You may have heard by now that New England QB Matt Cassel is on his way to Kansas City after a trade executed between the clubs this morning.

But Adam Schefter of NFL.com reports there was much, much more going on over the course of the day. It's a convoluted scenario for which there is no easy explanation, but the basics -- according to NFL.com sources -- are as follows:

The Bucs approached the Broncos about a three-way trade that would have sent Cassel to Denver and brought Broncos QB Jay Cutler to Tampa Bay. The Broncos, after some deliberation, declined. The report says the Lions also approached the Broncos with a similar proposal, but it, too, was declined. In the meantime, while the Bucs and Lions tried to negotiate with the third team in their respective three-team deals, the Patriots struck their deal with Kansas City, which recently hired former Patriots personnel man Scott Pioli. That move made all the prior conversations moot.

If either of the two proposed deals had gone down, it would have presented one of the wildest trade scenarios in recent memory. As it were, it didn't happen and the Bucs find themselves still searching for that player to compete with Luke McCown.

If you were reading the previous post in this blog Friday evening, we told you there was rampant speculation about the Bucs and Cassel. Turns out, that -- and a whole lot more -- might have been absolutely true.