John Elway Will Trade A Pick He Would've Screwed Up Anyway For Joe Flacco

Last season’s Denver Broncos went 6-10 with an unimpressive 30-year-old quarterback, putting them in position to pick in the top 10 for the third time in the last 27 years. Their poor record, formidable division, and need to actually rebuild would seem to make them a curious candidate to pay up for an aging QB who was benched last season, and yet, it will reportedly soon be Joe Flacco time in Denver:

Not only will the Broncos acquire a man whose notable achievements last season were sulking and getting benched, but they will give up a “mid-round” pick to do so. Denver believes it can win immediately within the shrinking window of a 34-year-old QB. In Flacco’s nine games last season, he was perhaps marginally better than Case Keenum, and his 11-year run in Baltimore ended unceremoniously when he was pushed out by a far younger and more energetic QB.

In that sense, Flacco is John Elway’s wet dream. Flacco is the latest tall, immobile, and surly QB brought in by Elway, joining the illustrious ranks of Brock Osweiler, Paxton Lynch, and Trevor Siemian. A big selling point will be familiarity between Flacco and the Broncos’ staff, though it’s hard to shake the feeling that the Broncos are trading for Flacco because he beat them in Week 3.

That fourth-round pick wouldn’t have been all that valuable in Elway’s hands anyway.