Anquan Boldin wants out of Arizona to a place "where I can win a championship and the Cardinals are listening to offers (must feel confident with Larry Fitzgerald and Steve Breaston) for the top 7 or so receiver in the league. Where will he wind up? Hopefully with the hometown Patriots. Here's why:
The cost: Boldin will most likely take a first round pick and a later round pick (3rd) or a later round pick (4th or 5th) and another later round pick (3rd or 4th) the following draft. The Patriots have a 1st round pick in a slot where there isn't talent to select in this season's draft and are stocked in later rounds (3 in 2nd, 2 in 3rd, 1 in 4th and 2 in the 5th) this year. A player like Boldin is worth the trade of picks, while still being left without quality slots to replenish your talent pool at LB and in the secondary. To boot, Boldin still has 2 years at $6M per on his contract, while looking for a 4 year $40M extension. At only 28, you would be locking him up in the prime of his career.
The potential: Tom Brady is back under center with a quality line with a few pro bowl talents (Mankins, Light & Koppen) and imagine him lined up across from Randy Moss with Wes Welker in the slot. You could line up the frail duo of Fred Taylor and Laurence Maroney behind that and never run the ball with an absurdly effective passing game. You save your backs for the grind when the weather gets sloppy later and the season and for of course, the potential for a return to the playoffs (Editor's Note: Aggressive pessimism). Try and devise a defense that can plan to stop Welker, Moss and Boldin with dump plays to Kevin Faulk. You can't.
The toughness: Boldin is the proverbial "football player" that the talking tv & radio heads keep talking about. The hit he took against the Jets, fracturing his "paranasal sinuses",sounds violent enough, to miss only 2 games was impressive. He's a big physical receiver to go across from a big finesse receiver that you can go to for crucial first downs and red zone plays.
Downside: Financially, you start tying yourself up with big names but few roster spots filled and with the unkown economic situation for the NFL looming, a firm or decreasing salary cap would not be conducive to tying $45M or more in 5 players (seymour, brady, moss the biggest offenders). You give up several quality draft picks for one player, taking away the chance to draft a couple of the high risk high reward caliber players, weakening your draft.
All in all, I think the experiment would work out well and would certainly be entertaining to watch while the Patriots offense was on the field. Would you ever want to miss one of their drives?
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