We’ve got five days left. And a lot of things to get to, both including, and aside from, the Chiefs and Eagles …
• News of the day for Monday: Cleveland Browns star Myles Garrett publicly requested a trade.
And the fact it wasn’t news to Cleveland tells you where this thing is.
Garrett’s decision to go public with a request that’s been in for days reflects a couple of things. First, it’s that the Browns had already communicated to him they aren’t going to deal him—if they hadn’t, Garrett would’ve let things play out more quietly. Second, given the fact that this was done via written statement, this was planned out—and done with a purpose.
That purpose, to me, is to push the Browns to the ledge. Now, whether GM Andrew Berry wants to or not, calls are going to come in. He’ll get a real idea on Garrett’s value without having to lift a finger. And rather than have that come via a targeted circle of teams the Browns prefer to deal with, it’ll come from everyone.
So what’s Garrett’s value? In calling around over the last day, it’s pretty clear that the baseline is two first-round picks. That, of course, could be affected by how high a team’s first-rounder is—obviously, dealing a top-10 pick would mean adding a lot less additional compensation than if the centerpiece of the deal was in the 20s—but history tells us the Browns should be able to get two ones, and additional considerations.
Taking quarterbacks out of the equation, the closest recent comps would probably be cornerback Jalen Ramsey, offensive tackle Laremy Tunsil, outside linebacker Khalil Mack and safety Jamal Adams. Mack was the earliest of these deals and the return included two first-rounders, but with givebacks that brought the net a little below that sort of value. The Adams and Tunsil trades included other players, muddying the math a little, but included two ones with sweeteners beyond that. The Ramsey trade (to the Los Angeles Rams in 2019) brought back two ones and a four to Jacksonville.
Garrett, at 29, is older than all those guys were. You could also argue he's a better player than any of them. So, again, two ones and then some is a reasonable starting point, and one that was pretty much unanimously agreed on by the guys I texted with on Monday.
Now, that doesn’t mean Berry is going to trade him.
But, at the very least, he will get a chance to see what the return would be. Which, Garrett would hope, might end up motivating a deal.
• The Tom Brady influence has continued to wash over Las Vegas, and with a very clear theme as I see it—having the ex-Patriot and Buccaneer quarterback’s respect coming in is a factor.
New GM John Spytek, as we’ve detailed, ran Brady’s Tuesday personnel meetings for the three years Brady was in Tampa (along with Bucs director of player personnel Rob McCartney), and became an invaluable resource for him in readying for whichever opponent was in front of Tampa. Pete Carroll, of course, was on the other side of the seven-time champion quarterback in one of the greatest Super Bowls ever—falling with the Seahawks to Brady’s Patriots in the final minutes.
And at the coordinator level, holdover DC Pat Graham was with Brady in New England, and OC Chip Kelly, in a roundabout way, was responsible for Brady’s offense evolving. Just before Kelly went to the NFL, hired by the Eagles in 2013, he’d huddled with the Patriots staff to teach them his Oregon “blur” offense, that weaponized tempo and pace to obliterate Pac-12 (and Pac-10 before that) defenses.
New England adapted by simplifying its terminology, continuing to empower Brady to run the show from the line, and the Patriots rolled through the rest of the NFL, which struggled to keep up with the concepts of the college game. So the Raiders’ willingness to go the extra mile to land Kelly is, yes, in part Carroll’s admiration for his former rival. But it’s also Brady’s.
While we’re there, the Raiders also brought over Mark Thewes from the Broncos. Where Thewes did work with Spytek for three years in Denver, he also had a tie to Brady, in that Josh McDaniels, a high school buddy of his, brought him into the league in 2009. McDaniels and Brady remain very close.
So just months into his ownership, Brady’s fingerprints are all over the organization. He’ll still be living in Florida day-to-day and, as such, won’t be lording over the folks he helped put in place. In the words of one Vegas staffer, “He’s definitely involved, and he’s making an impact where he wants to be and feels like he needs to be.” In other words, he’ll be a powerful resource for the guys running it to have. In fact, he already has been one.
• It was interesting to see a player, rather than his team, get the news out that he’s on the trade block as Cooper Kupp did Monday. And good for him—it’s fair for Kupp to want to make sure people have his side and to have the chance to protect his legacy in Los Angeles.
That said, this is another one that didn’t come out of nowhere.
Back before the trade deadline, the Rams fielded calls (though they didn’t make calls) on the availability of Kupp. Their response was that it’d take at least what the New York Jets gave Vegas for Davante Adams (a third-rounder that could become a second) to pull Kupp away from the team that drafted him in Sean McVay’s first spring in charge. Their stance, at the time, was they couldn’t give away a franchise icon in-season.
Instead, they’ll have the chance to do it in the offseason. And Kupp has leverage.
He’s due a $7.5 million roster bonus in March and $5 million of it is already fully guaranteed. Throw in his $12.5 million base for 2025, and he’s on the books for $20 million next year. Good as his career has been, no one is paying that for a 31-year-old receiver coming off a 700-yard season who’s missed a total of 18 games the past three years, and hasn’t missed fewer than five in any single season since winning the triple crown and the Super Bowl in 2021.
So the Rams have to thread the needle of trading him to a team that he’s willing to renegotiate his deal with, with $5 million already locked in, and another $2.5 million coming if he’s still on the roster in mid-March. That, of course, will take cooperation from Kupp, and means, in all likelihood, the Rams having to take less for him than they’d like.
Why move on then? Well, I think part of it’s all this water under the bridge, and also that Kupp and Puka Nacua, as good as they are individually, are a little redundant to one another in what they bring to the receiver group.
• Andy Reid said at his press conference on Tuesday that he plans to coach in 2025, which is great news for both the Chiefs and the league.
“I enjoy being around the guys,” Reid said. “I enjoy the football games. You can’t put in the hours that we do and not enjoy it. So, I really love the game.”
It also will give Reid a chance to keep chasing history. As it stands, he’s three games behind Bill Belichick for the all-time playoff wins record—he’s at 28—and with a win Sunday, he’d be positioned to pass Belichick next season. Playoffs included, he’s at 301 wins, which is fourth all-time behind Don Shula (347), Belichick (333) and George Halas (324), which gives him a shot to move into second as soon as 2026.
Another first that I think is remarkable is that he’s the first coach ever to spend a decade leading two different franchises, now being 12 seasons in with the Chiefs after 14 leading the Eagles. Which has set him up to be the only coach ever to win 100 games with multiple teams.
Of course, his focus is on Sunday. There’s an opportunity there, too, to pull into a tie for second all-time in Super Bowl wins with Pittsburgh’s Chuck Noll, behind only Belichick.
• One element of Nick Caley’s hire as Houston Texans offensive coordinator that shouldn’t be overlooked—his ability to forge a trusting relationship with C.J. Stroud.
That’s long been one of Caley’s strengths. In New England, his first position-coach job was tight ends, making him Rob Gronkowski’s coach at a time when Gronkowski was already an all-time great—and at odds with Patriot management. He navigated that, and eventually moved on to Los Angeles where he was able to fit in with a completely new staff, and within a new system.
I think the “players, not plays” refrain applies to Caley’s coaching style. Because of that, and his ability to connect with people, I think Stroud will really like him.
• An element of Klint Kubiak’s hire in Seattle that got my attention was how detailed he showed himself to be in the interview, as he took the Seahawks’ crew through his scheme, his philosophy on situational football and his approach to fundamentals.
At times, that detail was missing last season with Ryan Grubb moving from the college game to the pros, in particular in the run game.
• New Patriots OC Josh McDaniels and Doug Marrone, hired last week to be the offensive line coach, are going to have a key relationship in making a reimagined New England scheme work. McDaniels has spent a lot of time over the past year with college programs, and some NFL teams, to try to work and make his system a little more user-friendly for young players. Now, he’ll meld that with some Marrone philosophy in the run game.
Marrone, by the way, is one of a number of hires on that side of the ball from outside the old Patriot family, with former coordinators Thomas Brown and Todd Downing in that category, too. The good news? The position coaches were motivated to take jobs with New England not just by their relationships with Mike Vrabel, but a desire to learn the McDaniels system.
• Three days in, this is the best Super Bowl city. There’s no way the wait for the next one (it was last here after the 2012 season) should be nearly as long.
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Examining Myles Garrett’s Value After His Trade Request.
