Seth Walder

2026 NFL offseason trade grades: DJ Moore, Trent McDuffie We're handing out report cards on big offseason moves, including the Bears sending DJ Moore to the Bills.

Trade grades for all the deals thus far!

www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/...

Trade grades are up for the DJ Moore trade!

Five trades in this offseason and I haven't handed out a single variation of a B once. Lots of good/bad trades so far!

www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/...

It’s 4 years, $90 million. But because of the guarantees it is functionally:

1/40
2/64.5
3/73.5
4/90

And the Bills gave up a two-five swap for the right to pay that.

DJ Moore signed a four-year, $110 million extension prior to the 2024 season. Then he had a disappointing year in 2024 and a worse year in 2025.

You would think his stock would have dropped dramatically. But the contract the Bills are taking on is not that much cheaper...

Per Adam Schefter, the Bills decided to guarantee $15.5 million of DJ Moore's *2028* salary.

This was already a bad trade for Buffalo given Moore's contract as it was but throwing in 2028 fully guaranteed money just because is bizarre and makes the deal worse.

I was delinquent in adding this: in addition to the rankers (who do the hard work of ranking!) making a project like this possible, it's also only possible because @overthecap.bsky.social makes historical contracts so readily available (in R! Amazing!). So wanted to to shout Jason/OTC out!

A data point we can compare to my contract model's prediction!

oh it's totally different though.

transition tag is just right of first refusal if the player receives an offer elsewhere.

non-exclusive franchise tag means right of first refusal and two first-round picks in comp if player goes elsewhere.

I'm sorry I don't follow?

oh I like that idea!! I like it a lot. I'll test it.

it was my first instinct too -- and if he gets $17M per year I'll be very critical of that deal -- though it feels like the buzz is he's going to get a lot of money so...maybe? Super Bowl MVP, after all.

I haven't but I would say, like you mentioned, that's not the goal here.

Not forecasting what *should* they be paid, but what *will* they be paid. at least trying, anyway!

yes! at least a guide post. that was the initial impetus.

thanks! and yeppppp

thank you! and agree!

Curious to hear thoughts! To me the player I think the model is light on is Rasheed Walker. I bet he makes more than that.

Here are past out of sample (leave-one-year-out) predictions for edge rushers. This is a particularly clean position, they aren’t all like that.

The model has a light negative bias for players at the very top. Have done some things to mitigate that but still a ~0-2 million bias against the very best players.

Franchise tagged players are filtered out. At the moment the model is considering the existence of Kyler Murray but the chart is excluding him because not every outlet has a ranking for him yet. Also excluded Daniel Jones (transition tag) from the chart for the moment.

It’s trained on 2020-2025 and also considers position, age and the depth of position in free agency class (so, for example, John Franklin-Myers gets a little boost because of weak defensive tackle class).

New project I’m excited about: a model that forecasts free agent contracts based primarily on media rankings.

The model utilizes rankings from ESPN (Matt Bowen), NFL.com (@greggrosenthal.bsky.social), the Athletic (Daniel Popper) and PFF.

I think I would have franchise tagged Alec Pierce and rolled the dice on Jones. Realize the latter is scary, but my ~pure guess~ is other teams wouldn't have been excited to pay Daniel Jones knowing he'd miss most of 2026. And then Colts could have brought him back for less / with 2027 in contract.

Why the Lions came out way ahead in the David Montgomery deal

this rules

Talked about the Tytus Howard trade and why I think it’s a misallocation of Cleveland’s resources

The Colts promoted Ashleigh Prugh from Football Analytics Fellow to Football Data Analyst, per source.

The Lions fleeced the Texans in the David Montgomery deal: www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/...

it's not a fifth-round pick though, it's a fifth-round pick for the right to pay Tytus Howard $21M per year!

2026 NFL trade grades: Tytus Howard, Jermaine Johnson We're handing out report cards on big offseason moves, including Monday's trade for offensive tackle Tytus Howard.

The Browns spent a significant chunk of their limited resources on a below average starter in Tytus Howard. I'm not a fan of the trade!

www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/...

I find it crazy that the NFL sets the salary cap so close to the start of FA.

Yes, I know teams know roughly what it will be, but they've also already started making 2026 decisions!

Like a dynasty fantasy league would not stand for cap not being set while cut decisions have already been made.