NFL Free Agency 2020: One player every team should let walk

Whether it be price, performance or parity, not every free agent should be retained. Here’s one player every team should allow to walk in NFL free agency.

NFL free agency can be a blessing and a curse for NFL franchises. While adding talented veterans and signing them to long-term deals may look good on paper, it could lead to financial troubles down the road. Too often do teams fail to realize the consequences of paying a player.

There have been multiple teams this offseason who have released free agents only two years into their long-term deals. They get strapped for cash or plainly despise having an underperforming player on their roster, so they ultimately choose to save a few million dollars by simply releasing him, despite coveting the player only a few years ago.

The hardest decision for a franchise is not whether to sign other teams’ free agents, but whether to retain their own. Many pending free agents have had great success with their respective franchises and look to command a big payday.

Yet, teams need to be smart regarding whether to spend valuable cap space on their pending free agents; otherwise, they risk financial instability for the foreseeable future.

Even though these players could be elite performers if they remained with their current franchises, it may be in the best interest of the team to let them walk. I will list one pending free agent each team should allow to join another franchise this offseason.

(Note: All cap space figures and market value estimations are courtesy of Spotrac. Positional rankings, advanced stats are via Player Profiler.)