Martellus Bennett Might Just Be the Aaron Hernandez Replacement the Patriots Need

Bill Belichick is the current standard of evil genius in the NFL. When you think about that pairing of words, it likely brings to mind his two most famous legacies in NFL lore: SpyGate and DeflateGate. But if the NFL wanted to launch an investigation into a more important reason that the Patriots are good, we'd see TradeGate begin tomorrow.

In a league where trades are rare, Belichick loves to gamble on established NFL talents. His biggest success came when he stole Randy Moss out of Oakland for a fourth-round pick. But Corey Dillon, Wes Welker, and Aqib Talib were all also found on the NFL scrapheap.

Traditionally, trades are an underutilized tool for supplementing a roster, primarily because the main source of compensation are draft picks. Teams weigh the promise of finding a solid NFL player on a four-year rookie scale contract higher than an established veteran making decent money. Even if most second and third-round picks never deliver that value.

The other reason is that players available on the trade market have a certain implied risk to them. They're sketchy character-wise, they have absurd monetary demands, or are considered out-of-bounds by traditional NFL norms. NFL general managers treat risk like a burned investor stockpiling government bonds. Teams find it appealing to trade a volatile veteran for a draft pick. It's why Brandon Marshall has been passed back-and-forth between four different NFL teams despite clearly being a top-flight NFL wideout.

And so we catch up to that dynamic in the latest Pats trade, where they're sending a fourth-rounder to the Bears in exchange for tight end Martellus Bennett and a sixth-rounder. Bennett was an extremely productive tight end for the Bears, even when he slipped last year and missed parts of the season with injury. At 29, he's not fresh-faced, but he's also still in his physical prime.

This move makes all sorts of sense for New England on paper. The Patriots haven't had a second tight end to complement Rob Gronkowski since Aaron Hernandez. Together, Gronkowski and Hernandez tore the league apart schematically. The combination was strong enough to block safeties and light linebackers on run plays, but also fast enough to beat bigger linebackers off the line. Defenses had a hard time accounting for that level of versatility.

So, what baggage does Bennett bring? He was clashing with John Fox's staff in Chicago, and he's also kind of a character—the sort of player who is liable to say just about anything in a press conference:

Martellus Bennett (re: trade): "I knew possibility it was coming. Like everything in life…[blow] where wind goes, try to be a dandelion."
— Mike Reiss (@MikeReiss) March 17, 2016

Believe it or not, there are NFL personnel and evaluators who bristle at hearing players speak as openly as Bennett does. It sounds asinine, but there's a lot of pressure to conform to an NFL environment. Players like Bennett stick out, especially when the coaching staff and general manager in place weren't the ones who acquired him.

New England made a much bigger move in trading Chandler Jones to Arizona for a second-round pick. It was a win-win trade, with Jones being the pass-rusher the Cardinals need and the second-round pick replacing New England's DeflateGate punishment. Chris Long who they picked up off off the scrapheap, is a reasonable approximation of Jones physically, even if Jones tended to play beyond his tools.

But it's the Bennett trade that is more compelling to me. The Patriots have done just fine without Hernandez and Moss on offense. That's life having Tom Brady and Rob Gronkowski. But they haven't had an offensive weapon that's been able to dictate matchups to the defense besides Gronk since Hernandez was on the team.

In rolling the dice on Bennett, the Patriots are hoping to rekindle the kind of offense that can bewilder opponents again. Maybe Bennett winds up succeeding like Moss, or maybe he joins Chad Ochocinco on the quirky personality blooper reel. But all Belichick can do is keep firing while Brady is alive, and it's hard to say this trade doesn't help the Pats on paper.