Reacting to a Quiet NFL Trade Deadline
Josh Frey
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If you want more trade deadline talk, check out Jay Strack’s article on vikingsterritory.com!
Coming into the weekend, there were plenty of names floated around in trade talks. They included players like Sam Darnold, Anthony Harris, Will Fuller, and Stephon Gilmore, but none of them were traded come Tuesday’s 4 PM EST deadline.
In fact, very few moves were made at all on Tuesday. The biggest trade of the day was Isaiah Ford being moved from Miami to New England, giving the Patriots some needed help at wide receiver. A quiet deadline was beneficial to a few teams, but it also may prove detrimental to some others.
There are obvious teams that should have made moves like Green Bay or New England, but I am going to avoid talking about them because we’ve already heard those storylines. Instead, I have four other teams in mind, two that benefit from a quiet deadline and two that don’t.
New York Giants
There were a few rumors around tight end Evan Engram, but nothing came to fruition. The Giants lack of moves is a great thing for them. They don’t need to move off anyone. As we saw Monday night, this Giants team will compete and is not afraid of any team, not even a Super Bowl contender led by Tom Brady.
Daniel Jones, while still raw, is absolutely skilled as a passer. Sure, he makes some mistakes, but you expect that from young quarterbacks not named Pat Mahomes. Engram is a dynamic player that can block, catch, and run so keeping him is great for this team. And, we haven’t even mentioned the best player on this team, Saquon Barkley.
The Giants have held double digit leads in each of their last three losses, but because of a lack of a running game, they’ve been unable to hold onto them. With Barkley coming back next year, it’ll be much easier to develop that much needed aspect of their offense. There is no reason the Giants can’t win the NFC East next year with this core, and I’m ecstatic they kept it intact.
Houston Texans
Learn from history, so you don’t repeat it. Many people expected wide receiver Will Fuller to get traded to Green Bay on Tuesday, but that obviously did not happen. Rightly so, in my opinion. Houston was very clear that they wanted a second round pick in order to part with Fuller, but the Packers were unwilling to provide that.
In the offseason, Houston made the heinous mistake of selling DeAndre Hopkins for pennies on the dollar, and they were right to avoid making that same mistake at the deadline. If Fuller does walk in free agency, Houston will likely be rewarded a compensatory pick anyway, so better to leave Deshaun Watson with his lead receiver.
Baltimore Ravens
Everybody spends so much time talking about Lamar Jackson as a runner that we forget to talk about the fact that he has to throw the ball too. In tight end Mark Andrews, he has a great red zone target, but outside of that, who can he really consistently rely on? The Ravens have been weak at the wide receiver position, with just four touchdowns caught by wideouts this season, and the deadline was an opportunity to improve.
Willie Snead has regressed this year, and Marquise Brown is a fine number two or three receiver, but his 61% catch rate is not good enough to be the number one target. Baltimore could have benefited greatly from getting Fuller, Jamison Crowder, or any other receivers that were available.
Sure, they grabbed Yannick Ngakoue from the Vikings to add to their pass rush, but that should not have been the end of their activity to make a Super Bowl push this year.
Las Vegas Raiders
If there was a time for the Raiders to firmly cement themselves in the playoff discussion, it was the trade deadline. The offense has not been the issue as Josh Jacobs has been great in the run game and Derek Carr is on pace to set career-highs in completion percentage, yards, and touchdowns all while on pace for a career-low in interceptions.
Instead, the defense has been the Achilles heel. They enter week nine with a defense that has not been very dynamic, forcing a league-low four turnovers. Given the fact that Yannick Ngakoue, Desmond King, Everson Griffen, and Carlos Dunlap were all dealt last week, there were players to acquire if they just went out and got them.