The winds of free agency have calmed, and many big moves have occurred, from signings to trades to regular free-agent pickups. I will recap everything that happened over these past few weeks.
The Seattle Seahawks went on a significant selling spree. QB Geno Smith was traded to the Las Vegas Raiders for a third-round pick, and WR DK Metcalf was sent to the Pittsburgh Steelers for a second-round pick. This was a strange move because the Seahawks had just gone 10-7 and barely missed the playoffs to the Rams. Metcalf was looking for a new contract extension and was reportedly seeking $23-$26 million per year. This may have turned the Seahawks off of resigning him without a QB to replace him.
The Seahawks would eventually replace Geno and Metcalf with new talent. They signed Sam Darnold to a team-friendly 3-year, 100.5 million-dollar contract. Darnold revitalized his career with the Vikings last year, throwing for 4,319 yards, 35 touchdowns, and 12 interceptions. He was seen as an okay backup after terrible starting stints with the New York Jets and Carolina Panthers. However, some people see Darnold’s time with the Vikings as a fluke due to the incredible weapons and great Offensive line the Vikings have. The reason the Metcalf trade was so confusing was because if their plan was always to sign Darnold, why would they trade one of their best weapons and release veteran WR Tyler Lockett?
Seattle would replace DK Metcalf with former Las Angeles Rams WR and hometown boy Cooper Kupp. Kupp was receiving a lot of attention from teams like the Steelers, Bengals, and the New England Patriots but ended up going to Seattle for a 3-year 45 million dollar contract.
The Bengals finally decided to resign both of their star WRs to massive contracts. Ja’marr Chase signed for $161 million for 4 years which makes him the highest-paid non-QB of all time. Tee Higgins signed for 115 million dollars over 4 years. Why the Bengals took so long to resign both of them as the market was constantly resetting is something the world may never know. Higgins also had a much harder time getting the Bengals to re-sign him as the franchise used the franchise tag, which gives a player a 1-year set value deal and forces them to stay with the team, on him twice.
The problem that I have with these signings is that they should’ve never taken this long to resign him. While the Bengals continued to sit on their contracts, multiple players were receiving massive paydays like Myles Garrett, Justin Jefferson, and Nick Bosa. This only meant that the Bengals organization was going to have to pay more to retain their star players.
Finally, the Patriots made multiple big acquisitions in Free Agency. They picked up CB Carlton Davis III from the Lions for three years and 60 million dollars. I thought that was an overpay after seeing him perform mediocrely for the Lions all season after they gave up a third for him. But a lot of people like the pickup to pair him with Christian Gonzalez. The Patriots also signed DT Milton William for a four-year 104 million-dollar contract, which makes him the highest-paid Patriot of all time at 26 million a year.
The Pats did not address the offense that much, they only signed 1 wide receiver, Mack Hollins, who is best known for not wearing shoes anywhere. They also signed veteran tackle Morgan Moses from the Jets. Other than that I personally think this free agent class for the Patriots was pretty disappointing considering who they could have potentially signed.
