{"id":864231,"date":"2026-04-11T20:39:53","date_gmt":"2026-04-11T20:39:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/864231\/"},"modified":"2026-04-11T20:39:53","modified_gmt":"2026-04-11T20:39:53","slug":"nfl-trade-rumors-were-right-about-packersand-chargers-could-be-next","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/864231\/","title":{"rendered":"NFL Trade Rumors Were Right About Packers\u2026And Chargers Could Be Next"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Los Angeles Chargers<\/a> are a team to watch on the NFL trade block right now.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Joe Hortiz and the Chargers have tried to play it close to the vest when it comes to trading Quentin Johnston<\/a>. But a new offensive coordinator with Mike McDaniel makes it tough to ignore before a frugal front office has to decide on a costly fifth-year option.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Elsewhere in the NFL, the Green Bay Packers traded away wide receiver Dontayvion Wicks<\/a> to the Philadelphia Eagles.\u00a0<\/p>\n

And believe it or not, there\u2019s quietly a pretty big link between that Packers-Eagles pre-draft trade and the Johnston and Chargers.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Chargers Quentin Johnston trade could happen soon\"Los<\/p>\n

Quentin Johnston | Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t about player comparisons and team needs, per se. It\u2019s about simple NFL reporting.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Back in early March, ESPN\u2019S Jeremy Fowler<\/a> dropped this little nugget about what he\u2019s hearing when it comes to NFL trade rumors:\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cAlso, Brown isn’t the only receiver potentially available. Baltimore’s Rashod Bateman, Los Angeles’ Quentin Johnston and Green Bay’s Dontayvion Wicks have come up in my talks. Teams have interest in Green Bay’s Jayden Reed, but I don’t sense the Packers would trade him at this point.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hey, there\u2019s Dontayvion Wicks. It took a bit, but Fowler\u2019s reporting around what he was hearing wound up true before teams even travel to the draft.\u00a0<\/p>\n

And Quentin Johnston\u2019s name is right there too.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Johnston increasingly feels like a guy with one foot out the door. Ladd McConkey is going to feature as the No. 1 in McDaniel\u2019s offense. They have a second-round investment in Tre Harris from last year and can\u2019t exactly just shove that aside.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Granted, Johnston was a first-round investment. But he\u2019s had three seasons to prove himself and still comes up with the same old struggles in terms of route trees and drops. He hauled in all of 51 of 85 passes last year while earning a 67.6 Pro Football Focus grade<\/a>, just inside the top 50 wideouts leaguewide.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Now the Chargers are supposed to turn around and pick up his fifth-year option of roughly $18 million<\/a> and just hope he fits in McDaniel\u2019s scheme?<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a reason Johnston\u2019s name has popped up from NFL insiders already. Whether it\u2019s the Chargers putting feelers out around the NFL or other teams just making some of these same logical connections, his name has buzz around it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

If one had to guess, a Johnston trade would happen during the NFL draft itself when the picks are flying. Hortiz loves his flexibility and moving up and down the board.\u00a0<\/p>\n

They\u2019re not going to get a great return for Johnston, but if it helps them move around the board for prospects they want and tack on a pick or two in a draft where they enter with just five picks, one has to imagine a deal goes down.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sign Up For the Chargers Daily Digest – OnSI\u2019s Free Los Angeles Chargers Newsletter<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Los Angeles Chargers are a team to watch on the NFL trade block right now.\u00a0 Joe Hortiz…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":864232,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2072],"tags":[7,41,345,2514,2513,6,428],"class_list":{"0":"post-864231","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-green-bay-packers","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-green-bay","10":"tag-green-bay-packers","11":"tag-greenbay","12":"tag-greenbaypackers","13":"tag-nfl","14":"tag-packers"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116388014058572222","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/864231","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=864231"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/864231\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/864232"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=864231"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=864231"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=864231"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}