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Why Howie Roseman Contradicted His Trade Philosophy: 'QB Matters Most'

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Speaking at the MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference in Boston one year ago, Howie Roseman said:

"The history of trading up for one player, when you look at those trades, isn't good for the team trading up and putting a lot of resources into it."

Well, after re-gaining personnel control of the Eagles this offseason, Roseman contradicted his own philosophy. The Eagles traded up in the draft twice, from No. 13 to No. 8, finally to No.2 taking North Dakota State QB Carson Wentz on Thursday night.

"It's always better to have more lottery tickets, that's just the odds of it," Roseman told Angelo Cataldi and the 94WIP Morning Show on Friday. "But at the same time, it goes back to this specific position. This position matters more than any other position in the National Football League. You can't really go anywhere in this league without having a quarterback over a long period of time and to do that, sometimes you've gotta take risks.

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"We've invested in the quarterback position because we know in order to get to where we want to be, we gotta be great there."

Roseman explained the thought process throughout this offseason leading up to the draft.

Listen: Howie Roseman on the 94WIP Morning Show

 

"The first order of business was to re-sign Sam [Bradford]," Roseman said. "We wanted to bring Sam back here, put him in this offense, and then get a veteran quarterback to team him with. Someone who knew Doug's offense, someone who can help Doug on the field...and being able to get Chase [Daniel] was important to us. And then we wanted to get a young quarterback."

"We felt our best chance to get an impact player was to move into the top 10," Roseman continued. "So that was our first goal. Once we got into the top 10, we really started diving into all those players that we had in the top 10 on our board and that included quarterbacks.

"It was clear to us that this was a unique opportunity for our football team, where we could go and get a quarterback at the top of the draft, teams at the top of the draft were willing to trade those guys, and we didn't know how the future held. It was a really exciting opportunity and unique opportunity."

Bradford, of course, publicly requested a trade earlier in the week through his agent Tom Condon just days after the Eagles moved up to pick No. 2 in the draft expressing his clients interest in playing somewhere "long-term."

"He's a pro," Roseman said of Bradford. "He's competitive. I understand where he's coming from. He'd like to feel like he's gonna be in a place for 10 years. At the same, this league -- it doesn't always work that way. And so, nothing will make us happier then for Sam to have tremendous success leading our team because when we look at this decision we don't look it for just the moment, we look at it over a 10 year period.

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"We've been very open publicly and privately about the fact that we were going to draft a young quarterback," Roseman explained. "In terms of other telling people our strategy about exactly when we we're going to do that, that wouldn't make any sense. We've been very, very clear that we were going to take a quarterback in this draft."

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