[sendtonews_embed video_id=”dNPaG9spT7-1012639-7498″]
It’s a day that ends with “Y,” so Mike Florio found a pot to stir over at Pro Football Talk. This time he’s speculating as to whether the New Orleans Saints will try to trade embattled wide receiver Michael Thomas ahead of the NFL’s Nov. 3 deadline, or whether Thomas himself wants out.
Citing sources “in league circles,” Florio raised the question on Saturday with no basis and no knowledge from anyone in a position to know anything about what’s going on behind the scenes in New Orleans. He’s making it up whole cloth.
Sure, he admitted as much in his post for PFT, and from the jump described Thomas as an unlikely name to appear in trade talks before the cutoff date. Which undercuts all of this speculation.
The proposal makes even less sense the longer you think about it. New Orleans is laser-focused on winning a Super Bowl so long as Drew Brees is its quarterback, and trading away his best receiver doesn’t do a single thing to help accomplish that. No package of draft picks to spend after Brees has retired will help the Saints reach that goal. Would a team offering a player similar to Thomas in a swap help facilitate a deal? I don’t think so.
That doesn’t even get into the financial aspect of it. Trading Thomas would make the 2021 salary cap situation even more complicated, adding $20 million in dead money onto their accounting. If Brees retires as is expected, it would mean paying more than $46 million to two players not on the team (as Florio also pointed out, poking another hole in his idea).
Maybe things look different in the offseason. The Saints have shipped their best options out of town before; Jimmy Graham and Brandin Cooks stand out, but so do lesser weapons like Darren Sproles and Kenny Stills. But if the Saints want to set Taysom Hill (or Jameis Winston, or someone else) up for success as the heir to Brees, you’d think keeping Thomas around to helm the receiving corps would be the play.
Almost every player has a price when teams talk trades, barring the highest-paid quarterbacks like Patrick Mahomes and Deshaun Watson. It’s possible that a team could wrest Thomas away in the spring for a Jamal Adams-style trade package involving multiple first-round picks. That would sure help the Saints retool and reload for life after Brees. But “possible” isn’t the same thing as “likely,” which isn’t close to the same level as “yeah, it’s happening.” The contract the Saints paid Thomas last summer put him in place as a keystone of the offense for years to come.
So don’t spend too much time worrying about this. Maybe the situation looks different six months from now. But for now, Thomas is just as frustrated with the injuries that have kept him off the field as the Saints are. It’s what led to his scrap with a teammate and the one-game benching that all parties have moved on from. Hopefully this hamstring issue doesn’t keep him out of action much longer.
[vertical-gallery id=39346]