{"id":801849,"date":"2026-03-09T07:12:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-09T07:12:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/801849\/"},"modified":"2026-03-09T07:12:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-09T07:12:13","slug":"nfl-free-agency-grades-2026-live-analysis-of-every-free-agent-signing-and-trade","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/801849\/","title":{"rendered":"NFL free agency grades 2026: Live analysis of every free agent signing and trade"},"content":{"rendered":"

NFL free agency grades 2026: Live analysis of every free agent signing and trade<\/a> originally appeared on The Sporting News<\/a>. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

JUMP TO:Grading top 100 free agents\u00a0|\u00a0Grading other free agents<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0Grading trades<\/a><\/p>\n

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The NFL’s annual free agency and trade bonanza is here for 2026 with the open negotiations (aka “legal tampering” period) starting at noon Monday, March 9, and the new league year going into effect at 4 p.m. ET on Wednesday, March 11.<\/p>\n

Although several free agents are and will be staying off the market, either re-signed or franchise-tagged by their teams, most will change clubs by either agreeing to terms with another team or being traded.<\/p>\n

Sporting News once again is providing the latest analysis of the most significant moves. Keep track of all the key signings and trades during the 2026 NFL free-agency below:<\/p>\n

NFL free agency grades 2026: Key signings and trades<\/p>\n

BEST FREE AGENTS BY POSITION:\u00a0QBs<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0RBs<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0WRs<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0Defense<\/p>\n

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Grading top 100 overall free agent<\/a> signings<\/p>\n

This section will be updated with free agent signings<\/p>\n

Grading other key free agent signings<\/p>\n

This section will be updated with free agent signings<\/p>\n

Grading notable player trades<\/p>\n

Texans trade for RB David Montgomery (Lions)<\/a> | Grade: A<\/p>\n

Montgomery gives Houston a much-needed starter with strong power running and reliable work in the passing game. This cleans up some inefficiency and injury mess from last season’s backfield with Montgomery pairing with Woody Marks.<\/p>\n

Bills trade for WR D.J. Moore (Bears)<\/a> | Grade: A-<\/p>\n

Moore gives the Bills<\/a> much-needed savvy and durable No. 1 intermediate-to-deep receiver to help Josh Allen, feeling like that was worth a second-round draft pick. Moore also has familiarity with Joe Brady’s offense from their Panthers<\/a>‘ days together.<\/p>\n

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Rams trade for CB Trent McDuffie<\/a> (Chiefs) | Grade: A-<\/p>\n

McDuffie would be too pricey for the Chiefs<\/a> to extend before 2027 free agency and they have a history of feeling good about re-loading at corner (see L’Jarius Sneed). The\u00a0Rams<\/a>, however, have a shorter winning window and went hard after their top need.<\/p>\n

Franchise- and transition-tagged players<\/p>\n

Colts QB Daniel Jones (transition tag, $37.88M)<\/p>\n

Jets RB Breece Hall (non-exclusive franchise tag, $14.293M)<\/p>\n

Cowboys WR George Pickens (non-exclusive franchise tag, $27.298M)<\/p>\n

Falcons TE Kyle Pitts (non-exclusive franchise tag, $15.045M)<\/p>\n

This is another small group after only Chiefs guard Trey Smith and Bengals<\/a> wide receiver Tee Higgins were franchise-tagged last year. Both Smith and Higgins ended up with long-term extensions with the tag being used as intended as place-holders.<\/p>\n

Although Hall, Pickens and Pitts can still be on the move, it’s unlikely they are. Jones is not as protected with his lesser-valued tag, he still should stay put with a long-term deal, too.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NFL free agency grades 2026: Live analysis of every free agent signing and trade originally appeared on The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":801850,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3],"tags":[228,112341,487,2498,2772,597,7,32472,4609,194,2714,467,221,872,6153,6,5645,2978,4223,1216,2931],"class_list":{"0":"post-801849","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nfl","8":"tag-bengals","9":"tag-bills-trade","10":"tag-breece-hall","11":"tag-d-j-moore","12":"tag-daniel-jones","13":"tag-david-montgomery","14":"tag-football","15":"tag-franchise-tag","16":"tag-free-agency","17":"tag-free-agent","18":"tag-free-agents","19":"tag-george-pickens","20":"tag-houston","21":"tag-josh-allen","22":"tag-kyle-pitts","23":"tag-nfl","24":"tag-sporting-news","25":"tag-tee-higgins","26":"tag-trent-mcduffie","27":"tag-trey-smith","28":"tag-woody-marks"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116197978466349803","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/801849","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=801849"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/801849\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/801850"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=801849"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=801849"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=801849"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}