Post by JABF on Mar 18, 2023 21:18:17 GMT -6
In fairness, we all know Fields is not Tom Brady, but that doesn't mean he isn't capable of winning championships here. My point mentioning Belichick was that he often has had a good eye for acquiring players at a value (including Brady in the 6th round of the draft) and getting some good mileage out of them and letting them go to other teams and profiting off of them - comp picks, trading for draft picks and/or just off loading expensive vets who then seem to decline. It's like he "buys low and sells high" with these moves. He certainly uses FAs in the equation. Even reclamation projects. But you see him invest wisely. No spending $$$ like a drunken sailor. And it seems like many years he has 9 or 10 draft picks. So when the inevitable misses in the draft happen, he has enough picks that he still gets a good harvest. I think some here on our messageboard have described it as "getting more bites of the apple" in drafts. A good thing.
Anyway the only reason I mentioned the Pats is that I like how they approach the personnel side of things. No they are not perfect. No team is. And yes, having a great franchise QB helps (can make or break you) and that's why (finally) having a good QB here in Chicago is a game changer - literally. But Fields doesn't have to be Brady for the personnel model to work.
Yeah, I'm not putting them in that category either. I just like that business model Belichick has worked successfully for many years now. But it does require a good franchise QB. You don't have to have a Brady-level QB, but you do need a legit franchise QB in place to make it work well. Fields still needs to prove himself to be a quality franchise QB, now that we have some talent around him (and assuming they build out the OL this season... we're not there yet). Getting back to Belichick, he is so good at not overpaying players, or keep them past their shelf-life. He's not perfect. No GM is. But overall he does a solid job of getting a lot of value out of his players.