Former Eagles president Joe Banner dropped quite a bombshell on the NFL Insiders podcast when he revealed that a blockbuster trade never happened before the 2011 season because of the NFL lockout.
Banner said that the Eagles, who actively shopped Kevin Kolb following Michael Vick’s breakout season in 2010, had a deal worked out with Arizona to trade Kolb for the Cardinals’ first-round pick (number five overall), plus the Cardinals’ second-round pick in 2012. But the lockout prevented teams from trading draft picks, and when it finally ended in late July, the Eagles traded Kolb for a slightly different package. They still received a second-round pick in 2012, but instead of one of the top picks in the 2011 draft – which had already happened – the Eagles acquire former Pro Bowl cornerback Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie.
Banner claimed that if the trade had been able to go through, the Eagles would have used the fifth overall pick on versatile cornerback Patrick Peterson. In reality, Peterson did go to Arizona with the fifth pick, and he’s blossomed into one of the top cover corners in the NFL over the past five seasons.
Now, it’s impossible to know if Banner is telling the truth, but assuming his report is accurate, this would have gone down as one of the single most lopsided trades in the history of the National Football League. I don’t think that’s even remotely an exaggeration.
Look at what Kolb accomplished in Arizona. The short answer is virtually nothing. After signing a massive five-year, $63 million deal, Kolb played parts of two seasons, winning six games and throwing for a very pedestrian 17 touchdowns against 11 interceptions. He was benched for John Skelton before the start of the 2012 season, suffered multiple concussions and a major rib injury and was eventually released during the offseason.
So is it believable to think that a player of Kolb’s caliber could really have netted the fifth overall pick as well as an additional second-round pick? It’s highly unlikely. Then again, we all remember Andy Reid and his reputation for quarterback trades.
He unloaded third-string quarterback AJ Feeley for a second-round pick to the Miami Dolphins after Feeley posted five relatively uninspiring starts in relief of injured quarterbacks Donovan McNabb and Koy Detmer in 2002. And he traded veteran Kelly Holcomb, a camp body in 2004, for a fifth-round pick. But what he reportedly came close to pulling off for Kolb, a player most Eagles fans could quickly tell was nothing special as a signal caller, would have been the Eagles’ equivalent of the Herschel Walker trade.
Who knows what would have resulted from that trade? Maybe the Eagles wouldn’t have selected Peterson with the fifth pick. Maybe they would have taken Julio Jones (6), Tyron Smith (9), JJ Watt (11) or Robert Quinn (14). Or maybe they would have whiffed badly on one of the three failed first-round quarterbacks: Jake Locker, Blaine Gabbert or Christian Ponder. Or maybe they would have still selected a 26-year-old firefighter named Danny Watkins, 18 spots higher, and the pick would have again been essentially useless.
Would the drafting of Patrick Peterson prevented the Eagles from throwing $60 million at an over-the-hill veteran cornerback named Nnamdi Asomugha? Hopefully. It also would have prevented the short-lived but very unsatisfying tenure of DRC in Philadelphia.
For all we know, this could have led into a domino effect that could have prevented the entire Dream Team debacle, saved Andy Reid’s job and resulted in the 2013-2016 Eagles establishing themselves as a dynasty.
And it was all ruined because of a lockout.
