Free Agency: Winners and Losers

By Chad Stapley
Chad Stapley

 Winners & Losers from Free Agency


Winners:

 

Jimmy Graham and the Seattle Seahawks seem like a perfect pair. Graham is the top pass catching TE in the NFL and the Seahawks desperately need a consistent Red-Zone threat to throw to when teams stack the box to stop Marshawn Lynch. This trade is going to pay dividends down the road and can easily be one of the best moves of the offseason.

 

Sam Bradford & Nick Foles

It’s not often that you see teams swapping their starting QB’s but this trade seems like a win for both young QBs coming off injury. Bradford finally gets out of St. Louis where he suffered numerous injury setbacks and never quite had a good team to play with. Nick Foles is not Chip Kelly’s guy so the writing was on the door all season long. Foles inherits the best Rams team since the days of Kurt Warner. The Rams have been quietly building a very good young team for the last three season they just didn’t have a QB, insert Foles and the Rams could be a dark horse team to watch come this season.

 

Everything the Colts did.

The Colts knew they had a team that could get them to the playoffs and they made some moves that hopefully ensure they get to the Super Bowl in 2016. The Colts biggest weaknesses were that they had absolutely no one at RB and that they need a big body playmaking WR. Insert Frank Gore & Andre Johnson. Gore is a future hall of famer who absolutely has life left in his legs and will surprise a lot of people this year. Johnson is also a future hall of famer who has accomplished everything without ever actually playing for a decent QB. Andrew Luck is going to love the addition of Johnson and Gore because they are vet savvy players who tend to make everyone else around them better.

 

Jaguars signing of Julius Thomas.

The Jaguars drafted their QB of the future and two young WRs to build around last year by getting Blake Bortles, Marquise Lee, & Allen Robinson. This season they added one of the better TEs in the NFL in Thomas to pair with the young pass catchers they drafted last season. If Bortles continues to struggle this season it won’t be for lack of playmakers around him.

 

The Bills improving their running game.

The Bills made a big splash in free agency under new coach Rex Ryan. They obviously wanted to improve their run game as a Ryan led team always relies heavily on their run game. Ryan went out and got the best RB in the NFL right now in LeSean McCoy and he followed that up by signing one of the better blocking FBs in the league in Jerome Felton. McCoy running behind Felton is going to be a fun thing to watch and it should jump McCoy back up to the top of the leader board after a down 2014-2015 season.


Losers:


The Texans QB Situation.

The Texans have no idea what to do at the QB position, as last year was an utter disaster. The Texans re-signed Ryan Mallet whom no one really know what to expect out of him because he was a backup to Tom Brady for his first few season, then he got traded to the Texans last season before getting hurt almost immediately after being named the starter. What do the Texans do? They add another sub-par veteran QB in Brian Hoyer to compete with Mallet and second year QB Tom Savage whom the Texans drafted to groom and mentor to eventually be their QB of the future. Long story short the Texans seem like they are in for another long season.

 

The Bears signing of Eddie Royal.

This signing doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me. They traded away Brandon Marshall for essentially nothing (a 5th round pick) and they throw a bunch of money to a one trick pony WR who is in the decline? Eddie Royal is never going to be able to replace the job Marshall did for the Bears and to trade him away for almost nothing is beyond me. Royal is a decent #3 WR at best.

 

The Dolphins signing Jordan Cameron.

There is a couple of reasons not to like this deal or the way it ended up happening. First and foremost they have a better TE on their roster in whom they just the transition tag on in Charles Clay. The signing doesn’t make sense to me because they should have spent their time and energy on signing Clay to an extension instead of an injury prone Cameron. The only way I see this signing working out is if they get Clay to sign an extension also and they run plenty of two tight end sets. It just doesn’t seem like a great signing when they had a better player on their roster already.

 

The Saints sign CJ Spiller to a 4-Year deal.

I don’t like this deal for a few reasons. First Spiller is injury prone and the Saints could have gotten away with signing a 1-year prove it deal that so many veterans and injured players are signing these days. Second they just re-signed Mark Ingram who is far and away better than Spiller and they have Khiry Robinson on the roster who also ranks ahead of Spiller. The length of the deal with the components they already have on their roster don’t add up. Especially with the Saints offensive line needs some serious repairs.

 

The Cowboys sign Darren McFadden to a 2-Year deal.

McFadden has been one of the biggest bust in recent history. He can’t stay healthy and he is not even a top 32 RB so this signing just doesn’t make sense. The Cowboys panicked when DeMarco Murray signed with the Eagles and signed the first RB they could. The simple truth is that you’re not going to be able to replace Murray’s production with any free agent RB that is available outside of Adrian Peterson (and he isn’t technically available or a free agent). The Cowboys should have waited until the draft to answer this problem.