Former team exec predicts Watson will end up with Eagles

[time2rock]

Former team exec predicts Watson will end up with Eagles

 

The speculation regarding where Houston Texans quarterback Deshaun Watson will continue his career has been going on for more than a year. Watson requested a trade from team management in January of 2021. 

The colossal impediment to Watson getting what he wants is the allegations of sexual assault levied against Watson in the months that followed his trade request; a total of 22 lawsuits have been filed.

Tuesday, former Eagles team president Joe Banner penned an article for The 33rd Man, a football analysis and opinion site co-founded by Banner, which produces content from former NFL coaches and executives. The article mysteriously vanished for a while but is back.

Banner laid out the complications surrounding Watson, both obvious and not so obvious – the $37 million of guaranteed salary/bonus Watson would get in 2023 becomes guaranteed two weeks from today. Again, tying that much money to a player who could serve a lengthy league-mandated suspension, or a possible prison sentence, is a dice roll most teams aren’t willing to take.

Banner runs down the teams that are most in need of a QB, and ranks the Eagles as the team he believes is the most likely landing spot for Watson:

"The Eagles are clearly a team that recognizes if you’re going to win big, you need to have a great quarterback… There are teams that will do whatever it takes to get a great QB, and there are others that will not acquiesce if the QB costs too much. The Eagles fall into the former category. They will be aggressive. They have the capital to do it and an owner who’s shown over time the willingness to spend the money if it matters enough. 

"The Eagles’ effusiveness and the degree of their enthusiasm about Hurts at the Combine could be an indicator that the team is trying to maximize the trade value of the player. I do not believe the Eagles would trade Hurts under other circumstances, unless it was for a high-quality QB. With Watson, they’d be getting a top 5 to top 7 QB for $34M APY. If he were up for an extension right now, he’d get at least $45-47M. I can’t think of an example of a player of this caliber being traded."

Banner’s rationale makes a lot of assumptions. First, that they’re actively looking for a replacement for Hurts and playing coy with their true intentions, despite their outward confidence in Hurts. Second, that they’ll mortgage at least two first-round picks (likely more, IMO) and virtually all of their financial wiggle-room to acquire a player whose future is Schuylkill River-level cloudy.

What makes this even odder is Banner plainly saying that if he were running an NFL team, he wouldn’t trade for Watson until the cases against him are resolved. But maybe he knows some things we don’t about Howie Roseman, and whatever due diligence he’s doing about Watson’s situation.

Whatever he may or may not know, you have to believe that any team in pursuit of Watson will wait until he is clear of any legal hot water and ready to play football.

https://www.nbcsports.com/philadelphia/eagles/nfl-rumors-former-team-exec-joe-banner-deshaun-watson

[Miami]

Gotta kick the tires here.  He and DHop were the dynamic duo for a while.

[time2rock]

3 hours ago, Miami said:

Gotta kick the tires here.  He and DHop were the dynamic duo for a while.

So what you're really saying is ... DHop to Philly!!!