Brett Favre And Company: the NFL's Five Best Acquisitions of 2009

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Every offseason in the NFL, teams that seem just on the cusp of becoming great aggressively go after the players they feel will be the final piece of the puzzle; guys with singular talents who can turn a potential 10-6 team into a real contender.

At the very least, teams are always looking to make a splash by signing the guy they feel will help them make the leap to the next echelon of NFL clubs.

Before this season guys like Derrick Ward, T.J. Houshmandzadeh, Terrell Owens, and Jay Cutler all had that vibe of being poised for big things with their new digs.

Yet after eight weeks of regular season play, things haven't worked out quite as well for those guys.

On the flip side, many acquisitions that may have seemed solid, but not great at the time, have paid huge dividends for clubs.

It really is a tough old league.

With that, let's look at what I view as the five most important acquisitions of this past offseason and the way they've helped their clubs through these first games.

5. Gregg Williams/Darren Sharper/Jabari Greer, New Orleans Saints

This is a tough one for me because to my eyes, defensive football, more than any other phase of the game, requires the combined efforts of eleven different men to be successful.

Have the Saints been a great defense this year? Not entirely.

But they're much better than last year and already have won games on the back of their defensive effort, largely due to the work of these three new faces.

Gregg Williams was viewed by many pundits, myself included, as a poor fit for New Orleans because his hyper-aggressive "kill anything that moves" style of defense simply didn't fit the personnel that New Orleans had on the roster.

With the addition of safety Darren Sharper and cornerback Jabari Greer, that style of defense has become a possibility for New Orleans.

Sharper has already pulled down a mind-blowing seven interceptions while also playing solid in coverage and coming up against the run. Like other ball-hawk safeties in the league, he's making teams fear throwing in his direction, although as a safety he's harder to avoid. 

With Sharper's contributions the Saints have already caught more interceptions through seven games (16) than they did all of last season (15).

Greer, on the other hand, seems to have the ball thrown at him constantly.

Among corners in for at least 75 percent of their team's defensive snaps, nobody has held quarterbacks to a lower rating than Greer. In the 56 throws sent his way, or into his zone, Greer has only allowed a single touchdown all year.

If not for the contributions of these three guys and what they've done to help the New Orleans pass defense, the Saints could kiss hopes of a perfect season goodbye.

4. Tully Banta-Cain, New England Patriots

News reports emerged not too long ago that indicated that Tully Banta-Cain had been cut right before the trade deadline.

To put it lightly, people were mystified.

Wasn't this the guy who the Patriots had brought back from San Francisco after he began his career in Foxboro?

Wasn't this the guy tied for the team lead in sacks? The only real pass-rushing presence on the field?

Wasn't this the guy Derrick Burgess was supposed to be?

It was. And the Patriots had released him only so they could re-sign him to a long-term deal mere weeks into the regular season.

Whatever it was that Tully Banta-Cain didn't have in New England and what San Francisco didn't see developing, the Patriots spotted it early.

The Patriots don't make moves until absolutely necessary. Just ask Vince Wilfork.

That they went and got a deal done as soon as possible, rather than wait until after the season when multiple teams might go for Banta-Cain, says a lot about what he's done this year in games and in practice.

Now, Banta-Cain is only one of a number of acquisitions on New England's "way better than expected" 2009 defense.

Leigh Bodden, Shawn Springs, Brandon McGowan, the aforementioned Derrick Burgess, and Banta-Cain were all brought in to help revamp a defense that had gotten too old and too slow way too quick.

Now, the Patriots have yet to really play much in the way of talent offensively, but they shut out both Tampa Bay and Tennessee while also throwing a spanner in the works of Atlanta's offense.

A lot of that is due to the guys not named Banta-Cain, as well as the old vets like Ty Warren and Vince Wilfork.

But with injuries mounting and Burgess largely inactive, Banta-Cain has been the one true pass-rush threat the Patriots have.

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