Post#246 » by TSE » Thu Apr 29, 2010 3:58 pm
Not at all, it's all about the efficiencies of using up team resources to improve the team. We used a #1 overall pick on Stafford. So say if I like Claussen almost as much as Stafford, or what if I like him more, then why use a #1 pick and a contract like that when you can use less draft value and money value and get a key prospect for a better value? So instead we should have used that pick towards SOMETHING ELSE, and then taken a QB prospect when the price was right. My strategy for QBs is the same for all positions, and that is to figure out how I can fill ALL my positions with the BEST players possible with the BEST positional prioritization possible, and for our particular situation this year or last year, the best play was to stay out of Stafford, use that pick on another position, and take good odds at getting an early beat on a cheap franchise QB. It's all about hedging to find the right proportion of hard dollar investments against gambles and fliers, and Stafford just happens to get disqualified out of the solution set due to a logical handcuff. He is too expensive that he would have to have such a high percentage of panning out to compensate for the value of taking a lesser prospect like Claussen that you can tolerate a smaller conversion percentage and still be better off.
Let me make up an example, every team wants a star QB. So say you have a choice between a guy named Stufford that needs 40M for a 40% chance of panning out. Or you can have a guy named Clussen that only needs 1M, but he has only a 30% chance of panning out. Keep in mind, we aren't just talking dollars here, the 30 and the 1 represent dollars and draft pick material required to be spent as well. Now you might say well QB is the most important position, so I'll pay for that extra 10%, cause I want to do everything I can to get a great QB. Well that's fine and dandy if you have equivalent cost choices, but the 40% over the 30% is never going to make up for the 40M or the 1M. And you can make up any numbers you want, as long as you are logical here and you make this comparison, you should be able to see why this is a misfit. Then when you do this analysis across ALL other positions, you will find that there are built-in choices that you have to take because they have too high of a yield. If we get that 30% QB now, sure we lose 10% that we won't have a stellar #1 most important position, but that 39M of money and draft material savings might get us 5% more on an OT, plus 5% more on OG, and 5% more on WRs 1 and 2, and another 20 or so points to the defensive starters. Whoa you say, where are all these points coming up from and what does it all mean?
Well obviously this is all theoretical, all I'm trying to do is show you the blueprint of logic that shows when you analyze the full solution set of what a franchise needs to do to become elite, you need to factor in ALL aspects from drafting to trading to FAs to waiver wires to etc etc. And if you pigeon hole yourself into saying ok, I'm going to make a great strategy for our franchise now, but first thing's first I like Stafford, so let's start there, then right away you are already moving too fast. You can't just say Stafford looks good so let's get him, you have to look at all possibilities of what would happen in the event that you don't take Stafford, play it out for the next 5-10 years and see how many wins you project for your team. Well I liked Stafford quite fine as a prospect last year, and taking him number 1 overall last year I see our team winning "x" games over the next 10 years, and by doing anything other than drafting Stafford, I see slanted percentage probabilities in favor of winning more than "x" games, and weak percentages to fall short of "x" games, and I see a much more secure likelihood of establishing a perpetual elite dynasty, which to me is the ONLY goal in the NFL that all teams should shoot for, because that is the highest goal possible. My breakdown of the NFL game shows me that a team with a first mover advantage that sets up a perpetual dynasty can go on theoretically forever or for all intents in purposes a really long period of time even if the system falls apart due to excessive bad luck in a decade or two. But if you could see it my way, you could see how this perpetual dynasty is the holy grail of the NFL, and any team could shoot for it. Nobody talks about it, because nobody knows it exists and no team has ever properly set themselves us to take a run for it.
On the QB question, totally either or, it just depends on how the chips fall. Really it's like this. Imagine I'm the GM and Stafford and I are having a casual chat. I''m basically explaining to him that I think he has great potential, but unfortunately the logic dictates that he is a disqualified prospect for being a foundation piece in a elite perpetual dynasty plan. It's impossible for us to win by overpaying anything more than we have to get to the desired output levels, and unfortunately timing and circumstances just turn Stafford into an unusual animal that cannot fit into the system if we want to maximize the odds of winning the most amount of games in the long-term. It's all objective and subjective to determine, and there's not much worrying about the variances from one GM's opinion to another on the more tangible and objective evaluations that are close to each other, the key to worry about is getting a handle on all the subjective stuff and the outside of the box logical dynamics that are associated with winning in football. When you play these things out whether in a computer simulation or your mind, if you operate with the best logic possible, my contention is that logic and common sense will prove to you that it is impossible to gamble on Stafford and have a higher EXPECTED overall cumulative ending value than under an assortment of MANY other options, some of which have TREMENDOUSLY higher ending values and with greater projected odds of coming to fruition, along with increased odds on maintaining the perpetuity of the dynasty IMO.
And sure an average QB can win. In actuality, one of the builds for our team we could have gone with is to completely dominate the entire roster of all positions minus the QB position. The result is a massive advantage that has never been seen before by any NFL team of all non-QB positions, playing with a super advantage at 21/22 at the expense of the 1 most valuable position is a tradeoff that would result in a dominance greater than potentially the greatest team in NFL history, and with QB being the most valuable position and one you can sometimes plan for to get that Brees FA or that high draft pick, if you can then get lucky and then get that final hit, you can then not only beat the best of history, but then hit a 2nd lap after another plateau for a chance to either contend for being one of the best teams ever OR contend for being the first team to hit the 2nd plateau of this theoretical success group.
