I was not a huge fan of investing big money into Perry, I think they did about as best they could given the circumstances. He did perform when healthy, he was probably the 2nd best pass rusher in the FA market the year he got his deal, we had a very definite need to have one and they tried to mitigate his injury risk with lower guaranteed money that would only hurt for 2 years or so and could be gotten out from underneath ok. Unfortunately that is exactly what we needed to do because he never played another healthy down for us I don't think after that contract. That one hurt.
But, Hyde was the back up, they had made their investment in Burnett and Dix was on a cheap rookie deal and heading the right way. obviously knowing what we know now different choices would have been made. wasn't a slam dunk no brainer decision, but I think that was their thought process and at the time it didn't seem as bad as it ended up. But when you have a guy that was rated a 1st round pick by almost everyone for a reason, and he just came off a pro bowl season, named all pro, and had 5 int's with an arrow pointing up yet and still on a 5th year option rookie contract knowing that in a season you're going to have to up that, the 4th or 5th rounder who is a good football player, but up now probably wasn't the priority.
