The journey of Chris Ivory: Dismissed, discarded and, finally, celebrated
I see some very good points in this thread by people, but I have a question is for the people that is bashing SP, Loomis, and the FO for shipping him to N.Y.
Could it be possible that he wanted to leave? His agent could have told the FO that he didn't want to come back and gave them a chance to trade him? Maybe Ivory wanted to be the feature back and the FO just couldn't promise him that. At the time we had a pretty crowded backfield with PT, Sproles and MI. SP offense is usually based off of running by committee. So Ivory could of felt like he would be better off elsewhere and have a better opportunity to get touches. Which if he would of stayed he would have been limited with touches because of the way we used PT and Sproles at the point.
So my point is that the FO could have wanted him here but he wanted out or it could be the other way around too? I don't know the answer to that, but to just blame the saints for him being trades isn't fair IMO.
Now if you arguing the fact that we moved up in the draft to get M.I. than I could respect that. Cause I don't think we should of moved up to get him but the FO really liked him and thought he could be the featured back so I really cant blame them for that. He is a good every down running back but not a great one. But guys like A.P., Jamal Charles, and the best backs in the league don't just grow on trees. The FO thought MI could be one of the better backs so the went ahead moved up to get him. We took a chance on him and as of right now it just hasn't panned out. It happens.
Bottom line Ivory did some good things for us yes, but at the time of the trade I wasn't upset with it at all. He was never going to be our featured back and I think he wanted out so we got something for him while we could. Could he help our running game to this date? I'm not sure but like others I wouldn't mind seeing him still on the team to find out being we decided to take the approach this year to run the ball more. Which hasn't been really effective at this point and time. Could it be our best just not that good? Or could it been the lack of ability to run block? But at the time of the trade we was a different offense who threw the ball around all game and got the RB's involved in the passing game with PT and Sproles. So like I said at the time of the trade it wasn't a bad one IMO.