There were some high-end free agency contracts handed out this offseason, and with the amount of free agents left on the market, more deals could still be made, too. Free agency moves quickly. By the time the legal tampering period passes, most of the top free agents are off the board entirely.
We are still going to see some free agents signing in the coming days and weeks, but we're now onto the 2026 NFL Draft for the most part, and many teams will begin kicking it into high gear to prepare for the draft, but let's focus on free agency once more.
Let's dive into a few free agency contracts that these teams are going to end up regretting.
These three free agency signings are going to end up being failures for a few teams
Jaelan Phillips, Carolina Panthers (four years, $120 million, $80 million guaranteed)
One of the first contracts during the legal tampering period, Jaelan Phillips landed a massive deal with the Carolina Panthers worth $30 million per year, and he gets a whopping $80 million guaranteed. To me, this reeked of desperation from the Panthers front office to shore up a weakness.
While the process of signing one of the top pass-rushers on the market was fine, the contract is not. Phillips missed the better part of the 2023 and 2024 seasons due to injuries, and in 2025 with the Miami Dolphins and Philadelphia Eagles, he only managed to finish with five sacks, seven tackles for loss, and 14 quarterback hits.
Simply put, Phillips is a good player, but nothing more. He's not someone who needs to be making elite pass-rusher money, so this deal is going to be one that the Panthers come to regret.
Boye Mafe, Cincinnati Bengals (three years, $60 million, $19 million guaranteed)
The contract only contains $19 million in guarantees, but that's still steep for a pass-rusher who only produced two sacks and four quarterback hits in 2025. Just two years prior to that, Boye Mafe had a brekout second year with nine sacks, nine tackles for loss, and 16 quarterback hits.
He clearly fell out of favor in Seattle, but he'll now likely be the go-to pass-rusher for the Cincinnati Bengals. Already turning 28 years old during the season, Mafe just isn't a player who is on the right trajectory, and the fit with the team is also a bit questionable.
Alex Singleton, Denver Broncos (two years, $15 million, $11 million guaranteed)
This was one of the more puzzling deals we saw. Not only is Alex Singleton simply not a good player anymore, but he was still able to land $11 million guaranteed from the Denver Broncos, and to top it all off, the linebacker free agent class this offseason was truly deep.
You mean to tell me, as below-average as Singleton has been, the Broncos could not find a single better option? He offers virtually nothing as a rusher and is flat-out horrendous in coverage. The Broncos linebacker room is now still among the worst in the NFL with this move.