Any time NFL fans around the water cooler, on social media, or on popular message boards get together and talk about improving their team, one of the suggestions that inevitably comes up is “we should trade for/away that guy!”
While such ideas sound great in theory, some of those ideas could look very bad when judged through the lens of history. Every NFL team has made trades that looked great at the time, only to end up looking really bad when you take a look back.
Here’s our list of the worst trades in every NFL team’s history:
32. Arizona Cardinals – Trading for Kevin Kolb
After they watched Kurt Warner retire as the only quarterback to lead the team to a Super Bowl in franchise history, the Arizona Cardinals spent the 2010 season rotating between Derek Anderson, John Skelton and Max Hall. Rather than go through another season like that, they sent a 2nd round pick plus cornerback Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie to the Philadelphia Eagles to acquire Kevin Kolb to be the Cardinals’ quarterback of the future.
But Kolb was injured for much of his first season in Arizona, and eventually turned out to be a major flop for the Cardinals, releasing him two years after acquiring him.
Roger says
John Elway said he would not play for the colts. Trade me or I will play baseball. So how could they regret that?
JR says
The Champ Bailey trade is not even close to as bad as trading up to select Robert Griffin III…. not even close.
Scooter says
Worse yet, the Ravens let Scott Mitchell wear #19.
Steven Bernier says
I agree with the Mack trade for Oakland. Not many players come through the NFL like him and the raiders cannot draft, just look a the 2018 draft.
DC says
The Bills don’t regret trading Marshawn Lynch. They gave him plenty of opportunity to be a franchise back for them and he never was. He was the third best RB on their roster at the time, outplayed for years by Fred Jackson and then by CJ Spiller. How long do you wait for someone to decide he wants to be something more than mediocre ?
Matthew Robinson says
The Herschel Walker trade is always and will always be overblown. It wasn’t a train robbery for the Cowboys. They could have got E. Smith and D. Woodson without this trade. No one else in the trade matters.
BobUSAFret says
Lions have needed a rushing game ever since Barry Sanders left, how long? Stupid gm know and and never correct it.