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New Orleans Saints edge rusher Chase Young.
There is a simple piece of logic NFL teams should use when handing out free agent contracts that might cut a lot of players out of equation and save them some misery.
When considering a deal for a player who wants to be paid in the Top 10 or even Top 20 in the NFL for their position, simply check to see how often in his career that player has finished in the Top 10 or Top 20 in the most important statistical categories for their position.
For a player like veteran edge rusher and former Washington Commanders No. 2 overall pick Chase Young, that stat would be sacks — a category he’s never finished higher than 27th in his first 5 NFL seasons.
That didn’t stop Young from landing a 3-year, $51 million free agent contract with the New Orleans Saints on March 10. Young played for the Saints on a 1-year, $13 million contract in 2024, when he finished tied for 60th in the NFL with 5.5 sacks.
Bleacher Report’s Gary Davenport called Young’s deal one of the worst NFL free agent contracts in the 2025 cycle.
“The Ohio State product tore his ACL in 2021 and hasn’t been the same since,” Davenport wrote. ” … It just doesn’t make any sense. Rather than looking for bargains, a New Orleans team stranded in salary-cap purgatory overpaid a player who has been mostly mediocre in the NFL. No wonder the Saints have been the same for years.”
Young’s new contract pays him $17 million per year — tied for No. 17 on the list of the NFL’s highest-paid edge rushers alongside Pittsburgh’s Alex Highsmith.
Injuries Kept Young From Landing Massive Payday Sooner
Young started his career off like a rocket ship with a career high 7.5 sacks and helping lead the Washington Commanders to a playoff appearance as a rookie in 2020 after he was selected No. 2 overall in the 2020 NFL draft out of Ohio State.
Following a torn ACL suffered in Week 10 of the 2021 regular season, Young missed 22 of the next 25 regular-season games, including all but 3 games in 2022 — a 2-season stretch in which he had just 1.5 sacks.
Young revamped his career in 2023 with 7.5 sacks while playing for both the Commanders and the San Francisco 49ers after a midseason trade and helping the 49ers make it to the Super Bowl.
Commanders Still Don’t Have Elite Edge Rusher
While the Commanders head into 2025 as a legitimate Super Bowl contender, the irony here is that they still don’t have an elite edge rusher.
Dante Fowler led the Commanders with 10.5 sacks in 2024 but signed a 1-year, $6 million free agent contract with the Dallas Cowboys on March 14.
The one big move the Commanders made on their defensive front was for a defensive tackle after they signed Javon Kinlaw to a 3-year, $45 million contract.
Over the Cap’s Jason Fitzgerald gave the Commanders an “F” grade for the Kinlaw deal, which included $30 million in guaranteed money.
“Most contracts in the NFL have some level of justification … this does not,” Fitzgerald wrote. “ … Teams that do stuff like this because they have cap room often wind up a mess in a year or two because the cap room is gone and they wonder why they have some of these contracts on the books. On paper this is the worst signing of the early free agency period.”
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