Last week we looked at the best roster moves of this past season, the ones that sparked the most success for the teams involved, several which are playing this postseason. Today, it’s time to look at the other side of the coin. These moves didn’t pan out how their architects intended. We’re not just talking bad value on a free agent signing or a draft pick — you can make a case that each of these moves tanked the season for these teams before it even began. 

Let’s dive in. 

Jets signed QB Justin Fields

The Jets invested a lot in Fields this past offseason and had high expectations, even though New York was going to be his third team. Believing that the former first-round pick who only turned 26 in March still had untapped potential, the Jets handed him a two-year, $40 million deal with $30 million guaranteed — $20 million in 2025 and $10 million in 2026. Money talks in the NFL and that contract screamed that new HC Aaron Glenn and GM Darren Mougey were planning to give Fields a long runway as the starter. 

Instead, Fields barely made it half the season. He was benched at halftime of a Week 7 loss to the Panthers and that would have been it had veteran backup QB Tyrod Taylor not gotten hurt as well. Fields managed to pilot the Jets to a couple of wins, but the second the Jets were back in the loss column, they pulled the plug again. He finished the year with nine games, completing 62.7 percent of his passes for 1,259 yards, seven touchdowns and an interception, plus 383 yards and four touchdowns on the ground. 

Those numbers might not seem like a complete disaster on a surface glance, but a paltry 140 passing yards per game is just not viable in the modern NFL. Watching the Jets, it was glaring how incapable of running even a basic offense Fields had become, holding onto the ball far too long and misfiring on too many passes. It got to a point where Glenn cited the need to be able to evaluate other players on offense as a reason for benching Fields. 

The Jets entered the year with a fair amount of talent but Fields’ flop was one of a few factors that contributed to Glenn and Mougey tearing the roster down to the studs in their first year in charge. While they’ll move on to a different plan this year and likely cut Fields, he’ll still count for $22 million in dead money against their cap as a little unfriendly reminder of the mistake. 

Raiders traded for QB Geno Smith

Coming into last year, I loved this trade for the Raiders and thought the Seahawks were downgrading at quarterback by going to Sam Darnold. Instead, that swap ended up one of the best moves of the season. I still think Smith has some good football left in him but it’s hard to defend the results of this past year. Las Vegas gave up a third-round pick (No. 92 overall which Seattle used on QB Jalen Milroe) and signed Smith to a three-year, $106 million contract, $58.5 million of which was guaranteed at signing. 

In return on all that investment, Las Vegas will get one year, two wins in 15 starts and a league-leading 17 interceptions and 55 sacks taken. Not good at all. Smith still completed 67.4 percent of his passes and was slightly above league average in success rate. But that’s about as much lipstick as you can put on the situation. 

The Raiders pursued Smith because they believed he, along with HC Pete Carroll, could help raise the floor of the organization. But it turned out both weren’t nearly as impactful as hoped. Smith especially was held back by the team’s struggles up front, beyond some of the challenges he dealt with at times in Seattle. Carroll has been fired and the likely outcome with Smith is that he’s released before another $8 million of his salary becomes guaranteed. 

Raiders drafting RB Ashton Jeanty

The Raiders appear twice on this list because when you go 3-14 and earn the No. 1 pick, there’s a lot that’s gone wrong. ESPN published an article this week going into all the gory details, and the season was doomed from the start with the lack of alignment from key decision-makers. Las Vegas got caught between a front office that had an eye on the future and a coaching staff built to try and win now. 

The selection of Jeanty is a good example. Typically teams will wait to heavily invest in running back as a finishing piece to a roster that’s ready to compete. The Raiders had a litany of needs but passed on other players at premium positions to take Jeanty. It speaks not only to how high of a grade he had on their board, but also how they saw the team as being a lot closer to contention than how things ultimately played out. 

That’s not to say Jeanty is a bust even though his production was subpar as a rookie, averaging just 3.7 yards per carry and failing to crack 1,000 yards rushing. He had no chance with how bad the environment around him was. The offensive line struggled to open up holes all year long and it got even worse when outstanding LT Kolton Miller was hurt. There’s only so much a creative play-caller can do to get around that, and the Raiders were stuck with OC Chip Kelly who was fired after Week 12. 

Jeanty’s splits when the line created one yard before contact versus when they didn’t are startling and bode much better for his future. But even if he turns into a good player, it’s still possible for the Raiders to have made a suboptimal draft pick. The player taken right after Jeanty, Jets first-round OT Armand Membou, would have probably made a bigger impact. There were other tackles, receivers or pass rushers who would have been good picks. The Raiders likely could have even moved down with a team like the Bears and added more picks to juice their rebuild. 

Instead, they made a luxury pick they didn’t have the luxury of making. 

How the Bengals handled DE Trey Hendrickson

The conflict that boiled over between the Bengals and Hendrickson this year was not hard to see coming. The two sides put themselves on course for this when Hendrickson agreed to a one-year contract extension in 2023, halfway through a four-year, $60 million deal he signed back in 2021. He had decisively outplayed that number, then proceeded to dramatically outplay his new extension as well. The extra year of control he surrendered to Cincinnati ended up setting off a big standoff going into this offseason. 

From there, feelings got hurt, with a notoriously obstinate Bengals front office running into a player who was equally as stubborn and willing to lose money in fines and holdouts to prove a point. All of this took place with the backdrop of 2025 being a huge year for the organization to try and get back into the playoffs after two years out despite employing QB Joe Burrow in his prime. 

Eventually the two sides reached a compromise, with the Bengals giving Hendrickson a $13 million raise with no new years. He played the first seven games of the season and had four sacks before a sports hernia injury sidelined him. At the time, the Bengals didn’t think it was serious enough to put Hendrickson on injured reserve. But after trying to play through the injury and re-aggravating it, Hendrickson didn’t return for the rest of the season. 

It’s impossible not to think about whether being in a contract year factored into Hendrickson not making it back, as now that he’s on the other side of 30 it’s pivotal for his future earning potential not to put out bad tape. It’s also hard for the Bengals to be too salty about Hendrickson potentially looking out for his own interests considering they made very little effort to take care of him before this season. Ultimately the breakdown in the relationship hurt both sides on the field. 

Who knows if having Hendrickson would have been the difference between making the playoffs or not for the Bengals — he and Burrow both played all 17 games in 2024 when Cincinnati also missed the postseason. But having a player like Hendrickson for more than seven games absolutely would have made a difference for a defense that finished at the bottom of the league. 

Vikings not having a better QB alternative than Carson Wentz

The Vikings have taken plenty of arrows for how they’ve handled their quarterback situation over the past 12 months. As former first-round QB J.J. McCarthy has vacillated between being hurt and looking overwhelmed on the field, the two other veterans Minnesota had in the building last year have gone on to great success. Darnold sustained his success in Seattle after last year’s breakout with the Vikings, and the Seahawks are off this week as the NFC’s No. 1 seed. Colts QB Daniel Jones was on a similar course before a fractured fibula and eventually a torn Achilles ended his season. 

Much of that criticism is rooted in hindsight analysis, however. Few people were advocating for the Vikings to sideline McCarthy, the No. 10 pick in the 2024 draft, for players in Darnold and Jones who were considered mega busts in the not-too-distant past. Darnold and Jones both had agency in this situation as well, and they chose to leave for organizations where they wouldn’t have a highly-touted young player the team had invested a lot in lurking over their shoulders the first time they threw a pick — at least not to the degree of what the dynamic in Minnesota would have been. It made sense for the Vikings to evaluate their investment in McCarthy, even if they were gambling a veteran team on an unproven starter. 

What is much more fair game, in my opinion, is to go after the Vikings for not having a better insurance policy for McCarthy on the roster. He was drafted as a developmental project with the goal of sitting behind Darnold in 2024 until he was ready. A preseason knee injury made that a moot point, and McCarthy spent his rookie year on injured reserve rehabbing instead of practicing. Technically speaking he wasn’t a rookie this year, but it was a distinction without much of a difference. 

Rather than have a proven veteran behind McCarthy as an alternative in case he needed to sit, or to help mentor him as he adjusted to the NFL, the Vikings spent the bulk of OTAs with just journeyman Brett Rypien behind McCarthy. After the draft, they traded for QB Sam Howell, another young quarterback finding his legs in the league like McCarthy, and signed UDFA QB Max Brosmer. That was the room until the very end of the preseason when Howell was traded again after a rough camp and the Vikings brought in Wentz off the couch. 

When McCarthy struggled and got hurt, Wentz was the one tasked with trying to keep a Vikings team that had preseason hopes of repeating as NFC North champions afloat. When he got beat up to the point he couldn’t continue, it was Brosmer, who proved he wasn’t nearly as ready as the team hyped him up to be. No matter who was under center, the Vikings had inconsistent production from the quarterback. It wasn’t the only problem they had this year but it was definitely the biggest. 

It also didn’t have to be this way. There are a bunch of players Minnesota could have pursued, guys like Joe Flacco, Jacoby Brissett, Mac Jones and more who could have been a steadier alternative. It’s a mistake the Vikings won’t repeat twice, as reports indicate competition for McCarthy will be a much bigger priority in 2026.