Winners and Losers Through Two Days of NFL Free Agency

Welcome to the end of the first wave of free agency. Now, the tenor of this feverish period takes on a more plodding pace, with breathless news updates on … who might need a pass rusher badly enough to spend more than $25 million on Trey Hendrickson at age 32. A.J. Brown is still an Eagle, Kyler Murray (as of the publication of this column) is still waiting to make his move, and moments after I filed, the Saints threw their hat in the ring to claim the crown of Conor Orr offseason champion by signing my favorite remaining free agent, Kaden Elliss.

There are still some entertaining moments to come, but over the past 48 hours, we’ve gotten a chance to establish some clear-cut winners and losers. These are not just teams but individuals, markets and ideas. Life can change quickly in the NFL, especially as the cap soars and teams in need of improvement cling to the known commodity that is veteran talent.

In lieu of dragging out this introduction any further, we present our initial free agency winners and losers.

WINNERS

Patrick Mahomes

We’re assuming that Kenneth Walker III will get through the season relatively healthy, given that Walker is entering his age-26 season and is coming off a 20-for-20 attendance season last year with the Seahawks, of course. If that’s the case, Mahomes will have, for the first time in his career, a dependable running back who is a gifted tackle breaker and a more reliable short-yardage option. Mahomes had to pick up 27 first downs on the ground last year, and the Chiefs converted just 37 total first downs on third down via the run. That’s a big chunk of ground game responsibility for a franchise quarterback coming off an ACL tear. We have more fascinating numbers regarding Walker and the Chiefs in my Monday column on the deal, but the gist is that Walker is scheme-agnostic and will allow Kansas City’s offense to continue moving at Mahomes’s pace without the complications of accommodating a specific running game. We’ve been bullish on the Chiefs in the past for waiting to upgrade the receiving corps or waiting too long to oust certain diminishing veterans, but this is a pronounced shot toward making Mahomes’s life less complicated. That matters.

Jeremiyah Love

While we could easily spin this as a running back renaissance given the way teams prioritized the position in veteran free agency, I think we can also look at it like this: The Cardinals (Tyler Allgeier), Saints (Travis Etienne Jr.) and Chiefs (Kenneth Walker III) all made a Day 1 push to sign a running back. All these teams are selecting in the top nine of the draft, which likely means several different factors (all positive) are at play for the draft’s top running back.

One, he’s not going to get stuck on a struggling Cardinals team. By adding Allgeier and reworking a deal with James Conner, it’s clear that Arizona has made Trey Benson the odd man out, and the Cardinals are pivoting toward a veteran-laden backfield that will allow the team to use its plentiful draft capital on something far more necessary (a pass rusher, perhaps).

Two, this likely defines Love’s window between picks No. 4 and 7. That means Love will either land with the revamped John Harbaugh Giants, the Titans, the Browns or the Commanders. Cleveland has a backfield it seems to be content with led by a highly drafted back from last year, which further narrows Love’s options to a team that has Jayden Daniels and one of the more exciting debut offensive coordinators we can remember in David Blough; a team that has Cam Ward and Brian Daboll; or a team that has Jaxson Dart and some new offensive weapon upgrades as well.

Ejiro Evero

Evero, who has been one of my top NFL head coaching candidates for the past four seasons, has simply had horrendous luck. After rising through the ranks, his two shots at the defensive coordinator chair have come with the one-year Nathaniel Hackett stint in Denver (which actually featured a top-10 unit in points and yards allowed per drive) and the ill-fated one-year Frank Reich staff in Carolina (he was retained by Dave Canales). In Carolina, Evero inherited one of the most talent-starved defenses in the NFL and, despite that, didn’t get to utilize a first-round pick on the defensive side of the ball in 2024 after Tetairoa McMillan slipped to the Panthers. The Panthers spent a majority of their remaining picks, including second- and third-round selections, on defense, but those improvements were marginal at best heading into a breakout 2025 season. Now, finally, serenity: Jaelan Phillips and Devin Lloyd. Two players whom you would safely label as the best available at their respective positions, creating a legitimately formidable front seven to pair with Jaycee Horn on the back end.

New York Jets

I think I can harbor pronounced disapproval of the team’s actions so far under the Aaron Glenn–Darren Mougey regime, while also respecting the fact that the Jets clearly have a plan but are coherent enough to realize that they must also put a watchable product on the field. In recent years, we have seen teams like the Giants miss out on free agency or be forced to overpay because a regime change is clearly imminent. The Jets have that feel, but, in public-facing ways, are pacifying Glenn by robustly improving his defense. However, management is protecting itself with nearly all of those signings coming on short-term deals. Demario Davis, David Onyemata and Kingsley Enagbare are all on contracts that could be effectively wiped out after the season. Minkah Fitzpatrick, who is still a top-tier secondary player, and Joseph Ossai, who is only 25, are the only players who signed true “long-term” deals. They could easily be absorbed by the next coaching staff, should that be the path the 2026 season takes. Or, the likes of Fitzpatrick and Davis could serve as locker room anchors for the inevitable drafting of a franchise quarterback in 2027.

The Geno Smith trade, which delivers the former Jets draft pick at the league minimum, also fits into that category. With fears that the Jets would try to Band-Aid the season with Carson Wentz, Smith arrives with a little more gravitas despite coming off one of his worst seasons as a starter. He would undoubtedly be, in the hierarchy of fan acceptability, the most amenable Jets Week 1 starter since the beginning of the Zach Wilson era.

Tyler Linderbaum in a Ravens jersey with no helmet on. — Tyler Linderbaum reset the market for the centers who will come after him. | Daniel Kucin Jr.-Imagn Images

Centers

As teams build offensive lines from the outside in, so go the corresponding contracts. Elite left tackles, then right tackles, and then guards have all seen dramatic increases in pay as the game has evolved to understand each position’s individual importance. Guard play, in particular, after teams began to pivot to a more chaotic defensive front featuring heavy interior pressure, needed a financial boost to accommodate the increased responsibility. That’s left center, arguably the most important position for a developing young quarterback who doesn’t have the bandwidth to get involved in protection calls, at a paltry $18 million high-water mark (in terms of average per year money). Tyler Linderbaum’s shocking $27 million deal, which is effectively fully guaranteed and gives the former first-round pick another—as agents say—another “bite at the apple” (the ability to sign another contract before turning 30), was, of course, the result of the Raiders needing to pay an incompetence tax to lure the best free agent on the market. But it’s also a rising tide for upcoming prospects like the Colts’ Tanor Bortolini and Steelers’ Zach Frazier. While neither may match the $27 million threshold in their next extension, the center market will take a leap from the $18 million and close the gap. Unlike the Deshaun Watson trade, which we thought might usher in a new era of fully guaranteed contracts, this deal has some heft to it and the power to legitimately change the landscape. I suppose you would consider the Steelers, Colts and Falcons (Ryan Neuzil, who will be a free agent next year, though he’s closer to 30) losers by extension.

Jaxson Dart

The Isaiah Likely signing felt, to many, like just another example of new Giants head coach John Harbaugh prioritizing his free agents from Baltimore. My read is a little different. Last season, Dart was third in the NFL in EPA added per rush among all quarterbacks, behind just Baker Mayfield and Josh Allen. That meant Dart was a more efficient rusher than Lamar Jackson, Drake Maye, Jalen Hurts and Patrick Mahomes. Despite the highly publicized trips to the medical tent, my assumption is that Dart’s success as a mobile quarterback will not dissuade him from scrambling and leaving the pocket in 2026. Enter Likely, who, better than any other tight end on Baltimore’s roster last year, seemed to understand the creativity of his quarterback and find himself in the right space to make a catch. Matt Nagy, the Giants’ offensive coordinator, who oversaw a similar development between Mahomes and Travis Kelce, understands that a tight end with the ability to find predictable landing spots for himself while a quarterback works himself open in the backfield is an incredible gift. Likely offers more upside than Cade Otton, who has a similar skill set, and is a more proven commodity than Chigoziem Okonkwo.

The ole’ Jerry Jones roshambo

With Maxx Crosby, specifically, but more broadly with any free agent who is available that has some connection to the Cowboys and any modicum of name recognition, how skilled is Jones at making it known through the media that Dallas was this close to a deal with that person? The amount of baked-in delusion that must exist at the Star to think that fans will look at the aging general manager with any degree of earnestness and believe that Dallas is doing anything other than the necessary due diligence it requires to say, We made an offer! to [INSERT STAR PLAYER X] could power Washington D.C. for an eternity. However, there is a baked-in brilliance with this maneuver as well. If Crosby doesn’t perform well, this would be an anchor point from which Jones can say he correctly gauged the market. If Crosby does perform well, Jones can say he made an offer. This is really no different from your friend who spends weekends attending open houses, driving their realtor from a state of sobriety to ayahuasca-curious, with only the intention of telling friends at brunch that they liked the $900,000, four-bed, three-bath colonial but they just didn’t love it.

Justin Herbert and Mike McDaniel

While the Chargers have yet to make a brand-name splash at an interior offensive line position, this unit has been completely remade with ancillary pieces that fit McDaniel’s scheme and, in turn, will add additional protection for Herbert in the backfield. Tight end Charlie Kolar was a Chargers projection of mine from before the opening of free agency, due to the fact that he’s the best pass- and run-blocking tight end on the market, and can take some of the stress off either of Los Angeles’s anchor tackles. McDaniel favorite Alec Ingold comes in as a multipositional Swiss Army knife fullback and most of the interior offensive line has been replaced and upgraded by center Tyler Biadasz and Cole Strange, who, while a bit of a journeyman, found footing under McDaniel as a right guard in Miami last year and is a favorite of new Chargers offensive line coach Butch Barry. To me, Kolar and Ingold are just as—if not more—promising, as the tied-in nature of McDaniel’s run game with the right pieces will offer more protection for Herbert than simply throwing darts at veteran offensive linemen.

LOSERS

Mike McCarthy

This is McCarthy’s dream job and, very likely, the final chapter of his head coaching career. He’s replacing an incredibly successful, future Hall of Fame coach and is very obviously the outlier in Pittsburgh’s historic run of selecting young, defensive-minded head coaches. On top of this, he still doesn’t have a starting quarterback, and the rest of the division is busy signing or trading for very, very good players. Miraculously, we are back in this place where the Steelers are reportedly “nosing around” the positional market, according to the NFL Network, to accommodate Aaron Rodgers’s unknown timetable. That means lining up a contingency plan behind a 42-year-old who has talked openly about disappearing. That means having conversations with the likes of Kirk Cousins and Geno Smith and relaying to their representatives that Rodgers is still either awaiting a formal offer or is taking his time in accepting it (in fairness to Rodgers, he said on Pat McAfee’s show that there was “no contract offer” on the table). Either way, McCarthy is now shouldering the responsibility of supporting a veteran-heavy offense that has added Michael Pittman Jr. to the receiver room and Rico Dowdle to the running back room alongside DK Metcalf without the cemented certainty of a QB1. And, as we alluded to, I don’t think it's a stretch to say that the Bengals (quietly) and Ravens (loudly) have been two of the best teams in free agency to this point. Maxx Crosby, Boye Mafe and Bryan Cook are all changing the complexion of the division’s defenses.

Arizona Cardinals

As of right now, Gardner Minshew II and/or Jacoby Brissett is the primary starting option on the table for new head coach Mike LaFleur. Minshew is valuable if a team can use him correctly, putting him in a position to consistently run quicker-paced, no-huddle looks that give the cerebral quarterback a chance to digest and manipulate the defense. However, his rambling style is not for everyone and is certainly not an ideal foundational piece for a team letting go of a perfectly capable quarterback, who needs a change of scenery. It’s easy for us to look at the current state of play and see the Cardinals as a team that was down the aisle with Malik Willis and Jimmy Garoppolo, only to be left with a third option, but the truth is probably far more complicated. Given Arizona’s telegraphing of Murray’s release, it left the Cardinals as a convenient negotiating ploy for other teams during the legal tampering period. Either way, Arizona is going to struggle to win the optical battle of free agency and has the uphill challenge of motivating a high-end stable of offensive weapons, dealing with sub-optimal quarterback play.

Trey Hendrickson

I want to preface this by saying Trey Hendrickson is not a loser. He’s a four-time Pro Bowler who notched first-team All-Pro honors in 2024. It’s not lost on me that someone could simply screenshot Hendrickson’s name next to the word Loser and make a mess out of this whole situation when really we’re trying to make a point about market expectations versus market realities. One of my favorite stories from the past few years was a deep dive into the COVID-19 pass-rusher market. Matthew Judon and Hendrickson went for pennies on the dollar due to the uncertainty of life, football and team budgets during that very strange moment in time. Since then, Hendrickson has been chasing a market correction after a few years of massively outplaying one of the best deals in football, which, while we cannot blame him, has put him in a situation where he’s been forced into a pugilist’s stance time and time again. Then, he arrived at free agency at age 32 following a season in which he played seven games and logged four sacks with a reported salary expectation that felt way out of line. To me, this feels more like an agent-related issue, whether that was a failure to set the proper market number or a failure to realize that playing the high-low negotiation game with your star edge rusher client would make him appear like damaged goods beyond wave one of free agency. Hendrickson will be a short-term value for a contending team, which may ultimately be more fulfilling for him than getting a longer-term deal from a desperate club with cap space. Unfortunately, that does not make up for the reality that he was jettisoned into free agency at the absolute worst time.

Atlanta Falcons

I suppose, if the Tua Tagovailoa signing were a Kevin Stefanski–led decision, we should consider it a victory because he gets to align his roster as he sees fit. However, I think the fascination with getting good quarterbacks on the veteran minimum (a trend that really took off after the Steelers signed Russell Wilson) is one of those moves that is more of a front-office back slap than it is an actual boost to the roster. Tagovailoa’s recent injury history is alarming at best, and he is helping backstop a quarterback room led by Michael Penix Jr., who has now sustained a third ACL tear, making his longevity questionable to say the least. Tagovailoa was maxed out on a Dolphins roster full of star power, and while the same could be true of his weapon set in Atlanta, the Falcons’ evaluation of Tagovailoa seems to be rosier than that of teams that chose not to pursue the former first-round pick.

Top contenders needing starting-caliber veteran defensive help

This market saw two incredibly cap-rich teams with new head coaches furiously looking to put a stamp on their roster (the Titans and Raiders), in addition to a team that now views itself as a contender and must take a theoretical talent leap (the Panthers). That means inflated price tags, which forces veterans to choose between an opportunity to play in the postseason (always nebulous given injury rates and the unpredictable nature of an older body breaking down) or getting paid now. Tennessee, Las Vegas and Carolina alone gobbled up Josh Williams, Cor’Dale Flott, Alontae Taylor, John Franklin-Myers, Jermaine Johnson (via trade), Nakobe Dean, Quay Walker, Malcolm Koonce, Kwity Paye, Taron Johnson (via trade), Eric Stokes, Devin Lloyd and Jaelan Philips. Meanwhile, teams on the “cusp” of the Super Bowl have managed to snag the leftover crumbs, save for the Rams, who were aggressive and spent first-round capital on cornerback Trent McDuffie before signing Jaylen Watson. Consider some of the finalists from last year, who have better rosters and, thus, less cap space to spend on free agents.

Bills (with a new defensive coordinator who could use some scheme-specific pieces): Dee Alford.
49ers (with a new defensive coordinator who could use some scheme-specific pieces): Nothing
Broncos: Alex Singleton and Justin Strnad (both re-signings)
Jaguars: Montaric Brown and Dennis Gardeck (both re-signings)

When a rising cap meets a thirst for relevance, anything is truly possible.

Chris Ballard

The Colts’ general manager is truly up against it. Now needing to find a middle ground between the transition tag and Daniel Jones’s increasingly salivating agents, Ballard has top-tier money or draft equity tied up in a handful of players who, as presently constructed, finished 8–9 last season and clocked a majority of their wins over the Cardinals, Titans, Raiders, Cardinals and Falcons, all of whom changed head coaches after the season. I hate to beat the drum on this given how bullish I was on the Colts a year ago, but at best this roster is buoyed by a talented but vastly overpaid starting quarterback coming off a broken fibula and torn ACL, and a running back who is hoping Ballard can again draft well enough on the offensive line to fill another departure (Braden Smith signed a two-year deal with the Texans on Tuesday). While last year’s fourth-round pick Jalen Travis might be the logical replacement, Ballard doesn’t have a first-round pick this year or next year to buoy the running game via an early-round tackle pick. Arden Key remains Indianapolis’s big outside free-agent signing two days in.

Premium wide receiver movement

A.J. Brown and Brian Thomas Jr. have not found new homes yet, though it feels like we’re inching ever-closer to a scenario where the Patriots pick up both Brown and Romeo Doubs in the same offseason, which would be an incredible boon. For Brown, in particular, I have to wonder if the lack of early fervor—which may be part performative on teams that don’t want to show their enthusiasm—is disappointing to him personally. Brown is a player who struggles to be understood, despite having a high degree of emotional intelligence. Or, if the Eagles are finding out just how much the market might sour on someone after they—one of the best front offices in the NFL—sour on someone. This is a good receiver draft class with potentially up to six first-round talents, another factor that might be backlogging the process and forcing teams to consider the fact that, within this ho-hum draft class, the receiver position might retain its value.

Micah Parsons

Here comes the reality of the Parsons trade, which has arrived at breakneck speed. The Packers have lost a handful of talented free agents on both sides of the ball. The defensive coordinator who coached him last year is now the head coach of the Dolphins, and Green Bay will need to replace the defensive free-agent losses, starting at pick No. 52, having lost their first-rounder amid the effort to trade for Parsons in the first place. While you could make the argument that Green Bay’s defense cratered without Parsons last year, exposing the true value of the free agents the Packers let go, the Packers went into this offseason with some unwinnable battles ahead. Namely, aligning the defense with interior players who can accentuate what Parsons does best. Any semblance of an interior defender was gobbled up within hours of the legal tampering window and the linebacker market was similarly thin.