If We Knew Then What We Know Now

by Christopher Gates on Feb 26, 2011 7:01 AM CST in Minnesota Vikings

Yesterday's article about quarterbacks that the Vikings have "missed" on over the years brought a few interesting comments out, but MarkSP18 made an interesting point. There was one, actual, honest-to-goodness "franchise quarterback" that we've missed on over the course of the last few years, when we didn't have a quarterback of our own that we were already developing and that went on to be a pretty good quarterback.

Yeah, we could have had him. . .but it would have required the team to not make one of the more successful trades in recent Vikings history.

The 2007 Minnesota Vikings had a couple of glaring needs. The offense had a dynamic young running back in Adrian Peterson who had just won the Offensive Rookie of the Year Award and set the NFL's single-game rushing record along the way. However, the passing offense was ranked 28th in the National Football League and spent the season rotating through three different quarterbacks (Tarvaris Jackson, Brooks Bollinger, Kelly Holcomb). Defensively, the Vikings' rush defense was the best in the NFL by a considerable margin. . .but, in terms of yards allowed, the Vikings were the worst in the NFL, due largely to the inconsistencies of their pass rush. Yes, the Vikings had 38 sacks that year, good enough to put them in the upper quarter of the league in that category, but they lacked that one dominant pass rush guy that needed to be accounted for on every play.

So, it was widely thought that the Minnesota Vikings had two major needs going into the 2008 season. . .quarterback and defensive end.

Thanks to the "poison pill" spat they had with the Seattle Seahawks, the Vikings had an extra third-round draft choice. They had the 17th overall selection in the first round, as well as the 73rd and 82nd overall selections. There were two quarterbacks that year that carried a first-round grade. . .Boston College's Matt Ryan, who everybody knew was going to be taken in the top five selections (and was ultimately selected third by the Atlanta Falcons), and Delaware's Joe Flacco, whose stock went up and down a bit throughout the pre-draft process, but was ultimately taken at number 18 by the Baltimore Ravens. As mentioned, the VIkings had the 17th overall pick, and would have had the ability to select Flacco.

However, they chose to meet their other need instead.

All-Pro defensive end Jared Allen, coming off of a 15.5 sack season after missing the first two games of the season (and absolutely terrorized the Vikings in the first game he played that year) had made it clear that he had no interest in re-signing with the Kansas City Chiefs. The Chiefs had made him their franchise player, guaranteeing him a salary of around $9 million, but made it known that they were actively looking to trade Allen to the highest bidder. That bidder turned out to be the Minnesota Vikings, as they ponied up the 17th, 73rd, and 82nd picks in the 2008 draft to acquire Allen's services.

Allen has been an outstanding addition to the Minnesota Vikings, averaging about 13.5 sacks per season in the three years he's been in Minnesota and turning the Vikings' defense from a one-dimensional unit into one that has become significantly more balanced over the time he's been here.

Ultimately, the Vikings fulfilled their need for a pass rusher, but did so at the expense of missing out on the one potential "franchise quarterback" that they've really had a chance at over the past few years. Keeping those picks could have allowed the Vikings to get their hands on Joe Flacco, and use those third round selections to supplement their roster in other ways.

So, the question is this. . .knowing what we know now, if you could jump into the Wayback Machine and go back to the days leading up to the 2007 draft, would you still pull the trigger on that trade for Jared Allen, or would you hold on to the picks, take Joe Flacco at number 17, and take your chances down the track on finding a pass rusher?

Poll

Given the knowledge that we have now, if you could go back to the time before the 2008 NFL Draft. . .

I would still pull the trigger on the Jared Allen trade.

596 votes

I would keep picks #17, #73, and #82, draft Joe Flacco, and look for pass rushers later.

309 votes

905 votes | Poll has closed

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Comments

Wow, tough question

But I think I would lean towards quarterback. I haven’t felt the security of a franchise quarterback in awhile (Culpepper), and it would be nice to not have to worry about every year. Every year its been discussed to hell,, and some day i wish for a year with no qb concerns. Now, I almost lean to Freeman too. That guy is awesome.

by Quarem on Feb 26, 2011 8:32 AM CST reply actions

Jared or Joe??

I think we did alright.

by Maintainer Mick on Feb 26, 2011 9:09 AM CST reply actions

Flacco

No question about it.

Mullet Man’s the bomb, but studly pass rushers are a heck of a lot easier to find, and have a much shorter shelf life, than franchise quarterbacks.

The question assumes we know how Flacco turns out, of course, which makes it a lot easier. And having 3 extra draft picks makes this question easy for me.

Love ya, Jared, but the need for a Flacco is a lot more acute.

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by DCPurple on Feb 26, 2011 9:50 AM CST reply actions

agreed

Allen is an animal but franchise QB’s are a much harder find.
The whole fanbase will settle down if/when we have a real QB’s that we can count on.

"If you've got them by the balls their hearts and minds will follow."

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by just another viking on Feb 26, 2011 9:53 AM CST up reply actions

I think it can’t be decided on just Joe Flacco Vs Jared Allen but you have to look at who we could have taken with 73rd and 82nd picks.

In that draft KC took Jaamal Charles and DaJuan Morgan. The Charles pick was a steal and Morgan isn’t with KC anymore. Jermichael Finley and Mario Manningham are the only other two notable players taken in the third round of that draft.

Jamaal Charles, Joe Flacco, and Finley would all have looked great in purple.

by Skoaldybi on Feb 26, 2011 10:00 AM CST reply actions

Well this is true

I posted this in the “Faulty Logic” thread but the whole draft could have went something like this …

The first 4 rounds could have went like this without trading up for Tyrell & Booty ..

17. Joe Flacco QB
47. DeSean Jackson WR
73. Cliff Avril DE
82. Tyvon Branch CB/S
117. Jacob Tamme TE
150. Carl Nicks G (no need to trade up in the 5th round to get Booty if they already took Flacco)
152. Letory Guion DT
187. John Sullivan C
193. Pierre Garcon WR
226. Peyton Hillis FB – this pick was traded to the Jets for Brooks Bollinger!

by MarkSP18 on Feb 26, 2011 12:52 PM CST up reply actions

Now let me start out by saying this

Mark SP18 is a far superior mind in terms of scouting prospects and such but I completely disagree with you on this subject.
Regarding Desean Jackson: Desean was considered undersize and nothing more than a speed demon to stretch the field going into the draft. He was also projected to go to the Cowboys in the first round because they had made it publically clear that they wanted someone oppisite T.O. It was amazing that he fell as far as he ended up going. So we could not have anticipated him free falling.

And its easy to pull out the best players taken after our pick and say they could have been on our team because hindsight is 20/20, but ask yourself this. Would Pierre Garcon been as good as he’s become without Peyton Manning? Do you honestly think Joe Flacco would have that type of influence on him? Peyton Manning has continously made late round receivers very good ones.

And as for Peyton Hillis, please let me remind you that he was with the Broncos buried on the depth chart and did well when given the oppurtunity but did not explode until he was given the keys full time. Now if he was on the Vikings, he would have never gotten that full time job as I eluded to above.
Sure its an alternate draft we could have had but I’m just pointing out why it didn’t make sense then.

What you just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. At no point in your entire rambling incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.

by Percy Harvin My Fav! on Feb 26, 2011 1:08 PM CST up reply actions

I have to agree somewhat.

Again, with all due respect to Mark- he really is the master here of draft picks and salary cap stuff. That said, it is really easy to be looking back with the 20/20 hindsight and say what we could have done w/o trading for Jared Allen. Would we have even selected Flacco??? Would the FO have analyzed him in the same manner that the Ravens FO analyzed him? What about Jackson?

Personally, I don’t like looking back on things too terribly much because there’s a ton of what-ifs, and we’ll always view everything through our perfect hindsight. What we could have done, what we should have done… every single team out there will have those kind of thoughts, even teams like the Packers. For all we know, had we not traded for Allen, we would have completely wasted those picks on complete busts and be even worse off than we are today.

For me, the Allen trade was a success. He proved his worth and mettle, he’s been a role model locker room guy and a high performer on the field. As Mr. Gates pointed out, DE was a real need for us, and he took care of that need, and for more than just one year. It’s easy to say that yes, QB is more important than DE, but personally I would place this kind of discussion in the exact same class of “the Vikings could have drafted Aaron Rodgers”. Yes, we could have. Yes, we should have. But we had that Culpepper fellow who was our franchise QB and was producing quite well at the time. Well, his knee was destroyed and we were screwed- but you can’t look back now and bother with that. Same way with this. We had a need at DE and solved it in what, IMO, was the absolute best way possible. Yes, we lost out on Flacco and were subsequently screwed (except for ‘09) at QB- but again, we can’t look back and bother with that.

Nothing's tougher than being a diehard Vikings fan.

by KJSegall on Feb 26, 2011 2:50 PM CST up reply actions

It is true that Baltimore traded down and then back up

But it is also true that the Vikings had two 3rd round picks which they also could have used to trade up to get Flacco. As far as the analysis part on Flacco, I would hope that they had him rated pretty high considering most other scouts did too.

TJack is the reason the Vikings did not think they needed a QB. That was the whole reason I brought it up in the other thread. It was a total “what if” scenario. As in what if Chilly would have realized that he made a mistake with TJack? Unfortunately he did not and it took several years to figure it out and here we are now looking at all these prospects that may or may not be any better than Flacco.

by MarkSP18 on Feb 26, 2011 4:30 PM CST up reply actions

Don't get me wrong

it’s a valid point and makes for a great discussion. One would think that the Vikings would have thought well enough of Flacco to swing the trade for him and him alone. You’re entirely right, I think, in why we didn’t- Childress was too stubborn to admit that TJack wasn’t the ‘diamond in the rough’ he was looking for. I never really got that, BTW- lots, and I mean LOTS, of good coaches have dealt with draft mistakes and busts. It really wouldn’t have reflected THAT bad upon him to just say ‘OK, that didn’t work out, let’s try again’.

Nothing's tougher than being a diehard Vikings fan.

by KJSegall on Feb 26, 2011 5:43 PM CST up reply actions

To be fair

Tjax was a scapegoat. Chilli and Bevell were already talking to Favre. We know this, no matter what BS they try to say. Do you recall when the Vikings went under investigations for roster tampering, when Favre was still a Packer.
You can’t draft a QB in the 1st round and then try to persuade the FO to go after Favre for all that money.

by midnightwonder on Feb 27, 2011 8:24 PM CST up reply actions

Well..

I still don’t buy into Joe Flacco being a “surefire franchise quarterback” yet. He reminds me of Jay Cutler with slightly better decision making.

Let’s not forget how padded his stats get through the “air” when he checks down a third of his passing yards to Ray Rice.

by Amir Ghasemi on Feb 26, 2011 12:54 PM CST reply actions

No, I would have taken Jared Allen.

First of all, Baltimore originally had the 8th pick. Everyone knew they needed a quaterback so the consensus was that they would take Matt Ryan if he was there, or trade back to take Joe Flacco. Matt Ryan was not there so they traded back to 26 to gain some extra picks knowing they could then trade up to nab Flacco when they needed to.

Had the VIkings kept their 17th pick, the Ravens would have most likely not traded all the way down to 26 and maybe not make that trade at all knowing the Vikings were just one more team targeting a quarterback. Or they would have traded back to 15 to gain picks and still be in place to take Flacco.

As for the comment about taking Charles, why in the world would a team looking to get to the playoffs spend a third rounder on an undersized runningback that can run really fast when you just spent a first rounder on the rookie of the year? Who would have if not had been injured ran for over 1500 yards and led the league in rushing. Wasn’t Michael Bennet an undersized fast back?

For Jermichael Finley, we had just signed Shank to a lucrative contract the year before, once again I doubt a team with playoff asperations would spend a third rounder on a tight end.

So in conclusion, yea now it may have been something we could have thought about, had we not traded those picks Joe Flacco might have not even been there, and we would have been left without one of the best Defensive Ends or a FQB.

by Percy Harvin My Fav! on Feb 26, 2011 1:22 PM CST reply actions

Well our team drafting philosophy has been take the best player available. With that being said it’s possible that if we had those picks we would have taken the best players available. Not sure who scouts had rated high at those picks but it could have been Charles or Finley.

Not sure if you also remember this or not but circa 2006 Vikings pluck Baltimore Raven’s running back Chester Taylor and sign him up to a big contract. He responded by having a 1,216 yard season. The next year we took a running back with our first overall pick. BEST PLAYER AVAILABLE. Just because we had Shaincoe and Peterson doesn’t mean we wouldn’t have taken Finley or Charles had we not traded away our picks.

Also find it hilarious that you put Jamaal Charles and Michael Bennett in the same category. Charles is going to be ten times better and he’s really not that small if you look up height’s and weights for players I’m sure you’ll find he’s really not all that “undersized”.

by Skoaldybi on Feb 27, 2011 10:12 AM CST up reply actions

What's hilarious is the analogy that

Chester Taylor : Adrian Peterson as Adrian Peterson : Jamal Charles.
With Chester, we knew we could squeeze out 1000 yards out of him but with Adrian, the sky was the limit. There is no way in hell you would take Jamal Charles with a guy ahead of him that will compete for the MVP every year. That would be an injustice to Jamal because he wouldn’t get the touches that he deserves with an MVP candidate ahead of him. That’d be like having Tom Brady and Matt Ryan on the same team.

And Jamal Charles is 5’11 195 pounds. Thats not the prototypical size I guess is what I was getting at. A better person that fits the bill of undersized is Frank Gore at 5’9

And why is it hilarious to compare Jamal to Bennet? Bennet stands 5’9 205 pounds. He was drafted in the first round and had a good college career at Wisconsin. For what he was worth at the time we thought he’d be able to be a serviceable back in the NFL, just like the Chiefs did with Charles. No obviously Charles isn’t just a “serviceable” back now but at the time of the draft they were not expecting him to average 6.2 yards a carry.

by Percy Harvin My Fav! on Feb 27, 2011 1:36 PM CST up reply actions

No, I’m not saying that Adrian Peterson and Jamaal Charles are the same player. I was using it to disprove your logic on saying that we wouldn’t take Finley or Charles because we already had Shaincoe and Peterson.

“As for the comment about taking Charles, why in the world would a team looking to get to the playoffs spend a third rounder on an undersized runningback that can run really fast when you just spent a first rounder on the rookie of the year? " Also this logic really only works if we would have taken a running back in the first round two years in a row. AKA Lions Syndrome.

by Skoaldybi on Feb 27, 2011 6:36 PM CST up reply actions

I'm telling you the reason we didn't take Jamal

is because we already had Peterson. Thats my point.

Finley is a different story but I would have to think it’s because we had Shank and the FO had faith in Jeff Dugan developing

by Percy Harvin My Fav! on Feb 27, 2011 9:22 PM CST up reply actions

No, We didn’t take Jamaal Charles because we have Jared Allen.

by Skoaldybi on Feb 27, 2011 9:35 PM CST up reply actions

Well I'm under

the assumption that we have those picks there.

by Percy Harvin My Fav! on Feb 27, 2011 10:01 PM CST up reply actions

Let me phrase it better

Im assuming the fact that we never traded Allen

by Percy Harvin My Fav! on Feb 27, 2011 10:02 PM CST up reply actions

I knew what you meant, I was just being a dick. This argument is pointless anyway. I voted in favor of the Jared Allen trade although some of my comments might have made it seem otherwise. Jared Allen is a beast and every Vikings fan knows it was worth it to go out and get him. I remember too many years where we just let the opposing quarterbacks sit back in the pocket and pass all over us.With Jared that doesn’t happen as much.

What I’m really hoping for is that we let the door hit Ray Edward’s ass on the way out of Minnesota, unless for some reason he wants to sign for a reasonable amount of money. I just don’t see that happening though. In that case we can just hope that Robert Quinn from North Carolina drops to us. He has character issues but has huge upside and is super talented. He would be great across the line from Allen. We should also resign Brian Robison. He’s a good situational player and if need be could start for a few games.

by Skoaldybi on Feb 28, 2011 12:15 PM CST up reply actions

Here's a few qualifiers to this argument.

I won’t rehash my reply to Mark/ Percy above, but something else to point out. We’re looking at Flacco’s success with the Ravens right now and going ‘darn, we coulda had that!’. What, exactly, is our garauntee that Flacco would have had the same success with us? It’s the same argument as saying ‘darn, we could had that Tom Brady fellow!’ On another post, I’ve been discussing how his success is very much tied in with the Patriots organization and BB. I sincerely doubt Brady would have done for us what he’s done for them.

Flacco’s not quite a P. Manning in that he’s the perfect QB who can do anything with anyone and lead any team to success. He’s had success with the Ravens organization but there’s no garauntee he would have had success with the Vikings organization.

Jared Allen, on the other hand, has had great success with us. Even point out last season where he started with a production drop- he identified and solved the problem.

I wouldn’t go back and undo a succesful trade, ever. Even a bad trade is iffy because you still just never know what could have been. But a succesful one also runs the risk of, well, undoing that success.

Nothing's tougher than being a diehard Vikings fan.

by KJSegall on Feb 26, 2011 3:04 PM CST reply actions

This was my thought too.

Could the coaching staff and offensive schemes that the Vikings used [remember the KAO] made Joe Flacco as successful or even more successful as he has been in Baltimore or would we have become another #2 or #3 guy that shows moments of promise interspersed with moments of purely stupid football decisions that leave you scratching your head?

Jared Allen has not only been a success on the field but fired up the fan base as well. (There is also his support of the troops that I like.)

It may take a village to raise a child, but it takes a Viking to raze a village.

by Luft Krigare on Feb 26, 2011 3:43 PM CST up reply actions

I liked Jared Allen.

He’s not only a generally all around good guy, I swear he’s literally a Viking reincarnated.

Nothing's tougher than being a diehard Vikings fan.

by KJSegall on Feb 26, 2011 5:44 PM CST up reply actions

I voted for Allen, mostly because Flacco isn’t all that great. He’s decent, but he’s not a top 10 quarterback or anything like that.

by Birdman84 on Feb 27, 2011 12:17 AM CST reply actions

That's what I'm thinking too.

Combine that with the fact that we’ve had some pretty bad mojo with drafting pass rushers in our recent history and you just about have to trade for the best in the NFL. Remember how bad our pass rush was before we got Allen?

by Bodysuit Man on Feb 27, 2011 2:09 PM CST up reply actions

The thing about these 'what if' scenarios

is that you could throw yet another ‘what if’ out there. Baltimore really wanted a quarterback, obviously, and they took Flacco. As bad as they wanted/needed a QB, by the time the #16 pick came around, Baltimore could’ve done a trade with whoever picked at 16 to jump ahead of the Vikings, ensuring they got a QB.

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by Ted Glover on Feb 28, 2011 7:55 AM CST reply actions

This seems like a no-brainer...

… when you ask yourself “Did we win the superbowl?”

Don’t get me wrong, I love Jared Allen, and the move overall has been positive. But, given a choice to do something differently that might end better, I’d take it.

We still don’t have the franchise QB and that haunts us and limits where we can go, until we resolve it. Either that or we need to get much, much better on defense to have a shot without a franchise QB. I’m thinking like Baltimore Ravens + Trent Dilfer.

by HammeroftheGods on Feb 28, 2011 8:49 AM CST reply actions