How much more proof do the New Orleans Saints need that trading Marshon Lattimore would be a terrible idea? The Kansas City Chiefs agreed to a deal sending franchise-tagged cornerback L’Jarius Snead to the Tennessee Titans on Friday night, and they got back a pittance.
Per ESPN’s Adam Schefter, the Chiefs are getting a third-round pick in the 2025 draft while swapping seventh rounders in the 2024 draft coming up in April. That’s a very poor return for a player they thought so highly of as to use the franchise tag in the first place.
But it’s the going rate for high-end cornerbacks these days, and Snead is just the latest corner who is younger and more productive than Lattimore in recent years to be traded. As we’ve discussed before, the takeaway here for the Saints is not that they should trade Lattimore at a loss and accept a bad return in value. The lesson the market is teaching them is to not trade Lattimore.
It can’t be worth it. Even if Lattimore misses half the season with another freak accident injury, as has been the case the last two years, he’s still more valuable to the team than a third-round draft pick a year away. And that’s without getting into the complicated timeline and salary cap implications of moving him now or later this summer.
Teams aren’t valuing defensive backs like they used to. Pro Bowl-quality safeties were let go around the league earlier this month. Many of the best young cornerbacks are being traded for mid-round draft picks. The Saints have gotten by without Lattimore, but doing it again without the reliable depth that Isaac Yiadom and Lonnie Johnson offered last season is a dicey proposition. It’s in their best interests to mend fences with Lattimore and insure he’ll be starting for New Orleans in the fall. There won’t be a strong enough package of draft picks coming from another team to make trading him worthwhile.
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