John Elway don’t do sunk costs
By 
Interesting decision on both sides:
The trade:
Saints receive:
Denver’s 2023 1st round pick
Denver’s 2024 2nd round pick
Broncos receive:
Sean Payton
Saints’ 2024 3rd round pick
Thoughts on the compensation? https://t.co/1YWkA632Lr— Romi Bean (@Romi_Bean) January 31, 2023
From the Broncos perspective, I can see if not fully embrace the logic:
- Russell Wilson might be washed up. But he was a fine NFL QB just one year ago — indeed, if you take out the two games when he prematurely returned from a thumb injury, it was the best he had played in several years — and he also looked noticeably better after the incredibly overmatched by all accounts Hackett was fired. He still has a good arm. It’s possible he can at least be a good QB again, and a good QB would win a lot of games with the defense the 2022 Broncos had.
- You hate to give up the first rounder, but a quality head coach is the hardest thing to find. The Broncos can’t afford another failed experiment.
- Obviously, even assuming Wilson can come back to some degree the trade is a disaster. But it happened, so you might was well try to make it work, especially since ownership isn’t going to eat the contract or cap hit.
Not crazy, given that the Broncos don’t really have a “good” option per se right now. Although there is one obvious issue:
The ideal offense for Russell Wilson at this point in his career is markedly different from what Payton’s known for. I’m fascinated to see what he does from a scheme standpoint. https://t.co/5FVY6ZVaSH— Mina Kimes (@minakimes) January 31, 2023
Even at his best, what stopped Wilson from being an ultra-elite QB was his lack of a short and intermediate middle-of-the-field passing game, which produced too many 3-and-outs (especially if the running game wasn’t effective.) Drew Brees became a genuinely ultra-elite QB under Payton living on those throws, even after his arm went. A good offensive coach like Payton should be able to adapt, but one concern I would have is that Russ seems to like the idea of becoming a point guard kind of QB, even though he doesn’t really have the skill set for it. And having squandered even more draft capital keeping up the surrounding roster is going to be hard.
So I dunno if this will work, but at least this makes the league more interesting.