2. Browns trade first pick to the Saints for 11th pick, 32nd pick, second-round pick and 2018 first-round pick
Cleveland has been attempting to acquire as many picks as possible in order to build its roster from the bottom up. It’s a strategy we have seen other teams utilize in the past. And it’s worked out for the most part.
By sending three valuable picks to New England for Garoppolo, look for Cleveland (in this hypothetical scenario) to recoup some of its lost picks.
This is where a trade with the Saints comes into play here. Drew Brees has indicated he wants to play for a while. That’s fine and dandy, but New Orleans needs to look to the future. It should do so sooner rather than later so Brees himself can help an unnamed young quarterback learn the nuances of the NFL.
It would be rather similar to what we saw between Brett Favre and Aaron Rodgers in Green Bay a decade ago. Bite the bullet earlier so you can create a seamless transition at quarterback. That surely worked out well for the Packers, didn’t it?
In this hypothetical trade scenario, New Orleans moves up to the top spot in order to select a quarterback in Mitchell Trubisky that fits perfectly with what Sean Payton does on offense. It then uses the first-round pick the team acquired in the Cooks deal as leverage to move up to the top spot in the draft.
As it relates to the Browns, they would then be flush with two first-round picks in both 2017 and 2018. That’s team building in its clearest form. It would also enable the team to target two immediate starters in this year’s draft. Why the heck not?