The Redskins gave up four picks to move up in the draft. But there’s one thing general manager Bruce Allen said they didn’t do in trading with St. Louis on Friday: mortgage the future.
In his mind, it’s part of the plan. And it helps that they had 12 draft picks a year ago – and still will have six this year.
The Redskins sent four picks to the Rams in exchange for the No. 2 overall pick in April. They’re expected to take quarterback Robert Griffin III.
“The idea that you have 18 draft choices in two seasons, it’s very comfortable,” Allen told reporters Saturday night. “We understand it was a heavy price, but you when you bought your home, you probably wanted to pay a little less, too. But you like your home once you live in it.”
Allen wouldn’t say who they were going to take, only that they “fell in love” with two players in this draft – clearly Stanford quarterback Andrew Luck is the other one.
Allen did say it was important to complete this trade in free agency to “allow us the proper planning of what we wanted to accomplish in free agency. And when you know what you’re going to get with your first pick, it gives you great comfort.”
But he did not want to say what other plans they have at quarterback. They reportedly remain interested in free agent Peyton Manning. They could opt for Kyle Orton. Or they could bring back Rex Grossman.
“Let’s not get too far ahead,” Allen said. “We’re happy with what we did. We feel that our drafts in the future will take care of itself. But what we thought this franchise needed was, once again like last year, another infusion of youth. We put a little of jolt in it for the 2012 draft.”
Among other things, Allen said they franchised tight end Fred Davis because he was their most valuable free agent.
“We’re hoping to get a deal done with him, a longer-term deal,” Allen said.
And on potential free agent linebacker London Fletcher, Allen said, “I had discussions with his agent over the last month or two. We’ll see what happens. I’m not going to hide behind the fact that we love London… We hope he’s Redskin.”
As for Manning, Allen made it sound as if the Redskins preferred going with youth at quarterback. However, they had definite interest in Manning, but the ex-Colts quarterback preferred to look elsewhere.
“Peyton is a great player,” Allen said. “When you talk about Peyton’s abilities, it’s similar to Jerry Rice and Deacon Jones. They deserved to be in the Hall of Fame while they were still playing. He’s a great player, but our focus was really if we could accomplish something at this point, then we’d be OK. Coach and I have talked about for a couple years of building our Redskin organization around the draft, getting players that are born in the burgundy and gold, and that’s what we’ve done.”
