Quote:It's not disingenuous. 

 

Monroe may have been a starting LT, but he wasn't very good.  He was a middle of the pack starter at LT at best.  He wasn't going to command much under any circumstances, and he wasn't likely to stay when his contract expired.  Salvaging a couple of mid to late round picks for him wasn't bad, especially when those picks helped get us two of the best players currently on the roster.  Is Robinson looking like a better WR than Monroe was a LT?  Is Telvin Smith at LB looking like a better player than Monroe.  I say yes to both, and both look like they will be long term key contributors to this team.  I don't see how you can dismiss the proceeds from the Monroe trade when they resulted in two quality players.

 

Nobody was offering much of anything in trade for the top 2013 picks.  There was no QB, and it was widely considered to be a weak at the top draft class.  Heck, even Oakland only got a 2nd round pick trading down from 3 to 11 or 12 that year.

 

As to your closing statement, no that is not my position.

 

My position is that the players released/traded/jettisoned were not catalysts or difference makers on their sides of the ball, were older (in the case of Smith) and largely having them around would not be conducive to rebuiding.

 

None of those guys being on the roster stopped the team from being 2-14.

 

They were NOT indispensable.

 

EVEN IF (note emphasis) you could argue keeping Smith, Monroe or anyone else around could have resulted in another win or two in 2013, in my estimation, the extra win or two would not have been worth it.  We saw the price for meaningless wins at the end of the 2011 season, giving up Andrew Luck to the Colts. 

 

I pose the same question to you I posed earlier:  Is having ANY one or group of those guys from that 2-14 team worth not having Blake Bortles on the roster right now?

 

Which one of those players, straight up, would you trade for Bortles right now and why?

 

Monroe was a very good left tackle in 2012. He was not very good for the first few games in 2013 playing in an unfamiliar scheme that didn't fit him. If your point is that Caldwell made a good deal for Monroe after Gus ruined his trade value then I still disagree. His trade value hadn't been ruined to that degree. It was a poor trade value-wise. Caldwell didn't try to trade Monroe, he just accepted a sub-par deal from the first team that called.


 

Why do you keep bringing up Robinson and Telvin as if they were the other end of the trade?
 Caldwell got draft picks. Two low draft picks. The picks were used for Colvin and Chris Smith, not Robinson and Telvin. I'd rate Chris Smith as a warm body, and Colvin as the CB equivalent to Monroe, so Caldwell basically broke even. And either or both could have been drafted before Caldwell got the chance, there was no guarantee at the time of the trade that those players would drop to the middle of the 4th round.

 

An additional second to drop down to the 11th pick (what Miami offered for the very next pick) while keeping Monroe would have been a better deal. The Jags keep the LT equal to Joeckel and basically add a 2013 1st and 2nd.


And since you are arguing, based on the picks he got for Monroe, that Caldwell had foresight to know that the 2014 draft was going to be great, then he could have traded the pick used for Joeckel to (say) Baltimore for their 1st, 4th, and 5th round picks in 2014 (I'm sure he could have gotten a lot more, but for arguments sake ...). That would have resulted in the Jags having Monroe and C.J. Mosley instead of Joeckel, as well as whatever two players you want to claim we got for Monroe.

Finally, how do you know couldn't we have drafted Bortles in 2014 even at a lower slot? I hadn't heard of any other teams at the top of the draft wanting Bortles.


 

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