Insiders Shocked by DeAndre Hopkins' Departure From Cardinals

The Arizona Cardinals made serious noise yesterday after they officially released DeAndre Hopkins from the roster - a move that stunned everybody from fans to insiders who cover the game.

Perhaps his departure wasn't what shocked most people. It made sense for both sides to move on. However, the Cardinals tried for so long to move off Hopkins via trade, and most thought the organization would have wanted to walk away with something.

NFL insider Ian Rapoport was stunned by the move, appearing on the Pat McAfee Show and diving into what he heard:

"To me it didn't seem like an outcome at all, either. At that time [early April] the Cardinals were having trade talks - they had trade talks all the way through the draft, really up until Wednesday night and there were definitely times where I thought he was going to get traded," said Rapoport before diving into some financials.

"The contract - he's obviously not going to get paid the $19.5 million he would have made from the Cardinals this year. That was really never gonna happen for any team. He was willing to take less, he was willing to take an incentive-laden deal. The problem is when you're adjusting a contract ... you have to adjust his salary, then there was the draft pick compensation. Then there was talk of maybe the Cardinals eating some money.

"They didn't seem to want to eat money for a guy saying goodbye to anyway, so basically what they did was at some point they said, 'You know what? We have tried everything to trade him. We can not trade him. We are not going to pay $19.5 million this year in what could be a rebuild-ish year for the Cardinals' and today they just released him."

Full clip:

"DeAndre Hopkins being released by the Cardinals never really felt like a possible outcome..

They had trade talks all the way thru the draft but they could never get a deal done"@RapSheet #PMSLive pic.twitter.com/bnZyTg6pqY
— Pat McAfee (@PatMcAfeeShow) May 26, 2023

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