The iPhones and Blackberrys started buzzing and tweeting days, if not weeks, ago: NFL general managers and other personnel executives phoning, texting and e-mailing their counterparts in other cities, trying to get a feel for their willingness to trade up, or down, in the draft.
“We’ve gotten a few (calls) already,” Cardinals General Manager Rod Graves said last week.
When it comes to draft-day trades, those involving first-round picks garner the most attention. Already this year, the Washington Redskins have swapped picks with the St. Louis Rams, moving up to second, where they are expected to select Robert Griffin III.
For many years, the Cardinals didn’t do much but listen to those calls; they rarely made trades during the draft weekend. From 2001-06, they made just four draft-day trades.
Dennis Green, who coached the team from 2004-06, preferred to stay rooted in the team’s original draft slot. His mantra was to never fall in love with players.
But since 2007, coincidentally the year Ken Whisenhunt became coach, the Cardinals have been more active during draft week. That year, they made two trades on draft week. In 2010, they made three during the draft in addition to two others that came before.
The results have been mixed, but the Cardinals have shown they won’t always sit still during the three days of the draft.
“I do believe we take more into consideration now in terms of evaluating what we have to do, or what we’re willing to do to improve our football team,” Graves said. “So much more now depends on where you get the greatest value … whether it’s in (keeping) the pick, whether it’s in moving up to select a player, or whether it’s moving back to gain things that may have a great impact on our team.”
The Cardinals enter the draft this week with seven selections. But they have no second-round pick because they traded it last summer to Philadelphia for quarterback Kevin Kolb. They have an additional sixth-round pick, obtained in a trade that sent running back Tim Hightower to Washington.
The Cardinals have no compensatory picks, which are awarded based on the quality of free agents signed and lost the previous season. So, currently, the Cardinals don’t have a lot of currency to use for draft-day trades.
“We would certainly like to be able to have multiple picks beyond the ordinary seven rounds,” Graves said, “and this year we’re minus a second, but we’ll see what happens.
“We may end up getting back into a second, but if not, then we’ll work with what we have and try to optimize it as best we can.”
In pre-draft news conferences, general managers reveal nothing and rule out even less. That was the case with the Graves.
Though general managers are talking to each other often this week, few commitments are being made because no one knows how a draft will play out.
“A lot of it’s on the fly,” 49ers General Manager Trent Baalke told reporters last week. “You try to put scenarios together in your mind that may work. You might do some of that, some phone calls pre-draft.
“There were several ones that we did last year that we were on the clock when we made the decision … it’s tight, because time is limited. I feel if you’re prepared, those decisions are very easy to make on draft day.”
Those trades, like most other personnel decisions, take time to judge. In 2007, the Cardinals were congratulated for their boldness when they sent a fourth-round pick to the Raiders to move up in the second round to select Alan Branch.
Branch, it was hoped, would become the nose tackle so vital to the 3-4 defense they wanted to install. But Branch was slow to develop, and when he did, he proved more suited to playing end. He is now with Seattle.
The trades the Cardinals made in 2010 appear far more successful. They sent a third-round pick to the Patriots to move up to Round 2 and take linebacker Daryl Washington. It was a heavy price to pay, but Washington appears to be an emerging star.
In the fourth round that year, they were able to move down and still select O’Brien Schofield, who is expected to start at left outside linebacker this year.
In the fifth round, they traded their sixth-round pick and cornerback Bryant McFadden to the Steelers for a fifth-round pick. With that, they selected quarterback John Skelton, who has a promising future.
They made other trades involving picks, too, such as receiving a sixth-round pick in 2011 from the Eagles for offensive lineman Reggie Wells. The Cardinals used that to take nose tackle David Carter, who was a pleasant surprise in his rookie season.
And sometimes the best trades are the ones teams avoid. Deciding to trade up for a player is filled with nuance. Do you think a team ahead of you is likely to draft the player you covet? Is there a team behind you in the draft that’s willing to move ahead and take him? Are there comparable players at other positions that can be selected if a trade isn’t made?
And if you have a limited number of picks, as the Cardinals do this year, is it smart to send one to another team to move up?
“There are so many extenuating circumstances,” Graves said. “And a lot depends on who is on the board. And if you miss a certain player you have an eye on, what are the chances of us getting to address that position at a later point?”
Last year, for instance, the Cardinals wanted to take a tight end. They had their eye on Rob Housler as the third round ticked away, but there were other players around there that they like, too. They decided not to trade up to get Housler.
“We were on the edge of our seat waiting,” coach Ken Whisenhunt said. “We had him rated a little bit higher than that (third round).”
The Cardinals’ considerations in the first round were much easier last year when they had the fifth overall pick. Taking cornerback Patrick Peterson did not require much internal debate.
Things are different this year, because 12, not four, teams select ahead of the Cardinals.
“There have already been a couple of teams that said they are looking to move back,” Whisenhunt said. “When that’s the case, you never know what another team is looking at and who it’s going to throw to you or who it’s going to pull away from you.
“That’s this period, what we’ve been doing up here (in Cardinals offices), is all about, preparing yourself so that when it … gets close, you know where you stand with guys and what you’re looking for.”
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David Wallace/The Arizona Republic
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