After a frenetic week of free agent signings, trades and rescinded trades, the landscape of the NFL looks a lot different than it did last weekend.
But merely committing hundreds of millions of dollars to shake up a roster doesn’t mean it was necessarily money well spent.
Earlier this week we spotlighted our five favorite free agent signings — now it’s time to shine the light on the other end of that spectrum.
5 Most Questionable NFL Free Agent Signings
These are the five most questionable, head-scratching contracts doled out to NFL free agents.
1. Titans Sign WR Wan’Dale Robinson For Four Years, $78 Million ($38 Million Guaranteed)
Perhaps new Tennessee Titans offensive coordinator Brian Daboll forgot how his time in New York ended because the former Giants head coach decided to get the band back together in Nashville.
The Titans signed four of Daboll’s former Giants — including key cogs from his teams that went 5-22 in the last season and a half of his tenure there before being fired. More to the point, the Titans paid a few of them to the absolute peak of their potential. (Maybe Daboll wasn’t the influencer on all the moves, but the connection is hard to ignore).
That list includes Robinson, cornerback Cor’Dale Flott (three years, $45 million), center Austin Schlottman (two years, $9 million) and tight end Daniel Bellinger (three years, $24 million).
We can certainly wonder why Daboll felt compelled to overpay a backup tight end he barely used in New York (33 catches in 33 games over the last two seasons), but we’ll keep the focus on Robinson here.
Robinson got the second-biggest contract of any free agent wide receiver this year, both in terms of total value and average annual value. The overall list reflects that it was a thin free agent WR pool, which surely factored into the overpaying, but this is an absurd contract for a wide receiver whose previous career high was 699 yards before last season.
In 2025, Robinson did put together a career year with 92 catches for 1,014 yards and 4 TDs, but let’s consider the context. The Giants’ star receiver Malik Nabers sustained a season-ending knee injury in Week 4, leaving Robinson and solid but unspectacular veteran Darius Slayton leading one of the thinnest WR corps in the league.
With almost no competition for targets, Robinson only managed five games with more than 62 receiving yards all season. Another way to frame that is he was held to 55 yards or fewer in 10 of the 16 games he played — and held to 36 yards or fewer in six of those games.
That’s the guy now getting paid to be the No. 1 WR in Tennessee?
Make it make sense.
2. Bengals Sign EDGE Boye Mafe For Three Years, $60 Million ($19 Million Guaranteed)
The Cincinnati Bengals do know that Mafe wasn’t the MVP of the Super Bowl right? Or even a starter for the Seahawks? Right?
Nobody has made more money based on association/connection since Jason Kelce took his shirt off in a luxury box next to his more famous brother’s even more famous girlfriend Taylor Swift and suddenly became America’s most well-compensated endearing football goof.
Boye Mafe! $20 million a year! Goodness gracious, what is that contract if he didn’t play for the Super Bowl champs? Does he get even half that much?
Mafe’s role decreased each of the last three seasons in Seattle! His production went from 9 sacks in 2023 to 6 in 2024 and 2 this season while starting just 4 of 17 games. He had 5 total tackles, 0 tackles for loss, 0 sacks and 4 total pressures in the Seahawks’ three postseason games this year. He played 24 snaps with 1 tackle in the Super Bowl.
That’s who the Bengals broke the bank for after needing a prolonged contract standoff last year before giving former star edge rusher Trey Hendrickson $30 million coming off a season in which he led the NFL in sacks and was second in defensive player of the year voting.
The Ravens were happy to pounce on Hendrickson as a free agent and give him $28 million a year for four years while the Bengals’ answer to losing both Hendrickson and fellow edge rusher Joseph Ossai (to the Jets) was to pay a Seahawks backup 71 percent of that.
That’s the kind of decision-making that leads to three straight missed playoff appearances despite having one of the best offenses in football.
3. Raiders Sign EDGE Kwity Paye For Three Years, $48 Million ($32 Million Guaranteed)
We’re not even factoring the Maxx Crosby Saga into the evaluation here. When the Las Vegas Raiders signed Paye, they thought they were replacing their star edge rusher who they had traded to the Ravens for two first-round draft picks before Baltimore backed out of that deal.
So maybe they wouldn’t have been quite as aggressive in the spending on Paye, but that doesn’t justify the price in the first place!
Paye had 4 sacks and 6 tackles for loss total in 17 games for the Indianapolis Colts last season. He’s never had more than 8.5 sacks in a season. He had 0 sacks over the final six games last year as the Colts were trying to salvage a playoff berth. He had just 8 total tackles (6 of them assisted tackles) over the final five games as Indianapolis fell short.
Indeed, indeed.
4. Colts Re-sign WR Alec Pierce For Four Years, $114 Million ($84 Million Guaranteed)
We may be in the minority on this one, but hear us out …
Yes, Pierce was one of the most coveted free agents on the market. Yes, he led the NFL in yards per reception each of the past two seasons. Yes, he was going to get paid with a capital P by whichever team he landed with, so the outcome isn’t really a surprise.
It’s just … so much money for a wide receiver who’s never even had 50 receptions in a season through his four-year NFL career.
Per Spotrac, the $28.5 million average annual value on Pierce’s contract makes him the 11th highest-paid wide receiver in the league. The $60 million fully guaranteed ties for the fourth most behind established stars Justin Jefferson, Ja’Marr Chase and CeeDee Lamb, but per reports, the deal effectively includes $84 million in guaranteed money.
Every receiver ahead of Pierce on the AAV ranking has been a star, clear-cut No. 1 target with exception of Tee Higgins, the Bengals’ well-paid No. 2. The other questionable name in that top 10 is Brandon Aiyuk, who had an AAV of $30 million on a regrettable four-year, $120-million contract with the 49ers that he now won’t finish.
The rest of the WRs in that top 10 are Chase, Jefferson, Lamb, DK Metcalf, Garrett Wilson, Terry McLaurin, A.J. Brown and Amon-Ra St. Brown.
Even Aiyuk was coming off a pair of seasons in which he totaled 153 catches, 2,357 yards and 15 TDs. Wilson may look like an odd fit for the company as well, but he had three straight 1,000-yard seasons and was coming off a career-high 101 catches and 7 TDs for the Jets when he signed his extension last year.
Pierce is getting paid like he’s already one of those guys, and the reality is he hasn’t been and may never be on that level.
We’re not disputing that he’s an asset and a talented receiver, or that averaging 22.3 and 21.3 yards per reception the last two seasons is mighty impressive. It absolutely is.
But he only had two 100-yard games last season. He had six games with 2 or fewer catches.
Look at his catches-yards-touchdowns lines from the last eight games of the season to underscore the weekly volatility in his production: 4-84-1, 1-26-0, 4-78-1, 5-80-0, 1-16-0, 4-86-2, 0-0-0 (on 5 targets) and 4-132-2.
This is a big gamble for the Colts, and to make it happen they had to send former No. 1 WR Michael Pittman to the Pittsburgh Steelers. So now the pressure is on Pierce to prove he’s more than a specialized deep threat weapon and that he can be the volume producer that is expected of a No. 1 wideout.
5. Tennessee Titans Sign EDGE Jaelan Phillips For Four Years, $120 Million ($80 Million Guaranteed)
Much like Pierce, this one wasn’t a surprise because there had been so much buzz about Phillips being one of the top prizes on the free agent market. But groupthink doesn’t mean it’s necessarily correct.
It’s hard to understand why Phillips suddenly became perceived as 1980s Lawrence Taylor in signing the single biggest contract of free agency this year by both total value and average annual value.
He sure looks the part of a prototypical game wrecker off the edge at 6-foot-5, 266 pounds, and he did finish 9th in the NFL last season in total pressures (73), per PFF.
That’s all well and good and pressures change plays, but the big money normally goes to the pass rushers who most consistently finish those pressures and turn them into sacks.
Phillips is now the eighth-highest-paid edge rusher in terms of AAV at $30 million behind Micah Parsons, Aidan Hutchinson, T.J. Watt, Danielle Hunter, Myles Garrett, Maxx Crosby and Nick Bosa.
Let’s break down that list, shall we.
-Parsons is a three-time AP First-Team All-Pro selection, has finished top 3 in NFL Defensive Player of the Year voting in four of his five seasons and has had at least 12 sacks every year.
-Hutchinson had 14.5 sacks this season and finished fifth in defensive player of the year voting coming off a major injury.
-Watt has 115 career sacks, won DPoY once and finished top four in the voting four other years with four first-team All-Pro honors.
-Hunter has 114.5 career sacks and seven double-digit sack seasons.
-Garrett just broke the NFL single-season sack record with 23, has eight straight seasons with double-digit sacks, 125.5 for his career, two DPoY awards and five first-team All-Pro and two second-team All-Pro honors.
-Crosby has 69.5 career sacks, four double-digit sack seasons, five straight Pro Bowl nods and was briefly traded for two first-round draft picks before being sent back to the Raiders with that deal nixed.
-Bosa has 64.5 career sacks, led the NFL with 18.5 sacks one season while winning DPoY and has five Pro Bowl selections and one first-team All-Pro honor.
…
-Phillips has 28 career sacks in five seasons, set his career high with 8.5 as a rookie back in 2022, hasn’t matched that since while having two seasons undermined by injuries, had 5 sacks this season between the Miami Dolphins and Philadelphia Eagles and has never been to a Pro Bowl, named to an All-Pro team or factored into any awards voting.
One of those eight is simply not like the others in any way but contract cost.
Congrats to the free-spending Titans on somehow managing two of the five worst contracts of free agency and also one of the best (LB Devin Lloyd).
