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Bill Belichick
Anything special about swapping packages for Deshaun Watson from Houston, Texas?
The answer to that question is clearly no.
I’ve heard about some pretty wild trade packages since rumors about Watson’s accident with the Texans started circulating, but Eric Rube of the Providence Journal may have found the craziest hypothetical concept of all.
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Patriots should trade who?
According to Ryoub, not only should the patriots go after Watson, but he proposes that New England Texans offer Bill Belichick as part of the deal. This is what Rube wrote:
Do the patriots have to do that? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The answer is yes. In fact, one could say that all NFL teams, with the exception of Kansas City, Buffalo and Baltimore, should do everything they can to acquire Watson, who turns 26 at the start of next season. How’s this case going for a starting QB who’s not even in the prime of life? It would start with the capital project. Like an absurd crowd. We are talking about many first and second round options for the coming years, the kind where Houston could get Vontae Mack and Ray Jennings and have more than enough to rebuild the franchise in the coming years. It’s a problem for New England because a) they don’t have that kind of capital and b) Belichick likes design capital more than lacrosse or left-handed players. It seems unlikely that he would settle for just one player, even if that player is DeShawn Watson. What if Bob Kraft solved this problem by trading Belichick?
Rube wasn’t kidding. He was very serious. He presented his reasoning, which includes an alternative reality in which Robert Kraft has had enough of Belichick and is still stripped of Tom Brady’s departure. Rube continues:
Does that sound crazy to you? Well, let’s assume all the conspiracy theorists on the radio are right this time – Kraft is tired of being the biggest coach in the NFL since Brady collapsed, and he wants to restart the organization. Although it sounds blasphemous, it makes a bit of sense. Kraft traded for a head coach, why don’t we trade one for the other? As reported in the internal disputes between Brady and Belichick, many have tried to guess what the Patriots could theoretically get if they kept the QB and traded the HC. That was a few years ago. The market value that Belichick now has will only decrease with age. He’ll be 69 next season, so what’s left for him? Five or six more seasons on the sidelines?
From there, Rube suggests that the patriots should do even more if they want the Texans to take the bait on this deal. There’s a lot to unpack here, but first let’s take a look at the concept of a real head coach.
Is this even possible?
Yeah, that’s it.
Actually, the Patriots traded with the New York Jets to get Belichick. Sweatshirt was hired by the Jets to succeed his mentor, Bill Parcells. However, the team had a new group of owners and Belichick didn’t want to work with them. He wrote his resignation on a napkin and resigned the day after he took office. As he was technically under contract with the Jets after he agreed to coach, Belichick couldn’t just leave and coach elsewhere.
Kraft and the Patriots wanted it, so at the end of the month, Kraft made a deal with the Jets who sent Belichick, a fifth- and seventh-lap pick, to New York in exchange for first-, fourth- and seventh-lap pick.
Although this happened in January 2000, the chances of it happening again in 2021 are very small.
Why it doesn’t make sense
A number of factors make this concept unrealistic.
There’s no reason to think that Kraft Belichick will turn his back on Belichick now. He had a chance to look down on Brady from afar, but he didn’t. It’s hard to believe that he would do something as radical as replace the greatest coach in the history of football, or even surround himself with someone as talented as Watson, no matter what.
Secondly, there is no guarantee that Belichick will accept the exchange. He could have just walked away, which would have been a real possibility if Kraft had tried to trade him. Third, the new general manager of the Texans, Nick Caserio, has just come out of Belichick’s shadow, why bring him to the Texans?
Imagine how embarrassing it would be for Caserio to be Belichick’s last boss in another organization now.
This one is interesting, but very unlikely. It is more likely that the Patriots were a real trading pack with multiple choices in the first round than in the first round of trading their legendary coach.
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