NFL trade tiers: Which players are worth a first-round pick?

Bill BarnwellJul 30, 2025, 06:15 AM ET

He is the host of the Bill Barnwell Show podcast, with episodes released weekly. Barnwell joined ESPN in 2011 as a staff writer at Grantland.

While there are more trades in the NFL than ever before, I will admit that I occasionally look longingly toward my colleagues covering the NBA. When Kevin Garnett said “Anything is possible!” after winning a title in 2008, I’m guessing he wasn’t thinking about his league’s trade market, but there’s no better way of explaining what’s, well, possible in the NBA. Trading a star for five first-round picks feels ho-hum. Heck, trading a star for just one first-round pick is wild these days.

These sorts of deals don’t happen in the NFL, where teams can trade picks only within the next three draft cycles, keeping them from making the sort of long-term moves that NBA teams are happy to make. While the NBA salary cap is perhaps even more arcane and mysterious than the NFL’s, the structure of NBA deals makes them easier to deal than their NFL counterparts — dead money in the NFL can make a contract all but untradeable at certain times.

Let’s live in that world for just one moment. In a universe in which dead cap doesn’t exist and teams could trade for players on their existing deals, how much would the top players in the NFL land? Sure, it’s impossible to imagine a scenario in which the Chiefs trade Patrick Mahomes or the Bills deal away Josh Allen, but who could have expected the Mavericks to ship off Luka Doncic? I’ve gone through every team’s roster and identified the players who could realistically land at least one first-round pick in a trade, moving all the way up to the top of the market, where we’re approaching a decade’s worth of first-rounders in a hypothetical swap.

There are some contextual concerns, of course. No team is going to deal its starting quarterback without a successor in place during training camp, so we have to assume these trades take place during some indeterminate void between the end of the prior season and the start of the next one. The price to blow away a team that doesn’t want to trade away a player is far different than the price when a team wants to get rid of a player at all costs, so I’ve tried to strike the balance between those two scenarios.

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The idea of a player being valued at a first-round pick level can mean a lot of different things; one team thinking a guy is worth the No. 32 pick is very different than all teams thinking a guy is worth the first overall pick. Here, I tried to move past the idea of one outlier team considering something and tried to treat players with a first-round grade if I believed more than a handful of organizations would think they were worth that much via trade. I discounted more than I normally would for future first-rounders, given that we’re talking about picks well into the next decade in some cases, but not by the “one-round-per-year” rule.

I’ve tried to use real trades and player valuations to reflect how teams typically value archetypes around the NFL. That means positional value, contracts and age make a massive impact in evaluating how much even talented players get in return. Quarterbacks are always in demand, but the last time a non-quarterback got traded for a first-round pick after turning 30 was 1994, when the Vikings dealt 33-year-old Chris Doleman to the Falcons.

The only 29-year-olds to be dealt for first-rounders both involved the Raiders, who sent those picks off for pass rusher Richard Seymour (2009) and wide receiver Davante Adams (2022). Factoring in contract value and advancing age, only superstars get dealt for significant draft capital as they approach 30. And on the other hand, guys who went in the top half of Round 1 in this year’s draft (or some players who went in the bottom half, especially if they play premium positions) would likely be worth a first-round pick, even though they’ve never played a single pro snap.

What’s tougher is evaluating the trade value of players who are never going to hit the market. We don’t know what 25-year-old future Hall of Famers are going to land via trade because their teams hold onto them for dear life. Bills and Chiefs fans have waited generations to land Allen and Mahomes. Those guys aren’t going anywhere in the real world. But for one day, let’s live in a world where anything is possible.

Jump to a team:
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Two first-round picks and more: Edge Micah Parsons. Still waiting for his long-term contract extension, the price to procure his signature is only going up after Myles Garrett and T.J. Watt signed their own extensions. The baseline for a Parsons deal a year ago would have been Nick Bosa‘s extension, which is worth $34 million per year. Now, Watt’s deal is up to an average annual value (AAV) of $41 million. Parsons is going to get a record-setting deal when he signs.

I expect that to occur with the Cowboys before Week 1, but if they did decide they couldn’t justify paying three players market-setting deals at the league’s three most expensive positions, he would attract a massive trade haul. The closest comp is Khalil Mack, who in 2018 was traded before his fifth season with a second-round pick for two first-round picks, a third-rounder and a sixth-rounder.

Parsons is a year younger than Mack was at the time. And while Mack had a Defensive Player of the Year award under his belt, Parsons has more sacks (52.5 to Mack’s 40.5) and quarterback knockdowns (112 to Mack’s 84) over his first four seasons. The Mack deal came in just shy of two first-round picks of value after accounting for the other selections involved; the Cowboys would expect more for Parsons.

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One first-round pick and more: WR CeeDee Lamb, G Tyler Smith. Lamb is a special receiver, and at 26 years old, he should be right in the peak of his career. Unlike Parsons, though, he’s already earning top-of-the-market money at $34 million per year, making it tough for teams to realize significant surplus value on the player they would be acquiring. (Parsons is about to get paid, but there’s more runway with potential franchise tags than there is for Lamb.) Lamb would demand a first-round pick and a second-rounder, but probably not much more.

Smith signifies both the value in adding rookie contract players and the increased emphasis placed on interior linemen over the past decade. While he is capable of kicking out and playing tackle, Smith has been an elite guard since being drafted in 2022. Good guards such as Robert Hunt have commanded $20 million per year on the open market, and Smith’s on another level from the Carolina lineman. He’s also owed only $2.5 million in 2025 and a $21.2 million fifth-year option in 2026, which would be a meaningful savings from what he will get on his next deal in Dallas.

One first-round pick: QB Dak Prescott, G Tyler Booker. Booker gets in by virtue of being a player taken in the top half of April’s draft. Prescott would be a fascinating trade candidate if his contract made it financially feasible, which it would theoretically become in 2026 if he was willing to waive his no-trade clause. You don’t need me to fill you in on both the good and bad of Prescott as a player, but no other team has been willing to top the $60 million average salary the Cowboys gave him last September, even with Brock Purdy and Josh Allen signing new deals this offseason.

Average salary isn’t everything, but between the money, the no-tag and no-trade clauses and the guarantee structure, Prescott has the league’s most player-friendly deal. There are organizations that would be willing to pay him $60 million and accept good, sometimes great performance, but would they also be willing to give up a first-round pick for that privilege? Given how often teams manage to get something for QB contracts that seem underwater, my instinct is yes, but there are passer-needy teams that likely would prefer to sit this one out and go after a passer on a rookie deal instead.

Missing out: OT Tyler Guyton, a first-round pick last year, struggled as a rookie. While it’s too early to draw conclusions about his future, players taken toward the end of Round 1 who fail to live up to those expectations in their first season don’t have first-round trade value within the league. Him suffering fractured bone in his knee in training camp won’t help matters.

The two ball-hawking cornerbacks don’t make it here. Trevon Diggs hasn’t quite been the same since his torn ACL in September 2023, while DaRon Bland wasn’t his usual self after returning from a stress fracture in his foot last season. I liked what I saw from LB DeMarvion Overshown, but the 2023 third-round pick also suffered a catastrophic knee injury last season. DT Osa Odighizuwa signed a four-year, $80 million extension in March, and while that was fair, I’m not sure other teams would attach significant draft capital for the right to pay out his contract.

Two first-round picks and more: WR Malik Nabers. He still has three years and about $10.4 million in total remaining on his rookie deal; in other words, he’ll make about as much over the next three years as Ja’Marr Chase will make every 4½ games. And that’s without considering a fifth-year option for 2028 that should end up being a bargain versus whatever the top of the wide receiver market looks like at that point.

Chase is more of a sure thing than Nabers, but there’s a staggering sum of money being saved that can go to other parts of New York’s roster. Let’s say the Giants are relatively conservative about Nabers’ impact and think he is a top-20 wide receiver; a top-20 wideout on a non-rookie deal is making $25 million per year now (and a price that’s going up faster than the cap each year). That’s $60 million in surplus value. It’s tough for even transcendent non-quarterbacks to be that valuable when they’re making top-of-the-market money.

Nabers started his career with a 1,204-yard season while catching passes from Daniel Jones, Tommy DeVito and Drew Lock. He doesn’t turn 22 until next week. While acknowledging that wide receiver career paths don’t always go the way Chase’s has — Michael Thomas, JuJu Smith-Schuster and former Giants standout Odell Beckham Jr. are examples of injuries hampering a Hall of Fame start — Nabers was already playing at a star level last season. He won’t be paid like a star for years to come.

One first-round pick and more: Edge Abdul Carter. Regarded by some as the best player independent of position in April’s draft class, Carter slipped to the Giants with the No. 3 pick. He was extremely productive in his final college season, racking up 12 sacks and 24 tackles for loss. He’s still only 21 years old and plays a premium position. Even though he hasn’t played a down yet, he would land more than a randomly assigned first-rounder if traded.

Missing out: DT Dexter Lawrence is arguably the best nose tackle in the game, even if his career-high sack total from 2025 (9.0) was inflated by cleaning up other defenders’ pressures. With three years remaining on a four-year, $87.5 million extension, he makes second- or third-tier tackle money. He’s the sort of rare athlete at 6-foot-4 and 340 pounds that coaches love to have in their lineup. Nearing age 28, though, teams might need to see more consistent pass-rush production to deal a first-rounder.

OT Andrew Thomas plays a premium position and is in the prime of his career, but injuries have held him back, as he has missed 22 games over the past four years with a variety of ailments. He would be back on the first-round side of things with another healthy, productive season. S Jevon Holland earned a three-year, $45.3 million deal in free agency, which is great for the him but might limit his theoretical trade market. Edge Kayvon Thibodeaux has flashed moments of dominance, but he has one great season since being drafted in 2022.

Two first-round picks: DT Jalen Carter, QB Jalen Hurts. Go back and watch the final two snaps of the Rams’ 2024 season if you have any questions about Carter. He doesn’t have spectacular numbers, racking up 10.5 sacks and 25 knockdowns over his first two seasons, but the tape shows a player who consistently pushes the pocket and presents an incredibly difficult matchup for interior offensive linemen. He’s on the verge of a 10-sack season, which might come as early as 2025.

Are there teams that wouldn’t be willing to mold their offense to fit Hurts’ style of play? I suppose. It’s their loss. In Jeremy Fowler’s recent story polling league execs, Hurts was valued as the league’s ninth-best quarterback, which reflects reality: There are some in the league who never believed in him as a viable starter and some who see his style of play and injury concerns as worrisome over the long term. There are others who note the slowdowns the Eagles have had in the passing game in the second half of the 2023 and 2024 seasons and wonder what Hurts would do without a great offensive line and the threat of the run game.

At the same time, Hurts is propelling the run game forward, both with his actual running and his gravity as a potential threat to keep the football. He has dropped his interception rate below 1.5% in two of the past three seasons, and while he does take too many sacks, that’s his only statistical weakness as a passer. He has also been lights-out in the postseason, arguably outplaying Patrick Mahomes in each of their two Super Bowl matchups. There’s a wider range of opinions on Hurts than other star quarterbacks, but he’s a 26-year-old with a meaningful MVP push and two Super Bowl appearances in the past three seasons.

One first-round pick and more: WR A.J. Brown, WR DeVonta Smith, OT Jordan Mailata, CB Quinyon Mitchell. Both wideouts belong here, especially with the market continuing to rise after both Brown and Smith signed new contracts last spring. Brown has arguably been the NFL’s most efficient receiver since joining the Eagles in 2022, while Smith is more than a year younger and would surely have more impressive cumulative numbers if he wasn’t in a run-first offense with another star pass catcher.

Mailata’s prior deal was a bargain for the Eagles, which helped them as they negotiated a new extension for him (three years, $66 million) last offseason. He has rounded into a prototypical left tackle, albeit one stuck in the same conference as Trent Williams and Tristan Wirfs. Mitchell was one of Philadelphia’s two rookie cornerbacks who excelled last season, and his stock is higher than it was a year ago after he grew into a defender to avoid on throws to the sideline.

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One first-round pick: CB Cooper DeJean, G Landon Dickerson. DeJean could justify something beyond a lone first-round pick after his ascension into the starting lineup coincided with the Eagles morphing into the league’s best defense. He was a second-round pick a year ago, however, and almost exclusively played in the slot, a role teams typically don’t value quite as highly. If he repeats that level of play while moving outside more often, he’ll rise further. Dickerson is a three-time Pro Bowler on a deal with a $21 million AAV, which might soon look like a bargain relative to other guard contracts.

Missing out: Well, there’s the guy who nearly won MVP last season. RB Saquon Barkley represents one of the league’s most unique situations; it’s clear he wouldn’t have landed a first-round pick in a trade last year, when he hit free agency and signed for just over $12.5 million per season. Now, he just finished one of the greatest running back seasons ever and looked like a walking 60-yard touchdown every single week, including deep into Philadelphia’s run through the NFC side of the playoff bracket.

Teams would love to have the 2024 version of Barkley, but that’s no guarantee going forward. Given his significant injury history with the Giants, the inherent benefits of playing behind a dominant offensive line and alongside a quarterback who changes the numbers in the run game and a new deal that will pay him more than $20 million per season, my guess is most teams wouldn’t be able to justify shipping out a first-round pick for the 28-year-old. (The Giants might be the exception.)

Other offensive linemen could feature here. C Cam Jurgens just signed a new deal and plays the least-valued position along the line, although he was also just fine at guard in 2023. Lane Johnson is the best right tackle in football on a snap-by-snap basis, but injuries have been a reality of life for the six-time Pro Bowler. No team is trading a first-round pick for a 35-year-old non-quarterback.

There are front-seven players who could make the leap to the next tier with another big season. Edge Nolan Smith was lost as a rookie before looking more like his old self under coordinator Vic Fangio. He had four sacks and five quarterback hits during the postseason. DT Jordan Davis hasn’t quite turned into the unblockable defender the Eagles hoped for, but if he ends up as a great two-down defender who occasionally runs over an interior lineman one-on-one next to Carter, he’s still a valuable player. And while LB Zack Baun‘s 2024 season was every bit as impressive as Barkley’s, he’ll need to do that again to get front offices believing he really is the league’s best off-ball linebacker.

Four first-round picks plus more: QB Jayden Daniels. I can see both sides of the argument. While nobody doubts what Daniels did last season, he has only done it once, as opposed to Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson, who have been MVP candidates for most of their careers. There are still teams that would hesitate to invest in him because of his slight frame, and there’s always a concern that a quarterback who had so much success scrambling and creating on fourth down might not be able to keep that up. Maybe that side thinks Daniels is worth two first-round picks.

Then there’s the other side, which would (correctly) point out that Daniels reinvigorated an entire fan base last season. He had one of the best rookie seasons in league history, throwing for 3,568 yards with 25 touchdowns while adding 891 rushing yards and six more scores on the ground. He did that with wideout Terry McLaurin, offensive coordinator Kliff Kingsbury and a bunch of guys who weren’t moving the needle around the league. There probably won’t be another Hail Mary to beat the Bears or another 86-yard touchdown to nearly tie the game in the fourth quarter against the Cowboys, but Daniels doesn’t need those plays to be an elite quarterback. If he cuts unnecessary sacks out of his game, what else would he need to be on the same level as those guys I mentioned?

Crucially, while Mahomes, Allen and Jackson are all on significant contracts, Daniels is in the second season of his four-year, $37.7 million rookie deal. With the Commanders already having paid his signing bonus, they’ll pay him $2.5 million in 2025 and $4.3 million in 2026 before he is even eligible for an extension. He might be one of the league’s two or three biggest bargains while playing the most important position in sports. Is that worth five first-round picks? Six? Seven? The answer is “too many,” so I tried to strike a middle ground.

One first-round pick: CB Mike Sainristil. The other star from Washington’s 2024 rookie class, Sainristil entered the season expecting to play the slot before quickly ending up outside, where he picked off four passes, including two in the playoff run to the NFC title game. His size (5-10) might concern some teams, but he’s a reliable tackler and is quickly becoming a leader for a team finding the guys who will be the formative parts of its culture once veterans such as Zach Ertz and Bobby Wagner move on.

Missing out: It turns out there are a lot of rentals on the roster, so while there are plenty of other talented players in Washington, they’re not in the first-round pick range. OT Laremy Tunsil was just dealt from Houston without a first-round pick attached, although the Commanders sent second- and third-round selections the other way. Elsewhere along the line, G Sam Cosmi was excellent during the first half of the season, but he tore his ACL in January.

Commanders fans don’t want to find out whether they can land a premium pick for WR Terry McLaurin, whose public battle for a new contract has felt like a relic of the Daniel Snyder days. As good as I believe McLaurin is, it would be tough to see a team trading a first-round pick for a wideout who turns 30 in September. The other young player who might be able to get on the first-round track with more playing time is second-year DT Jer’Zhan Newton, who will assume a larger role after the departure of Jonathan Allen.

Two first-round picks and more: QB Caleb Williams. For now. The Bears wouldn’t have taken anything close to this for him a year ago, but that was then. He struggled through a dismal rookie season, and while it’s fair to chalk up some of his woes to an underwhelming scheme and seemingly disinterested playmakers, he deserves plenty of the blame for what went wrong. Indulging the worst elements of his game most weeks and eventually losing his confidence, Williams wasn’t reliably creating within the offense, and his attempts to improvise often proved disastrous.

And yet, he was the consensus first overall pick and a potential superstar quarterback prospect. While Williams has essentially wasted a year of a bargain rookie contract, he’s still on a team-friendly deal for up to four more years. If new coach Ben Johnson does everything Bears fans are expecting with Williams this season — and he is willing to rein in his hero-ball tendencies — he could be back toward the untouchables in 2026. If not, something will have gone very wrong in Chicago.

One first-round pick: WR Rome Odunze, TE Colston Loveland, CB Jaylon Johnson. Chicago’s two highly drafted playmakers for Williams would still fetch first-round picks. We haven’t seen Loveland play yet, but he was attracting plenty of interest before the Bears took him at No. 10 in April. Odunze’s rookie season wasn’t anything to write home about, but there were flashes of the receiver who ran away from coverages and racked up 2,785 yards and 20 touchdowns over his final two college seasons.

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Like just about everybody on the Bears’ defense, Johnson was better in 2023 than he was in 2024, but he stayed healthy and did enough to earn his second straight Pro Bowl nod. He is one of the league’s best zone corners, and after struggling at times with his tackling, he was far more reliable there last season. His $19 million AAV isn’t onerous given the deals that have since pushed up the top of the cornerback market.

Missing out: CB Kyler Gordon and S Jaquan Brisker are both very good defensive backs, but Gordon just got paid and is primarily a slot corner. Brisker has battled injuries throughout his career, including a concussion that cost him most of the 2024 season. Edge Montez Sweat and LB Tremaine Edmunds are good players, but they’re on significant contracts.

WR DJ Moore was worth a first-round pick earlier in his career and represented meaningful trade value as part of the trade that led to Carolina getting QB Bryce Young, but he looked slow on tape in 2024 and is about to start a four-year, $110 million deal. OT Darnell Wright could earn more consideration if Chicago’s improvements at guard make his life easier on the right side.

Two first-round picks and more: Edge rusher Aidan Hutchinson, OT Penei Sewell. Detroit’s two homegrown building blocks along the line of scrimmage are both needle-movers at their respective positions. Sewell is an elite two-way tackle, and while Lane Johnson is a better pass blocker, Sewell’s age (24) and health (he has missed just one game as a pro) make him the far more valuable player from this perspective. I could see an argument to push him into the range of three first-round picks, if only because he appears to be four years into a Hall of Fame career.

Hutchinson would have been in that tier if he had stayed healthy and continued producing the way he did last season before suffering a broken leg. The 2022 second overall pick had 7.5 sacks and 17 knockdowns in 4½ games before his season-ending injury. He plays a more valuable position than Sewell, and while they’re both 24, he is still on his rookie deal. I’d expect that to change shortly. The Hutchinson we saw before the injury had been a Defensive Player of the Year-caliber edge rusher for more than a year. As long as he gets back to that level, he is going to remain incredibly valuable.

One first-round pick and more: RB Jahmyr Gibbs, WR Amon-Ra St. Brown, S Brian Branch. Two members of Detroit’s wildly successful 2023 draft class, Gibbs and Branch have overcome concerns about their positional value to create an outsized impact. Gibbs has been devastating as a runner between the tackles and a threat to make defenders look foolish at the second level; the only reason he doesn’t have more catches and receiving yards is the sheer quantity of playmakers in Detroit’s offense. Branch’s versatility and impact as a run defender, tackler, blitzer and space eraser has been essential for a team that blitzes as much as any in the league. Both are due for extensions.

I can poke some holes in their games, too. Gibbs has been the featured back for only a brief spell last season while David Montgomery was injured. Branch has the ability to create takeaways and break up passes, but teams have been able to throw on him in coverage when they isolate him in space. Even acknowledging those concerns, these are two of the most exciting young players in the NFL, and they’re still on team-friendly contracts.

St. Brown is starting a four-year, $120 million extension, which seems entirely fair now and could look like a bargain very soon. But there are teams that would be hesitant to pay that much for a guy who primarily works out of the slot. After three years at a star level, it seems foolish to not regard him as a great wide receiver, full stop. He has been effective lining up outside on a route-by-route basis, has a great feel for coverage, might have the best hands in the league in tight quarters and is enough of an athlete to create after the catch.

One first-round pick: QB Jared Goff, CB Terrion Arnold, S Kerby Joseph. Would the Lions get more for Goff? We’re only a few years removed from the Rams giving up on him and winning a Super Bowl after doing so. While he has done excellent work to rebuild his career in Detroit, some of the credit for those improvements will likely go to Ben Johnson, his now-departed coordinator. Goff has plenty of fans, and he can be nearly unstoppable when he gets hot, but there still are whispers about his struggles against pressure and organizations that would be nervous about paying him $53 million per season.

Missing out: A handful of players come close. TE Sam LaPorta was excellent as a rookie, but tight end is low on the list of positions that teams target with first-round picks. DT Alim McNeill was having a breakout season when he signed a four-year, $97 million deal last October, but he tore his ACL late in the season and might not be ready to start the 2025 campaign on the active roster. LB Jack Campbell, a first-round pick in 2023, plays a position the league doesn’t typically value at that level. While he’s a solid player, I’m not sure there would be a ton of interest in him if the Lions were asking to get back their Round 1 pick.

The 2024 on-field version of WR Jameson Williams was worth a first-round pick, especially in a speed-starved market where WR3 types such as Dyami Brown and Tutu Atwell were able to command $10 million per season. With a significant ACL tear and a gambling suspension in the recent past, though, teams likely would be wary of committing a first-round pick to acquire him. I’d expect a theoretical Williams trade to look closer to what the Steelers got for George Pickens (a 2026 third-round pick) than a first-rounder.

Two first-round picks: QB Jordan Love. He was one of the toughest players to evaluate during this exercise. He’s a 26-year-old franchise quarterback who ranks seventh in Total QBR over his two seasons as a starter. He doesn’t take sacks, can make any throw needed, has won big games (including a victory over the Chiefs and a playoff win over the Cowboys) and has finished each of the past two regular seasons as one of the league’s hottest QBs. He has done that without a No. 1 receiver.

All of that is true, but it feels a lot of important information is missing. After spending three years sitting behind Aaron Rodgers, Love already has played through his rookie deal and signed a significant extension, with the Packers paying him $55 million per year. He’s also turning 27 this season. He struggled in the first half of his debut season as the starter in 2023, and while a knee injury undoubtedly played a part, he wasn’t great during the first half of 2024, throwing at least one pick in each of his first eight games. He finished the season with three picks in a playoff loss to the Eagles, albeit in a game that finished with his top interior lineman and his three top wide receivers all injured.

Love plays in a quarterback-friendly offense, both in terms of the run-pass option game and how heavily the Packers rely on the run game; even removing the two games Malik Willis started from the equation, coach Matt LaFleur ran the league’s most run-heavy offense on early downs in neutral game scripts. There’s nothing wrong with running the ball and creating extremely efficient early-down passing opportunities off play-action, but if this is all Love ends up being, teams might not be thrilled with that guy at his price range. He might also be able to piece together the player we’ve seen in the second half over the past two seasons for a full 17 games and challenge for MVP honors.

One first-round pick: WR Matthew Golden, OT Zach Tom, LB Edgerrin Cooper, S Xavier McKinney. After chatter in 2024 that Tom could be a Hall of Fame-caliber player if he moved to the interior, the Packers left him at right tackle and got Pro Bowl-level play, leading them to lock him up on a four-year, $88 million deal last week. While that makes him the league’s third-highest-paid right tackle, it’s not an unreasonable deal for the prime years of a player who has been ever-present over the past two years, although it might be too much if Green Bay ended up moving him to center.

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Cooper’s case is interesting. A second-round pick in 2024 at one of the league’s least-appreciated positions, he was awesome across 491 snaps as a rookie, racking up 3.5 sacks, seven knockdowns, 13 tackles for loss and allowing a 78.8 passer rating in coverage. On a snap-by-snap basis, he was one of the NFL’s most productive linebackers, and he’s making just under $1.6 million per year over the next three seasons. I’m not sure every team would be interested in giving up a first-round pick on an off-ball linebacker with a limited history, but he could be a superstar on an extremely team-friendly deal.

Missing out: With the league’s deepest, flattest roster, the Packers are full of talented young players who are one breakout season away from being extremely valuable. That group doesn’t include their free agent signings over the past two years beyond McKinney, who was excellent in his debut season with the Packers and turns 26 in August. While the Packers employ favorable contract structures with limited guarantees for their free agent additions, I’m not sure any of them would justify a first-round pick in return.

Instead, it’s general manager Brian Gutekunst’s draftees across the board who could qualify. The rookie defensive back next to McKinney in the backfield had a banner season, but it wasn’t the one people expected, as S Evan Williams was able to push Javon Bullard into a slot role (and now seemingly into an uncertain spot in the lineup after the arrival of Nate Hobbs in free agency.) Williams ranked third in the top 25 prospects list in the recently released FTN Football Almanac 2025, trailing only Jalyx Hunt (Eagles) and Trey Benson (Cardinals).

On offense, C Elgton Jenkins has been underrated throughout his career, with the versatile lineman playing just about everywhere on the line for the Packers. Set to move to center this season, he wants to talk about his contract as part of the move to a less-compensated position. He is a Pro Bowl-caliber player, but as he turns 30 this year, it would be a surprise if Green Bay landed a first-round pick for the guy who might be their best lineman. OT Rasheed Walker could make the leap if he improves his pass protection in obvious passing situations.

Two first-round picks and more: WR Justin Jefferson. Five years into what looks to be a Hall of Fame career, he is a top-two player at one of the league’s most valued positions. As Jefferson just turned 26 in June, the Vikings would surely have plenty of suitors if they did put him on the open market, although that won’t be happening after he signed a four-year, $140 million extension last summer. The contract limits Jefferson’s surplus value, which is why he wouldn’t be worth more, but guys who are as valuable and impactful as him in the prime of their careers almost never become available.

One first-round pick: Edge rusher Jonathan Greenard, QB J.J. McCarthy. Both teams won when the Vikings an https://wol.com/nfl-trade-tiers-which-players-are-worth-a-first-round-pick/