Let There Be Speculation

Longtime reader eagles nut threw out a rumor tonight about the Colts making a trade for WR Jeremy Maclin.  Then Jim Irsay started tweeting about the team possibly making a big deal.

“In Arizona,but the phone lines burning up…we want to win so damn bad our toes ache and our brains are gurgling!!!!!!!”

“Colt Fans,hint—— it’s a Wide Receiver!!”

“Everyone stand buy,pour strong drink…do ur voodoo,Colts need the strength of it’s nation to get this wopper in the boat! DO U UNDERSTAND!?”

That last tweet makes you think it could be a major star, but what elite WRs are available?  Could this be a deal for Victor Cruz?  Would the Chiefs trade Dwayne Bowe?  Is Kenny Britt someone you trade for?

Is there any way this could be Jeremy Maclin?

I’m hesitant to think the Eagles would deal Maclin.  He won’t turn 25 until May.  He’s already got 258 catches and 26 TDs.  He is a high character guy that has played well, but still has room to get better.  Organizations don’t like to trade players like that.  It looks bad.

The addition of Chip Kelly does change things.  He’s never coached Maclin.  From the outside, Mac doesn’t seem to be his type of WR.  Kelly demands that his guys block.  He wants tough players.  Mac was an atrocious blocker last year.  His toughness is an issue.  Mac goes down way too easy, thus earning the name “Self-tacklin’ Jeremy Maclin” from Jimmy Bama.

There is also the angle of Mac’s contract status and future.  He’s entering the final year of his deal.  Will the Eagles pay him big bucks?  Are the Eagles interested in keeping him long term?  I do think Chip Kelly would be interested in trying to see what he could do with Mac.  Let’s not forget just how great he was in college.  Mac has only shown glimpses of that player in the NFL.  I think he can get better, but he needs a coach to really push him.  Reid didn’t push enough.  Chip would.  That would make or break Mac.  Is it worth the risk to keep him?  It is also risky to deal him.

The Colts need weapons for Andrew Luck.  Mac does fit that offense.  He runs good routes.  He has good hands.  The deal would make some sense on the part of both teams.

What would be the compensation?  Tricky question.  Maybe a late 2nd or early 3rd.  Maybe a combination of picks from this year and next year, with performance clauses factoring in.

Doubt this is what Irsay is talking about, but this has already been a wild offseason around the NFL.  You never know.

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Jake Long is back talking to the Dolphins.

Nnamdi is talking to the Saints.  He’s never made the playoffs.  Rob Ryan is the DC and has never been on a winning team.  This is the ultimate test for Sean Payton and Drew Brees.

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Apples and Oranges

There seems to be a train of thought by some people that because Jeff Lurie didn’t make any changes yesterday, he is accepting failure.  That is largely affected by the fact that the Bears fired GM Jerry Angelo and the Colts fired Bill and Chris Polian.  If those teams don’t accept failure, why does Lurie?

Vastly different situations.  And that’s putting it mildly.  Let’s start with Polian.  First, Bill is 68 years old.  In recent years he has been trying to ease back and let son Chris take over.  Bill still made the key decisions, but Chris was involved in everything.  Bill knew he wasn’t going to stay GM forever.  That’s a grind.  Chris actually had the title in recent years, but Bill was still The Man.

I don’t know how comfortable owner Jim Irsay was with Chris getting more power.  He approved the move and said the right things publicly, but I have to believe he had some internal reservations about this.  Chris might turn out to be a good GM, but Bill is the guy with a great, great resume.

There is no question that Polian was a brilliant GM.  You do wonder if he lost his fastball, though.  The Colts roster has more than a few holes.  Manning really carried them in recent years.  LT Tarik Glenn was never replaced.  WR Marvin Harrison was never replaced.  RB Edgerrin James was never replaced.  And so on.  The Colts kept winning as long as Manning played, but the roster was eroding.

There is also a personality side to things.  Bill Polian ruffled a lot of feathers.  He pissed off media types.  He bullied random people that he didn’t like in certain situations.  He even got into an odd back and forth with Peyton Manning recently about practicing and rehabbing.

Add all this up and a nightmarish 0-14 start to the season where the Colts became a punch line and you can see where Irsay might be ready to make a move.  Irsay can hire a new GM from the outside to run his team for the next decade.  Polian isn’t the long term answer there and might not even have been the short term answer.  If a change was to be made, the time was right.

Contrast that with the situation here in Philly.  There are no personality clashes.  Andy Reid isn’t a bully like Polian.  Bill’s outbursts with people are legendary.  Andy is terse and awkward, but not a physical bully.  Howie gets along with everyone very well as far as I know.  And the timing side of things is far different.  The Eagles are a team built to win now.  The Colts are in rebuilding mode.  Making a change right now makes sense.

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Jerry Angelo is also an older guy.  He’s in his early to mid-60s.  Jerry made some great moves in his time with the Bears (Briggs, Hester, Forte, trading for Jay Cutler, and signing Julius Peppers).  He’s also had his share of misses.  Angelo doesn’t have the kind of track record that Polian does so he also doesn’t have that kind of goodwill built up.

Angelo failed to build a good OL in recent years.  Dealing with Mike Martz’s offense didn’t help matters, but the line flat out lacked talent.  Angelo failed to have a good backup QB in place this year.  Caleb Hanie showed promise last year in the NFC title game, but Martz was never a believer in Hanie.  I’m not sure many OCs would see Hanie as a desirable backup QB.  The Bears expected to contend for the Super Bowl.  In this era of football, you must have a reliable backup QB.  The Packers have Matt Flynn.  The Lions have Shaun Hill.  The Vikings at one point this year had Donovan McNabb, Christian Ponder, and Joe Webb as their QBs.  Caleb Hanie?

The Bears got off to a 7-3 start.  The team looked like definite playoff  material, although not good enough to catch GB for the division title.  Then Jay Cutler got hurt.  The team lost 5 straight games.  There was a 3-game stretch where the team failed to throw for 90 yards in any contest.  That is beyond shocking in today’s NFL.  In 6 games, Bears backups threw for 851 yards and 5 TDs.  Matt Flynn threw for 480 yards and 6 TDs in the season finale for GB.  Ouch.

Angelo also had some personality issues.  Star RB Matt Forte is mad at Angelo/the team for not offering him a good contract extension.  The Bears cut very popular C Olin Kreutz this summer.  That move may have been needed, but the handling was far from ideal.  LB Lance Briggs is mad at the team for not re-negotiating his deal.  I don’t blame them, but this situation remains awkward.  There was a botched draft day trade with the Ravens that Angelo backed out of.  That had the Ravens very mad at the time.  Things have been smoothed over since, but there was bad blood for a while.

I think Angelo also suffered from the success GB had and the swift rise of the Lions.  Chicago is a veteran team, built to win now.  The Lions have a ton of young talent.  The Packers also have more young talent than Chicago.  Bears writer Sean Jensen talked to scouts and compiled a list of the best players under the age of 30 in the NFC North.  GB had 11.  Detroit had 8.  Chicago had 6 and the lowly Vikings just 5.

Bears ownership perceived a growing talent gap in the division and blamed Angelo for that.  Rather than seeing him as the solution, he was the scapegoat.

So let’s compare this situation with the Eagles.  Age isn’t an issue here.  Again, there is no personality conflict.  The Eagles are one of the most respected organizations in the league.  Since the hatchet job article came out on Roseman, I think he’s made 237 trades.  He gets along just fine with other GMs.  Andy is Andy.

As for talent, there aren’t many top-to-bottom rosters in the NFL that are better.  Plenty of teams certainly played better in 2011, but in terms of sheer talent, the Eagles are among the best.  There is no talent gap in the NFC East, unless you mean the Big 3 and the Skins.

As for QB…the Eagles always aggressively address QB.  We had Donovan, Kolb, and Feeley when we signed Vick.  Compare that to Cutler and Hanie.  You cannot live and die with one QB in today’s NFL unless that guy is a freak and/or has a great OL.  Martz QBs always take a beating.  It is imperative to have a veteran ready to go in that system.  Why not have Marc Bulger there?  He retired in August, but I’m sure a call from his old mentor Mike Martz could have changed that.

Clearly Andy Reid and Howie Roseman have some work to do in order to get the Eagles where they need to be, but the notion that Lurie is accepting failure in comparison to Indy and Chicago is simply ludicrous.