Plenty of teams ostensibly could use quarterbacks. Before cutting the quarterback who, as of as week or so ago, was the starter in New England, the Patriots did not try to trade that player to a team that perhaps would want to sign him.
Per a league source, the Patriots did not attempt to trade Cam Newton before cutting him.
The move was made out of respect for Newton. If the Patriots had begun calling around in an effort to generate interest, all it would have taken was one person to say one thing to one reporter, and the news that the Patriots are trying to trade Cam would have become the biggest story in all of football.
Instead, the biggest story is that the Patriots have cut Cam. It’s an astonishing development, which underscores the reality that, in the NFL, anything can happen. Sometimes, anything does.