Some New York Giants fans, after watching the team miss out in an effort to land an offensive tackle to replace Marshall Newhouse on the free-agent market, have been turning their lustful eyes to the Cleveland Browns and the idea of a trade for six-time All-Pro left tackle Joe Thomas.
Well, you probably want to look elsewhere.
Sorry Giants dreamers. Hue Jackson says LT Joe Thomas isn't going anywhere. Says trade rumors are "just talk."
— Tom Rock (@TomRock_Newsday) March 22, 2016
#Browns Hue Jackson said Joe Thomas "is not going anywhere. We have the best left tackle in the league"
— Mary Kay Cabot (@MaryKayCabot) March 22, 2016
Jackson's comments from the NFL owners meetings is in line with one made by Browns Executive Vice President Sashi Brown, who said the team has no plans to trade Thomas. From Cleveland.com:
"That's not our plan at all,'' he said. "I know it's been written about a lot. But that's as simple as I can say it."
And if somebody offers you a first-round pick?
"Again, our plan is not to trade Joe Thomas,'' he said. "He'll be our left tackle."
Valentine's View
Hopeful chatter from Giants fans about Thomas has never been realistic. Yes, he has been a great player. Yes, obviously he is better than Newhouse. He's better than current left tackle Ereck Flowers, too. Thing is, he's a 31-year-old nine-year veteran. A team that would trade for Thomas, if the Browns were of a mind to trade him, would be a team that believes Thomas could be the difference making a Super Bowl and not making a Super Bowl. A team like the New England Patriots.
Like it or not, the Giants are not in the same position as the Patriots or any other perennial contender. They haven't made the playoffs in four years and have had three straight losing seasons. Trading away a first-round pick, and probably more, for a past-his-prime veteran is not the proper approach to getting back on the right path.
There is also the not so small matter of the Giants' insistence that Flowers is their left tackle. Why would you trade your first-round pick to abandon that plan? Or, why would you trade your first-round pick and pay Thomas, with an $11.4 million cap hit in 2016, that much to move to the right side? Neither of those scenarios makes sense.
Unless a starting-caliber right tackle is released by his current team it seems more and more likely that the Giants will have to address that spot in the upcoming 2016 NFL Draft.