When John Schneider sent a 1st round draft pick ^[1]And a little more. As it turned out, the Vikings drafted Xavier Rhodes, Jerick McKinnon, and Travis Bond with those picks. That looks even better today than it did a year and a half ago. to Minnesota for the right to pay Percy Harvin $67M over six years, it looked like a risky move that might pay off if a whole bunch of “ifs” came true. Today? After paying Harvin more than eighteen (18!) million dollars and getting little in return, the Seahawks are sending him to the Jets for a conditional pick (rumored to be a 2nd, 3rd, or 4th, depending on what exactly those conditions are). The 2012 transaction now looks like one of the worst trades in recent NFL history. What was Seattle thinking?

Let’s travel back in time to October 31, 2012. Would you be shocked to learn that Percy Harvin may have been the best wide receiver in football? To measure this, I looked at how all receivers had performed over the trailing 365 days. The table below shows the production for each receiver from week 9 of the 2011 season through week 8 of the 2012 season. I’ve also calculated each wideout’s fantasy points, with 0.5 points given for each reception, 0.1 points for each yard from scrimmage, and 6 points for each offensive touchdown. Since, due to bye weeks, some receivers could have played between 15 and 17 games, the table includes the 20 wide receivers with the most fantasy points but is sorted by FP/G:

Why yes, Harvin was the top receiver — at least in fantasy football — over the trailing twelve months. This, remember, was on October 31, 2012. Four days later, Harvin would injure his ankle against the Seahawks; at the time, he was a legitimate MVP candidate, but he would never play another game for the Vikings.

So after the season, you could see why Schneider would want to trade for Harvin, who, by the way, was still just 24 years old. But as it turned out, injuries (and perhaps other off-the-field issues) ruined his time in Seattle. In six regular season games for the Seahawks, Harvin caught 23 passes for just 150 yards. He added only 92 yards on the ground, giving him a paltry 242 yards from scrimmage. Of course, he did return the second half kickoff in the Super Bowl for a touchdown, so perhaps fans in the Pacific Northwest will always have a soft spot for Harvin. But to give up a first round pick — especially in this cost-controlled environment, when GMs should be doing the opposite — and over $18M for little production is a black mark on Schneider’s resume.

For the Jets, the main takeaway is that this would be a very exciting deal if it happened four weeks ago. At 1-6, the Jets season is over. Only one team in NFL history has ever made the playoffs at 1-6, and no Jets fans, Bill Walsh is not walking through that door. New York would need to go 8-1 or 9-0, or 7-2 with some finger-crossing, to wind up in the postseason, and that simply isn’t going to happen.

But the trade should give the Jets a better chance to evaluate Geno Smith, and that’s worth something. The offense with Harvin, Eric Decker, Chris Ivory, Jace Amaro, Jeremy Kerley, Chris Johnson, and Jeff Cumberland suddenly looks pretty decent, assuming Smith can deliver competent quarterback play. The Jets may be in position to select Jameis Winston, Marcus Mariota, Connor Cook, Brett Hundley, or some other college quarterback early in the 2015 draft. If Smith doesn’t play well over the final ten games, he’ll be helping the Jets move up the draft board to find his replacement.