Monday, March 23, 2020
The 2020 Free Agency “Awards”
The Most Ballyhooed Signing Award — To the Buccaneers, for signing Tom Brady (as if you didn't know).
The Most Intriguing Signing Award — To the Bears, for signing Nick Foles.
The "Colossal Waste of Money" Award — To the Raiders, for signing Nelson Agholor, who probably dropped the pen half a dozen times while signing the one-year deal.
The "Il Vagabondo" Award — To Case Keenum, who signed with the Browns — his seventh different team.
The Ralph Kramden "I Stand on the 21st Amendment" Award — To the Eagles, a 4-3 team, who signed Javon Hargrave, a 3-4 nose tackle, for $39 million over three years, including $26 million fully guaranteed. Obviously someone was drunk at the time.
The "Second Chance" Award — To Marcus Mariota, who signed with the Raiders. Guess this is proof positive that Derek "Dude, Where's My" Carr has found his way into Jon Gruden's Roach Motel — where players check in, but they don't check out.
The Hertz "Rent-A-Player" Award — To the Colts, who signed 38-year-old Philip Rivers.
The "We Paid Way Too Much" Award — This one technically doesn't belong on this list because it involves a trade rather than a free-agent signing, but the Bills gave up their first-round pick this year, along with 2020 picks in the fifth and sixth rounds and a fourth-round pick in 2021 for Stephon Diggs — a wide receiver who ran a pedestrian 4.46 at the 2015 combine and has an even more pedestrian 12.7 yards per catch in his NFL career, proving that he didn't just have a bad day at the combine.
The "Forced Move" Award — To the Eagles, who traded for Darius Slay. They still need another shutdown corner, which will presumably arrive via the draft (the Lions received a third-round pick and a fifth-round pick from Philly).
The Best Player Retention Award — To the Cowboys, who re-signed Amari Cooper and slapped the franchise tag on Dak Prescott.
The Best Player Still Unsigned — Robby Anderson. Where might he go? Hint: he went to Temple.
The Most Useful Player Still Unsigned — Carlos Hyde. A lot of teams could use this hard-nosed RB who will move the chains on short yardage and punch it in close to the goal line. He would have to do it for his fifth different team, although his value does go up somewhat because the only comparable RB available in the draft is Boston College's A.J. Dillon.
The Damaged Goods Award — To the Falcons, for taking on Todd Gurley, arthritic knees and all.
"The Name's the Same" Award — To the Browns, for signing free-agent CB Kevin Johnson from Buffalo. A WR by the same name (who caught passes from Donovan McNabb at Syracuse, lucky him) was a second-round pick of The New Browns in 1999, their first year of existence.
The Do-Nothing Award — To the 49ers — the only team who so far has not signed a single free agent from another team, nor acquired a player from another team in a trade.
The Show Must Go on Award — To the NFL, which refuses to cancel or even postpone the draft.