Trading Osborn makes too much sense. He was a productive #3 WR in Minnesota the last three seasons, but he always seemed to be a one year rental to weather Bourne’s injury and maturation of whatever rookie they picked
unless he broke out and showed that he was worthy of a bigger role than the 53/615/5 he averaged those three years with the Vikings. He did the opposite of breaking out, Bourne is back, and the nerd stats say Polk has been doing very well but needs a QB to throw him the ball. I suppose Boutte working his way into the rotation is a bonus too.
The issue now is that the comp pick system is going to rule teams out, as trading for Osborn counts as a free agent addition and would cancel out comp picks that teams otherwise would get. He’s a 7th round comp pick value himself (meaning he’d cancel out a team’s lowest projected pick), so going off Korte’s projections, these are the teams that would be losing a comp pick in addition to whatever they traded for him:
3rd: Vikings
4th: Giants
5th: Bills
6th: Raiders, Seahawks
7th: Dolphins, Browns, Chiefs, Chargers, Packers, Saints, 49ers
Compensatory Picks | Over the Cap
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