Commanders Trade Deadline This Week. Monday’s Status
Should they stay or should they go now. Players that are FAs next year.
Washington should be in a sell mode this week no matter how often MoRon Rivera keeps repeating his matra of, “there’s always next week.” His pipe dream of going 6–3 to finish the season with a winning record considering their schedule over the next 9 weeks is ridiculous. 5 of those games are against teams that are in 1st or 2nd place in their division and Washington can’t even beat teams with a losing record.
While Rivera has the final say in personel decisions at the moment hopefully Josh Harris and company will carefully review any choices considering how poorly Ron has managed the roster since he’s been in Washington.
DE Montez Sweat would return the best value in a trade but depending on how well the budget is managed he could be resigned next year but they’ll still have to dump some players to make it work. They might get a low 2nd pick from a contending team depending on how much interest there is but if it looks like they can’t sign him next year that value is going to drop.
DE Chase Young really wouldn’t yield much although it’s better than it was prior to the beginning of the season (about a 6th). I was hoping he’d play well enough to get something better by the trade deadline. He’s played OK but inconsistent and not worth trying to sign him next year considering who else they should be keeping and there’s depth at the position. At best a low 3rd round pick depending on how desperate a trade partner is to get him.
One would hope that even Rivera isn’t stupid enough to trade both of the defensive ends.
QB Jacoby Brissett would get very little and likely the Commanders need a QB back in trade unless Rivera is willing to risk Howell going out leaving them with Jake Fromm as their only other QB on the roster. Maybe a conditional 5th or lower depending on who they could get back in trade or just 1 of those 2. I doubt Jacoby would be inclined to resign with the Commanders next year anyway so a trade now would make sense although that’s a big roll of the dice if Howell gets injured.
How desperate are the Vikings to get a QB and how do they think Jacoby compares to the available FAs?
RB Antonio Gibson probably doesn’t get a new contract next year due to his ball security issues. Not much value for a draft pick but a young player in return that has some promise would be worth it, especially an LB or a G where they have zero depth. Rowboat Ron hasn’t addressed either position since he got to Washington. Please, no more aging veterans that have 5 minutes left in their career.
WR Curtis Samuel has played well but they might have shopped him before the season started to free up some cash ($10.6M) but they didn’t. With plenty of receivers on the roster they have the depth to do so.
SS Cam Kurl would be interesting taking into account how many teams would like to add his skill set to their roster. Although trading him would likely guarantee Washington losing most of the rest of their games as there’s nobody even close to replacing him.
CB Kendall Fuller has been their best corner this season but Washington is highly unlikely to sign him next year. It’s to imagine him getting over a 6th round pick or a backup player in return. The market isn’t there for him especially at his salary. Maybe they would take their healthy #1 and/or #2 pick CBs that aren’t seeing more than 5 snaps a game off the bench and use them if Fuller went.
LB Cody Barton is injured at the moment hasn’t stood out this year. They don’t have the depth to get rid of him anyway and may have to sign him next year because they just don’t have the manpower. But MoRon thinks having 6 LBs on the roster is still 4 too many, so who knows?
TE Logan Thomas works well in the Commanders system but probably not of much value to any other team and as an aging player with an injury history doesn’t help. Maybe get a deal where another team would pickup his contract with nothing else in return.
Focus on retaining Sweat and Kurl next year. Everyone else could go. As far as making some decent amount of cash available from FA trades, that’s it.
