{"id":843589,"date":"2026-03-30T20:32:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-30T20:32:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/843589\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T20:32:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-30T20:32:16","slug":"prized-free-agent-addition-named-carolina-panthers-most-overpaid-player","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/843589\/","title":{"rendered":"Prized free agent addition named Carolina Panthers&#8217; most overpaid player"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sportingnews.com\/us\/nfl\/carolina-panthers\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Carolina Panthers<\/a> made a big splash in free agency by stealing edge rusher Jaelan Phillips away from the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sportingnews.com\/us\/nfl\/philadelphia-eagles\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Philadelphia Eagles<\/a> on a massive deal.<\/p>\n<p>The addition of Phillips has the potential to reshape Carolina\u2019s defense, but did they overpay?<\/p>\n<p>Jaelan Phillips named Panthers&#8217; most overpaid player<\/p>\n<p>At least one person thinks they did, as <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/bleacherreport.com\/articles\/25411395-every-nfl-teams-most-overpaid-player-following-peak-2026-free-agency\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Brad Gagnon of Bleacher Report<\/a> recently named the newly-signed Phillips as Carolina\u2019s most overpaid player.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Phillips put up a top-20 PFF pass-rushing grade among qualified edge defenders in 2025, but he was limited to just two sacks in eight games with the Eagles as a rental, and injuries cost him the vast majority of 2023 and 2024 before the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sportingnews.com\/us\/nfl\/miami-dolphins\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Dolphins<\/a> bailed on him,&#8221; Gagnon wrote.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Considering the 26-year-old has never been a first- or second-team All-Pro or a Pro Bowler, it&#8217;s pretty wild that he&#8217;s just the 12th defensive player in the $30 million AAV club.&#8221;\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The Panthers may have overpaid to land Phillips, but that was likely the only way they were going to get him, as he had other suitors, including the Eagles, and ultimately his decision to sign with Carolina came down to the offer.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI have respect for them (the Eagles), and I don\u2019t want to disclose what they were offering or anything like that, but they definitely did want me to come back. That\u2019s something I knew after the season that they would be making a push, but ultimately, the Panthers just came with a more attractive offer,\u201d <a target=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.sportingnews.com\/us\/nfl\/philadelphia-eagles\/news\/jaelan-phillips-reveals-why-he-chose-panthers-over-eagles-free-agency\/0d1f5fb919ced7793834279d\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Phillips said<\/a>\u00a0of his decision to sign with Carolina.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat just shows the belief they have in me and the belief they have in their team that we\u2019re going to invest in to pieces that are going to take this team to the next level. It was kind of a no-brainer to come to the Panthers.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>This story will be updated.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>More NFL news:\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Carolina Panthers made a big splash in free agency by stealing edge rusher Jaelan Phillips away from&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":780389,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2075],"tags":[235,260,2567,7,6,236],"class_list":{"0":"post-843589","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-carolina-panthers","8":"tag-carolina","9":"tag-carolina-panthers","10":"tag-carolinapanthers","11":"tag-football","12":"tag-nfl","13":"tag-panthers"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116320032897080463","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/843589","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=843589"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/843589\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/780389"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=843589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=843589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=843589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}