A little more on the Bears’ stadium news: they had been in the midst of negotiations with Illinois over taxes and infrastructure, and had, in fact, had a long meeting with state officials just yesterday. It sounds like Indiana threw a bigger deal at the team, and the Bears then lied to Illinois legislators about why they wanted to delay further discussion on a piece of legislation, as well as telling Illinois, later today, that their announced “agreement” with Indiana was not as final as their statement this morning indicated.
Really really classy.
From an update to the above WGN link I had shared earlier:
The Combine is this week in Indianapolis; today and tomorrow feature media availability for coaches and GMs. Several news items from today:
Raiders GM John Spytek says that he “expects” that edge rusher Maxx Crosby – the subject of many trade rumors – will be a Raider in 2026, but that the team will always be willing to listen to trade offers, including for Crosby, and their first-overall pick in the draft.
As has been widely expected, Falcons QB Kirk Cousins will be released on March 11, which is the first day of the “league year.”
The Ravens are working on a contract extension/restructuring for QB Lamar Jackson, and a new deal for pending free-agent C Tyler Linderbaum. They are hoping to get a restructured deal for Jackson prior to March 11, as his current contract cap number for 2026 is $74.5 million.
Eagles coach Nick Sirianni indicates that there is “mutual interest” in WR A.J. Brown returning for 2026, but on the heels of Brown’s open frustration with the offense last year, the Eagles are not yet committing to keeping him.
Am I the only person who gets excited around this time… The combine, the draft, offseason trades…
It’s a time when every fan can dream that their team might be the best team in the NFL next year. Even garbage teams can have miraculous turnarounds with enough luck and the right moves.
I know the Combine is often silly and that a lot of really bad takes are born here, but I don’t care. I like it.
And every so often I see a player and the eye test is just overwhelming. I remember watching Aaron Donald and spending the entire offseason pounding the table for the Bears to draft him.
The NFL salary cap for 2026 will be $301.2 million, an increase of $22 million over last year, as revenues continue to rise. The cap has gone up by 40% over the last five years alone, after a brief dip in 2021 (due to lower revenues from empty stadiums during the COVID year of 2020).
Yeah, I guess they switched to artificial turf last year and they HATED it.
The only other time Lumen Field has featured real grass for an extended period of time was last summer, for the 2025 FIFA Club World Cup matches in Seattle. The pitch for that at Lumen Field last June and July was a temporary hybrid-grass pitch of ryegrass and bluegrass. Then the Seahawks went back to playing on the artificial turf for their 2025 Super Bowl championship season. And the players hated it. Again.
So I guess it’s the fact that they briefly had grass, and loved it, and it went away that pissed them off.
It’s interesting that those reports got leaked. The league just won a grievance against the NFLPA, preventing them from publishing the reports. Guess that didn’t work!
I wonder how hard the NFL will try to find the leaker. They must be pissed.
Treatment of Families: D- Home Game Field: B- Food/Dining Area: D+ Nutritionist/Dietician: C+ Locker Room: F Training Room: C Training Staff: C+ Weight Room: B+ Strength Coaches: B+ Position Coaches: B- Offensive Coordinator: D+ Defensive Coordinator: A- Special Teams Coordinator: D Team Travel: D- Head Coach: C- General Manager: C Team Ownership: C Overall Rank: 30
And if the Brown’s team ownership gets a C and Jets get a B, while the Steelers get a D- and the Cardinals get an F? What the hell are they grading on?
Only their own team, AIUI, except maybe for the ratings for things like the playing field.
This other article on the survey results says this about the Steelers, which suggests to me (as a market researcher) that the survey contains “open-ended” questions for the players to explain their ratings (which weren’t generally released).
The impression that I get is it is a sort of workplace survey. So they asked players about the teams they were on.
Things like, “how well does the team handle travel? How’s the weight room? What about the food they serve in training camp?”
In other words, from a player standpoint, how desirable is it to play for that team?
I’s interesting to me that it doesn’t correlate with team performance: Besides Miami at #1, players rate the Raiders #6.
But, per the players who played for Las Vegas, they have an A+ weight room, and they get an A for their food, nutritionist, and treatment of families, among others. It would seem to be an attractive landing spot for a free agent.
(They’re obviously changing their coaching staff, which accounts for their bad scores)
It’s a brand new facility. The honeymoon is still on. The harsh reality that the Raiders are the Raiders no matter where you plant them hasn’t rubbed off the new-stadium smell.
