Ten years ago the best free-agent signing in NFL history went down
Peyton Manning retired a few months ago, and it’s shocking to think that it has been more than 11 years since Reggie White died. My, how times flies in the NFL.
Those are two of the very best free-agent signings in NFL history, but neither were the best. That honor belongs to Drew Brees, who — speaking of time flying — signed with the New Orleans Saints.
Ten. Years.
That’s crazy, right? I mean, think about all the things that have happened in the NFL — and with the Saints and Brees, for that matter — since then.
The rise and fall of Roger Goodell. Two major CBA negotiations. A whole generation of quarterbacks entering the league. No one named Manning had yet won a Super Bowl in 2006. Chip Kelly was coaching at New Hampshire. Russell Wilson was his high school senior class president and a 2-star prospect. Pere Carroll had just lost the Rose Bowl to Vince Young. Aaron Rodgers had 16 NFL pass attempts (and three turnovers to go with them).
Pretty much everything has changed in a decade. But no team’s fortunes changed for the most, or for the better, with Brees picking the Saints over the Miami Dolphins, who — let’s face it — decided that his shoulder was not in good shape.
Brees was meeting with teams as a free agent, and the Saints wanted him badly. But even he wasn’t sure if his shoulder would ever be the same.
“It was different because it was the first time we’d gone through anything like that,” Brees told the team’s website this week. “It was unique too because I was coming off my shoulder injury. I was in Birmingham, Ala., about two months into rehabilitation for my dislocated right shoulder. So much of my focus during those two months had been just on the day to day with trying to get range of motion back in my shoulder and strength.
“Every day hoping that I would see progress and get the shoulder to where I wanted it to be. Yet still it was an eight-month process, so I was so early in the rehab it’s not like I could do anything that was really going to impress any teams that were coming after me in free agency. I remember putting together a video of me just doing some exercises that showed I was ahead of schedule and yet it was probably really unimpressive when I look back on it.”
Brees stopped to laugh. It’s hard for us not to do the same now. To think that teams were leery of Brees, and that he even might have had some doubt in himself.
“I was just searching for anything to try and impress the Saints or anybody else who was coming after me in free agency,” he said. “Obviously, at the end of the day, it was down to New Orleans and Miami during that process.”
The Saints won that bid and did so, most decided by way overpaying Brees. His six-year, $60 million deal at the time was roundly viewed as a desperation move whose past few starting quarterbacks had been Aaron Brooks, Todd Bouman, Jeff Blake and, in one of the most under-told stories in league history, two men who went by Billy Joe — Hobert and Tolliver — in the same damned season.
The fact that Hurricane Katrina had wrecked the gulf shore and that the Saints had been displaced in 2005 to Houston and Baton Rouge, La. added another layer of desperation to the mix, they said. Of course, we know how that all worked out.
“That’s when my wife and I really realized that this journey to New Orleans was so much more than just about football or the comeback of an organization or football team, it was really about the resurgence and resurrection of a city and a community and we had a chance to be part of that,” Brees said, looking back on his visit with the Saints before signing. “That’s when we really felt the calling like you know what, this is not going to be easy but nothing that’s worthwhile in life is. This is a great opportunity to be part of something very special here.”
And in case you’re in the White camp or the Manning corner for best free-agent signing, allow New Orleans Times-Picayune columnist and Hall of Fame voter Jeff Duncan to change your perception for everything Brees has meant to the Saints.
“Drew Brees is the best free-agent signing in NFL history and it’s not even close,” Duncan said, via ESPN.com. “Quarterback is the most important position in the game and teams spent countless resources trying to find a player of Brees’ caliber at the position. Pro Bowl quarterbacks in their prime simply do not land on the open market, and Brees isn’t just a perennial Pro Bowler, he’s a future Hall of Famer.
“In addition to leading the Saints to their first Super Bowl title and breaking countless NFL passing records, he transformed the culture and perception of the entire organization. I can’t think of another free agent who single-handedly did as much for his new club.”
In the past 10 years, the Saints have hit the highest of highs, winning a Super Bowl and Brees winning numerous awards and setting myriad records, to some pretty low marks, with Bountygate in 2009 and the team (and even Brees, at times) struggling the past few seasons. But he still lingers on, and Brees and head coach Sean Payton return for yet another season despite Brees’ current contract situation still lingering in the air now.
And when you consider the mark he has left on a mostly moribund franchise since then, plus what not signing Brees meant to the Dolphins as their playoff winless streak just hit 15-plus years, then Brees is the most important free-agent signing in NFL history.
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Eric Edholm is a writer for Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @Eric_Edholm
