In-season NFL trades are on the rise: Why teams are making more impactful pregame moves than ever before

It wasn't too long ago that the NFL trade deadline was barely a word. In fact, entire seasons went by without teams making any meaningful deals during the season. But in recent seasons, things have changed quite dramatically. Meanwhile, teams are increasingly willing to embrace it and make deals at a rate closer to that of their counterparts in the NBA, MLB and NHL, all of which have traditionally been much more active leagues when it comes to midseason deals.

Take this year for example. As of Tuesday evening, we have already seen nine completed trades since the start of the 2024 NFL regular season. These offers are as follows:

That's a lot of talk!

This is more than the number of pre-deadline trades made between 2011 and 2016 combined. Since 2011 (i.e. in the new CBA environment), there have only been two more pre-deadline week trades: first in 2015 and then again in 2019.

We don't yet know how next week will turn out. We know that with the expanded playoff field introduced in 2020, there will technically be more teams in contention throughout the season. And after the league pushed back the trade deadline itself by a week this year, there's now more time than ever to get deals done.

We're already seeing teams take advantage by making increasingly impactful trades. The Seahawks, Titans, Chiefs and Jaguars each completed two deals. Four different teams have added starting wide receivers, ranging from solid No. 2 options like Diontae Johnson to current or former stars like Davante Adams, Amari Cooper and DeAndre Hopkins.

Last year we saw players like Kevin Byard, Leonard Williams, Montez Sweat, Ezra Cleveland, Chase Young and Rasul Douglas switch teams during deadline week, and JC Jackson, Chase Claypool, Randy Gregory and Mecole Hardman have already done so before that. Big movers in 2022 included Robert Quinn, Kadarius Toney, Roquan Smith, TJ Hockenson, Bradley Chubb, Calvin Ridley and Jeff Wilson.

Von Miller and Odell Beckham Jr. have been getting on in years lately. So do Christian McCaffrey, Stephon Gilmore, Yannick Ngakoue, Jalen Ramsey, Aqib Talib, Leonard Williams (from the Jets to the Giants in 2019 before the Giants sent him to the Seahawks last year), Michael Bennett, Emmanuel Sanders, Quandre Diggs , Marcus Peters, Minkah Fitzpatrick… you get the idea.

We have come a very long way in a very short period of time. In 2011, Carson Palmer was the only player traded during the season. He held out in Cincinnati and was eventually traded to Oakland. In 2012, it was just Mike Thomas (no, not the Saints one).

It used to be thought that NFL systems were too complicated to justify in-season change. The training period for a new attack or defense would be too long and the impact would therefore be too small. The teams obviously don't feel that way anymore. You make more swings and bigger swings than ever before.