Please don't use the Faulk trade as the gauge. That was the one of the stupidest Colts trades of all time. If they kept him, they could have traded their 1st found draft pick to the Saints for all of their choices that year. They wouldn't have had Edge, but they would have had several starters from that draft and still had Faulk. As good as Edge was, I still think Faulk was just a little better.

Not going to debate the trade possibilities with the Saints, because I would have to go cherry pick that entire draft to speculate who the the Colts had a chance to pick.

Yes, I agree that Faulk may have been a little bit better, but he stopped being a productive RB in 2003, when Edge was just beginning his career renaissance.

Marshall Faulk is a really fun what-if to imagine had he stayed.

But so is pre-ACL Edge. They were head and shoulders the two best backs in the league from 1999 until October 25, 2001.

2005 was the last year that Edge played for the Colts and 2002 and 2003 were injury plagued years. Don't get me wrong, I loved Edge and he was fantastic, but having Faulk and the entire Saints draft slate for that year would have been similar to when Dallas traded Herschel Walker and went on to win a couple of Super Bowls.

Agree on '02 but I wouldn't call '03 injury plagued as Edge still rushed for 1,259 yards w/ 292 receiving yards in 13 games.

Totally agree though that we would have been better off keeping Faulk and trading the pick to NO, especially if we could have worked back up and drafted Champ Bailey like Wash did. Also, I also think we would have been better off keeping Faulk and drafting either Bailey or Torry Holt w/ the #4 pick. B/c Faulk+Bailey/Holt >> Edge+Peterson+Scioli.

On a side note - Was looking at Wash's draft trades and didn't realize how much Wash actually gave up in their move to get Bailey, which was the 1st and 3rd they had just gotten from NO (12th and 71st overall), their original 4th and 5th, and their 3rd in '00. Of course they had an over abundance of draft capitol to work w/ from the trade to NO.

Tom Pelissero
@TomPelissero
·
19h
The NFL informed clubs today it is projecting a 2026 salary cap in the range of $301.2 million to $305.7 million per club, per source.

That would represent another significant jump from this year’s $279.2 million cap number, and nearly $100M than the $208.2M cap in 2022.


https://x.com/TomPelissero/status/20...840930672?s=20

I stand corrected, it wasn't 2002 and 2003, it was 2001 and 2002. 2003 was a nice comeback after two injury plagued years.

https://x.com/TheDestinAdams/status/...519490407?s=20

Been thinking about the whole Faulk-Edge-'99 draft since I posted earlier, and as much as I hate to say it Polian royally fucked that up big time. He had a HOF dual threat RB on the roster, who he didn't want to pay for some reason. So he traded him away for less than market value and then used the #4 pick in the draft on another HOF RB, who he ended up paying just as much on his rookie deal that it would have cost to extend Faulk. And in order to do this he had to pass on adding a HOF CB or a WR who should be in the HOF.

BAD JOB Polian!!!!!!

I felt like he fucked it up at the time. I loved Faulk. Man was a real running back, could pass block and run routes with the best of them. Edge was the same, maybe a little better running in-between tackles (he has these amazing moves in traffic) but it was a terrible trade nevertheless