In 2013, the Baltimore Ravens made the obvious right decision to keep Joe Flacco

With the 2016 NFL Draft right around the corner, there will be quite a few teams around the league that will look for its quarterback of the future. A quarterback that a team could be set with for the next 10 years. Luckily for the Baltimore Ravens, the organization doesn't need to go that route because it has Super Bowl 47 MVP quarterback Joe Flacco.

Flacco, who has spent each of his nine seasons in the NFL with the Ravens since being selected in the first round of the 2008 NFL Draft, has had a lot of success and the Ravens front office hasn't had one single regret about it since. But when the 2013 offseason arrived, the Ravens and Flacco were due to meet at the table for a contract extension as Flacco was set to become a free agent. The Ravens and Flacco would agree to a six year deal worth 120 million dollars.

That contract was criticized by many in the national media as well as other fans of the other 31 teams in the NFL. The Ravens since then, agreed to a contract extension once again this offseason with Flacco and that contract is criticized as well.

I don't think this gets said enough in the direction of the people who have a problem with Flacco's contract: Who exactly were the Ravens supposed to wait for in the last three NFL quarterback draft classes? Has there been a star-studded quarterback in the last three NFL draft classes? No!

Let's look at the horrid 2013 NFL Draft class:

Let's look at the 2014 NFL Draft Class:

Let's look at the 2015 NFL Draft Class:

Images via Wikipedia.com

Looking at the draft classes above, I have a question for the people who still criticize Flacco's contract after all these years...

• Were the Ravens were supposed to dump Flacco for that horrible 2013 quarterback draft class? Really?
• Were the Ravens were supposed to tank in 2013 to get to Blake Bortles, Teddy Bridgewater or Derek Carr in the 2014 NFL Draft? Look, those three quarterbacks have promise and could end up being pretty good, but as of right now, none of them were worth dumping Flacco for.
• What about in 2015? The Ravens were supposed to tank the season two years in a row to get to questionable quarterbacks like Jameis Winston and Marcus Mariota? Really?