Would you consider doing 3?

"3. Giants are supposedly in need of a RB. Would you trade P. Thomas and his $2.2mm 2012 salary (year 2 of a 4 year deal) for Osi? Saints still would have to pony up $1.75mm for Osi in 2012. Releasing Shanle would do it?"

I wound not do this. PT is the most underrated RB's in the NFL, and our best RB. Trading Shanle would release 2,950,000 cap space, more than PT. Not a bad move, hadn't really thought of this. We are LB heavy at the moment.

I was all for trading PT a couple of years ago but since then he’s proven to be a great asset to this team. I would trade Ivory for Osi but that really wouldn’t do much for us in the cap department.

PT needs to stay. Full Stop

I would not want to lose P. Thomas!!!!!!!

Very true, PT, Ingram, and Sproles are off limits.....Ivory on the other hand (I love him too) would be an option. The guy proved last season that he can stay healthy (well after he got off PUP) and can be a beast. The Giants do the 1-2 punch thing and though Brandon jacobs is a huge guy he's one of the softest (I mean how you that big but REFUSE to run hard up the middle?!?! Dude was always cutting to the outside like he's Sproles but like 10 times slower) Ivory sure aint shy about contact. He can help them and have a bigger role which will be good for him to develop.

If you can give them Ivory & maybe a 5-6th rnd pick I would take that in a heartbeat. We're 4 mil under the cap right now and thats already including Brees' tag money. You can restructure, Ellis & Harper, cut Shanle & Herring and have enough to pay both of these guys cuz with us 4mil under with Brees' cap @ 16mil, he wants 20-23mil a yr. So that means you can give Brees 20mil an dbe right against the cap. You cut Shanle & Herring you can possibly give Brees 1-2mil more to get it closer to 23mil if he won't take the 20mil. You restructure Ellis & Harper to get the space for Osi who's at 3.9mil. Its possible but its up to them to make the move. Shoot if i'm Harper or Ellis if you say to me "we need you guys to restructure so we can get Osi" I'll do it in a heartbeat.

The thing is that this year's 3rd and 4th picks have an elevated value for the Saints because they are the highest picks of 5 overall and they need an injection of new (young) blood into their roster.

I would not give up the 3rd in a trade for him, the 4th maybe, but even then it would be very hard because the Saints would undoubtedly lose his services when the current contract is up.

When OU would be signing with a new team, the prospect that could've been picked by either one of those picks would be potentially entering a new season with the gained experience and understanding of the system.

That is basically the reason why I don't see this trade as an attractive proposal - the money to me is secondary because like has already been stated, they can make him fit under the cap if it becomes necessary.

Any other year with more draft picks it would probably be another story, but those remaining picks are incredibly important for the Saints' organization and the FO needs to "hit" with all of them even though that is unlikely.

And I would definitely not want to see PT be included in the trade, because he is the best RB they have as Sproles is more of a scat back, furthermore, his contract is very very affordable in terms of the financial details, so there's no reason to trade him away. Nor would I like to see Ivory traded, but his value isn't high enough for him to be included in any trade anyway.

I seriously doubt that the Giants would be interested in Smith and his contract, and his value is at the moment very low, so it makes no sense to include him in a trade at this point in time. I think he'll have a much better season this coming season both statistically and directly play-wise, so his value will go up because of it and then if the Saints want to trade him next offseason, they would get much more in return for him.

I would very much like to have OU join the Saints, but I think it would cost too much and the positive effect he would bring would be short term while the negative impact might be long term because of the lost draft pick(s).

Keep the 3rd round pick, Give 'em Smith and Shanle.
That puts Osi on the field most every play...does his numbers suffer?
Osi would be trying to prove a point, looking forward to his next 4 year deal.
That's two bounty players gone, with cap savings to cover Osi.

Leave the RBs alone; remember the Seattle playoff loss?

We ran out of RBs; remember...

They're are better RBs than PT for sure; but he's at his best complimenting the Saints...