. Washington had the 2nd, 33rd, 64th, etc. pick. The second overall pick might be valuable but how valuable is the thirty-third and sixty-fourth overall pick?
To re-iterate that point, does that also come with a Drew Bledsoe to sit behind and a Bill Belichik to learn from? Or are you expecting him to be fully developed before training camp? Those first couple years, he was relying heavily on a stellar defense so the offense did not have to do as much.
Nobody is drafted a HOFer. It literally takes a whole team of people to get you there. Look at Andrew Luck. Had all the tools, motivation, and skills, and had to retire early because he was failed at so many different levels by his front office, coaches, and even teammates.
But I think the premise of this thread is that coaches would have known back in 2000 that Brady had the potential to become a legendary player. Knowing this, they would have done the work of realizing that potential.
A lot of coaches (and GMs and owners) think they’re particularly good not only at talent identification but at player development. Most are wrong.
Again, Andrew Luck was considered a can’t miss. And he was very good from the beginning. And still didn’t quite live up to what he could have achieved. And I place very little of that on him. And that’s what happened when the team correctly identified a franchise QB available early in the draft.
There are undoubtedly several other players like that. They’re not all draft busts or whatever we say about them now.
Somebody like Tom Brady? I can see half the teams back in the late 90s never getting him up to speed on reading defenses or keeping the ball moving. The other half may have been able to develop him better, but I doubt many of them would have gotten 1 Super Bowl out of it, much less several.
How many times do we personally see something like that in our work places? A super star employee put under a bad manager and never properly developed? Sometimes the bad manager gets shifted away but just as often if not more often, the employee never gets the development they need.
As well as being failed by his own body; the grind of having to rehab through injuries, particularly the shoulder injury which cost him the entire 2017 season, was one of the things he’s specifically cited.
That’s also why I think Brady doesn’t have as good a career at Random NFL Team. Even if he got appropriate coaching, the front office would have to build the right team around him as well. That Pats were fortunate not only in having Belichick but also Dante Scarnecchia running the OL until 2013.
Those first few Super Bowls weren’t as pass happy as the later ones. They ran the ball a lot behind good to great OLs and backed with good defense. Even if you know you have one of the great QBs of all time, selling out to acquire him puts you in a terrible position to build/develop the other pieces around him over the long term. Unless you already have those pieces, which doesn’t describe most teams, and even for the smart ones who do, they don’t overpay for single players.
You need a complete team, not just a HOFer QB and a random assemblage of hot garbage. Brady left NE in the first place because there was no way they could keep a competitive team built around him year after year after year. They’re not world beaters anymore, but what the Pats still manage to accomplish with those rosters is a testament to the quality coaching they get.
I’m sure Tampa loved winning the championship but not even 2 years later, they’re now paying the price for it. They were very fortunate to be in such a weak division this year.
I think he would have done just as good, or even better, with the Cowboys. He would have had the chance to learn from Troy Aikman his first year. Then starting in 2003 he would have Bill Parcells as his head coach. What could go wrong from there . How much draft capital would that be worth? I think the Cowboys first rounder in 2000 plus their first rounder for the next four years, at least. Maybe throw in Jerry Jones as a bonus .
The “so what?” is the point of this thread. As you note, coaches can only guess what kind of potential a college star has at the professional level. And you also note, that guesswork often doesn’t work.
So the premise of the thread, as I understand it, is what if coaches were in a situation where they had proof rather than guesswork to act on? How valuable would that proof be?
Would you trade Peyton Manning for Tom Brady if you ran the Colts? For this hypothetical, pretend they were rookies in the same year instead of 1998 and 2000 respectively.
I think I keep Peyton Manning. I know he will win me a Superbowl, whereas Brady becomes an unknown with tremendous potential but no guarantees.
Unless I’m on the Patriots, I don’t think I offer any first rounders for him. And if I am on the Patriots, I know I can draft him way late without concern.
But let’s say I’m the Jets GM. Do I really think I’m getting five championships from this guy? On the Jets?! Likely not.
Sure, and as I said before, though implicitly, I don’t think the knowledge is worth all that much on its own. Certainly not more than a couple first rounders.
The problem with paying a lot for a known top tier QB is it leaves you with no draft capital to build a team around the QB. What good is a QB without an OL or a defense or anybody to throw to? Maybe you go all-in, trade all your picks for the next five years, max out your cap on free agents, and have a couple good seasons. And then what? Certainly not 5 Super Bowls.
And that’s assuming the coaches are even capable of identifying and realizing the full potential of their players, which is incredibly questionable in the vast majority of cases, as most teams eventually realize about the majority of the front offices and coaching staffs there have ever been.
The hypothetical has been sort of answered historically. Teams sell out to move up in the draft to get their dream QBs. Many don’t pan out for a variety of reasons but the roster and coaching end of things is often a big one.
Think of David Carr on that first Houston Texans team. I’m not saying he was going to be a HOFer but there was no chance any QB was going to develop behind that OL. He’s lucky to still be alive. A rookie Tom Brady on that team (granted, this would be shifting things a few years) would be running for his life, not appropriately developing his skills.
And isn’t that how Dallas built its 90s dynasty? They got the Vikings to overpay for Herschel Walker and did pretty good with the picks they got in return.
The premise of the OP is that you KNOW what you’re getting in Tom Brady and that every other GM knows too, that’s why they’d want to trade for him. The question is, do you do it?
Given that in sports, you don’t really know anything, as Cleveland’s GM, I would not trade a pick. Especially the Browns, my understanding is that they never were a good team, at least not good enough to win it all. I have no idea if it’s because they don’t know how to draft or something else but you keep a more-or-less sure thing.
You think you may know but you don’t, see Moneyball. See the 1966 New York Mets who drafted first and picked Steve Chilcott who never played in the majors while the Athletics picked Reggie Jackson. At least the Mets that same year won Tom Seaver sweepstake.
As pointed out by others, it doesn’t mean that Brady would have turned out the same. This a totally different timeline of his career if had been picked by anyone else. Could have gotten a career-ending injury early. Heck, he could have chosen to play baseball instead and catch for the Montreal Expos. For all we know, that could have changed that franchise’s history.
. How much draft capital would that be worth? I think the Cowboys first rounder in 2000 plus their first rounder for the next four years, at least. Maybe throw in Jerry Jones as a bonus 
.