Do we want TO?

That was the discussion on Mayhem this morning. To me, that's like discussing whether I'd want Charles Woodson and Ian Gold to play on this year's Michigan defense or whether I'd want Salma Hayek and Catherine Zeta Jones to play on my...nevermind, I'm married. Anyway, the point is that it isn't going to happen. Philly isn't going to trade him to the team they just played in the NFC Title Game, TO probably isn't going to want to play for a team that doesn't throw that much and a quarterback with questionable passing skills (remember his aversion to Kyle Boller?), and the Falcons have shown an aversion to signing players like Owens. Additionally, the Falcons are already paying Peerless Price a boatload of money and they have spent their last two first round picks on receivers. Who do we think we are, the Detroit Lions? (Ugh.)

If I were Rich McKay, I'd make this deal in a second because players like Owens don't come along very often. For one thing, the discussion about having to trade a player like Keith Brooking is ludicrous because stars are traded all the time in the NFL for bupkes. Travis Henry, a 1,400-yard back, just went for a third round pick. Owens went to Philly for what, a third round pick and Brandon Whiting? Corey Dillon was worth what, a low first round pick? A second-rounder? The NFL is this bizarro world where, despite all of the empirical evidence that draft picks aren't worth the value to which teams assign them, stars are traded all the time for picks (and not especially high ones, at that.)

The key with Owens is to approach trading for him the way one would approach dating Angelina Jolie. You go into the relationship knowing that you'll have fun, but ultimately, your target is bat-shit crazy and you can't let yourself get committed to a wack-job. In the NFL world, that means not signing him to a deal that you can't get out of. When he gets mad at Mike Vick, just as he has with every other pro quarterback with whom he's played, you need to be able to get rid of him with a minimum of fuss. That means that the contract cannot have prohibitive up-front money. Come to think of it, this is another reason why a deal for Owens won't happen: Drew Rosenhaus is not going to let Owens sign another idiotic deal like the one he signed with Philly. Owens is in the prime of his career and is looking to max out his income, guaranteed, in the next few years. Those goals are inconsistent with those of any smart team that is going to avoid a long-term commitment to an inherently unstable player.

My feelings on TO are these: I hope that he sits out for the whole year and ends up discrediting himself and Rosenhaus, who is another prominent sports figure who's not winning any image awards for my tribe. (Why can't they all be like lovely David Stern?) I don't root for Philly teams on principle because a group of fans who revel in their own negativity should not be rewarded with championships (and karma being what it is, they haven't,) but I would root for the Eagles this year if they took a stand against TO just to make him look dumb.