If you’re an NFL fan waiting with bated breath to see what’s under your team’s free agency Christmas tree … well, let’s hope your general manager isn’t a procrastinator when it comes to shopping. After all, given all that has transpired in recent days – and especially Sunday evening – kinda feels like the market to obtain impact players is basically picked over before it ever really opened.
The league’s legal tampering window initiates Monday, veterans who are unsigned for the 2025 season permitted to negotiate with teams other than the one they played for last season. However they can’t begin switching sides, nor can trades be officially executed, until 4 p.m. ET on Wednesday, the start of the NFL’s new league year. (The exceptions are players like Davante Adams and Joey Bosa, whose previous contracts were terminated rather than expiring, which is how Adams was able to join the Los Angeles Rams on Sunday.)
And while so many of the highly anticipated names that seemed to be available are already accounted for, there are still a few major story lines that have yet to play out. Here are six to monitor as the market swings its doors open Monday, if mostly just to allow for browsing of its mostly barren shelves:
1. Where will Sam Darnold go?
Who would have imagined a year ago that a guy many had considered a major draft bust after he was selected third overall by the New York Jets in 2018 – before playing for two subsequent teams – prior to his Pro Bowl emergence with the Minnesota Vikings in 2024 might emerge as the prize of free agency? It seems that Darnold isn’t going back to the Twin Cities, where the Vikes will be compelled to eventually turn the QB1 role over to 2024 first-rounder J.J. McCarthy, whose preseason knee injury scuttled his rookie season.
It seemed like the Seattle Seahawks reshaped Darnold’s market Friday, their decision to trade Geno Smith to the Las Vegas Raiders making the Pacific Northwest an enticing landing spot – thought Pittsburgh might look pretty good, too, now that the Seahawks have chosen to send WR DK Metcalf to the Steelers, who still have a wide-open quarterback situation themselves. Maybe Darnold picks his next home Monday … and maybe he now has a robust enough market to drag this out for a minute.
2. Who else is on quarterback carousel?
While Darnold seems like the big QB fish in the free agent pond, others will also be biting. For teams that have or will be targeting young arms in the draft, there will be some accomplished bridge options with the likes of Russell Wilson and Aaron Rodgers, who will be released by the Jets in the coming days. For those looking at younger and probably cheaper options and hoping for a Darnold-esque revival, Daniel Jones and Justin Fields should be available – though the latter likely did enough in his six early season starts with the Steelers in 2024 that he could command a multi-year deal from Pittsburgh or elsewhere (Jets?). The Cleveland Browns, Indianapolis Colts, New York Giants, Tennessee Titans, Seahawks and Vikings (sort of) all seem to need at least an upgrade if not at least an insurance plan behind center.
3. What will Patriots do with their free agency bankroll?
Just a few days ago, the New England Patriots were projected, per Over The Cap, to have a league-most $127+ million to spend this year in free agency – and executive vice president of player personnel Eliot Wolf said at the combine (following a 4-13 season), “We have to do what’s necessary. So last year, we didn’t do enough of what was necessary. This year, we have to do what’s necessary to improve the team.”
Thus far, that doesn’t feel like a whole lot.
The Pats have signed a badly needed pass rusher in Harold Landry, who was recently jettisoned by the Titans, to a three-year deal that reunites him with first-year coach Mike Vrabel, formerly Tennessee’s HC. Otherwise … backup TE Austin Hooper is back?
Maybe Wolf and Vrabel will by hyperactive in the coming days – they still have the most cap space in the league by orders of magnitude despite committing $43.5 million to Landry. Yet it also seems like New England has been beaten to the punch by some degree, the Chicago Bears set to consummate trades (Joe Thuney, Jonah Jackson) for offensive line help while receivers such as Metcalf, Adams and Christian Kirk are already on the move. And if there are two areas where second-year QB Drake Maye is in drastic need of more help, it’s his protection and his playmaking options. Let’s see what he winds up with.
4. What is Seattle up to?
An overhaul, basically? Though the Seahawks managed to go 10-7 in 2024 under Mike Macdonald, the ‘Hawks were not the defensively dominant, smashmouth, ball-control team the then-rookie coach had envisioned when he took the job a year ago. But GM John Schneider has significantly churned this roster over the past week, trading Metcalf and Smith, releasing several players (notably WR Tyler Lockett) while re-upping LB Ernest Jones IV and DT Jarran Reed to three-year extensions.
What next?
Seattle clearly needs another capable receiver opposite Jaxon Smith-Njigba, must upgrade in the trenches – particularly the O-line – and now has a fascinating question at quarterback. Smith’s departure signaled the Emerald City as a logical home for Darnold. But if he is lured elsewhere, what’s Plan B? The Seahawks currently hold the 18th overall pick in the 2025 NFL draft, yet now have five of the top 92 selections after obtaining extra choices in the second and third rounds by dealing Smith and Metcalf. That might be sufficient ammo to move up for Cam Ward of Miami (Fla.) or Colorado’s Shedeur Sanders if Macdonald and Schneider choose to go that route instead.
5. What will Bengals screw up next?
Cincinnati Bengals QB Joe Burrow has been publicly pleading with his employers in recent weeks to keep the team’s best players under its (circus?) tent.
“I want deals done just like our quarterback wants deals done,’ Cincy director of player personnel Duke Tobin said at the scouting combine. ‘Everything he says, I agree with. I want them done. I want the best players available. And I also want to add more players to our team.”
That pledge started out well enough, the Bengals biting the franchise tag a bullet a second straight year to keep WR Tee Higgins in house. But soon enough, the situation began to seemingly deteriorate, the team permitting DE Trey Hendrickson – all he did in 2024 was lead the NFL with 17½ sacks while earning runner-up honors for Defensive Player of the Year – to seek a trade. And maybe you can’t pay everyone (have the Bengals ever done that?), but juxtaposing the potential departure of Hendrickson with the team’s decision to re-sign eminently replaceable dudes like TE Mike Gesicki and OL Cody Ford instead just doesn’t square.
Naturally, it gets worse – which is what the Bengals usually do in short order once they unexpectedly flourish. Tobin also put himself in a negotiating box by vowing that All-Pro WR Ja’Marr Chase will “end up being the No. 1 paid non-quarterback in the league. We’re there. Let’s get it done.’
Except Cincinnati hasn’t, and the delay is going to be especially penal. The Las Vegas Raiders granted DE Maxx Crosby that honorific last week with a three-year extension that averaged $35.5 million, making him the best-compensated non-QB in league history – an incremental bump beyond what Chase’s former LSU teammate, Vikings WR Justin Jefferson, earned last year with a mega-pact that averaged $35 million. But then the Browns, as they’ve done in recent years, raised that bar to dizzying heights – doubtless to the consternation of owners and GMs everywhere – eradicating DE Myles Garrett’s desire to be traded by tacking four years onto his existing package, the new money set to average at least $40 million annually.
Chase always wanted to top the paychecks his good buddy Jefferson is cashing. Now, if Tobin is going to keep his word, Chase will do a whole lot better than that – regardless of what the overall impact is to a team that might have to field a starting defense with 11 undrafted free agents … (we’re exaggerating, but maybe not by much).
6. What will happen in the NFC East?
Let’s just do a quick collective snapshot of what is typically the NFL’s most high-profile division and likely will be again in 2025:
The reigning Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles have already extended RB Saquon Barkley (when they didn’t have to) and LB Zack Baun (they kinda had to). What’s next for EVP/GM Howie Roseman? OLB Josh Sweat, DT Milton Williams and OL Mekhi Becton are all pending free agents he seems unlikely to re-sign, and TE Dallas Goedert could also be on the move. Does that mean Roseman is saving his remaining player acquisition resources for a rainy day? Or might he make it rain with an unexpected, Barkley-adjacent trump card, even though Garrett is no longer an option? Stay tuned.
It would be a disservice to say that the surprising NFC runners-up in 2024 are in run-it-back mode, even as the Washington Commanders busily re-sign LB Bobby Wagner, TE Zach Ertz and K Zane Gonzalez – moves that follow their pending acquisition of WR Deebo Samuel from the San Francisco 49ers. But with more than $72 million to spend, is there another splashy addition or two GM Adam Peters will make to continue maximizing the roster around wunderkind QB Jayden Daniels? Hendrickson would be a coup at a time when the Bengals may no longer have the option to come to their senses.
The Dallas Cowboys leaned forward financially for once, averting a franchise tag for blossoming DT Osa Odighizuwa by extending him ahead of that deadline. They also seemed to position themselves to be far more active in free agency after last season’s ‘all in’ debacle, restructuring 2024’s massive megadeals with WR CeeDee Lamb and QB Dak Prescott. But in the interim, by waiting to pay extension-eligible LB Micah Parsons, they’re back in their own version of Bengals mode, which could have cascading consequences on whatever their plans might have been otherwise.
The Giants don’t seem like they’ll be clawing out of last place in 2025. That doesn’t necessarily mean they won’t get better given they have more than $44 million to invest in roster improvement. The big question here is if and when they might aggressively pursue the No. 1 overall draft pick currently held by the Titans and whether that deal might be consummated amid whatever’s left to occur in the league’s free agent frenzy, or if Tennessee rookie GM Mike Borgonzi’s due diligence approach unfolds on his own timeline.
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