Usually, we rip on Peter King for not really giving the Saints the respect they deserve, or for having his head so far up his own rear end that he can see his own food as he swallows it just getting things plain wrong.

Check out what he says about Malcolm Jenkins in this week's MMQB though:

I think there's a good reason why the Saints fell in love with Ohio State cornerback Malcolm Jenkins and drafted him 14th overall in April. He's obviously got a good football IQ. But his love of the game is something Sean Payton, GM Mickey Loomis and the football staff considered a major factor. And this past week, he showed his eagerness. He finished all his Ohio State coursework a week early (Ohio State has three terms, not two, and thus school in Columbus runs into June), pulling an all-nighter before his last final exam Friday, and flew to New Orleans late Friday so he could report for the last two days of Saints' minicamp this weekend.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/writers/peter_king/06/07/coaches/4.html

http://blogs.nfl.com/2009/02/24/chiefs-cut-surtain-edwards-and-huard/

Huard to be the new backup? He's obviously still got some left in the tank, he's done a decent job when asked to come in and manage games, and he's a smart, smart QB. Seems a Payton kind of guy to me, he just might want a little bit more money than we want to invest in our backup...

I was taking a look at this draft picks value chart, and this is what it gives us for rounds 1-4:

Our 1st rounder, #14: 1100

Our 4th rounder, #110: 74

Jets' 4th rounder, #113: 68

Total points for 1-4: 1242

So it looks like we've got plenty to play with. We can ask for a 2009 first and a 2009 second from anyone from Philly on down, possibly even higher than that if we start talking about 2010 picks, which is where I think the real opportunities are. If we can find the optimism in a Buffalo, a Houston or a San Fran, a team that feels like it's on an upswing and is just that one piece away, then I'd suggest we'd be able to talk them into, say, a 2009 second and third (which would be 700 points from SF, 685 from Buffalo or 625 from Houston) and their 2010 first (which, if they're looking at being in the playoffs, is at most 780 but could be lower) for our 2009 first and fourth, plus a 2010 second (assuming we make the divisional round of the playoffs, that'd be around 330).

To put it a more concise way, we could offer the following:

Houston gives us their 2009 2nd and 3rd, and their 2010 first, for our 2009 first and sixth and our 2010 second. (Houston 1428.6, Saints 1430)

Buffalo gives us their 2009 2nd and 3rd, and their 2010 first, for our 2009 first and fifth and our 2010 second. (Buffalo 1465 Saints 1465.5)

San Fran gives us their 2009 2nd and 3rd, and their 2010 first and sixth, for our 2009 first and the Jets' fourth and our 2010 second. (SF 1498 Saints 1498)

Just a few options that might be open to us. Feel free to point out mistakes in my working, or that the other clubs I've mentioned don't have the picks I've suggested, but I think these are things we could do, parlaying our first-rounder this year into multiple picks this year and a first-rounder next year, which is slated to be a monster draft in terms of talent.

So the team kept him around for two years when he was long-term injured, and the moment he gets healthy he gets himself released. Sounds like pure class on his part (like we didn't already know that), but he's a damn good centre (if healthy) so do we think he could be worth a shot?

An incentives-laden, low base salary kinda deal would seem to be the most obvious thing, not sure whether or not anyone will be dumb enough to pay him big guaranteed money.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/football/nfl/06/06/jets.baker.ap/index.html

Looks like Chris Baker's unhappy with the Jets. If we're still looking into picking up tight ends, maybe we could do worse than see what they're asking for him?

For all that it initially doesn't seem the best idea to go after a guy who's throwing his toys out of the pram over "broken promises" over re-structuring a deal that's still got two years left to run, the guy's mentioned in the article as having been a team player throughout his time in NY. He also posted career totals in receiving, plus he can block the hell out of most things.