The Trade That Pleases Everyone And No One

In football terms, the trade of Donovan McNabb that went down on Easter Night makes perfect sense for both sides involved. For years, Eagles fans have had to endure the Andy Reid-Donovan McNabb tag team, arguably the most frustrating successful partnership in football history. They won so much. And yet, when they lost… Oh, when they lost. Few people can work in tandem to construct an agonizing loss quite the way Andy Reid and Donovan McNabb could.

So ditching an aging McNabb with a year left on his contract for a second round pick in a loaded draft (and a conditional extra pick that could end up pretty high), when the Eagles already have a promising successor in Kevin Kolb, makes perfect sense.

As for the Redskins, they were faced with yet another year of Jason Campbell, or the prospect of drafting the incredibly unlikable Jimmy Clausen (even his name makes me angry) at No. 4, paying him upwards of $30 to $40 million up front, and then watching him flail behind what was one of the worst offensive lines in history last year. So bringing in a fairly capable veteran to play the position while the team builds the O-line and numerous other areas of need is, again, a decent move. Maybe the Redskins will draft a QB later in this draft, or perhaps they will next year. McNabb gives them the luxury of not being pressed into taking someone like Clausen. And that is good.

Now this is where the trade gets fun. While this trade is, on the surface, reasonable, it is being conducted by two teams have the most UNREASONABLE fans in all of football. Already, Eagles fans are going bonkers over the trade, blasting Reid and Eagles management for trading away a guy they NEVER even liked to begin with. Then you have Skins fans, who are so burned out by big name players coming in, taking Dan Snyder’s money, and then going straight in to the tank, they can hardly stomach the idea of again bringing in a headliner like McNabb AND losing draft picks in the process. Especially that conditional pick. No team randomly throws extra draft picks into a trade quite like the Skins do.

So here we have two disgruntled fanbases who are so used to being disgruntled, that they find themselves all but incapable of reacting positively to a trade that, again, seems to be pretty good for both sides. That’s just how insane the Eagles and Skins have made their fans. They can’t even process this kind of thing anymore. There’s too much baggage. Too much frustration.

And the best part of all? This trade COULD be a disaster. What if McNabb gets hurt immediately? What if Kolb turns out to be horrible? What if both teams suffer as a result? It’s possible this trade will send fans of both teams over the proverbial cliff and down into a canyon of lunacy that they may never extricate themselves from. They may never again be able to see anything rationally, if they even could now.

And what a glorious moment that would be. So join me as I bask in the delightful weirdness of this trade. Everything about it makes sense. But that hardly seems to matter anymore in Philly and DC. September can’t arrive quickly enough.

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