Swap for WR Samuel wouldn’t be wise move

Deebo? No go.

49ers star receiver Deebo Samuel on Wednesday told ESPN that he wants to be traded out of San Francisco. The 49ers seem willing, since they aren’t eager to meet Samuel’s preferred $25 million annual compensation level.

Yes, the Eagles have only two viable receivers — DeVonta Smith and Quez Watkins — so they need more firepower. They also have two first-round picks in each of the next two drafts, so they’ve got the picks to trade. And they’ll have about $10 million in salary-cap space after they sign their rookie class, according to overthecap.com, so they can afford Samuel both now and later.

But still, no thanks. He’d be too expensive, all told.

He fits better as the final piece on a contending team, and as long as Jalen Hurts is the Eagles’ quarterback, they won’t contend for anything more than mediocrity.

Samuel will cost too much in draft capital. He’ll cost too much to extend. In this era of vasty overpaid wideouts, it’s financially wiser to keep drafting receivers.

After all, we’re living through an era in which every draft class features a bumper crop of elite athletes with elite pass-catching skills. Even the Eagles are bound to draft a couple of them.

It will take too much. The Dolphins gave the Chiefs first- and second-round picks this season, plus three more late-round picks in this draft and next year’s draft, then had to give Tyreek Hill a $120 million contract extension.

Samuel isn’t as good, and he’d cost at least as much.

It doesn’t matter that Samuel is the second-most lethal weapon in the NFL after Hill; he’s still a receiver. The Hill deal will haunt the Dolphins, and the similar deal that sent Davante Adams from Green Bay to Las Vegas will haunt the Raiders. But then few franchises deserve haunting like those two clown shows.

Only elite quarterbacks are worth two first-round picks, and only standout quarterbacks are worth more than a first rounder and other significant assets.

That’s because the only skill position that plays every play is the quarterback. The only position that touches the ball every play is quarterback. The rarest animal in sports is a franchise NFL quarterback.

Here’s another reason why Samuel shouldn’t be too appealing: The Eagles don’t have a franchise NFL quarterback; they have Hurts.

It would be like giving a Ferrari to a kid with a learner’s permit.

Economics

Assume that Samuel costs a firstround pick and second-round pick and that he agrees to an extension matching what Hill really got, which was about $75 million in guaranteed money during the first three years of the extension (Hill is on the Dolphins’ books for $50 million in Year 4, but that will never happen).

Samuel will be 29 when those three years are up. He’ll have given you four prime years, including the final year of his current deal and cost you about $80 million.

He probably will have been the best offensive weapon in the league for those four seasons, considering Hill will be 32 and Christian McCaffrey sprains his ankle making breakfast.

The Eagles should hold on to those picks. There is real talent from No. 15-101, where the Eagles hold five picks. Depending on how things fall, at No. 15 they could land 6-foot-4 Drake London from USC, Garrett Wilson or Chris Olave from Ohio State, or even Jameson Williams, another slim burner who would bookend nicely with fellow former Alabama star Smith.

As a matter of fact, for argument’s sake, we’ll even grant that this draft class doesn’t have a lot of remarkable first-round talent. That’s OK too. The Eagles desperately need an interior defensive lineman, edge rusher, a linebacker and safety. All of those positions will be well-represented at picks Nos. 15 and 18.

The 2022 receiver class has lots of guys with lots of questions, but it also has lots of intriguing athletes, so there will be plenty of value at wide receiver in the second and third rounds.

Evaluations

Admittedly, any receiver would be a gamble, since they’d all be rookies and the position is the most difficult to project. But if you can’t pick a top wide receiver in an era when colleges are producing five or six just-add-water guys every April, then you not only should be fired but excommunicated from the league. But that’s a different conversation with regard to general manager Howie Roseman.

At any rate, no receiver would cost more than $18 million total for five seasons, according to the projected rookie contracts scale published by spotrac.com. That’s a savings of about $62 million — and you’d have that first-round rookie under contract for a fifth year.

You’d also have that secondround pick in your back pocket as well as two third-rounders, so Day 2 could be crucial. It was in 2019.

Guess who were Day 2 picks in 2019? Seahawks star DK Metcalf, on whom the Eagles notoriously passed in favor of JJ Arcega-Whiteside, as well as Pittsburgh’s Diontae Johnson, Kansas City’s Mecole Hardman and current offseason workout boycotters Terry McLaurin in Washington, A.J. Brown in Tennessee and ...

Tyshun Raequan “Deebo” Samuel.