willie mcginest

I remember September 6th, 2009 like it was yesterday. The Patriots were in the midst of cutting down their roster as teams always do over Labor Day weekend, and we were eight days away from kicking off the 2009 season with Tom Brady back behind center.

The Pats looked primed to return to glory after missing the playoffs for the first time since 2002. It is always one of the most exciting times of year for an uber-blogger like myself.

I was sitting in a diner, just about to dig into a monster plate of pancakes when I saw the tweet proclaiming that Richard Seymour had been traded to the Oakland Raiders. Of all the shocking moves BB has made, this one took the pancake.

The list of controversial trades/cuts/picks that BB has made over the years is quite long, and I can’t seem to recount a season without one. Keeping Brady in the starting lineup after Drew Bledsoe was healthy to return was just the innocent (and obvious) start of it.

The trading of Seymour might be the most highly debated personnel move of BB’s career (4th & 2 is the coaching one). From a pragmatic standpoint you can understand why he made did it. You don’t have to agree with it, but the reasoning is clear.

Seymour would’ve walked after 2009 and the Patriots would’ve gotten little more than a compensatory pick for him, maybe a fifth rounder, and it was clear just before the season started that the last remnants of the old guard defense were on their way out.

2009 was really Year One of what I call BBD 2.0.

It would be the first year without Bruschi, Vrabel, and Harrison, the final heart-and-soul pieces of the dynasty. It was time to start building anew.

Would they win another Super Bowl with Seymour in 2009? Maybe. But probably not, not with so much youth and new guys playing key roles. So the page was turned.

When they pulled the trigger on the deal it appeared that the Patriots would be in line for a high first round pick in 2011 from the Raiders, likely with a rookie spending cap in place.

Of course the trade didn’t work out exactly the way we and the Patriots might’ve hoped. I was thinking the first overall pick might not be out of the question. Oh well, they had to pick this to be the one season they didn’t have a losing record. Unacceptable. I hope they fired their head coach.

Still, even without a rookie cap in place at this moment, the 17th pick is still excellent value and should net a very good player or trade value.

But the problem has now become how to you replace the irreplaceable? The trading of Seymour left a major void on the defensive line and now, two seasons laters, you can hardly read anything without the mention of “finding the next Richard Seymour”.

It’s ironic when you consider the fanfare that Seymour received as the sixth overall pick in 2001. I’ll let Ron Borges describe what he saw in Big Sey at the time:

“On a day when they could have had impact players David Terrell or Koren Robinson or the second-best tackle in the draft in Kenyatta Walker, they took Georgia defensive tackle Richard Seymour, who had 1 sack last season in the pass-happy SEC and is too tall to play tackle at 6-6 and too slow to play defensive end"

Hard to believe that this is the same player who must be cloned for the Patriots to ever win another Super Bowl, huh?

I don’t take exception to people stating the need for a dominant defensive end who can play three downs. Believe me, I’m banging that drum as hard as anyone. But every single team in the NFL has that need.

My problem is the belief that finding a carbon copy of Dickie Seymour is the only answer.

If that’s what you think, you’re setting bar at one of the greatest defensive lineman of all time. It would be like saying after Tom Brady retires that we need to find another Tom Brady at quarterback.

Uh, yeah. 

This very same thing could be said for Willie McGinest. He’s the bar against which all potential outside linebacker conversion projects are measured now. Everyone has been on an Elephant hunt for the next Willie Mac since 2008, when we realized Adalius Thomas wasn’t the answer.

Great players who are physical freaks don’t come along very often. And if you continue to believe that it’s Hall of Fame freak or bust you’re setting yourself up for severe disappointment.

The approach that needs to be taken is continue adding players who fit the system and coach them up, while giving them some time to make mistakes and progress. 

For every high round physical freak who becomes a legend there are just as many free agent cast offs or mid-to-late-to-no round draft picks who flourish in a football-only environment that consistently puts them in position to make an impact. 

Dispense with the comparisons. There will never be another Richard Seymour. There might be a player who does some things better and some things worse, but we must let go of the idea that the only way the Patriots defense will be successful is to find Seymour 2.0 and McGinest 2.0.