From Mike Woodford (@DFlutieBB):
Mike, in a word, yes. What’s more, I think it absolutely should be.
Let’s, for a second here, go on the assumption that USC’s Caleb Williams and North Carolina’s Drake Maye play like they’re expected to in the fall—and the Patrick Mahomes and Justin Herbert comps hold water into early 2024. If that’s established and I’m, say, the owner of a 2–10 team in December, I am 100% doing what I can to game the system to land one of the first two picks, and preferably the first pick, with my football folks.
Earlier in the offseason, I had a conversation with a general manager who told me he’d be furious at Lovie Smith if he were Nick Caserio over the way Houston’s Week 18 game was handled. He said that he wouldn’t tank a whole season, under any circumstances, but in the case where he was that close, and winning a game had lost its meaning, he saw it as borderline malpractice to not do what you could to get the first pick.
This year, it sure looks like the stakes will be raised from where they were last year, because most people I’ve talked to regard Williams and Maye as superior prospects at this point to Bryce Young or any other quarterback in the 2023 class.
Now, there are examples where a team thought to be tanking for a quarterback actually wasn’t, and it worked out in the end. A great one is the 2017 Bills, who offloaded Ronald Darby and Sammy Watkins in training camp, dealt Marcell Dareus in season, made the playoffs and wound up with Josh Allen the following April anyway.
But there are more cases out there where losing is, in fact, the best thing for a team.
The Jets beat two playoff-bound teams in a row, the Rams and Browns, in December 2020, and it cost them Trevor Lawrence. Conversely, creative roster management helped the Colts snap a two-game win streak in December 2011 to land Andrew Luck over Robert Griffin III. And the Eagles’ Week 17 white flag in 2020 moved them up from No. 9 to No. 6 in the draft order. They traded down from No. 6 to No. 12 and ended up with an extra first-rounder in 2022 for it. The two first-rounders resulting from the tanking became DeVonta Smith and Jordan Davis.
You think the Bengals lament the Week 16 overtime loss to Miami in 2019 that sewed up the first pick the following April? Or doubt that things might be a little different in Washington were it not for a win in Carolina on Dec. 1 of that year?
Now, to be clear, I’m not saying any player should ever be told to go into a game and give less than his best, nor should a coach ask that of him. What I saying is that these are things that can have long-lasting impacts on franchises—and, when an elite quarterback prospect is involved, can quite literally be franchise-changing. So if I’m a two-win team in December, and Williams and Maye live up to expectations in the fall, and losing means getting one of them, and winning means missing out, am I manufacturing a loss or two?
You’re damn right I am.
