NFL Free Agency is unpredictable at the best of times, but in the midst of a global pandemic 2020’s version has been even more bizarre.
Given that every other major sports league is on hiatus, the NFL forged through with its off-season with a “business as usual” mantra – except it wasn’t business as usual. Travel bans and social distancing meant players could not fly to meet with clubs in person and team doctors couldn’t conduct physicals. That could be the reason many free agents with checkered injury histories are still unsigned.
With all of that in mind, here are the early winners and losers of a free agency period we’ll likely never forget.
WINNERS
Tom Brady
Who is a bigger winner than Tom Brady? The six-time Super Bowl champion got a two-year deal for $50 million guaranteed that can get as high as $59 million after incentives. The $25 million per year is the highest average salary Brady has had in his career. He’s heading to a place with warm weather, no state income tax and two Pro Bowl receivers.
Make that two big Pro Bowl receivers.
Brady has zero pass TD attempts to a six-foot-five receiver in his entire illustrious career. The four wide receivers with the most career receptions from Brady are all under six-feet.
Brady’s new wideouts are big and elite. Mike Evans is six-five and Chris Godwin is six-one. Last season, the Bucs receivers racked up 642 receiving yards on tight-window throws (less than one yard of separation at the time of the catch), which ranked third in the NFL.
It’s time to bump Brady up in your fantasy draft queues.
Tampa Bay’s ticket office
Tampa Bay was 30th in attendance in 2019, averaging under 52,000 fans. This wasn’t a one off because they were a bad team: Tampa Bay’s best attendance rank in last decade was 26th.
Why? Because the Buccaneers have been bad for a while. Tampa Bay’s last 10-win season was 2010, and that Bucs team missed the post-season. Their last division title was 2007, as was their last playoff appearance. Their last playoff win was in 2002, the year the Bucs won the Super Bowl.
Brady could end all of those streaks, and early signs show fans believe he will. Lethargy amongst Bucs fans forced to watch a bad product wasn’t always the case. When the Buccaneers won the Super Bowl more than 17 years ago, they had 100,000 people on their season-ticket waiting list.
Tampa Bay is hosting the Super Bowl this year and could be the first team to play in a Super Bowl as host. The buzz is back in The Bay.
AFC East
The AFC East is up for grabs. The mystique of Brady no longer will torment an entire division.
Since 2001, Tom Brady’s first season as a starter, TB12 has as many wins in the Super Bowl as all other AFC East starting quarterbacks have post-season wins over that period of time. Brady has won 17 AFC East titles since 2001 while the rest of the division has combined for two. The Patriots have won 11 straight division crowns and never finished worse than second with Brady as starter (2002).
But now it’s time for the other AFC East teams to step up.
The Buffalo Bills played the Patriots tough twice last year and the Miami Dolphins beat New England the last time they played, pushing the Patriots out of a first-round bye. Both the Bills and Dolphins have been aggressive this off-season and could challenge New England for the automatic playoff berth that comes with winning the division.
Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen, centre, runs with the ball as New England Patriots defenders Joejuan Williams, left, and Duron Harmon, right, give chase in the second half, Saturday, Dec. 21, 2019, in Foxborough, Mass. (Steven Senne/AP)
Teddy Bridgewater
Not only did Bridgewater come back from a career-threatening injury to become a starter who garnered a lucrative contract, he bet on himself and won.
Last off-season, Bridgewater turned down a contract offer with Miami and the chance to play in his hometown, choosing instead to stay in New Orleans as a backup, waiting for the perfect fit.
When he got his opportunity this season, he balled out and went 5-0 as a starter. He was rewarded with a three-year, $63-million deal from the Carolina Panthers.
Despite now being the divisional rival of his former team, Carolina is a great fit for Bridgewater as the new offensive coordinator in Carolina, Joe Brady, was an assistant in New Orleans two years ago and knows Bridgewater well.
We expect Bridgewater’s .647 win percentage, fourth-best since 2014, to go up during his time in Carolina.
Darius Slay
Big Play Slay never hid his desire for the Detroit Lions to trade him, and trade him they did.
He’s a winner not just because he got his wish, but also because he got paid. Slay agreed to 3-year, $50-million extension with the Philadelphia Eagles after being acquired from Detroit. The average value of the deal is $16.7 million, making him the highest paid corner per year in the league.
The raise is well-deserved. Slay is one of three defensive backs to be selected to the Pro Bowl in each of the last three seasons. Over the last three seasons, he has 52 per cent completion rate allowed as the nearest defender, third best in the NFL. He covers No. 1 receivers exclusively, and last year had a 50 per cent completion rate allowed against Pro Bowl wideout.
That’s what he’ll be called to do in the NFC East by the Eagles, which is why they are also winners here. Slay limited Amari Cooper to just two catches in Week 11 last season. Philadelphia needs Slay badly as the team’s corners were injured and inept last year – the Eagles allowed 11 30-yard touchdowns in the air last season, 10 of which were to perimeter receivers. That’s more than twice as many as any other defence.
In this Dec. 22, 2019 photo, Detroit Lions cornerback Darius Slay (23) knocks away a pass in the end zone intended for Denver Broncos wide receiver Courtland Sutton (14) during the second half in Denver. (David Zalubowski/AP)
Detroit Lions
The Slay trade was actually mutually beneficial. Detroit gives up their best player on defence, but they are more than one player away from contention and gets third- and fifth-round picks in return for Slay.
The Lions now have nine picks in the upcoming draft, including four of the top 85. They need to stockpile talent to improve the roster as head coach Matt Patricia looks to turn the team into a contender. He’s already put his stamp on the team, as the Lions have seven former Patriots on their team and only six Lions who were on the roster before Patricia took over ahead of the 2018 season. But big improvements need to be made, and more draft picks are the key.
Detroit is desperately trying to rebuild the culture of the team and improve the talent. The Slay trade, if the Lions draft well, will help them do that.
Nick Foles
Just 14 months ago, Nick Foles was beating the Chicago Bears in the playoffs. Now he’s been brought in as the saviour to help them get back there.
Foles has four playoff wins as a starter. The Bears have four as a franchise since 1991. In total, 23 starting quarterbacks have played for Chicago since 2000, the second-most by any team in that span behind only the Cleveland Browns.
Foles’ tenure in Jacksonville started off poorly as he suffered a broken clavicle in the first game of his Jaguars career and was 0-4 as a starting quarterback last season when he returned. But, when healthy, Foles has proven to be a winner. He is 26-22 as a starter and a Super Bowl LII MVP.
Now Foles could join Jim McMahon and Trent Dilfer as the only Super Bowl-winning QBs to start for five teams. And he’s back in the offence he played well in as Bears head coach Matt Nagy was with the Chiefs and Eagles when Foles played for those teams. Bears offensive coordinator Bill Lazor and QB coach John DeFilippo also both coached Foles with the Eagles and are now reuniting with him in Chicago.
LOSERS
Los Angeles Rams
The Rams have gone from Super Bowl contender to troubled times in a short period of time.
General manager Les Snead and coach Sean McVay are being forced to revamp L.A.’s lineup because they have mismanaged the salary cap and have failed to hit on players in the draft. Not only did they have to cut their starting running back in Todd Gurley before $10.5 million was guaranteed on his contract on Thursday, their defence was decimated this off-season as they’ve said goodbye to Dante Fowler Jr., Cory Littleton, Michael Brockers, Clay Matthews and Nickell Robey-Coleman.
All the Rams have been able to add to replace them with thus far is Leonard Floyd and A’Shawn Robinson.
Highly paid running backs
I don’t want to place a specific name to this because this is bigger than one player and is a sign of the trend happening at the position, but it’s clear now: it’s not a good investment to pay elite running backs.
The aforementioned Gurley is the latest and greatest example. He scored 21 total touchdowns in 2018 and was rewarded by the Rams that July as the team made him the highest-paid player at his position and gave him $45 million guaranteed.
A year before Gurley was made the highest-paid back in the league, Devonta Freeman had that distinction.
Both players were released this week after their teams couldn’t find a trade partner. Gurley is just 25 years old and Freeman is 28.
Gurley was great. He is one of five players in NFL history with 70 or more touchdowns in their first five seasons. But an arthritic knee and drop in his workload made him expendable. He rushed for just 57.1 yards per game in 2019, 21st in the league, and had zero 100-yard rushing games.
Gurley was also one of four running backs making at least $13 million last year. Among them, only Ezekiel Elliott rushed for more than 1,000 yards, putting up 1,357 yards while making $15 million. Gurley made $14.4 million and rushed for 857 yards. Le’Veon Bell rushed for 789 yards and had a career-low three touchdowns for $13.1 million. David Johnson put up 345 yards and made $13 million.
Gurley and Johnson are already on new teams and there are rumours Bell could be on the move as well. None of their teams made the playoffs.
While the argument can be made that you need an elite runner to win, you definitely shouldn’t pay one big money.
Los Angeles Rams running back Todd Gurley celebrates after scoring a touchdown. (Scott Eklund/AP)
Melvin Gordon
Gordon bet on himself and lost. The league figured out the trend outlined above before Gordon got his market-setting payday.
The 2019 NFL season started with Gordon holding out for a long-term contract. Gordon missed four games and sat out nine total weeks, including training camp. The absence seemed to hurt Gordon as he put up just 3.8 yards per rush and eight rush touchdowns in 2019 when he ended his holdout without a deal.
Gordon turns 27 next month, so that big payday he was hoping for now will likely never come. After putting up just 612 rush yards in 2019, Gordon ended up settling for a two-year deal worth $16 million dollars from the Denver Broncos.
Jameis Winston
There’s no shame in being replaced by the best quarterback of all-time, but it’s not ideal that after being the first-overall pick in 2015 and now at the age of 25, Winston is an unrestricted free agent still searching for a new team.
Last season Winston put up 33 passing touchdowns, second-most in the league, but coupled those scores with 30 interceptions, seven of which were pick-sixes.
Despite plenty of opportunities, Winston is just 28-42 in his career as a starter. His style of play isn’t conducive to winning football. The top seven NFL teams in turnover differential all made the playoffs. Meanwhile, Winston has 23 more turnovers than anybody since 2015.
It’ll be tough for a team to talk itself into signing Winston, especially when it can’t meet with him in person to have him explain away his on-field decision-making or off-field indiscretions.
Mitchell Trubisky
If Foles is a winner, Mitchell Trubisky has to be a loser by default.
It’s not just that Trubisky was the second pick in the 2017 draft ahead of both Deshaun Watson and Patrick Mahomes and is already on the verge of being replaced, it’s that the Bears traded up to get him. After all that, Trubisky has just one winning season and one playoff appearance as a starter despite the Bears boasting a championship-level defence ready to win now.
Former first-overall picks Cam Newton and Jameis Winston are looking for work right now and they have more accomplished resumes than Trubisky. If Trubisky doesn’t prove he can be a solid starter and hold off Foles in the inevitable Windy City QB Battle, he’ll be the next pivot looking for work.
TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — Lamar Jackson threw for 281 yards and five touchdowns, helping the Baltimore Ravens overcome an early double-digit deficit and extend their National Football League winning streak to five games with a 41-31 victory Monday night over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, who lost their top two receivers to injuries.
The two-time NFL MVP improved to 23-1 against NFC teams, the best mark by a quarterback against an opposing conference in NFL history. He’s 3-0 against the Bucs (4-3), who faded after taking a 10-0 lead with help from the 100th TD reception of Mike Evans’ career.
Evans departed with a hamstring injury after Baker Mayfield tried to connect with him in the end zone again, and late in the fourth quarter with the game out of reach, leading Bucs receiver Chris Godwin was carted off the field with a left ankle injury. ESPN declined to show replays of Godwin’s injury, which appeared to be severe.
Jackson completed 17 of 22 passes without an interception, including TD throws of nine and four yards to Mark Andrews. He also tossed scoring passes of 49 yards to Rashod Bateman, 18 yards to Justice Hill and 11 yards to Derrick Henry, who rushed for 169 yards on 15 carries. Bateman had four catches for 121 yards.
The Ravens (5-2) rebounded from a slow start on defence, with cornerback Marlon Humphrey turning the game around with a pair of second-quarter interceptions — one of them in the Baltimore end zone. Jackson led a four-play, 80-yard TD drive after the first pick, and the second interception set up Justin Tucker’s 28-yard field goal for a 17-10 halftime lead.
Elsewhere in the NFL:
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CARDINALS 17 CHARGERS 15
GLENDALE, Ariz. (AP) — Kyler Murray ran for a 44-yard touchdown and led the Cardinals on a drive that set up Chad Ryland’s 32-yard field goal as time expired, and Arizona rallied for a win over Los Angeles.
Cameron Dicker kicked his fifth field goal of the night — this one from 40 yards — to give the Chargers a 15-14 lead with 1:54 left. But the Cardinals (3-4) quickly moved into field goal range, aided by an unnecessary roughness call on Cam Hart that cost Los Angeles (3-3) 15 yards.
Arizona followed that with a bruising 33-yard run by James Conner, who finished with 101 yards on the ground. That eventually set up Ryland’s short field goal and a Cardinals celebration.
It was a frustrating night for the Chargers’ offence, which gained 395 yards but couldn’t find the end zone. Justin Herbert completed 27 of 39 passes for 349 yards.
Dicker booted field goals of 59, 50, 28, 47 and 40 yards, the first of which tied a franchise record for distance.
Murray ran for a spectacular touchdown early in the fourth quarter, rolling to his left before turning on the jets, beating safety Junior Colston to the sideline and then coasting into the end zone for a 14-9 lead.
It was Murray’s second long touchdown run in three weeks after he scored on a 50-yard sprint against San Francisco. It was also Murray’s 20th career game with a touchdown pass and run.
Murray completed 14 of 26 passes for 145 yards, one touchdown and one interception.
VANCOUVER – The Vancouver Whitecaps have been here before — literally and figuratively.
With the season hanging in the balance, the ‘Caps were dealt a blow last week when the club learned it wouldn’t be able to play a post-season wild-card game in its home stadium, B.C. Place, due to a scheduling conflict.
The Whitecaps ceded home field advantage to their regional rival, the Portland Timbers. The two clubs will battle for the final playoff spot in Major League Soccer’s Western Conference in Oregon on Wednesday.
The winner will face No. 1-seed Los Angeles FC in a best-of-three first-round series, starting Sunday.
An unforeseen hurdle like a change of venues is nothing new for the ‘Caps, said defender Ranko Veselinovic, who was part of the team that was forced to relocate first to Portland, then Utah during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“It feels that always something happens for us, but it is what it is. So far, we’ve managed to always find solutions for those situations,” said the Serbian centre back. “But I hope this team can find it one more time, because we need it this time. And it will be a really nice feeling in those circumstances to go in, win and go face L.A. in the next round.”
Vancouver (13-13-8) heads into the post-season winless in its last seven MLS games and with losses in four straight after dropping a 2-1 road decision to Real Salt Lake on Saturday.
The skid followed a run that saw the club go 4-1-3 across all competitions between late August and late September.
There’s just one way to return to that level, said Whitecaps head coach Vanni Sartini.
“The work is the only way to do it. Try to put the work in and try to put the team in a way that they’re going to regain the form and the way that they were in the past,” he said.
Despite the final score, Sartini has seen positives in the way his team played in its two most recent losses.
“I think already we turned the corner,” he said. “And we start from there to build and build and build.”
Facing challenges together can help a team build, whether it’s a winless skid or an unexpected hurdle, said Vancouver’s captain Ryan Gauld.
“When you’re going through adversity, that’s when people start to raise their voice a little bit. You get good when the problems arise, you get a lot of people coming together to make sure we get out of it,” said the Scottish attacking midfielder.
“And we’ve had a tough time the last few games, but everyone’s aware of the fact that we’re a much better team than we’ve shown, and we need to find a way to get back to doing what we’re good at.”
The ‘Caps face a familiar foe in the Timbers (12-11-11).
The two sides have already met three times this season, with each coming out of the series with a win, a loss and a draw.
Portland has also struggled in recent weeks and are winless in their last five MLS outings (0-1-4).
The Timbers boast one of the league’s top offensive units, though, with threats such as Evander. The Brazilian midfielder notched 15 goals and 19 assists during the regular season.
To earn a win on Wednesday, the Whitecaps must be solid defensively, Gauld said.
“They must be one of the best attacks in the league. They have a lot of good players, and they can hurt you if you switch off,” he said. “So just being concentrated from the first whistle, and just being hard to beat, being stuffy. Just being on it for the full 90 minutes.”
A victory in the wild-card match would guarantee Vancouver at least one home playoff game, a factor that Sartini said would be a big reward for his group.
The entire team relished the experience of playing post-season soccer in front of more than 30,000 fans last year, the coach said, and the desire to repeat the feat is high as the club heads to Portland.
“Everyone is happy to be in the playoffs. So we don’t have to be moody to be in the playoff. And we go in there, we’re play one of our rivals. So it’s gonna be a nice game to show up and to play our best game possible.”
VANCOUVER WHITECAPS (13-13-8) AT PORTLAND TIMBERS (12-11-11)
Wednesday, Providence Park
HISTORY BOOKS: This will mark the seventh all-time post-season meeting between the Timbers and ‘Caps, dating back to 1975. The last time the two clubs squared off in a playoff game was during the Western Conference semifinal in 2015. Portland won the two-game aggregate series and went on to hoist the MLS Cup.
ROAD WARRIORS: The ‘Caps boasted a 7-6-4 record on the road during regular-season play — better than the 6-7-4 showing they posted at B.C. Place.
POST-SEASON PARTY: Wednesday will mark the first time the Timbers have hosted a post-season game since 2021.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 22, 2024.
GLASGOW, Scotland (AP) — Scotland conceived rugby sevens in the 1880s yet it will not feature in the scaled-back 2026 Commonwealth Games hosted by Glasgow.
Other sports that have also been dropped include field hockey, triathlon, badminton, Twenty20 cricket, squash, and diving.
The Games will have a 10-sport program in four venues. Athletics and swimming are compulsory while there will also be track cycling, gymnastics, netball, weightlifting, boxing, judo, bowls and 3×3 basketball.
There will also be integrated para events in six of those sports: Athletics, swimming, track cycling, weightlifting, bowls and basketball.
The Games will take place from July 23-Aug. 2 after Glasgow stepped in when the Australian state of Victoria withdrew last year because of rising costs.
It was not easy to decide which sports to include, Commonwealth Games Scotland chairman Ian Reid told the BBC on Tuesday.
“I think everybody recognises that these events need to be more affordable, lighter and we would have loved to have all of our sports and all of our athletes competing but unfortunately it’s just not deliverable or affordable for this time frame,” Reid said.
Athletes and support staff will be housed in hotels. Around 3,000 athletes are expected to compete from up to 74 Commonwealth nations and territories representing a combined total of 2.5 billion people, a third of the world’s entire population.
More than 500,000 tickets made available for spectators.
The Commonwealth Games Federation chief executive Katie Sadleir said: “The 2026 Games will be a bridge to the Commonwealth Games of tomorrow, an exciting first step in our journey to reset and redefine the Games as a truly collaborative, flexible and sustainable model for the future that minimises costs, reduces the environmental footprint, and enhances social impact. In doing so, increasing the scope of countries capable of hosting.”
Glasgow hosted the event in 2014 at a cost of more than 540 million pounds.
