a quick look at 2026 FA

[ScottishPatriot]

We should be all over Reed Blankenship. Eagles almost never re-sign vet DBs, and we have self-sabotaged our safety depth this year. He isn’t even that old, but if he hits FA, we should jump at the chance. Same with their LB Nakobe Dean, although I think they’re more likely to sign him up.

 

[rabidfireweasel]

This. I've been posting about Pitts. Talented, WR skills as a TE..and just hasn't lived up to his draft billing. However Give me the "talents " of Pitts all day.... Pitts with Drake and JMD would give LBs fits. Offer Pitts a 3 yr 24M deal.. I say..

This is classic, offseason Patsfans talk. This guy is awesome, incredible talent. I would offer him $250,000 more dollars per year than Minnesota’s Back up TE, Josh Oliver and less than Mike Gesicki. I’m sure he’ll take that!”

Kyle Pitts will get a contract that on paper is at least 12M a year.

 

[Real fan 02]

This is classic, offseason Patsfans talk. This guy is awesome, incredible talent. I would offer him $250,000 more dollars per year than Minnesota’s Back up TE, Josh Oliver and less than Mike Gesicki. I’m sure he’ll take that!”

Kyle Pitts will get a contract that on paper is at least 12M a year.

Yeah.. it's just all woulda, coulda, shoulda, talk right now on the hopes of FA.. of course as fans we would like all the good players to come here.. but realistically your probably right on pitts.

 

[Huckleberry1]

The most obvious move is to sign the best available LG in free agency & move Wilson to C. Until they do that it won’t matter who they have running the ball up the middle. David Edwards is a FA & would weaken the Bills in the process. Solidifying the OL longterm should be the main priority while Maye is on a rookie deal.

I agree, creating the best interior OL in football should be the priority. Not only would it allow them to punish teams inside and out with the run, but it would make dealing with Drake Maye brutal. If he can step up into a clean pocket teams opposing defenses will be completely screwed. They could spend heavily at OG and Center and then focus heavily on defense with the rest of their resources, which are plentiful. Or they could spend for either a guard or center, then take the other the first 2 days of the draft.

 

[The Gr8est]

Fair points, but to me the best way to disrupt a great quarterback is tight at him, and having a guy like Lindebaum there makes that much more difficult for defenses. As for Garrett it's always going to take multiple 1st round picks. I think their best route to get Edge rushers is going to be to draft and develop them, same goes for WR. Free agency's seriously lacking at both positions, and trades cost too much. I would re-sign Chiasson and possibly try to find another player like him, as well as drafting multiple Edge players.

I believe strongly in building the best OL possible, they have their franchise LT, and a good young player in Wilson, an All Pro center would go a long way to that goal.

The rest of the league should tremble at the idea that Drake can regularly step up into a clean pocket.

The Omissioner would strip the Pats of a 1st rounder now and get back to us once they’ve determined what our offense was.

 

[The Gr8est]

I expect both Lampe and Larison to be in camp competing for spots on next years roster.

We could have really used both of them this year, especially Larison with what the Pats have been forced to use.

 

[p8ryts]

We could have really used both of them this year, especially Larison with what the Pats have been forced to use.

I hope he turns out to be as good as you seem to think he is.

 

[Toofy]

Is it more a bradberry thing that the run is being so stuffed on inside ? What about on right side with onwenu and bradberry ?

 

[TommyD4207]

Is it more a bradberry thing that the run is being so stuffed on inside ? What about on right side with onwenu and bradberry ?

Wilson had a much better game last week, both he and Campbell have been playing on gimpy ankles for several weeks, hopefully the extra couple of days helps.

Bradbury-Onwenu-Moses seems to be a lost cause when it comes to high-level run blocking.

It's still so much better than last year, even when they're kind of bad.

 

[Toofy]

Wilson had a much better game last week, both he and Campbell have been playing on gimpy ankles for several weeks, hopefully the extra couple of days helps.

Bradbury-Onwenu-Moses seems to be a lost cause when it comes to high-level run blocking.

It's still so much better than last year, even when they're kind of bad.

i hope Bryant pans out so that we can get two guards with our 2nd and 3rd/4th rounders who can replace bradberry and onwenu while Wilson moved to center and becomes our linderbaum .

 

[VrabelJr]

Wilson had a much better game last week, both he and Campbell have been playing on gimpy ankles for several weeks, hopefully the extra couple of days helps.

Bradbury-Onwenu-Moses seems to be a lost cause when it comes to high-level run blocking.

It's still so much better than last year, even when they're kind of bad.

The diagram with the different colored and sized penises actually shows that outside runs to Moses side are only slightly worse than to Campbell's side and inside runs between Onwenu and Moses are 0.2 more effective than Campbell and Wilson.

The gap between Bradbury and Onwenu is the worst, which makes me believe Bradbury is also spending a lot of time helping Wilson.

 

[ctpatsfan77]

I agree, creating the best interior OL in football should be the priority. Not only would it allow them to punish teams inside and out with the run, but it would make dealing with Drake Maye brutal. If he can step up into a clean pocket teams opposing defenses will be completely screwed. They could spend heavily at OG and Center and then focus heavily on defense with the rest of their resources, which are plentiful. Or they could spend for either a guard or center, then take the other the first 2 days of the draft.

I think everyone other than Campbell could either be upgraded or moved. I don't see the FO replacing all of them, but I would expect definitely one new starter, quite likely two.

 

[Huckleberry1]

I think everyone other than Campbell could either be upgraded or moved. I don't see the FO replacing all of them, but I would expect definitely one new starter, quite likely two.

It depends on what they do in free agency and the draft, they have a variety of options. Wilson seems to be settling in at Guard, so if they could get Lindebaum or McGovern that would take care of Center to LT, Bradbury would become depth. Then the questions will be if Onwenu restructures, or if they want to draft a RG, and whether Moses has another year in him, if Bryant can step up, or should they go for one of the right tackles in the draft. They know the answers and options much better than we do, but I do believe the OL will continue to be a priority for them.

 

[Hugepatsfan]

What's really exciting about this upcoming FA (and draft) is that they have a ton of money to spend and very few actual needs. They really only have four "significant" openings on the team to retain or replace IMO:

Chaisson - starting EDGE who plays 2/3 of the snaps
Hawkins - starting S who plays every down
Hooper - TE2 who plays like 50% of the snaps
Gibbens - starting to come on as a starter next to Spillane, maybe displacing Elliss

EDGE is a premium position so retaining/replacing Chaisson will cost some coin for sure, but TE2, starting S, and LB2 are probably the cheapest starting positions you could be looking to sign on the open market. Those are probably just among the most devalued positions in football. They have the option to create a big need for themselves at RG by moving on from Onwenu, but if they choose to do that they add $17.5M of cap space to work with which should cover the cost of a replacement (and then some).

As of right now, before an Onwenu decision, they're at $51.2M of cap space. For comparison, all of the offseason activity we did last year and the roster moves we've made in-season to this point cost about $75M of cap space (I believe we started with about $127M of cap space and we're now at $52.8M). And again, that's before possibly releasing Onwenu which opens up a hole but probably more money to spend than it takes to fill. They also have plenty of other avenues to open up more room without real hurt on the roster:

1) Hunter Henry is due $8.5M in cash on the last year of his deal but they could do a 2-3 year extension that pays him that in mostly signing bonus while adding a similar guaranteed salary for next year which would reduce his cap hit by probably $3-4M.

2) Plenty of guys with large salaries they can convert to signing bonus. Milton Williams stands out to me because he's so obviously a core piece and the $21M salary is so large. There are other candidates to do this with but not sure they'd want to considering age and maybe shakier long term projections on the team than with Williams.

3) Jennings ($4M), Gibson ($3.5M), Elliss ($5.1M), Tavai ($2.0M) are all pretty ancillary pieces to this team that they could move on from if those positions are upgraded/replaced.

So what does that all mean... it means that any player they sign is going to be out of feeling good about that signing rather than driven by need. That sets you up better for success. They have enough cap space to sign any individual player they want to even at the top of the market and overall they could probably do a fairly close approximation of what they did last year again if they liked enough players. But they won't have to talk themselves into anyone either.

I don't expect them to be caught up on certain positions. I think they're just going to look all over and ask themselves "does this guy REALLY fit what I want to do that position" and if the answer is yes, make a real run at him.

 

[hornetfb85]

 

[Zuma]

Getting Lindebaum would be a game-changer when it comes to the draft. You gotta figure he's still got 3-4 good peak years left.

This, of course, assumes Wilson continues to get better at LG.

He's better at Center. He'll make the transition during the off-season. Lazar said as much a couple weeks ago (who's opinion I value more then other reporters because of his football knowledge and the fact he sees the players daily). What happens at LG then? Bradbury? Brown? Wallace? My guess is a high draft pick.

 

[Hugepatsfan]

He's better at Center. He'll make the transition during the off-season. Lazar said as much a couple weeks ago (who's opinion I value more then other reporters because of his football knowledge and the fact he sees the players daily). What happens at LG then? Bradbury? Brown? Wallace? My guess is a high draft pick.

If they do go this route, I'll throw out Joe Bitonio as an idea. LG for CLE, might be a HOFer. On his last legs at 34 years old. But Vrabel spent that year in CLE working with their OL a lot and he seems like a football player's football player. Possible he wants to leave rebuilding (to put it kindly) CLE where he's spent his whole career for another chance at the playoffs. Could be a good "stop gap" type of signing to keep the seat warm for a draft pick because it's not like we'll be picking early enough where we can GUARANTEE we even get our top guy.

 

[Zuma]

If they do go this route, I'll throw out Joe Bitonio as an idea. LG for CLE, might be a HOFer. On his last legs at 34 years old. But Vrabel spent that year in CLE working with their OL a lot and he seems like a football player's football player. Possible he wants to leave rebuilding (to put it kindly) CLE where he's spent his whole career for another chance at the playoffs. Could be a good "stop gap" type of signing to keep the seat warm for a draft pick because it's not like we'll be picking early enough where we can GUARANTEE we even get our top guy.

He might be a fit but like you said he's a bit old. It would be great if a backup can step up and be a quality starter or at least find one in the draft. Lazar said Wilson "will be" a better Center then Guard and said they will try him at Center in the off-season and expects to win the starting job.

 

[Hugepatsfan]

Malcolm Koonce of the Raiders is someone I'd have interest in. Signing Chaisson from them worked, so maybe try it again!

In 2023 he had 8 sacks playing opposite Crosby. McDaniels was the coach of that team. He rose up the depth chart to starter that year, though the sack production came after McDaniels left. However, it's not like McDaniels is a defensive guy anyway. Point is just that we have some insight into him.

He hasn't done much of anything this year, but he's coming off a preseason knee injury that cost him all of 2024. So this is kind of his "get back" year. It's pretty common for guys to be a shell of themselves for a year and then back to form in year 2 after injury. So it could line up well for us to land him on a 1 year deal for him to get his production back up. On paper, he's a speed rusher type that fits Vrabel's scheme well. And I'm sure Chaisson would recommend this system to him, whether that's recruiting him as a teammate or if he does sign elsewhere just offering up genuine advice to a former teammate.

 

[mgteich]

What's really exciting about this upcoming FA (and draft) is that they have a ton of money to spend and very few actual needs. They really only have four "significant" openings on the team to retain or replace IMO:

Chaisson - starting EDGE who plays 2/3 of the snaps
Hawkins - starting S who plays every down
Hooper - TE2 who plays like 50% of the snaps
Gibbens - starting to come on as a starter next to Spillane, maybe displacing Elliss

I cannot remember an analysis I disagree with more.

If NONE of these were replaced (and all extended instead), this would be a great start for the off-season.