Over recent disastrous series, selectors have swapped players on a whim.
In recent seasons, Tannenbaum had earned the nickname Trader Mike, plugging holes by swapping players for draft picks.
The potential for sharing facilities, swapping players and giving fans something to watch during the long NFL offseason is obvious.
Swapping players with other general managers on the telephone, Pitt is almost as quick as Cary Grant's manic newspaper editor in "His Girl Friday".
If that's too depressing, feel free to celebrate the Canadian national holiday known as the N.H.L. trading deadline, which involves otherwise sane general managers swapping players like children swapping baseball cards.
But Portland, who'd been good in parts all year, got it right when it mattered – and when they swapped players in or moved them around, there was no discernible drop in quality.
The draft has been talked about as a carnival of dealing, with teams scrambling to improve their draft positions and merrily swapping players ahead of July 1, when the free-agency signing period begins.
"Clearly the existing swapping players have not figured out exactly the business they are going to end up in," said Mark Gambale, an e-commerce analyst with Gomez Advisors in Lincoln, Mass.
When England met Argentina in Sapporo in the 2002 World Cup, British journalists swapped players' quotes with their South American counterparts, as is customary; this time, however, we broke the usual quid-pro-quo custom by giving them money, because back home the peso had crashed, the banks were boarded up and they were suddenly penniless.
Last week's four-team, nine-player swap, which involved Golden State, Utah, Dallas and Boston, marked the first time four teams agreed to trade players in one package.
