Written by: Brad & Jai

It was a humid Tampa Bay morning… the sun was peaking through the mangled, dusty mini-blinds.  GM Blankenship was just waking up, groggy, from an all night rum bender.  Waking up hung-over on the floor with his arms around his pig Becky is not an uncommon occurrence at Raymond James Stadium… but something was different about this Monday…

…as the other GMs in the NFC were waking up to the bizarro shit-Christmas that Luke had concocted for them the night before, they began opening their trade offers, sharing, and laughing at them publicly with the rest of the IFL.  One GM in particular was laughing the loudest…

That GM you ask?  Christopher Storey, GM of the Philadelphia Eagles…

Chris, you see, has a storied past as the victim of repeat trade rape visits from the porpoise.  If anyone can recognize ‘stranger danger’, it’s Chris, so it didn’t come as a surprise to those privy of Chris’ past that he would be sounding off with his rape whistle in chat that morning.  

…What happened next was stranger than fiction…

All of a sudden the phone rang.  The laughter stopped.  It was commish.  “Chris, buddy, is this trade for real?”  Chris went into shock.  “Could it be?  Did it happen to me again?” Chris pondered.  

Sure enough.  Chris had fat fingered the accept trade button by mistake and inadvertently fell victim to trade rape yet again.  This time, from another team in Florida.   His stomach turned, surely there’s a way out.  Surely this unchecked aggression will not stand, man…

“All trades are final,” commish said.  

“I would advise you to work with Luke on an alternate deal, see if he is game.”

The two GMs played trade tennis for the next 12 hours… finally coming to terms on the trade that was accepted and made public this morning.  In the end, a valuable lesson was learned.  Some players changed cities.  The rest? Well the rest is history…

Part I – The Dream

The nightmare that Chris dreamt included six players and three draft picks between the two teams.  What were the details you ask?  You ask and you shall receive:

Part II – The Reality

For anyone who missed out on the summary of the trade, the following graphic shows the players that each team gave up in the trade and their associated salary/contract information.

Luke, the GM of Tampa Bay, had the following to say about this trade:

“This trade came out of nowhere. I woke up after a heavy night of drinking and found that Julio Jones was traded. I looked on the chat and realized people were making fun of me for the trade offers I sent them the night prior. This was hilarious as it’s not the first time this has happened, but then I realized, this is not a joke, this is real fucking life. I traded Julio fucking Jones. The funny part was, Chris had no idea he was the one who acquired him. In fact, he was the first person to make fun of me for the offer I sent him, which blew my fucking mind that he accepted a deal he didn’t want to have, as he mistakenly hit the accept button. After some strange logistical conversations about whether the first trade would go through or not, which would have required a ruling from the commissioners, Chris and I went to work and found an alternative trade. We had about 10 different counters discussed, but at 5am the next day, we hammered out a deal. This was the biggest dynasty trade I have ever been a part of! Giving up a player who has been on my XFF team for the last two years and in my eyes is the 2nd most valuable player in IFL behind Antonio Brown. I couldn’t let him go for scraps and I feel like what I got was a legitimate haul that will help me short term with depth concerns and long-term with 4 draft picks.

Offensively, D. Thomas I feel is underrated as he succeeded with Tebow under center and was solid with Peyton Manning being the worst QB in the NFL last season. Whoever is throwing him the football, he will eat! Crabtree is someone who I view as a fantastic back-end starter for me, and he consistently produced last season. I think he could even take a step forward in 2016, being a part of the same offensive unit another year, in addition to Derek Carr and his supporting cast improving. Adam Jones will pair with Tyrann Mathieu to make the most dangerous CB duo by far in IFL. 20 PPG from Honey Badger and 16 PPG from Jones is what they scored in 2015.

Overall, losing Julio hurts my roster as it stands now. He has a very good chance to be the #1 offensive player this year and he doesn’t have to face Josh Norman twice a year anymore. I think Chris got a talent that his team was lacking. He has great depth on offense and defense and I think Julio is going to give him a great chance at the East. 

Side note, I would also like to give a shout out to Wade, who traded DeAndre Hopkins for LB’er Chandler Jones and the 1.09… This is what you should expect when trading a top 5 asset in this league and anything less, I feel you are selling yourself short.” 

Here is the perspective from Chris:

“Luke is absolutely right.  I saw the trade in my gmail inbox while I was driving to work.  I rejected, and then a few minutes later I arrived at work and got on Slack to tease Luke about the trade.  Several others chimed in, and that’s when we discovered Luke had gotten drunk and thrown trade spaghetti against the wall.  Apparently it stuck to wall of the office in Philly – after being at work a few hours I check my phone and I’m getting notices from Brad on Slack that I have to pay next year’s down payment to have the trade processed, and I’d gotten an email from Jai asking me to comment on the trade.  I almost shit myself!  I told both of them that the trade was an accident.  Chris’ reaction was like

It looked at first as though the trade might be invalidated if I simply didn’t pay next year’s dues and used my draft picks for 2016.  However, Brad pointed out that all deals are final and there may have been creative ways to push the initial deal through.  He advised me to talk to Luke and try to renegotiate a deal before he and Jai had to make a call.  I talked with Luke, who was understanding but still wanted to get a deal for Julio done.  So we went to work.  It took all night, and we restarted at 4:30 a.m.  It looked bleak for a second, but we got it done without any hard feelings.

I am glad I didn’t have to give up two first rounders, and while I wasn’t terribly happy about the Wide Receivers I sent Luke’s way, I think I got a better one in return, and I think I have to defensive depth to absorb the loss of Adam Jones.  Overall, I am grateful to Luke for being a standup guy and renegotiating with me, and Brad and Jai for giving us the space and the time to get it done.  While the trade started as a mistake, I think it will ultimately benefit Luke and myself.”   

The following are the thoughts of Tampa’s division mates:

“I think that was quite a bit to give up for Julio.  I don’t know if losing out on all of those draft picks is worth it.  Luke made out on this one and that makes me mad.” – Floyd, Atlanta Falcons

“3 things: (1) It just got a bit less competitive in the NFC South. (2) Ewwwww! (3) Woohoo!

No, really though. As of right now, I have no idea how Luke offered this, I don’t care how drunk he was. Unlike real rape, trade rape does not offer protection from shame. No sir! When it comes to trade rape, it’s fucking Saudi Arabia over here. Get ready for the verbal stoning of your life Luke Munster!

And Chris, just because the frail white body is lying there spread eagle drowning in a puddle of gin, it doesn’t make you any less dirty for shoving a parking cone up its ass!” – Nils, Carolina Panthers

“In my opinion, PHI improves short-term as I do not think (Demaryius) Thomas will have a great season with Sanchez at QB.  And I agree with the line of thinking that says that the team getting the best player usually wins the trade. Depending on who will become the starting QB in Denver after Sanchez, Bucs will be medium-long term winners. – Carlos, New Orleans Saints

The following are the thoughts of the Eagles’ division mates:

“You never want to see a divisional rival get a top-tier guy like Julio!  The Eagles’ are stacked this year, but this trade will hurt them down the road in terms of draft picks and possibly salary cap.” – Brian O., Dallas Cowboys

“To be honest, this trade makes both teams better. We have seen Luke’s ability to draft and getting a 2nd and 2x 4th round picks will make his team better. Will be interesting to see these 3 players produce compared to Julio Jones. While Chris has definitely gotten the better player, Luke got great value for a top 2 WR!” – D. Jordan, New York Giants

“I like the trade for both sides, but I think the Eagles might have given up a bit much.  Eagles bring in a stud and still have depth on offense to absorb losing 2 starting caliber offensive players.  The Bucs give away one of the top point producers, but he gets 2 starting offensive players, which it looks like he needed.  Also, the Bucs get a bunch of nice picks and a top corner.” – Brian G., Washington Redskins

 

In the end, we’ll let you decide which offer you feel is better if you were the Eagles or the Bucs…However, in the end we still believe Chris is like