The Eagles are adding a tight end who last played in the AFC East.
Philadelphia has agreed to terms with tight end Stone Smartt on a one-year deal, according to NFL Media’s Ian Rapoport.
Smartt, 27, spent the 2025 season with the Jets. He appeared in 15 games with one start for the club, mainly playing special teams. He caught seven passes for 52 yards.
A former college quarterback, Smartt spent his first three pro seasons with the Chargers after going undrafted in 2022. In his 53 career games, he’s tallied 38 receptions for 432 yards with one touchdown.
Jets Clips
The 2026 NFL draft is still more than a month away, but five teams have already accumulated two first-round picks.
The Dolphins became the latest team to get a second first-rounder when they agreed to trade wide receiver Jaylen Waddle to the Broncos. Miami will have its own pick (No. 11 overall) as well as Denver’s pick (No. 30).
The Jets have their own pick (No. 2) and the Colts’ pick (No. 16) from the Sauce Gardner trade.
The Cowboys have their own pick (No. 12) and the Packers’ pick (No. 20) from the Micah Parsons trade.
The Browns have their own pick (No. 6) and the Jaguars’ pick (No. 24) from the draft-day trade a year ago that allowed the Jaguars to move up to draft Travis Hunter.
The Chiefs have their own pick (No. 9) and the Rams’ pick (No. 29) from the Trent McDuffie trade.
A sixth team was poised to get a second first-round pick when the Raiders agreed to trade Maxx Crosby to the Ravens, but that trade fell through and the Ravens kept their first-round pick.
Five teams don’t have a first-round pick: The Broncos, Falcons, Colts, Packers and Jaguars.
The teams with two first-round picks all missed the playoffs last season and are attempting to rebuild their roster. A draft with two first-round picks is a big part of the rebuilding process.
No one does “do as we say not as we do” better than NFL owners. Some of the ones who don’t want to be publicly criticized by players have no qualms about publicly criticizing them.
Case in point: Jets owner Woody Johnson. He and his partners successfully (sort of) stifled the NFL Players Association’s ability to publicize report cards that Johnson dismissed as “totally bogus.” Meanwhile, Johnson publicly criticized quarterback Justin Fields during the 2025 season.
“It’s hard when you have a quarterback with a rating that he’s got,” Johnson said during quarterly league meetings last October, regarding the Jets’ latest struggles with Fields at quarterback. “If we can just complete a pass, it would look good,” Johnson added.
Fields took the high road, but he surely was bugged at some level by the idea that he was being thrown under the bus by the boss. Now that Fields will be playing for the Chiefs, he’ll get a chance to prove Johnson wrong.
And, yes, the Chiefs host the Jets this season.
There’s no guarantee Fields will take a regular-season snap in 2026. Much of that depends on whether Patrick Mahomes is healthy when Week 1 rolls around. It also depends on whether the Chiefs put Mahomes on a pitch count as he works his way back to 100 percent.
Mahomes will want to do everything. The team may try to hold him in check, for his own good. Regardless, Fields becomes another weapon for the offense.
Besides, Fields wasn’t horrible last year. His passer rating was 89.5. He completed 62.7 percent of his passes, with seven touchdown passes and one interception. His career numbers aren’t awful, either; they’re not nearly as bad as Johnson’s assessment.
No one forced the Jets to give Fields $30 million fully guaranteed at signing on a two-year deal. Fields has had moments. And now he has extra motivation to use 2026 as the foundation for the chance to become the latest Jets alumnus to become a much better quarterback elsewhere.
Maybe he’ll eventually do well enough that, one of these days, the Jets will do a trade to bring him back. Like they did last week with Geno Smith.
Former Jets defensive end Mark Gastineau’s lawsuit has been, yes, sacked.
Last year, Gastineau sued ESPN, the NFL, NFL Films, and co-directors James Weiner and Ken Rodgers for The New York Sack Exchange, which included a clip of Gastineau verbally accosting Brett Favre for his gift to Michael Strahan that allowed Strahan to break Gastineau’s single-season sack record in 2001.
Via Zach Powell of The Athletic, a federal judge dismissed Gastineau’s lawsuit on Monday.
The defendants had argued that the complaint failed to state a claim on which relief could be granted. Which is a fancy way of saying that, even if every fact alleged is true, there’s no recognized legal theory that would make the conduct a violation of Gastineau’s legal rights.
Gastineau had argued that the inclusion of his words with Favre were used without Gastineau’s consent or permission, and that the clip portrayed him “in a manner which was maliciously false.” Gastineau argued that the producers “intentionally and maliciously” omitted footage of Gastineau and Favre shaking hands.
Regardless, the court decided it wasn’t enough to create a valid claim for relief.
Gastineau will have the right to appeal the decision. Sometimes, a plaintiff whose first crack at fashioning an actionable legal claim gets a chance to try again.
Cornerback Nahshon Wright’s play with the Bears during the 2025 season landed him a contract with the Jets and it earned him the most performance-based pay in the league for last year as well.
The NFL announced that Wright earned more than $1.44 million in performance-based pay. The bonus more than doubles Wright’s base salary for the season.
Wright signed with the Bears after being released by the Vikings last April. He was named to the Pro Bowl after recording 80 tackles, five interceptions, two forced fumbles and three fumble recoveries during the regular season.
The performance-based pay fund is part of the league’s Collective Bargaining Agreement to compensate all players based on a formula encompassing their playing time and salary. It paid out more than $542 million for the 2025 season.
Browns safety Ronnie Hickman earned over $1.293 million for second place and tackle Elijah Wilkinson earned over $1.272 million for his work with the Falcons. Wilkinson has since signed with the Cardinals.
Panthers safety Nick Scott, former Commanders guard Chris Paul, Ravens guard Andrew Vorhees, Vikings defensive end Jalen Redmond, Steelers guard Mason McCormick, Chiefs defensive back Chamarri Conner, and Patriots safety Craig Woodson make up the rest of the top 10 recipients of performance-based pay for 2025.
The Chiefs needed a veteran quarterback with starting experience. The Jets had one too many.
And while it’s not exactly an accidental collision between peanut butter and chocolate, the trade that will send Justin Fields to the Chiefs for a 2027 sixth-round pick is a win-win-win for the two teams and the player.
In Kansas City, starter Patrick Mahomes is recovering from a torn ACL. He’s determined to return as soon as possible. The Chiefs need someone who can handle the reps until the team is comfortable clearing him to practice.
In New York, it was clear they wanted to move on from Fields. They were facing the possibility of cutting him and eating his $10 million in fully-guaranteed salary, less whatever he’d make elsewhere (most likely, the $1.215 million minimum for his level of experience).
And while the Chiefs could have waited for Fields to be released, the Jets could have dragged their feet. Since the Jets would have owed Fields nothing beyond the guaranteed $10 million until Week 1, they could have kept him from going to Kansas City and getting to work.
So the Chiefs will pay $3 million ($1.785 million more than they would have paid if/when he’d been cut) and give up a 2027 sixth-round pick to get him immediately. And the Jets will gain the draft pick and pay less than they would have owed if they’d cut him.
On that point, Fields was due to make $20 million total in 2026. Per a source with knowledge of the situation, Fields’s total 2026 salary has dropped to $11 million. As we understand it, the Jets will pay $8 million total and the Chiefs will pay $3 million.
To summarize, the Jets save $785,000 and get a pick, the Chiefs get a veteran quarterback now, and Fields receives $11 million and a potentially perfect destination for his sixth NFL season. He’ll learn from coach Andy Reid, from offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy, and Mahomes.
And maybe Fields will get some playing time, if Mahomes isn’t ready — or if the Chiefs aren’t comfortable with the idea of rushing him back.
With Patrick Mahomes on the mend from a torn ACL suffered in December, there’s a chance he may not be ready to return for the start of the regular season.
With that in mind, Kansas City has now made a move to solidify its backup quarterback position.
The Chiefs are finalizing a trade to acquire Justin Fields from the Jets, according to multiple reports.
Kansas City will send a 2027 sixth-round pick to New York to complete the deal.
Via Tom Pelissero of NFL Media, the Chiefs will pay $3 million of the $10 million Fields was guaranteed in 2026, with the Jets paying the rest to facilitate the trade.
Fields, 27, signed a two-year deal with the Jets last March. He started nine games for New York in 2025, with the club going 2-7 in those games. Fields completed 62.7 percent of his passes for 1,259 yards with seven touchdowns and one interception. He rushed for 383 yards with four TDs.
The No. 11 overall pick of the 2021 draft, Fields has appeared in 59 games with 53 starts for the Bears, Steelers, and Jets. He rushed for 1,143 yards with eight touchdowns in 2022, though he also took a league-high 55 sacks that year. Fields played well with the Steelers in 2024, piloting the club to a 4-2 record in the games he started. But Pittsburgh elected to roll with Russell Wilson at QB once he recovered from a calf injury.
Fields will now be in position to take the bulk of the offseason reps as Mahomes recovers.
Garnder Minshew, Kansas City’s backup in 2025, recently signed with the Cardinals. The Jets traded for Geno Smith last week, putting him in position to start for New York in 2026.
Linebacker Demario Davis had two stints with the Jets early in his career and he’ll be back for a third in 2026.
Davis signed a two-year deal to return to the Jets last week and he said at a press conference that the presence of head coach Aaron Glenn was a big part of his decision. While the Jets were just 3-14 in Glenn’s first season, Davis has familiarity with the coach from shared time with the Jets, Browns and Saints and said that he’s learned over his career that “anyone who would talk to you about being part of a great organization would tell you it’s about the people.”
Davis made it clear that he feels Glenn has the right makeup to create that kind of organization because “you walk through the building and you can feel his leadership even before you have a conversation with him.”
“Once my agents let me know the Jets were an option, it was a no-brainer,” Davis said, via the Jets’ website. “I didn’t even need a conversation with him to get on board, to see what he’s building here with the culture. There’s just a ton of excitement.”
Davis is heading into his 15th season, so he brings plenty of experience with him in his return to the Jets and Glenn will likely be leaning on that as he tries to build the kind of winning foundation that has eluded the organization for nearly two decades.
Things didn’t go well for the Jets during Aaron Glenn’s first year as head coach. This year, they’re relying on older players to help get the team’s culture under control.
Veteran defensive tackle Harrison Phillips, who arrived in a late August trade with the Vikings, repeatedly used the term “cancerous” when describing the mood within the 2025 Jets after the season ended.
This time around, the Jets have targeted seasoned veterans, several of whom have played for coach Aaron Glenn in the past. Rich Cimini of ESPN explains the mindset that has led to the effort to bring more gray to Gang Green.
“I think when you bring in guys like that into a football program, I think there’s a level of calm and a level of discipline and not being scared of the unknown,” newly-acquired safety Minkah Fitzpatrick said, per Cimini. “That’s extremely important because when things go bad, people want to press the red button and completely change how to do things.”
The additions include 37-year-old linebacker Demario Davis and 33-year-old defensive tackle David Onyemata, both of whom have ties to Glenn.
Then there’s 35-year-old quarterback Geno Smith, who’s back with the Jets a decade after his last year with the team.
So as the Jets try to build something new and different, Glenn will be relying on old and familiar. If Glenn hopes to have a future in New York, dipping into the past could be the only way to make it happen.
Return specialist Kene Nwangwu is returning to the Jets.
According to multiple reports, Nwangwu has agreed to re-sign with the team. It’s a one-year deal worth $2 million with $1 million guaranteed and another $1 million available in incentives.
Nwangwu joined the Jets in 2024 and he has returned two of the 21 kickoffs he’s fielded over the last two seasons for touchdowns. Nwangwu also had three kickoff return scores during his three seasons with the Vikings and his five career touchdowns are tied for the ninth most in league history.
The Jets also got two punt return touchdowns from Isaiah Williams last season, so their return game was a rare strength during a 3-14 season.
