To be clear, my post wasn't directed at you in particular, and I do like this move. I'm optimistic that the near-term upside will outweigh the future drawbacks.
Here's a short version of why I think moves like this are universally bad in the context of NFL long-term roster building.
A. Given a fixed salary cap number, the only way to have above average talent is to pay people less than they are worth on average. You can also play games with your cap by moving charges through time, but that's really to do with discounting the future.
B. Rookie contracts are underpaid due to the rookie wage scale. If a rookie hits then this could be a ridiculous difference, ie. rookie contract Russ. Or for this context, 4th round LB KJ Wright. That creates huge surplus value on your roster.
C. Once a player hits UFA they become overpaid due to the Winner's Curse of free agency. That creates slightly negative value on your roster depending on how much you had to overpay. QBs can be an exception here, since in my view the best ones would be paid even more than they are in a truly open market.
In order to re-sign Ernest Jones we will have to pay him what his expected production warrants. That puts the ceiling on his marginal impact at average production per dollar. In order to do that, we traded a potential rookie away that will be paid much less than their production if they end up being good - and if they end up busting then they don't affect our cap. That strategy can help a team avoid having bad talent, but will not lead to above average talent.
Where I agree with you is that long-term strategy doesn't always work so it can become necessary to pivot with free agents.
