Tailgater Magazine: 2026 NFC Free Agent Grades

[SteveTheCowboy]

Title says it all. Read other grades too:

https://tailgatermagazine.com/sport...tter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nfc_grades

 

[DallasEast]

 

[Ironicalicon]

Don't you know the Joneses are always the smartest guys in the room??

 

[SteveTheCowboy]

Dallas recieves a "D".

 

[Ironicalicon]

Dallas recieves a "D".

Big D Gets a D

 

[big dog cowboy]

Outside of Jalen Thompson, the Cowboys made almost no moves in the free agency market and settled for trades instead.

Pretty short-sighted view of FA.

Looks like their website is more click bait to try and sell their tailgating stuff.

 

[CowboysLakerBamaFan]

This is a stupid premise....as the grades just coincide with who spent the most.

Probably written by people that don't understand football

Sometimes it's smart to spend in FA...but even then, it's nuanced (gotta spend in yhe right way).

Other times, you should get an A+ for not spending anything and maybe just getting a cheap depth guy or 2

I mean....if Arizona or Cleveland went out and paid a RB or a 32 year old WR a 20 Mil dollar a year contract, is that smart, even if the player is great? Nope....that would be an F minus. But....if Oakland, who also sucks, went out and overpaid for some good oLinemen to help nurture and support their new franchise QB to hopefully avoid getting him killed and possibly derailing his career by constant pressure....that would be smart! A+

 

[SteveTheCowboy]

Pretty short-sighted view of FA.

Looks like their website is more click bait to try and sell their tailgating stuff.

I was under the impression we generally aren't very happy with our FA moves.

Can you point us to a source that is more long-sighted / positive?

Sure the sell stuff...they also have BBQ/tailgating tips and recipes.

 

[SteveTheCowboy]

This is a stupid premise....as the grades just coincide with who spent the most.

Probably written by people that don't understand football

Sometimes it's smart to spend in FA...but even then, it's nuanced (gotta spend in yhe right way).

Other times, you should get an A+ for not spending anything and maybe just getting a cheap depth guy or 2

I mean....if Arizona or Cleveland went out and paid a RB or a 32 year old WR a 20 Mil dollar a year contract, is that smart, even if the player is great? Nope....that would be an F minus. But....if Oakland, who also sucks, went out and overpaid for some good oLinemen to help nurture and support their new franchise QB to hopefully avoid getting him killed and possibly derailing his career by constant pressure....that would be smart! A+

It looked to me like the NUMBER of sigings were more important than money. {shrug}.

Also EARLY signings...as they believe there's not much left now....so any future pickups will be JAG at best.

BTW....I'm neither praising nor criticizing their grades. Just topic for discussion.

 

[jazzcat22]

These authors must have tailgated too much before they wrote this.
Nothing like drunk writing.

 

[leicafan]

These ratings are useless. They probably know tailgating but football? NO!!!

 

[RodeoJake]

These authors must have tailgated too much before they wrote this.
Nothing like drunk writing.

Drunk writing is just a tick better than drunk GMing. There should be a law against both. On the other hand, some of the strangest stories that came out of my fingers were written on Absinthe.

 

[Kwyn]

Elite NFL website

 

[Coogiguy03]

This is a stupid premise....as the grades just coincide with who spent the most.

Probably written by people that don't understand football

Sometimes it's smart to spend in FA...but even then, it's nuanced (gotta spend in yhe right way).

Other times, you should get an A+ for not spending anything and maybe just getting a cheap depth guy or 2

I mean....if Arizona or Cleveland went out and paid a RB or a 32 year old WR a 20 Mil dollar a year contract, is that smart, even if the player is great? Nope....that would be an F minus. But....if Oakland, who also sucks, went out and overpaid for some good oLinemen to help nurture and support their new franchise QB to hopefully avoid getting him killed and possibly derailing his career by constant pressure....that would be smart! A+

Your first sentence says it all!!!!!!!!!!!!! I mean spending has it's benefits, but we've seen in the past how teams spend a lot and nothing special happens during the season

 

[gimmesix]

Pretty short-sighted view of FA.

Looks like their website is more click bait to try and sell their tailgating stuff.

That may be the case, but I do think it can also be argued that Dallas didn't do as much in free agency as other teams (or even with trades). Thompson was the only signee who got a contract that says we expect big things from him. And neither trade (a fourth-rounder and a fifth-rounder) screams quality starting addition.

This is a league where you can generally follow the money, so, for example, us trading a fourth-round pick for Gary shows he had a much lower value in the league than Jonathan Greenard, for whom Philly traded two third-round picks. That doesn't mean Gary won't end up being as good or better than Greenard, but the expectations should be higher with Greenard because of the cost.

It's kind of like the difference in trading for George Pickens and trading for Jonathan Mingo. Maybe we're smarter than the Eagles with taking the less costly Gary, but we have plenty of examples of our front office thinking it outsmarted the rest of the league to only fall on its face.

Now frankly, I wouldn't have been happy if Dallas had traded two third-round picks for a player who had only three sacks in 12 games last year. I'm sure they are hoping he can get back to being a double-digit sacker after fighting through injury. Gary has never had a double-digit-sack season and was healthy for 16 games last year and only had 7.5 (and most of those came when Parsons was on the other side).

Ogbonnia, Bullard, Durant, Winters and Locke are all low-rent signings/trades that we hope to get more out of than their value, which we also hope with Gary.

 

[TheMarathonContinues]

Dallas Cowboys: D
Outside of Jalen Thompson, the Cowboys made almost no moves in the free agency market and settled for trades instead.


What a stupid article lol. It gives no input or anything. And what trades are they talking about lol?

 

[thunderpimp91]

I'd probably go slightly higher and give the Cowboys a C, but if we are going strictly off of FA moves then yeah I'd agree it was a pretty underwhelming haul for Dallas. Thompson was a solid move. I think Durant is an under the radar move as well. That said I was hoping for more....like a true MLB and maybe a swing tackle who could push our current guys for snaps.

 

[thunderpimp91]

Dallas Cowboys: D
Outside of Jalen Thompson, the Cowboys made almost no moves in the free agency market and settled for trades instead.


What a stupid article lol. It gives no input or anything. And what trades are they talking about lol?

Winters, Gary, etc.

 

[TheMarathonContinues]

Winters, Gary, etc.

Forgot about both lol. Fair enough. My mistake.

 

[big dog cowboy]

I was under the impression we generally aren't very happy with our FA moves.

Typically, "we" aren't.