Going into the 2024 draft, the Philadelphia Eagles started with eight picks, but because of Howie Roseman’s addiction to trading picks, they ended with nine rookies. Right now, the Eagles only have seven picks in the 2025 draft.
They have a first, a second, a third, a fourth, and three fifth-round picks. It’s good that none of those are sixth or seventh-round picks, but everyone in the world knows that it won’t stay like this. Aside from trading his picks for more picks, Roseman also has some players that he could and should trade.
This could be another big offseason for the Quarterback Factory
Howie Roseman has a big opportunity ahead of him over the next couple of months. He’s got an edge rusher that didn’t work out, a backup quarterback who is as valuable as he will ever be, cornerbacks that aren’t necessarily needed… and a generational edge rusher in Cleveland who wants to play on a winning team. Howie SZN is coming.
Do something with Bryce Huff
Just to recap: In the 2023 offseason, the Eagles traded edge rusher Haason Reddick to the Jets. Then, in free agency, the Eagles paid Bryce Huff $17 million a year in the hopes that he would replace Reddick. Bryce Huff’s best game of the season came in Week 7 (against the Giants) where he had two tackles, five pressures, and one sack. On November 22, 2024, he went on the IR after he had surgery on his wrist. He missed Weeks 12 through 16 and came back in Week 17. In the postseason, he played a total of 13 defensive snaps, which were all in garbage time, and he was a healthy scratch in the Super Bowl. It’s been bad.
It’d be great if the Eagles were able to trade Huff, but that’s going to be a tough thing to do. He’s still got a whole lot of money left on his contract, and he’s just not good.
If there’s a way to spin this, it’s that Huff is one of those players who needs a change of scenery or to play for coaches he’s comfortable with. Luckily, his coaches from when he was with the New York Jets are defensive coordinators on two different teams now. That means it would check both boxes of that scenario.
Robert Saleh was his head coach, and Jeff Ulbrich was his defensive coordinator. Saleh is the defensive coordinator in San Francisco (again), and Ulbrich is the defensive coordinator in Atlanta.
The other issue is actually finding the value of Bryce Huff. There’s no way that the Eagles would get something remotely close to a third or fourth-round pick for him. The best bet for either of these trades would be a sixth, maybe a fifth-round pick, or a player-for-player trade.
Kenny Pickett conundrum
Kenny Pickett will never be more valuable than he is right now. He was the backup quarterback on a Super Bowl-winning team, he did just fine in the one game he started, and he’s still on his rookie contract.
It feels like the whole point of trading for Pickett was that the Eagles would try to flip him, and there’s no better time than now to do that, especially with Tanner McKee (who is better than Pickett) still on the team.
In college, my preferred currency was McDoubles and Natty Light. I thought of everything as, ‘Oh, a gallon of gas is two McDoubles’ and ‘I probably could buy that shirt, but that’s two cases of Natty.’ Howie Roseman is like that, but with draft picks, and Kenny Pickett would be a great way to get a handful of them.
The Eagles traded a 2024 third-round pick and two 2025 seventh-round picks for Kenny Pickett. It would be great if they were able to get the equivalent of those picks back, but there’s a chance they could get more.
There are a whole bunch of holes around the NFL at the QB1 and QB2 positions. ESPN’s Ben Solak predicts that the Rams would trade for him to be Matt Stafford’s backup, but with the news that Stafford and the Rams are going through it right now, that might not happen.
The Dolphins are also a team that perpetually needs a backup quarterback, given the volatility of Tua Tagovailoa’s brain health and his proclivity to break tackles the same way giraffes fight. They tried a combination of Tyler Huntley, Skylar Thompson, and Tim Boyle last year, and it really really didn’t work at all.
The Eagles could also trade Pickett to the Cleveland Browns. They’re a team that will seemingly never ever learn their lesson, and they could certainly be duped into thinking Kenny Pickett is going to be their guy while they faux-tank for yet another season. Also, they have Myles Garrett.
Get Myles Garrett
On February 3, 2025, Myles Garrett requested to be traded from the Cleveland Browns. It turns out that the six-time Pro Bowler, six-time All-Pro, and 2023 Defensive Player of the Year doesn’t want to keep losing in Cleveland. There’s a good chance that he could have a Saquon Barkley-esque resurgence, which is crazy because both of those guys were already super good with the teams that drafted them.
As soon as Garrett said he wanted to be traded, the online sentiment was, ‘Oh, Howie Roseman is going to get him to Philadelphia, isn’t he?’ And he absolutely should.
If Bryce Huff gets traded, Josh Sweat leaves in free agency, and Brandon Graham retires, the Eagles will only have Nolan Smith and Jalyx Hunt as their two edge rushers. Hunt looks like he’ll be good, but he’s not there yet. Myles Garrett has been, is, and will continue to be there.
Unfortunately, the Browns aren’t going to get rid of Garrett for chump change. The asking price could be two first-round draft picks, a first-round draft pick and a conditional second-round pick that could turn into a first, or a first and second-round pick, and also a player like Kenny Pickett.
The Browns could be smart and try to get Tanner McKee instead of Kenny Pickett, which would be worse for the Eagles, but putting any backup quarterback in a trade for Myles freaking Garrett is a universal success.
Kelee Ringo or Eli Ricks
The Eagles hit big-time on both Quinyon Mitchell and Cooper DeJean, so the cornerback room is in a pretty good spot… even if Darius Slay retires or goes to a different team. That means it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world if they traded Kelee Ringo or Eli Ricks.
Ringo is only 22 years old and going into his third season in the NFL. An incredibly young cornerback who is a veteran has to be super attractive to any team looking for help at the position. If Howie is looking to get some draft picks, Ringo could be a guy that leaves.
Ricks is a different deal. He’s a roster bubble guy who was inactive for 14 games in 2024. Sure, he’s a dude who offers some depth, but he’s maybe worth a seventh-round pick or something really late like that.
All in all, the Eagles have a lot of options for players they can trade away if they want to bolster the number of picks they have in the later rounds or if (fingers crossed) they go and get a perpetual superstar like Myles Garrett.
That being said, it’s almost impossible to predict Howie Roseman’s moves. There’s a reason he’s the best general manager in the NFL: His brain functions on a different level than every other person in the world. This is a guy who turned a broken Carson Wentz into DeVonta Smith, A.J. Brown, Jalen Carter, and Cooper DeJean … but then again, he also traded a third-round pick for Jahan Dotson, so who knows?