Bill Barnwell, "The Evolution of the NFC West."

[Smelly McUgly]

This is a GREAT timeline!

One of my favorite parts, being a Seahawks fan:

October 12, 2011: Aaron Curry, 2009's fourth overall pick, is traded from Seattle to Oakland for a 2012 seventh-round pick and a conditional pick in the 2013 draft. The first pick in question is used on North Carolina State defensive end J.R. Sweezy, who converts to guard after being drafted by the Seahawks. Sweezy eventually becomes Seattle's starter at right guard. The second pick is used on cornerback Tharold Simon in the fifth round.

We turned Aaron Curry's sorry butt into Sweezy and Simon? That is fantastic.

 

[Popeyejones]

Or in other words, you traded the fourth overall pick in the draft into J.R. Sweezy and Tharold Simon.


(and yeah, totally just being a smart@ss, but seriously, the Hawks have been the Dungeon Masters of the draft for the past few years, and of all the examples of their wizardry, I don't think anything having anything to do with Curry is one of them).

 

[Marvin49]

Or in other words, you traded the fourth overall pick in the draft into J.R. Sweezy and Tharold Simon.


(and yeah, totally just being a smart@ss, but seriously, the Hawks have been the Dungeon Masters of the draft for the past few years, and of all the examples of their wizardry, I don't think anything having anything to do with Curry is one of them).

Well...

....I said this about AJ Jenkins and I think the same applies to Curry.

A good GM recognizes when it's not working and cuts the best deal he can WHEN he can. He doesn't sit there with the bad pick in the hopes the guy will eventually justify the pick.

Now Jenkins has turned out to be a far worse pick than Curry...I'm just sayin you have to give the Seahwks credit for recognizing the error and attempting to fix it.

 

[Smelly McUgly]

Or in other words, you traded the fourth overall pick in the draft into J.R. Sweezy and Tharold Simon.


(and yeah, totally just being a smart@ss, but seriously, the Hawks have been the Dungeon Masters of the draft for the past few years, and of all the examples of their wizardry, I don't think anything having anything to do with Curry is one of them).

Yeah, but turning what was a super-bust into Sweezy and Simon is fantastic, especially if Simon turns out to be Browner-lite. I know you knew that, though.

Is Curry's draft status/contract an example of a "sunk cost" that should not be considered when valuing him going forward, or do I misunderstand how "sunk cost" is defined?

 

[Popeyejones]

Is Curry's draft status/contract an example of a "sunk cost" that should not be considered when valuing him going forward, or do I misunderstand how "sunk cost" is defined?

Yeah, that's the correct usage of sunk cost (i.e. you can't get the pick back so you shouldn't use the value of what the pick was at a prior date in deciding what to do with Curry at a later date).

That said (sorry, just nerding out, so stop here if you want ), the "sunk cost" rule doesn't apply perfectly to the NFL because as is lurking in all neo-classical economic principles, it's assuming clear preferences and perfect information. As we all know being NFL fans, frequently our teams don't have clear preferences (the way most teams create draft boards) precisely because they DON'T have perfect information. The "sunk cost" argument about Curry gets muddied because the Hawks literally didn't know what would happen with him once they traded him, and also had 1) no idea who would ultimately be available in exchange for him and 2) how valuable those players would end up being after their availability was even known.

Curry busted hard so it worked out well for the Hawks, but this is why we see teams regularly committing what economists would claim are sunk cost fallacies (e.g. keeping or starting a high pick even though he has shown to be an inferior player), but they really aren't, because the sunk cost model brackets out informational uncertainty in a situation in which its existence is inarguably obvious. [/nerd rant]

 

[kearly]

Curry was a mistake pick by the previous regime that PC/JS inherited. So it's a little disingenuous to say they paid a #4 overall for Sweezy/Simon.

 

[Popeyejones]

Curry was a mistake pick by the previous regime that PC/JS inherited. So it's a little disingenuous to say they paid a #4 overall for Sweezy/Simon.

The article is about the teams, not the regimes. Curry of course didn't come out of thin air. It's like arguing that the 9ers are masterminds for getting a sixth round pick for All-Suck Squad representative Kentwan Balmer without pointing out that they spent a first rounder on him, regardless of if it was Harbaugh who made that mistake or not.

In any case though, my basic point was that for all the Seahawks' draft wizardry, transactions involving Aaron Curry are some of the last things to come to mind for me.

 

[chris98251]

Curry was a mistake pick by the previous regime that PC/JS inherited. So it's a little disingenuous to say they paid a #4 overall for Sweezy/Simon.

Mistake or not, if you buy a buy a Mercedes on line because of the picture you see, not noticeing the orange Yugo in the background, ad saying real good body and top condition and what arrives at your house is a Yugo but the price was for a Mercedes you are still out the money regardless. Ad didn't lie you just focused on the Mercedes and paid the price, Yugo was there the whole time, you just chose to ignore it and got scammed by paying Mercedes money for it.

 

[kearly]

PC/JS didn't draft Curry though. They didn't buy anything. They just sold.

I think the Curry trade was definitely a good move. Dumping his salary alone made it a good deal. Even if Curry had turned his career around later I would still say that- he burned bridges here and he wouldn't have turned things around in Seattle.

But that said, I do agree that it is silly to judge a trade by the player they got back in the draft. There is a ton of luck involved there. I judge the trade simply by the fact that it added more raffle tickets. Part of the reason Seattle has drafted so well is because they have averaged almost 10 picks per draft.

Since it was brought up, Kentwan Balmer was a good trade for SF. If a guy doesn't have value to you anymore, getting maybe something beats the hell out of nothing.

 

[Smelly McUgly]

I agree that the draft is such a crapshoot that judging by player comparison is not a good method of judging a FO, but getting two draft picks for a bust that should have been outright cut is one of the little moves we don't think about. If the org then picks a guy and develops him into a quality RG with one of those picks, it generally indicates the high level at which FO and coaching staff ate working at together, and thus is a key step on the timeline to seeing how a couple of these NFC West teams turned things around so quickly.

 

[chris98251]

Your judgeing by regime I'm judgeing by franchise is the difference Kearly. John and Pete off loaded that Yugo to a collector for a few new models of experimental designs.

 

[kearly]

Popeye basically said that the Curry trade wasn't good because the previous regime made a mistake drafting him, basically said that we traded a #4 overall pick for Sweezy and Simon. By the same logic, you could argue that it wasn't a great trade when Seattle offloaded former #2 overall pick Rick Mirer by a mid-1st rounder a few years later.

Granted, the disaster of the decision by Tim Ruskell to draft Curry was not made up for with the Curry trade, just like how getting back that mid-1st didn't cancel out the price of paying a #2 in Mirer's case. But it doesn't change the fact that both were fantastic trades for the Seahawks.

 

[Popeyejones]

Popeye basically said that the Curry trade wasn't good because the previous regime made a mistake drafting him, basically said that we traded a #4 overall pick for Sweezy and Simon. By the same logic, you could argue that it wasn't a great trade when Seattle offloaded former #2 overall pick Rick Mirer by a mid-1st rounder a few years later.

Granted, the disaster of the decision by Tim Ruskell to draft Curry was not made up for with the Curry trade, just like how getting back that mid-1st didn't cancel out the price of paying a #2 in Mirer's case. But it doesn't change the fact that both were fantastic trades for the Seahawks.

Just for clarification I unequivocally didn't say that trading curry wasn't a good trade. It was obviously a good trade, as it turned a gigantic draft mistake into simply a very big draft mistake.

My point was simply that Curry didn't appear out of thin air, and these things need to be treated holistically when talking about the trajectories of teams (as the article does).

The Hawks ddidn't get what they got for Curry based on his play, they got what they got BECAUSE he was a top five pick who had busted but someone else was willing to kick the tires on. If they got Curry in the fifth there's no way they would have gotten a fifth and sixth back for him in trade after he sucked for a few seasons. Even after sucking the value they got in return for him was still dependent on the big draft mistake, was my point. They turned a big pile of sh!t into at least something, but for all the Hawks truly remarkable draft successes (which there are no shortages of) , I don't think this one is a great example. That's it.

 

[RedAlice]

That was a fun read. Thanks for posting it. The charts w the top draft picks for all 4 are great.

Oh, the fun of looking backwards with perspective....

 

[Popeyejones]

Oh, the fun of looking backwards with perspective....

... Although that can unfortunately also be a harsh mistress.

There are some teams or there that will end up being not nearly as good as we currently think they are.

Here's to hoping it's neither of ours.